About Attila Benő

Born in Hungary, Europe, Attila Benő has been fascinated by the events of the past ever since his childhood. With education in both ancient religion and information technology, a past in writing offline magazines, and a passion for comics, the archaeological mystery series in a graphic novel format was an obvious choice.

Q: Why archaeological mystery? What background do you have in archaeology?
A: I remember digging up bones in the backyard of kindergarten. Of course, they were just chicken bones, and I did not want to know their history. (Or I came upon a murder scene pretty young in my life, and never told anyone. I guess we'll never know. :)) Although I have no formal education in archaeology, I have studied ancient religions, and I have spent a lot of time researching forgotten civilizations. I'm more of a theoretical follower of the long-lost cultures. I admit I would not have the patience to deal with all modern archaeological protocols. And neither do the characters in the Civilization Hunt series, so you won't have to read about all the bureaucracy. :) We'll concentrate on the fun stuff! :)

Q: Why a graphic novel?
A: We go back to my childhood again, when comic books were a big sensation, and they soon became my favorite reads. (And by comic book, I don't mean Superman or Batman, the classical comic books. I actually mean graphic novels, we just did not have this term in our part of the world. Actually, we still don't. We don't differentiate between a comic book and a graphic novel. The term "graphic novel" was pretty new to me, even though in other parts of the world it's been around since 1978.) I like to tell a story. I don't like long descriptions. Even though I'm a visual type of guy, I hate stories where 50% of the novel explains what people are wearing and another 25% describes where they are. So a graphic novel was a perfect solution: you can visually see what everyone is wearing, you can see where they are; yet the novel itself focuses on the story. Both my visual and my story-telling side are satisfied. :)

Q: How long is the series going to be?
A: This is a difficult question because of the technology of e-books. As you can see, the first book is 1000+ pages long, and it takes a lot longer to download to a kindle device (or your phone) than a text-only novel. For the whole series, I'm thinking in terms of "episodes." Because of technical reasons, I had to break up even the first episode into 3 books. You'll see after the first book that the story does not come to any meaningful conclusion. You have some sort of cliffhanger, but let's be honest: we all know what's going to happen. (And we are all wrong. ;)) The first "episode" will concludes at the end of book 3. The story itself will keep moving forward, but our heroes will leave the island, and continue their adventures elsewhere. Their adventures at this new place will mark the beginning of episode 2. Book 4 is already half done, but because it takes lo long to create the grapics for the book, I'm having a litle bit of a pause right now. Book 4 might be a graphic-text hybrid in the end so we can get on with the story faster in the future. Lots of exciting things will happen, that much I can already tell you!

Q: You also write interactive short stories. What are these, and how are they connected to the Civilization Hunt series?
A: The interactive short stories are not connected to the Civilization Hunt series at all. They are standalone stories, where the reader decides what happens next, and these decisions influence the outcome of the story. They are indeed short stories, the ideal path through the story is usually around 10,000 words. Some paths are shorter, some are slightly longer. But these are not full-length novels. These short stories vary in genre, and as I said, they have nothing to do with the graphic novel series. Some people ask why I write these, instead of creating the next chapter of the graphic novel sooner. The answer might be surprising: the pictures for the graphic novel take a lot of time to create. While my PC is creating the 1000+ images for each book, I already have the next book outlined, and still have plenty of time to work on short stories that you, too, might enjoy, while waiting for the next book in the epic graphic novel series!

Q: Any plans for a full-length novel?
A: Absolutely! As I mentioned above, book 4 of the graphic novel series might be a little different. I'm writing an experimental full-length novel now, and the reactions to it will shape the future format of the graphic novel series as well.

Q: How can people get in touch with you?
A: I'm on Twitter (@AttilaBeno), and you can also send me an email: attila@AttilaBeno.com