Graphic Novels

For a number of years Beau L'Amour worked to get the opportunity to produce a Graphic Novel based on one or another of his father's novels and short stories. He had all but given up when he was approached by Charles Santino, a comic book adapter and packager with the same idea. Before trying their luck on the open market they made one more attempt to sell the idea to Random House and in 2010 they succeeded. The material chosen was the short story "Law of the Desert Born" and Charles began by adapting a movie script of that story that Beau had written with his long time audio writing partner Katherine Nolan.

The material went through several stages of refinement; with more screenplay drafts being written by L'Amour as well as his carefully preparing an on line encyclopedia of location, costume, prop and character photographs, sketches and maps. The screenplay then underwent a careful conversion by Santino into the graphic novel script form. Veteran comics artist Thomas Yeates was chosen to do the illustrations and over the course of two years he and Beau collaborated to produce the more than seven hundred panel in the finished book. They used both old school, meaning black and white "wash" or watercolor techniques and digital compositing to produce the final effect. The result was so stunning that Random House agreed to release the book in an oversized format to allow the art to truly be appreciated. In the end the book received a number of awards and notices; including an Eisner nomination (the comic book equivalent of an Academy Award), a Feathered Quill, and a "Best Graphic Novels of 2013" from the Village Voice. Law of the Desert Born, the Graphic Novel also received feature coverage in Publishers Weekly, The Wall Street Journal, Library Journal and Cowboys and Indians magazine.