Illustrating - Martyr the Bride Cover

Cover art draft for the first volume of Martyr the Bride.

Art is a A Labor of Love

It’s 2025. I could easily use AI to generate the cover art or the entire Martyr the Bride story, but where’s the fun in that? And really, what would be the point?

Part of why we are so familiar with names like George R.R. Martin, J.R.R. Tolkien, and J.K. Rowling is because their works are impressive in terms of what humans are capable of. To build an entire world with characters that feel real and narratives that have you on the hook for more, requires a lot of things. There is the skill of writing, but not just grammar, having an understanding of how people think, feel, what motivates them and scares them is something that those with excellent observational skills and storytelling capabilities use to get readers invested.

Anyone can write. Anyone can draw. Anyone can do any thing. To do something well though, that requires consistent effort and a love for that thing.

In short, it’s not satisfying for “creators” to use AI to generate music, or books and art and it’s not satisfying for readers or listeners either. It’s an insult to readers and viewers to ask them to give their time and attention to a project you refused to.

I don’t use protections on my artwork to keep it from being eaten up by AI, and maybe I should, but that stands in the way of what art is all about: risk taking and truth telling.

Art confronts emotions and insecurities and desires by placing them directly on the canvas for others to observe and feel. Art reflects the culture and time period it was created it, and this is because art is something that can only be created by organic living beings.

So, while this draft may appear ‘sloppy’ to more critical folks, I can at least say with confidence that I made it on my own, with no AI input.

I have been working on this digital illustration in Sketchbook Pro for iPad, for 3 days, and I am still not finished with it. And you know something? I’m having fun. Making art IS the art. When you remove creation from creating, all you have is production. Machines produce. Humans create.

Thought Process Behind this Cover Design

First and foremost, I don’t have a background in graphic design or commercial art, but I have read an absurd amount of comics, graphic novels, and manga in my time and I love studying the cover art and book jacket designs. This design started as a pencil sketch on regular drawing paper, and then I took a photo of that outline and began drawing over that on my iPad.

The design features the lead protagonist Chase as the focal point, directly in the center. Over her shoulder is her guardian angel Layne, keeping a watchful eye on her while she seems to be day dreaming. Chase appears happy and blissfully unaware of the angel behind her, the reflection of Nightshade in her hand mirror, or the hallucinated eyeballs crawling around her vanity.

These details are meant to allude to the “shadows” that surround her - a darkness, a secret side that she is unaware even exists at the start of the story.

On the vanity rests wedding band, a rosary, and a lipstick tube - hints to her marriage, and the theme of Christianity throughout the story, as well as her own understanding of her sexuality as a young woman.

She is wearing a dress that is intended to subtly look like a wedding dress - a clue and reference to the title, and she doesn’t have the dark lipstick I typically draw her with, a possible nod to innocence.

My favorite visually metaphor is that her eyes are drawn to the roses, not noticing the petals that have fallen, or the creepy eyeball-guy right next to them, a play on the phrase “rose colored glasses”.

Layne appears in either a window or a picture frame, and the walls are this moody, gothic-inspired wallpaper design that looks cool paired with the novel’s title.

I wanted something that communicated visually what this story could be about, obviously. I also wanted to showcase Chase as the beautiful ‘all-American girl’ that she is.

My art style is also meant to be an “Americanized” version of manga/anime artwork: high contrast, sharp lines, ‘cat-like’ faces that have smaller noses and large eyes, etc.

It’s a story about a woman who is in her mid 20’s, sure, but the average readership for comics and manga skews younger- teenagers and anyone who enjoys ‘YA fiction’.

Will it be a hit success and make me rich and famous? Eh, the odds are probably not. Is that the point? No, of course not. Writers and artists don’t start their crafts for the intention of making money from it, that is a happy side effect for those that choose to pursue their craft commercially. In short, I’m writing Martyr the Bride because I want to, because I believe in it, because I think there are many people that will relate to the morally-gray place Chase and other characters find themselves in.

For now, it’s my baby. I will take my time crafting not only this cover, but the entire story. Once published, only the rights will belong to me. The story will belong to the world, for people to either love or hate. It will belong to those that own copies of it and resonate with it.

It gives me a great sense of purpose and fulfillment to work on the project, and I couldn’t imagine my life without Martyr or the experiences that lead to its creation.

I hope you will enjoy it when it’s finished.

Illustrating - To The Hilt, To the Bone

9 X 11” India and Gel Ink Illustration on Paper, November 16, 2025 “To the Hilt, To the Bone” by Kai Briscoe

Behind the Art

As a practice, my drawing pad and iPad go everywhere with me, and any down time I have, I will usually sketch on something. It’s either storyboarding for MTB, or it’s a full ink illustration. I haven’t been making as much art as I did earlier this year or in recent years because of lifestyle changes, so last week I set the intention to draw and complete something. Anything! I didn’t care what, I just needed to draw, damn it!

I wanted to channel some things I had been feeling recently, including some negative emotions. This autumn has gotten off to a rocky start: lost friendships, got my heart broken by my on-and-off again ex-boyfriend in a rather jarring manner. Then, I witnessed a coworker go through a tough time before leaving unexpectedly. It all created this deep skepticism within me. I heard that little voice say “trust no one”.

Getting Started

There wasn’t really a plan, I just knew I wanted to draw something that felt intimate to me. I started drawing her jaw and cheek and the maiden’s face. Then I built out the curve and slope of her shoulders, taking time to decide where her hair should fall.

I sketched her eyes shut, but then scribbled over that and drew the blood-stained bandage over her eyes. I finally had direction for this piece: pain, betrayal. The rest started to flow more naturally, a rose close to the hear, an Irish claymore held loosely in her grasp, but still defensively, still protective. I gave her a long medieval-inspired gown, wings like those you see on cemetery angels, and wrote the words “veritas” and “ceartas” at the bottom, inverse and bleeding into each other - both are words that when translated, mean ‘truth’.

The maiden is surrounded by stalagmites and two giant, angry humanoid creatures. Directly above her is a bright, big full moon.

The “Meaning” (If There Is One)

I’m unsure if it is any of my business as an artist to explain what my art means to me. I think that is probably better saved for the people observing it. To me, it seems to be about self-preservation. She appears wounded but still mostly alright. The moon could be representative of some powerful, protective figure meant to keep her safe. Maybe its’ light illuminates her path and reveals something to her. Maybe we wouldn’t be able to see the ‘monsters’ behind her if not for the moon’s light. The moon has often been used to symbolize intuition and divine feminine energy. Altogether, it could be that the maiden was hurt and has learned to stay guarded, thanks to her intuition. Even though she is blinded, she senses something nearby means to harm her.

As far as the name goes, “To the Hilt, To the Bone” just sort of popped into my head when I was researching sword anatomy and types. I often find myself thinking in partial stanzas or lyrics, and I “heard” that phrase in my head repeatedly while working on it. It just made sense so I went with it.

Scrying and Spell Work

Most of my newer art has special words or even names hidden within. Some words are more obvious than others. The most common word you will see in my illustrations is the Latin word for truth “veritas”. I put that shit on everything. This pieces has two words that are each in different dead languages that mean the same thing. The words are flipped. Truth in Latin faces truth in Irish - the truth faces itself.

I’m not entirely sure why I did this. I guess I thought it looked cool.

It could be interpreted as one of my favorite Latin idioms: solve et coagula, or “as above, so below”. Maybe with that in mind, the message is that the truth will always be the truth, no matter how it gets flipped around or misconstrued.

Conclusion

This is one of my favorite pieces ( I say that about everything I make, so maybe don’t trust my opinion on this) for a few different reasons. For one, the line work was done with very fine Prismacolor pens and not my typical Sharpie S Gels. It appears “higher resolution” because of this, and is softer yet more detailed due to the different fine pens used.

It also just feels very emotional to me. A lot of my art depicts more aggressive energy: anger, vengeance, courage and lust, so to see something like this has a different sort of heaviness attached.

I also just enjoy the Catholic/ renaissance/gothic inspirations in this piece.

The original is being sold to a dear friend, and prints of “To the Hilt, to the Bone” will be available when this site’s shop is live.

Kailey, Unabridged

There is technically a page dedicated about myself on this site already, however, it’s a quick overview and not a full picture (and if you couldn’t tell, I like full pictures with LOTS of detail). The following is more complete introduction as to the mess that I am.

‘Just a Small Town Girl Living in a Lonely World’ - Don’t Stop Believing - Journey

While there are no midnight trains for people to ride in my little hick town of Huntsville, Texas, there is a lot of history here — both in general and for me personally. I am cousins to former governor of Texas, Dolph Briscoe, who was a rancher in the Lone Star State in the 1940s-1950s, he played a major role in building out the Farm to Market road system that connects rural farmers to nearby towns and markets. Nearly 80 years later, I live off one of those Farm to Market roads in a quiet area that lends to relaxation and creativity.

My mom was really into genealogy when I was in middle school, and she was able to trace parts of our family all the way back to the 1400’s in England. I also have a fair amount of Irish, German, Choctaw, and Korean (if you can believe it). She took me to ancient white churches in the rural parts of Missouri where we used paper and crayons to etch over tombstones to read the names and dates. I loved hanging out in cemeteries, and now 20 odd years later I still do. I feel at peace, and feel a sort of reverence when I sit beside the grave markers of strangers.

Family Tree - Ethel Cain

Dad worked as a prison guard and mom worked in receiving at a large store chain when I was born, (side note — I share a birthday with the late Ozzy Osbourne) and later, dad would start a career with the railroad and mom went to work for the local school district. As I’ve written about in two previous posts, my father is an alcoholic, and has at times been unpredictable and abusive. My mom is reactive and would either incite fights, or work him up. It was a chaotic environment for me, which is how I think I originally got into drawing when I was little. It was a quiet, meditative practice and a nice distraction from their chaos.

I would sit inside my room quietly dreaming up story lines and realities that were more exciting or interesting than reality. Psychologists call it maladaptive daydreaming, I just called it imagination. I had this one story line that I dreamt up when I was 12 that I called ‘The Princess of the Sky’ that I worked on off and on from middle school into college, constantly re-working the story line to be something original and not plagiarizing whatever anime I was into at the time. The story was about a high school athlete named Iris Larkspur who had short mint-green side swept spiky hair who participated in a sport called Aero Surfing or Sky Surfing. The plot was based in dystopian version of Texas, about 40 years from present day, and water is a scarce resource that the town folks hoarded and fought over. Every year, a competition is held that awards in a large sum of money, and Iris is hellbent on making the varsity squad as a freshman High Flyer (think, trick shots at high altitudes that involve sprints and drops from the sky) to win the money to use for water for the town. As the plot continued, it was revealed that the military was sponsoring the sport across the nation because sky surfers have the agility on their boards that is useful in some types of combat, and Iris gets offers from top brass pretending to be talent scouts for professional sky flyers. The backdrop of war and dystopia grows as Iris grows into womanhood. That wasn’t always the plot, it’s changed a lot over the years, (and for now the idea is shelved while I develop Martyr the Bride).

Shortly after we moved into a new home, my parents took me to the pound to adopt a puppy that we named Angel! She was feisty and had the bark of a much larger dog. She lived to be 17 and died when I was in college.

At school, I was painfully shy unless I knew you. My primary method for making friends was to sit quietly alone and draw and eventually people would get curious about me and come up and watch and start talking to me. I loved and hated the attention at the same time. I was so used to feeling invisible at home that the attention I craved felt uncomfortable. By middle school and junior high I started to come out of my shell, and by high school I had blossomed a fair bit. I was still practically mute if I didn’t know someone, or in large groups, but got better at making friends and bridging that gap.

On the Edge of Seventeen - Stevie Nicks

I loved school, though I wasn’t an academic. I liked the social elements of school — clubs and sports and social events. I’ve been part of the anime, photography and Technology Student Association club, and played water polo and competitive swimming in high school.

I had group of about 10 close friends that I’d hang out with regularly. I was sort of a social chameleon and collected a variety folks in my posse. My childhood best friend was a brainiac type that did drill team, dance, and was heavily involved as an honor student and in her church. She was my rock for many years. There was another girl that was the embodiment of everything I wanted to be. She was the coolest. She smoked pot listened to punk music and dreamed of driving a hearse and wearing pink dreads but her mom wouldn’t allow it. Then there is Zander— my best friend of over 20 years now.

I’m With Stupid - Static X

You ever meet someone and clique so well that you both lose brain cells when you hang out? That is me and Zander. He was always the nerdy, goofy, shy type. He was into technology and had a video camera that we used to film me doing really stupid ad libs with titles like “Gangstalicious Kai” where I did a ‘Pimp My Ride’ inspired bit about a chrome light weight car body. It was a shopping cart we found in his front yard. We were 12. We watched these skits a few years ago and were laughing our asses off. I guess all those years watching Comedy Central helped me develop impeccable comedic timing before I could even get a driver’s permit. I’ll post the videos some day.

My best friend Alex and I in our senior year of high school at a conference for the Technology Student Association.

Kids at school were quick to let me know I was weird, uncool, ugly and fat. So, I became funny. Trauma is good for personality development, I guess. I figured out how to get a group of people to laugh and to this day it’s one of my favorite things to do. I love to slip in the most unhinged, out of pocket remarks with dead pan delivery.

I am both the least and most serious person you’ve ever met. My idea of fun ranges from watching 2 hour youtube interviews on property tax fraud schemes across the country to jousting in shopping carts with pool noodles, with not much nuance in-between.

I went to only one homecoming dance in high school, and it was because my friend Morgan asked me to. She let me borrow the dress I’m wearing (and the car I’m sitting on).

Dropping Out of School - Brad Sucks

High school started off strong - sports, friends, advanced courses, clubs, and just a general sense of optimism. By senior year though, things had taken a darker turn. I entered a deep depression in the fall of my senior year after getting cheated on and dumped by a guy I really liked. I hardly ever attended my first period Statistics class, and had many days where I’d skip school altogether and spend my days writing at my local bookstore’s cafe. I also watched an unhealthy amount of Keeping Up with the Kardashians for some inexplicable reason during this period of my life. I was truant so often that I was issued a citation by the school, and since I was 18 that meant I could technically handle it without parent involvement. I went to court and the old man behind the glass took a look at me and could tell I wasn’t what you think of when someone says the phrase ‘delinquent’. I think he took pity on me. He said “do me a favor, promise me you’ll attend school the rest of the year and not miss any more days, and I’ll sign this off and waive the fee.” I promised and kept my word, and was able to attend prom and graduation.

I started college majoring in Animation and Art but I hated it. I’ve never liked the way 3D/CGI animation looked, to me, it looks plasticky and gummy. The newer stuff looks better, but it’s not nearly as beautiful as classic, hand-drawn or cell style 2D animation and it doesn’t hold up as well, but there were no classes and no real market on 2D animation, and I didn’t like the art program at my university, so I surprised everyone in the family and my friends when I switched my major to Business and Marketing. Hell, I surprised myself too.

In Drawing 1, our professor assigned us different greek statues to draw in charcoal, this is the David (I think?).

I slogged through college- it was a difficult time for me. My parents were going through a divorce, my dad got fired from his job at the railroad and went to prison. I was in an abusive relationship with a guy I met at junior college and worked 30 hours a week while taking 12-16 hours a semester and commuting an hour each day between university and home. I didn’t do anything special while in university, it was a struggle to attend class due to health issues brought on by chronic stress and trauma. If I thought my childhood was unstable, my young adulthood was straight up destructive and destabilized.

In college things really blew up. My father hurt his back and was prescribed pain meds that he quickly became addicted to. This combined with his drinking caused him to get fired after showing up drunk. The family was panicked. Mom couldn’t pay all the bills. He was doing crazy stuff like threatening to burn the house down, deflating the tires in mom’s car, barricading the door to the house and not letting anyone in.

All of the chaos at home caused my body to wig out. I grew up chronically stressed and by college, it was boiling over and my body couldn’t take it. I had severe migraines where I’d see stars and lose my vision in class, and once had a classmate drive me home. The pain was debilitating. I also had menstrual periods where I would bleed nonstop for a month or longer at a time. Understandably, I became severely anemic from this. I worked retail and had no health insurance and couldn’t get help or afford a few hundred bucks for appointments and ultrasounds. I had days where I literally shoved wash cloths in my underwear on top of sanitary pads, because it was THAT damn heavy! Finally, a doctor put me on regular birth control pills, which i used for several months until they realized the pills caused my blood pressure to skyrocket to dangerous levels. I had a doctor check my vitals as part of a routine appointment for a refill on my birth control, and she said ‘I cannot legally let you leave until we get that blood pressure under control’. So, I was on two different meds to treat it, and taken off the birth control. The bleeding issue lessened in severity with the blood pressure medicine but didn’t really stop until years later when I no longer lived in chronic stress at home.

My body was constantly exhausted, so while my friends are out partying and having adventures, I was coming home from my opening shift at the coffee shop to collapse into bed and sleep through constant pain. It was hell. I tell people all the time that I’m younger at 31 than I was at 21.

Sometimes I do really awful, goofy pen sketches. This was intended to be weird and funny when I drew it in college, but over the years it kinda paints a picture for how I felt in my 20s.

To this day 10 years later, I still never received a diagnosis for whatever that was. Was it Endometriosis? PCOS? Or just unexplainable Menorrhagia (heavy bleeding)?

I graduated with my bachelor’s in Business and Marketing from Sam Houston State University in December of 2017, by the skin of my teeth. There was so much going on between graduating high school in 2012 and then univeristy, it was unreal. I got fired from a job I liked, struggled with chronic insomnia, major anxiety and depression from untreated C-PTSD, and all of that and the other stuff previously mentioned made it hard to complete assignments. People said I was lazy, lacked discipline. That wasn’t it. I was quite literally fighting for my life and no one believed me or tried to understand. Friends called me flaky because I was chronically burnt out and would cancel plans.

I got married in October of 2018, and in 2019 I developed Bilateral Papilledema (swelling on the optic nerve behind both eyes). I was working in a cafe taking orders, when I started to lose peripheral vision. I went to my optometrist who was very alarmed and referred me to a neurologist in Houston. Everyone was convinced I was going to die or go blind. The doctor at Houston Methodist hospital basically said it would go away if I lost weight.

ANYWAY! All of that shit is the reason why I’m all for healthcare reform.

In 2021 life started to look up for the first time in years. I started Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and my therapist diagnosed me with Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and Depression. I started weight loss with the Noom program, too, and lost 80 lbs, which has contributed to no more bleeding or brain swelling or chronic migraines. Yay!

Breaking Up Slowly - Lana Del Rey, Nikki Lane

2022 shook my foundation. You’ll read about it in Martyr the Bride, well, a fictionalized version of it anyway. To sum it up, I got divorced and started my life over. The opening lines in A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens also applies to my life in 2022: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.”

Tech Noir - Carpenter Brut Remix

The years 2023 and 2024 and this year have been a bit of a blur. I’ve changed day jobs a few times, made a lot of friends, and changed a lot as a person. I went from being conservative and a faithful Baptist to being a pagan leftist— from thinking that feminism was part of the destruction of the western world (thanks to online content from the Alt-right before it even had a name) to realizing that my story ‘Martyr the Bride’ was a deeply feminist piece that was critical of patriarchy and the church. That led to a lot of questioning about everything! I’ll sum up the whiplash by saying this- I was MAGA in 2016 and voted for Harris in 2024. This is why I’m adamant that people can change their minds and their hearts, by the way.

Alexa, play ‘Peace Somehow’ by Avi Kaplan

Life has always been difficult for me, but I am the happiest I’ve ever been. At 31, I am a homeowner with the cutest ragdoll cat ever named Skyler. I have a full-time job that keeps me fairly busy, and a range of friends and peers I can call on any time for support or laughs. I love the freedom, but am hopeful I’ll find a partner when I’m ready again. I’ve made significant progress in healing my trauma and am finally confident enough to pursue my art business- so, full steam ahead!

I’m still affected by trauma, but as time goes on, the severity of my C-PTSD symptoms lesson. I spend a lot of time learning about relational dynamics and psychology in general to try to find healing methods and I like to think it’s paying off.

My goals are to launch the LLC at the start of 2026, and to sell art online and out of local shops. I am writing and storyboarding my graphic novel, and creating content and art as often as I can!

I believe that with humor, grace, and a knack for getting shit-faced time to time, you can weather anything life throws your way. Things will inevitably have their seasons of sorrow or loss, but life is for the living, and you’re still here, you’ve made it this far, so just keep on going. Your problems are as big or as small as you make them in your mind. If the world feels like its closing in, you need to change perspective and shift your focus. It’s not easy when you are in the thick of it, a lot of what makes a person resilient is in their decision and determination to do so.

Wow! You must have been bored as hell to have read all of this nonsense, but for that I am grateful. Thank you.