Greystone Flashback: Trever

Today’s comic features a cameo appearance by Trever, who started as an intern at Greystone Inn and worked his way up to assistant producer.

What you may not know is that I considered spinning Trever off into his own strip. I had been doing Greystone Inn for a couple years (and was quite pleased with its progress), but I still harbored interest in becoming syndicated at that point. I knew the syndicates would never accept GI, but after reading an article about a new demographic group — Boomerangers — I thought I had a good concept for a strip that a syndicate might accept. Boomerangers, the story said, were kids who graduated college and then moved back in with their Baby Boomer parents. Seeing the number of comics that the syndicates launched that seemed to be based on nothing but demographics, I decided to pitch a strip based on Boomerangers.

So, I produced a four-week storyline that featured Trever and his decision to move in with his parents after graduating college. I packed it up and shipped it off to all of the major syndicates, confident that I was finally ahead of the curve. I had my demographic, I had my characters, and I had my cartooning up to the level that I thought I could attract the attention of an editor.

Needless to say, I was rejected all around.