By Zack Quaintance — Today we have an interview with Ibrahim Moustafa, in which the cartoonist talks about his new book, out now via Humanoids. The book is called Retroactive, and it’s the second of a three-book deal with the publisher. Check out a brief synopsis of the new book below, followed by our Q&A with Moustafa…

Enjoy!

In RETROACTIVE, the discovery of time travel is unknown to the general public, but a new Cold War rages between global intelligence agencies as they attempt to alter historical events in favor of their respective futures. When new intel points the U.S. Bureau of Temporal Affairs (BTA) toward a hostile anomaly in the past, veteran field agent Tarik Abdelnasser and his new partner, Lucia Olmos, are dispatched to investigate. They discover a radical adversary wielding a new technology that could unravel everything the BTA fights to maintain. As Tarik gets closer to the truth, he finds himself trapped in a time loop where an imminent terrorist attack, and his own death, trigger the day to restart. He must keep his sanity intact and find a way to prevent the attack, escape the loop, and return to his own timeline to thwart the destruction of the BTA and everyone inside of it.

INTERVIEW: Ibrahim Moustafa

ZACK QUAINTANCE: What drew you to doing a time travel story for this second book with Humanoids?

IBRAHIM MOUSTAFA: I love the time-travel genre, and I especially love a good time-loop story. It's very fertile ground for the comics medium to explore, and to my knowledge there aren't many comics at all that dabble in that sub-genre. It was the book I was most excited to pitch, and with my three book deal with Humanoids, it was the logical next step.

ZACK: It doesn’t seem like it on the surface, but are there any throughlines that tie this work to your first book with Humanoids, Count?

IBRAHIM: I can't say that there are, no. That being said, if other folks see some commonalities in theme or something, I'm not here to tell them that's wrong. It just wasn't intentional.

ZACK: How has it been working with Humanoids on these projects?

IBRAHIM: It's been really great. Creative freedom is such an important aspect of telling these kind of stories, and Humanoids gives me free reign to do pretty much whatever I want. It's really wonderful. Publisher Mark Waid is one of my heroes in comics, and to get to work with him has really just been such a cool thing. He gives fantastic notes, and is a strong advocate. Rob Levin, who has been my editor on both projects so far (now Senior Editor at Valiant) is just phenomenal as a project manager and a creative sounding board. I'm really looking forward to doing my next book with incoming Editor Jake Thomas (previously at Marvel).

ZACK: Did you do anything to keep the timeline logic straight as you worked on the book, and if so what?

IBRAHIM: I did. The first step was to nail down the rules of time travel (or “drifting” as I call it in the book) within this world, the means of drifting, etc. The way the events play out evolved a bit as I was breaking the story, but once I had it all written out I made a key/diagram to share with my editor to make sure it was easy to track.

ZACK: Finally, what are some of your favorite time travel stories — in any medium — and did any of them inspire your work on this book?

IBRAHIM: Groundhog Day is a favorite and was definitely an influence, same with Edge of Tomorrow. There's a movie called About Time, starring Rachel McAdams and Domhnall Gleeson, which is a really touching story about simple time travel that I love a lot as well. It wasn't a drirect inspiration, but I'm sure some of it made it's way out of my brain and into the book.

RETROACTIVE by Ibrahim Moustafa is out now

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Zack Quaintance is a tech reporter by day and freelance writer by night/weekend. He Tweets compulsively about storytelling and comics as Comics Bookcase.