Seven writers, seven artists, and seven meteors come together to tell a series of stories set in the post-apocalyptic world of The Wrecked Earth, the same universe where C.E.L. Welsh’s novel, CLUTCH, takes place. I reviewed CLUTCH last year and had the pleasure of speaking with Welsh and some of the others on the Seven Stones team a month ago about this exciting project.

Seven Stones is a project in two parts: the first is an anthology of seven short stories written by C.E.L. Welsh (CLUTCH), Howard Mackie (Iron Man, Spider-Man), William Meikle, Jeremiah Tolbert (Lightspeed, Interzone), Scott Colby (Shotgun), Emily Hall (Ithaca), and Craig Terlson (Correction Line) that are each centered around a different meteorite. The Kickstarter includes an overview of each of these stories. The anthology will include tales like, “Wrath of the Rat God” by C.E.L. Welsh, a story of a much younger Clutch dealing with what, at first, seems like a small and simple job; “Found,” by Emily Hall, where a young woman adopts an abandoned baby from a cannibalistic group of mutants; “Hope and Desire,” by Scott Colby, where a politician-turned-gang leader banks on the threat of violence being enough to make a group of villagers submit to him but might have bitten off more than he can chew, and more.

The second half of the project has artists taking these short stories and adapting them into comics to be collected as a graphic novel. The artists on the project include: Daniel Govar (RELAUNCH, Azure), Jeremy D. Mohler (Outland Entertainment), Nicolas Giacondino (Utopia, Free Mars), Chris Meeks, Kelly Williams (Co-Op, CLUTCH colorist), and Kennon James (Mohagen). The Kickstarter page also includes some of the early art with pieces such as the one below from the “Wrath of the Rat God” comic adaptation:

The project is currently running a Kickstarter where backers can acquire copies of the short story anthology, graphic novel, or an omnibus containing both along with posters, copies of CLUTCH, and at higher pledge levels even a chance to chat with some of the creators and receive feedback on your own short story or portfolio.

In addition, Welsh sent me along a couple of sneak peeks from the story anthology, which I thought I’d share my impressions of.

Wrath of the Rat God by C.E.L. Welsh

Clutch is back and ready to kick more a–! This is a great story showing the big Tribesman doing what he does best, saving people and killing big, scary things. This story is beautifully layered, going far beyond a story about a simple job and, as always, Welsh is able to tie in multiple stories around Clutch’s actions and peel back the curtain many of the events, good and downright terrifying, that take place in The Wrecked Earth.

Staying Alive Among the Beasts by William Meikle

Not everybody gave up their old jobs after Rockfall. That’s what could be said of Fred Atkins who manages a zoo even after many of the animals have died or been changed by the meteorites. This story has a really neat concept. We’ve seen how animals can be changed and be deadly back in CLUTCH, but we’ve seen nothing this exotic, friendly, or even dangerous as what old Fred has around. The story suffers from a lack of tension from the marauders who feel more like cattle being lead to a meat grinder, but I suppose with Marnie around that’s exactly what they are. Speaking of, I can’t wait to see Marnie’s depiction on the graphic novel side of the project.

The Kickstarter runs until Monday, September 2nd, and can be found here.