Outdrawn

Noah Blue has built an audience with her webcomic, and now she has a full-time job on the relaunch of Queen Leisah, a cult classic. The company behind it expects the project to sell very well, and she is determined to prove she belongs on it.

Sage Montgomery has long been a top-charting webcomic artist. She assumed the relaunch would be hers to run. Instead the credit is split with Noah, whom she has known since college and regards as a rival.

To keep their employer content, the two have to look like partners. Behind that act, their grudging respect keeps shifting into something warmer, and neither of them wants to admit it.

The romance is a slow burn between rivals who become lovers, with two women at its centre, and it unfolds inside the comics industry. Family pressures weigh on both women, and the industry around them keeps setting one against the other. It is a standalone, self-published in 2023.

The question is whether a pretend collaboration can hold up once the feelings under it are real.