Carla Speed McNeil's

award-winning Finder series has a new home at Dark Horse after more than a decade of being self-published. Beginning in February of 2011 Dark Horse will publish Finder: Voice, the first of her four Ghost Quartet graphic novels. A month after that volume is released, Dark Horse will release the first volume of the Finder Library, a giant 600-page omnibus volume collecting the first four books of Finder's 8 trade paperback releases.

Six months after that Dark Horse will release the second 600-page volume of the Finder Library and will start releasing subsequent volumes of the Ghost Quartet at the rate of about one book a year until the series is complete. Dubbed "aboriginal science fiction' by McNeill, the Finder series follows the peripatetic life and concerns of Jaeger, a shiftless but lovable "finder," a skilled and almost mystically endowed tracker in a far future world of domed cities and wildly imagined technologies. McNeil has self published the book since 1996. The deal with Dark Horse was negotiated by literary agent Bob Mecoy.

Dark Horse editor Katie Moody said she was "really excited to publish Carla. As many awards as she has received, she still hasn't gotten the audience that she deserves. Hopefully we can change that." In addition to collecting the previous material, Dark Horse will publish new Finder stories in full color in a new version of Dark Horse Presents, their anthology showcase. It is the first time Finder has been published in full color.

Interviewed on the floor at C2E2, McNeil said she hoped the new publishing deal would get her books into more libraries. She also said would continue to "some self-publishing; minicomics and some strip cartoons every once in awhile on the web. The last few years have been bad for my finances but really great creative years."