Overview
Left Turn Past the Last Pine Tree is set in rural Colorado in a late 2000s world very much like our own, except supernatural groups such as witches/werewolves do exist in secret societies. Magical Folks do their best to keep humans blissfully unaware of their supernatural neighbors.
For a long time, The Doctor has existed in cold, sad buildings; morgues, hospitals, asylums. He stalks his supernatural prey in their dreams, luring them into his hideout to kill and harvest their magic-filled organs. The Doctor captures Nell Li as his next victim, but lucky fae Nell escapes and turns to his friends TY and Dylan for help. The trio are now on the run, trying to save Nell by stopping The Doctor.
Characters
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Nell Li
FAERIE
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TY Morado
WEREWOLF
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Dylan Ioven
WITCH
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The Doctor
GHOST
I only started working on Left Turn Past the Last Pine Tree in December of 2024, so it’s not as fleshed out as As Above, So Below (which began in July of 2021).
I’m exploring “casual magic” in LTPtLPT, where characters do not overtly show their magical stereotypes (ie, a pointed hat for a witch). Magical Folks masking their powers is intended to be very allegorical to queer/neurodivergent masking.
I have explored TY’s werewolfism (to the right), a painful and brutal transformation he does his best to avoid, and is ashamed of this form. It’s triggered by the full moon of course, but also intense emotion. You can see him slightly transform under stress in some of the illustrations below.
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What I have the most fun showing is the friendship between Nell, TY, and Dylan. Nell and Dylan may bicker, and TY and Dylan are lifelong friends compared to newcomer Nell, but they especially come to trust each other while fighting the horror that is The Doctor.
