Nel by @tarysand (Taryn Sanders)

This drawing is a gift to one of my best friends, Sarah, of her fancreation, Nel, featured in one of the most fantastic fanfics I've ever had the honor of reading, I Didn't Make it Rain. It's a beautifully written, detailed story about how Nel and Dib meet and fall in love, but don't make the mistake of thinking that this is just some typical, overly done "Dib meets Mary-Sue" fanfic. This story actually has Nel as a non-perfect, believable, yet very mysterious character, and is just an absolutely engrossing read. The plot is really good, and though it's a serious story it still has some great moments of humor scattered here and there. 'I Didn't Make it Rain' is a truly wonderful piece of work, but don't take my word for it, go click the link above and see for yourself ^~
And Sarah, for the record, is the very same person that I mentioned a few posts ago who did those stunningly gorgeous drawings which inspired me to do the 'My Butterfly' picture. Not only did she write one of the best IZ fanfics I've ever seen, but her art is astounding. Still though, she always says that she has trouble drawing well in the Invader ZIM/Jhonen style. I of course think she does just fine, but still I thought since I liked Nel and her story so much, and wanted to draw something to show Sarah how much I've appreciated her inspiration to me, I thought I'd take Nel and draw her as she might appear on the show. Sarah draws Nel in her own lovely Manga-type style with such delicate beauty, so I really prayed I wouldn't ruin trying to make her a little more Vasquezian, so it ended up being a sort of cross between Sarah's, Jhonen's, and my own style of drawing. Sarah sent me a few pix of Nel, and in a lot of them she had angel wings, so that's how I wanted to draw her. The heart she's hugging I just came up with as en excuse to have some pink in the drawing (I'm weird ^^), but I think there's some symbolism there, too. Oh, and just so nobody thinks, "Oh jeez, not another fancharacter who wears a trench coat!" know that Nel normally does NOT wear one. She only does once in the story (and it's for a really adorable reason too ^^), but I liked the contrast of the black on blue, so blame the coat thing on me ^^;; Artwork © Copyright 2003 Taryn Sanders