I Was The Cat

By the end of 2014, it might be tough to name a comics publisher that hasn't offered up a Humble Bundle deal. Oni Press is the latest publisher to join the ranks of the Humble Bundle crowd (others include Top Shelf, Valiant Comics, and Boom Studios), though it's put a bit of a spin on its offering of 24 titles and more than 2,500 pages of comics. Buyers can choose to donate the proceeds from their purchase to the charity Direct Relief, an organization helping to treat and contain the Ebola outbreak in Africa, among other humanitarian causes.

The San Diego Comic-Con is only a week away, and the reveals of convention exclusives just keep coming. Today, it's Oni Press, offering up a roster of special items and unique covers that you can only grab at Booth 1833, including a full-color hardcover edition of Scott Pilgrim v.5 that comes complete with a pair of Kim Pine's drumsticks. Other con-exclusive items include a mask and print for Paul Tobin and Benjamin Dewey's I Was The Cat, a patch for Charles Soule and Alberto Jiménez Alburquerque's Letter 44, an exclusive cover for Princess Ugg that crosses over with Battle Pug, and more.

In the pages of Paul Tobin and Benjamin Dewey's I Was The Cat -- a new graphic novel serialized weekly on ComiXology -- a young journalist is hired to ghostwrite the memoirs of an eccentric billionaire named Burma. The trouble, as you may have already guessed from the title, is that Burma is a cat -- specifically, a talking cat who has spent his last eight lives attempting to conquer the world. It's a great premise, but what Tobin and Dewey are doing in their story is interesting not just for bizarre feline histories, but for how dark and sinister a fluffy kitty who spends most of his time on-panel being petted by the other lead characters can actually be. To find out more, we spoke to Tobin about the origins of the story, why you don't have to like cats to enjoy it, and the amount of research that he thinks a writer should be doing in order to create a proper history.