Michael Vance Interview
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Author Michael Vance was interviewed by author and radio DJ Mark Justice on a recent Pod of Horror. The subject of the interview was a new novel by Vance, Weird Horror Tales, that is an homage to pulp magazines from the ‘20s, ‘30s, and ‘40s.
“My stories are founded on the premise that there is something larger than our narrow view of reality,” said Vance. “Each interconnected story shares setting, history, prominent families, and a macro plot. The stories also focus on the Azrealites, a religious cult that works tirelessly to reinstate that ‘Other’ on Earth through science and the occult.”
Vance has written for national and international magazines, and as a syndicated columnist and cartoonist in over 500 newspapers. His history book, Forbidden Adventures, has been called a “benchmark in comics history.” He briefly ghosted an internationally syndicated comic strip, wrote his own strip and several comic books.
The cover artist, Keith Birdsong is famous for his extremely realistic covers for Star Trek novels, on Hamilton Collection collectors’ plates, and on U.S. Postage stamps. The interior illustrations are by artist Earl Geier, best known for his horror, fantasy and science fiction artwork. He has illustrated role playing games, books, magazines, and comic books.
The publisher of Weird Horror Tales, Cornerstone Book Publishers, also publishes Masonic and esoteric books, selected pulp fiction, art literature, limited children’s books, and poetry collections.
December 16th Fantastic Fiction
By · CommentsThe next Fantastic Fiction at KGB reading series, hosted by Ellen Datlow and Matthew Kressel, will present Andy Duncan, whose new novelette “The Night Cache” will appear from PS Publishing just in time for Christmas, as befits a ghost story, while his revisionist Appalachian folktale “The Dragaman’s Bride” concludes the new Jack Dann-Gardner Dozois anthology The Dragon Book. Duncan is the winner of two World Fantasy Awards and the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for best science-fiction story of the year.
Also reading will be Christopher Rowe. Rowe’s short fiction has been shortlisted for the Nebula, Hugo, and World Fantasy Awards. A Forgotten Realms novel for Wizards of the Coast is scheduled for Spring 2011, and he is hard at work on a fantasy about maps and megafauna, Sarah Across America.
It’s all happening on Wednesday December 16th, 7pm at KGB Bar, 85 East 4th Street (just off 2nd Ave, upstairs.)
Ellen Datlow has posted photos from the KGB November 18 with Sarah Micklem and Alisa Kwitney here: Fantastic Fiction Photos
New Simon Clark Novella From Telos Publishing
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Telos Publishing has announced the upcoming publication of a new horror novella by one of the supreme horror writers working in the UK today.
Simon Clark’s new chiller explores something nasty found in a village garden by an amateur archaeologist, something which has lain buried for centuries, and which has seen tribute paid to it by generations of local inhabitants. But what happens when the bones are removed and Humpty once more stalks the Earth …
With an evocative cover by multiple award winning artist Vincent Chong, Humpty’s Bones is being published for the World Horror Convention in March 2010 in three editions. There’s a standard paperback edition, which includes the novella alone. Then there is a Deluxe signed hardback edition, which contains Humpty’s Bones, a special introduction and author’s notes by Simon Clark, and a new long short story called “Danger Signs,” about a group of children who investigate an abandoned military bunker, and find that everything there is not quite as dead as they expected.
The third edition is a very limited, signed and numbered traycased edition, which will contain a copy of the hardback edition signed by both Simon Clark and Vincent Chong, and an exclusive hardbacked Vincent Chong art book, also signed by Vincent. This special traycased edition will only be produced if Telos receives enough orders for it, so please order quickly if you are interested. Should it not be produced, then anyone ordering it will receive a copy of the Deluxe hardback edition and a refund of the difference, or a full refund, depending on which the customer prefers.
Standard paperback edition: £9.99 plus p&p
Deluxe signed hardback edition: £30.00 plus p&p
Limited signed and numbered Traycase edition: £95.00 plus p&p
Publication date: March 25 2010, at the World Horror Convention in Brighton
Please visit the Telos site to pre-order this title. It’s in the Original And Classic Fiction section of the site.
2010 National Haunters Convention Coupons
By · CommentsA couple of weeks back we posted about Ty Schwamberger’s upcoming appearance as the Horror Author Guest of Honor at the 2010 National Haunters Convention. The event will take place April 29th through May 2nd.
In that post Schwamberger promised he’d have some discount coupons available for the convention. Well, true to his word, he now has 40 coupons to give out. These provide a $15.00 discount off the $25.00 admission price.
How do you get one?
Be one of the first 40 to request one and Schwamberger will mail it out to you free of charge. He can’t guarantee that your coupon will be mailed out in a week or even within the next month, but he promises that you’ll have it before the convention.
To request a coupon (you can request up to 2 per address), simply email Schwamberger with a subject line of ‘Coupon Request for NHC’ and include your full name and mailing address in the body of the email.
King & Spielberg Team On Under The Dome
By · CommentsAccording to Variety, Steven Spielberg and Stephen King will team up to develop a limited television series based on King’s newly released novel, Under The Dome. DreamWorks TV optioned the book and is apparently intending to develop the series for cable. The story unfolds after an invisible force field suddenly descends on a small vacation town in Maine.
DreamWorks has begun meeting with potential writers for the project.
Spielberg and King previously developed a screen adaptation of King’s 1984 novel The Talisman, which was tabled before becoming a mini-series on TNT a few years ago.
Changes Coming For Chizine Publications In 2010
By · CommentsFollowing a year that saw acclaim for its titles, growth into eBooks, and a successful launch party at the World Science Fiction Convention in Montreal, ChiZine Publications has unveiled more changes for 2010.
One change will be simultaneously releasing signed, limited edition hardcovers, trade paperbacks, and eBooks. “We used to release the hardcovers months before trade paperbacks because, one, the profits from the hardcovers helped offset the costs of the trades; two, it helped gauge interest in a book; and three, that’s how everyone else did it. And eBooks would be released whenever we could get the conversions done. Not anymore. We have the staff and finances to get them out and reach those three audiences at the same time. One book, one release date.” Publisher Brett Alexander Savory adds that they’re dedicated to keeping the prices of their eBooks as low as possible — most ChiZine Publication’s eBooks are $5.95 — and without DRM.
In addition, from now on all hardcovers will contain exclusive content not found in the trade paperbacks or eBooks. “We used to include special content in some of the hardcovers, but it will be the norm now. Besides the signatures, that kind of extra content is what makes them special.”
Novellas — fiction too long to be a short story but not long enough to be a full-length novel — may become a staple for CZP moving forward. “Getting Robert J. Wiersema’s novella The World More Full of Weeping was a coup for us, having an author that well known. What I didn’t fully realize is that big publishers won’t touch them, not even for someone like Rob. Since then, we’ve landed Tim Lebbon’s The Thief of Broken Toys, and word is getting around to other well-known writers that we’re in that market. We really hope be able to announce some big names in the coming months.”
Another change is that the formerly invite-only press has begun accepting unsolicited manuscripts, thanks to the addition to the CZP staff of Slushie/Editor Helen Marshall. “CZP’s mission is to publish voices we felt needed to be heard. We’ve done that. There are others we want to talk to, but to fulfill CZP’s mission to move the genre forward, we now need writers to find us.”
When talking about CZP’s success, Savory says: “There are a lot of reasons. One is that my wife and business partner — who is an absolutely voracious reader and fantastic editor — has equal weight in choosing what we do and do not publish. Her insight has been invaluable. Another big advantage is our publicist, Matthew Moore, being so plugged in and online, talking to people on Twitter and Facebook and blogs. But more than that, a lot of big publishers are in the book business. We are in the story business. I trust the writer’s vision and purpose and stay out of their way as much as possible as editor. I know they’re great, so my job is to get their greatness in front of as many people as I can. This also means moving into eBooks in a big way and knowing what readers want—a reasonable price without DRM gumming things up. But still, a book has to be great inside and out, which is why Erik Mohr’s brilliant cover art is so valuable and a big reason we’ve been noticed. The cover for David Nickle’s Monstrous Affections stopped people in their tracks at WorldCon. Plus, I’ve found a printer that can deliver a book you can tell is of very solid quality when you pick it up.”
CZP plans to launch six new titles — Chasing the Dragon (Nicholas Kaufmann), Chimerascope (Douglas Smith), A Book of Tongues (Gemma Files), Katja from the Punk Band (Simon Logan), Cities of Night (Philip Nutman), and The Thief of Broken Toys (Tim Lebbon) — at the World Horror Convention in Brighton, Sussex, England in March 2010.
Gauntlet Cutting Off Dealers
By · CommentsIn their November 18th newsletter, Gauntlet Press says, “In these hard economic times there are some difficult decisions that have to be made. I have had to drastically cut the hours of an employee who handles dealer orders. And the discount we have to offer dealers is hard to absorb in a tough economy, as well, since many of their orders are for 1-3 books. As a result, with one or two exceptions, we will NO longer be supplying dealers with books. This is most important for customers purchasing our Repairman Jack titles, which often sell out on publication and some other books where demand is high (i.e. this past year’s signed editions of He Is Legend).
“If you have a dealer order in for Bullet Trick please contact your dealer as we are not providing copies to those who ordered less than 5 copies of the book. And, just two dealers will receive Secret Circles, which just went to the printer. We strongly suggest you order directly from the Gauntlet Press website to guarantee a copy of the book (we will provide a small number of copies to Amazon.com but we are cutting the number of books they receive by 50-80%). If you have any questions please contact us at info@gauntletpress.com.”
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