Mike Carey (writer)
Mike Carey, also known by his pen name M. R. Carey, is a British writer of comic books, novels, and films, known for the novel The Girl with All the Gifts, as well as its 2016 film adaptation.
Early life and career
Carey was born in Liverpool, England, in 1959 – describing his young self as "one of those ominously quiet kids... lived so much inside my own head I only had vestigial limbs". As a child, he maintained an interest in comics, writing and drawing primitive stories to entertain his younger brother. He studied English at St Peter's College, Oxford, before becoming a teacher. He continued to teach for 15 years before moving on to writing comics.Writing career
After a series of one-off jobs for independent comics companies, including a biographical comic of Ozzy Osbourne and a fantasy about the band Pantera, Carey gained regular employment at 2000 AD, where he created the original series Th1rt3en and Carver Hale.For the Vertigo imprint of DC Comics Carey went on to write the entire run of the Eisner Award-nominated comic book Lucifer, and issues 175 to 215 of Hellblazer, a run on that title only exceeded in length by Garth Ennis and Peter Milligan. He also wrote the original graphic novels The Sandman Presents: The Furies with John Bolton and Hellblazer: All His Engines with Leonardo Manco.
He was a longtime writer of ' working with artist Scot Eaton, plus Ultimate Fantastic Four for Marvel Comics.
He also had three recent Vertigo title: Faker a six-part mini-series with art by Jock; a second graphic novel, God Save the Queen, with John Bolton, featuring Queen Titania, Oberon, Puck, Nuala and Cluracan from the Sandman and Books of Magic comics; and Crossing Midnight with Jim Fern. September 2006 saw the long-delayed debut of Wetworks: Worldstorm with Whilce Portacio for Wildstorm Comics. He is also one of the first authors on DC's Minx imprint for teenaged girls, his second Minx title being co-written with his daughter, Louise. The Unwritten premiered in May 2009, with art by Peter Gross and covers by Yuko Shimizu.
booth at the New York Comic Con, 10 October 2010.
In 2008 Carey worked on a number of different titles, including tie-ins to the "Secret Invasion" crossover storyline, that included an eight-page story in the one-shot anthology Secret Invasion: Who Do You Trust?, which features Abigail Brand of S.W.O.R.D., and a four-issue mini-series, Secret Invasion: X-Men. That same year he began writing Queen's Rook, the first of Virgin Comics' Coalition Comix on MySpace, where users could suggest ideas for a comic which would then get made. He also wrote "Dark Deception", a crossover story arc that appeared across ' and ', and tied into X-Men: Original Sin, he retold the Beast's origin story in X-Men: Origins, wrote an Iceman story in ', a comic book adaptation of Ender's Shadow, and the Vertigo Comics series The Unwritten.
Carey's first prose novel, The Devil You Know, was released in the UK by Orbit books in April 2006, and as a hardcover in the US in July 2007. Its sequel, Vicious Circle, was published in October 2006, and the following three novels in the series, Dead Men's Boots, Thicker Than Water, and The Naming of the Beasts, followed in September 2007, March 2009 and September 2009, respectively.
What would have been Carey's first feature film, the erotic ghost story Frost Flowers, was reported in June 2006 to be in pre-production, with filming to begin that September under the direction of Andrea Vecchiato, but the project collapsed before production began and the script is in limbo. Carey is also working on the TV series The Stranded, the first co-production between Virgin Comics and the Syfy network.
In 2011 he wrote a crossover between X-Men Legacy and New Mutants titled Age of X. In August 2011, Marvel announced Mike Carey's final X-Men-Legacy arc.
In January 2014, he had another prose novel published which was titled The Girl With All The Gifts. It was released to critical acclaim and was later that year announced to be made into a film. Filming began in May 2015, with Gemma Arterton, Paddy Considine, Glenn Close and Sennia Nanua. TV veteran Colm McCarthy directed the movie.
Comics
Early work
Titles published by various British and American publishers include:- Apocalypse:
- *Toxic! #30–31: "Aquarius: Promised Lands"
- Malibu:
- *Ozzy Osbourne: "The Comeback"
- *Pantera: "Power in the Darkness"
- Caliber:
- *Inferno #1–5 collected as Inferno
- *Negative Burn #49: "Suicide Kings"
- *Dr. Faustus
DC Comics/Vertigo
- Lucifer:
- *Devil in the Gateway includes:
- **The Sandman Presents: Lucifer #1–3
- **"A Six-Card Spread"
- **"Born with the Dead"
- *Children and Monsters collects:
- **"The House of Windowless Rooms"
- **"Children & Monsters"
- *A Dalliance with the Damned collects:
- **"Triptych"
- **"A Dalliance with the Damned"
- **"The Thunder Sermon"
- *The Divine Comedy collects:
- **"Paradiso"
- **"The Writing on the Wall"
- **"Purgatorio"
- **"Breaking & Entering"
- *Inferno collects:
- **"Inferno"
- **"Bearing Gifts"
- **"Come to Judgment"
- *Mansions of the Silence collects:
- **"Naglfar"
- **"Sisters of Mercy"
- *Exodus collects:
- **"Brothers in Arms"
- **"Stitchglass Slide, Part 1: The Weaving"
- **"Wire, Briar, Limber Lock, Part 1: The Winnowing"
- **"Stitchglass Slide, Part 2: The War"
- **"Wire, Briar, Limber Lock, Part 2: The Widow"
- *The Wolf Beneath the Tree collects:
- **"Neutral Ground"
- **"Lilith"
- **"The Wolf Beneath the Tree"
- *Crux collects:
- **"The Eighth Sin"
- **"Crux"
- **"The Yahweh Dance"
- **"The Breach"
- *Morningstar collects:
- **"The Wheels of God"
- **"Morningstar 1"
- **"The Beast Can't Take Your Call Right Now"
- **"Morningstar 2"
- *Evensong collects:
- **"Fireside Tales"
- **"Evensong"
- **"Untitled"
- **"The Gaudium Option"
- **"Eve"
- **"All We Need of Hell"
- **Lucifer: Nirvana
- The Sandman Presents: #1–4
- Flinch #16: "The Wedding Breakfast"
- Hellblazer:
- *9-11 Volume 2: "Exposed"
- *Hellblazer:
- **Red Sepulchre collects:
- ***"High on Life"
- ***"Red Sepulchre"
- **Black Flowers collects:
- ***"The Game of Cat and Mouse"
- ***"Black Flowers"
- ***"Third Worlds"
- **Staring at the Wall collects:
- ***"Bred in the Bone"
- ***"Staring at the Wall"
- **Stations of the Cross collects:
- ***"Ward 24"
- ***"Out of Season"
- ***"Stations of the Cross"
- ***"Happy Families"
- **Reasons to be Cheerful collects:
- ***"Event Horizon"
- ***"Reasons to be Cheerful"
- ***"Cross Purpose"
- **The Gift collects:
- ***"Down in the Ground Where the Dead Men Go"
- ***"The Gift"
- ***"R.S.V.P."
- **"With a Little Help for my Friend"
- *Hellblazer: All His Engines
- The Sandman Presents: The Furies
- Batman:
- * #37: "Fear is the Key"
- *Detective Comics #801–804: "The Barker: When You're Strange"
- My Faith in Frankie #1–4 collected as My Faith in Frankie
- Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere #1–9 collected as Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere
- Crossing Midnight collected as:
- *Cut Here
- *A Map of Midnight
- *The Sword in the Soul
- God Save the Queen
- Re-Gifters
- Faker #1–6 collected as Faker
- Confessions of a Blabbermouth
- The Unwritten collected as:
- *Tommy Taylor and the Bogus Identity
- *Inside Man
- *Dead Man's Knock
- *Leviathan
- *On to Genesis
- *Tommy Taylor and the War of Words
- *The Wound
- *Orpheus in the Underworlds
- *The Unwritten Fables
- *War Stories
- *Apocalypse
- House of Mystery Halloween Annual #2: "Infernal Bargains: Just Say No!"
2000 AD
- Pulp Sci-fi:
- *"Eggs is Eggs"
- *"Doin' Time"
- Tharg's Future Shocks:
- *"Inside Job"
- *"Right Back at Ya"
- Carver Hale collected as CH: Twisting the Knife
- Thirteen collected as Th1rt3en
Marvel Comics
- Ultimate Elektra: Devil's Due #1–5 collected as UE-DD
- Spellbinders #1–6 collected as Spellbinders: Signs and Wonders
- Fantastic Four:
- *Ultimate Fantastic Four:
- **Volume 2 includes:
- ***"Think Tank"
- **Volume 4 collects:
- ***Ultimate X4 #1–2
- ***"God War"
- ***"Untitled"
- ***"Devils"
- **Volume 5 collects:
- ***"Silver Surfer"
- ***"Ghosts"
- ***"Four Cubed"
- **Volume 6 includes:
- ***"Salem's Seven"
- *Fantastic Four: The Movie
- *Marvel Holiday Special:
- **"Christmas Day in Manhattan"
- **"A is for Annihilus"
- **"The Meaning of Christmas"
- *What If?.. featuring FF collected in What If: Mirror Mirror
- X-Men:
- *X-Men collected as:
- **Supernovas
- **Blinded by the Light
- **' includes:
- ***X-Men: Endangered Species
- ***"Chapter 1"
- ***"Chapter 2"
- ***"Chapter 3"
- ***"Chapter 6"
- ***"Chapter 7"
- ***"Chapter 12"
- ***"Chapter 13"
- ***"Chapters 16 and 17"
- **'
- *' collected in Wolverine: Dangerous Games
- *' includes:
- **"Danger Room"
- **"Lights Out"
- *' collected as:
- **Divided He Stands
- **Sins of the Father
- **Original Sin
- **Salvage
- **Dark Avengers/Uncanny X-Men: Utopia
- **Emplate
- **X-Necrosha
- **'
- **Collision
- **Age of X
- **Aftermath
- **Lost Legions
- **Five Miles South of the Universe
- * includes:
- **"Pixies and Demons"
- **"Kill or Cure"
- *Secret Invasion: X-Men #1–4 collected in SI: X-men
- *X-Men Origins includes:
- **Beast
- **Gambit
- Ultimate Vision #1–5 collected as Ultimate Vision
- Legion of Monsters: Werewolf by Night: "Smalltown Girl" collected in LoM
- Secret Invasion: Who Do You Trust?: "Agent Brand: In Plain Sight"
- Ender's Shadow collected as:
- *Battle School
- *Command School
- *Ultimate Collection
- The Torch #1–8 collected as The Torch
- Breaking into Comics the Marvel Way! #2: "Butterfly Blade"
- The Mystic Hands of Doctor Strange: "Duel in the Dark Dimension"
- Thor: Wolves of the North
- Sigil #1–4 collected as Sigil: Out of Time
Other publishers
- Boom! Studios:
- *Rowans Ruin
- *Suicide Risk collected as:
- **Volume 1
- **Volume 2
- **Volume 3
- **Volume 4
- **Volume 5
- **Volume 6
- Dark Horse:
- *9-11 Volume 1: "In the House of Light"
- Desperado Publishing:
- *Negative Burn #14: "Red Shift"
- Dynamite:
- *Red Sonja #0–6 collected as RS: She-Devil with a Sword
- *Untouchable
- Harris:
- *Vampirella: Revelations #0–3 collected as Vampirella: Revelations
- Image:
- *Thought Bubble Anthology: "The Timeless Genius of Leonardo"
- Virgin:
- *Voodoo Child #1–6 collected as Voodoo Child
- *The Stranded #1–5 collected as The Stranded
- Wildstorm:
- *Wetworks: Worldstorm collected as:
- **Volume 1
- **Volume 2
Novels
Felix Castor Series
- The Devil You Know
- Vicious Circle
- Dead Men's Boots
- Thicker Than Water
- The Naming of the Beasts
Other Novels
- The City of Silk and Steel
- The Girl With All The Gifts
- The House of War and Witness
- Fellside
- The Boy on the Bridge
- Someone Like Me
- The Book of Koli
Short Stories
Poems
- In Thule with Jessica
Films
Interviews
- , Comic Book Resources, 3 January 2006
- , April 2006
- on , 15 September 2009
- , 9 November 2006
- , Comic Book Resources, 20 December 2006
- , Comic Book Resources, 10 April 2007
- , Comic Book Resources, 4 October 2007
- , LiveWireWorld.com, 24 and 25 October 2007
- , Comic Book Resources, 4 December 2007
- , Comic Book Resources, 29 January 2008
- , Comic Book Resources, 25 March 2008
- , Comic Book Resources, 10 June 2008
*
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- , Comicbook Bin, 14 February 2010