I’ve been highlighting books I’ve written, edited, or contributed to throughout my career, with a new entry posted every Thursday. It’s “Throwbook Thursday,” ya’ll! (But please do not throw books. It can hurt someone and damage the books.)
I’ve been a fan of Swamp Thing and Hellblazer for around 20 years now, which is why I was ecstatic to be attached to DC Comics’ official 30th-anniversary celebration of John Constantine. But that wasn’t the only Hellblazer book on which I’ve worked. In 2020, Sequart published an essay anthology from me and my friend Lou Tambone, From Bayou to Abyss: Examining John Constantine, Hellblazer, of which I am immensely proud.
British occultist John Constantine elevated Alan Moore’s Swamp Thing, and it wasn’t long before John had his own spinoff comic titled John Constantine: Hellblazer. This anthology examined the mage’s long and tumultuous history from his earliest appearances to the present—not only in the pages of DC’s Swamp Thing and Hellblazer, but also on film and television—and the best part was that we were able to finagle a foreword from Hellblazer‘s creator himself, Jamie Delano.
The book contained a plethora of insightful, humorous, and unique essays, and it featured a gorgeous cover illustration by artist Leah Battle. For my contributions, I wrote the introduction and two essays, and I co-edited each writer’s work with Lou. We were both very pleased with how this project turned out, and when you consider the other essays listed below, it’s no wonder:
• “No Hard Feelings: A Foreword”—Hellblazer creator Jamie Delano
• “Give ’em Hell, John: An Introduction”—Rich Handley
• “Mad, Bad, and Dangerous to Know: Alan Moore’s John Constantine”—John Trumbull
• “The Sum of His Parts”—Tony Simmons
• “The Birth of a Mark”—John E. Boylan
• “What Do You Do With an Undead Sailor? The Creation of “Dark Conrad” Constantine”—Swamp Thing writer Nancy A. Collins
• “Going for It: The Personal Is Political in Jamie Delano’s Hellblazer“—Ross Johnson
• “The Making of a Forgotten Hit: Putting Constantine Into Context”—former DC editor Alex Galer
• “The Left Side of the Road”—Martín A. Pérez
• “The Birth and Death of John Constantine: A Critical Analysis of Hellblazer #4 and #40″—James Chambers
• “…The Odd Boyfriend: John Constantine’s Bisexuality in Hellblazer and Beyond”—James Wilkinson
• “What’s Love Got to Do With It? John Constantine, Kit Ryan, and the Women of Hellblazer“—Julianne Clancy
• “Manifest Magic: John Constantine on Television”—Joseph Dilworth Jr.
• “Dirty, Dirty Hands: Touring the Underbelly of America with Azzarello”—Robert Jeschonek
• “Silk Cut Smoke Breaks: Exploring the Themes of Hellblazer Fill-ins”—Draško Roganović
• “A Man You Don’t Meet Every Day: Constantine’s London”—Adrian Brown
• “Hell to Pay: How the 2005 Movie Changed Hellblazer‘s Theology and Doomed John Constantine”—James Wilkinson
• “Rhymes with Wine”—Lou Tambone
• “The Many Faces of Papa Midnite”—Frank Schildiner
• “Ghosts, Grimoires, and Dealing With Demons: Hellblazer‘s Real-World Magic”—Genevieve Williams
• “The Hell They Weren’t: Hellblazer‘s Lost Lore”—Rich Handley
• “Cursing the Waverider: John Constantine in the Arrowverse and in Animation”—Sabrina Fried
• “John Constantine’s Banishment from the DC Universe”—Brian Cronin
• “A Nasty Piece of Work? The Mercurial Morality of John Constantine”—James Wilkinson
• “A Total Wanker in London: The Poison Truth and the Hellblazer’s Rebirth”—Richard Gray
• “Prime Time and Vertigo Do Not Mix Well”—former DC editor Robert Greenberger
• “The Constant Serpentine: Anti-Savior Resurrected”—Tony Simmons
• “Still Blazin’ After All These Years: An Afterword”—Lou Tambone
• “From Liverpool to Swamp Thing’s Fool”—Rich Handley
From Bayou to Abyss can be ordered from Sequart’s website, Amazon, and other booksellers. As explained in the anthology’s description: “Constantine has a weakness for narcotics, alcohol, and sex; an unnatural obsession with the occult; and a long list of lovers he’s betrayed, hurt, and discarded. He’s slain his twin brother in the womb, taunted Satan, outwitted demons and angels, been trapped in Hell, and even fathered an elemental. No matter what the universe throws at him, he somehow always seems to come out on top… though his loved ones have usually ended up caught in the crossfire. At times, John can be a bastard. He has questionable hygiene and a lack of ethics, and he’ll likely hurt anyone foolish enough to let him into their lives. But John is nonetheless a hero—well, a Byronic hero, in any case. As fans, we wouldn’t have him any other way.”