Snow White: The Motion Picture (Again)

Posted on March 30, 2012 by Steven

As you may know, today marks the big-screen debut of the fantasy Mirror Mirror, starring Lily Collins and Julia Roberts. It’s the first 2012 entry in Hollywood’s latest who’s-got-the-better-movie-adaptation contest, this time involving “Snow White,” the Brothers Grimm’s classic fairy tale that celebrates its 200th Anniversary this year.

Well, then, there’s no better time to become reacquainted with this timeless story than by reading StarWarp Concepts’ first e-book-only release!

Snow White features five incredible full-color illustrations originally published in 1883, and is available for just $1.99 from DriveThruFiction.com and the StarWarp Concepts store. Download your copy today!

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Institute of Horror Wrap-up

Posted on March 28, 2012 by Steven

Saturday, March 24, was the fifth annual gathering of the Institute of Horror, Fantasy, and Science Fiction, presented by Blood Moon Rising magazine and held at the main branch of the Queens Public Library, in Flushing—smack in the middle of the borough’s own Chinatown. My brother, Frank, helped me haul The ’Warp’s wares to and from the show and became official photographer for the day. (Hey, at least I paid for parking!)

After being warmly greeted by the show’s host, Blood Moon Rising publisher AL J. Vermette, and BMR editor D. W. Jones (who gave Blood Feud a stellar review in BMR #47), Frank and I set up shop in the back of the library’s conference room that was being used for the panels and waited for the crowd to file in. The festivities soon got under way with a pair of psychics, who explained their backgrounds and their beliefs, and then gave demonstrations—one using her ability to see angels and colors around one audience member, the other doing a tarot card reading of D.W.

Then it was time for the writers’ panel, where I joined musician Soda, who wrote the fantasy novel The Wizard of Odd, and up-and-coming teen writer Nicolette DeSanto, whose young adult paranormal romance is currently making the rounds of publishers. Soda read a Halloween-themed, Ray Bradbury–esque short story that’s soon to see print; Nicolette, who’s a major fan of Cassandra Clare’s Mortal Instruments series, read an excerpt from her own novel—and both writers are very talented. As for me, I chose a sample of the Pan and Javier “trash monkey” chase scene from Blood Feud. Then we fielded question from the audience, which skewed quite a bit older than I’d expected—but that’s because the teens in attendance had left to go get their tarot cards read! D’oh!

During the course of the event, makeup effects artist Jennifer Jaksic had been working on one of her models, transforming him into a demon, and now it was time to show off her finished work. She gave an overview of her methods and prior work, and fielded questions on such subjects as working with models’ potential allergies to the chemicals in the makeup she uses. Go check out her online portfolio, there are a whole slew of great effects makeup in the gallery.

Up next was a presentation of Zombie Hunters: City of the Dead, a TV series that got its start on Queens Public Access, but in recent years has grown beyond its basic-cable roots. (In fact, the second volume of episodes has just been released on DVD.) Episode 7 was shown to the audience, followed by a Q&A with director, series creator, and star Patrick Devaney, and costar Christopher J. Murphy.

A pleasant surprise came after the presentation, when Frank realized that he’d gone to high school with Murphy, who then invited him to become a zombie extra for one of their upcoming episodes! As they say on cable news, more details on that story as it continues to develop…

The final panel showcased director Dave Rodriguez, who presented a short movie—done especially to premiere at the Institute—about two demon hunters cleaning house in a Bronx, NY apartment building. Some of the digital effects were a little rough, but considering the film had been completed only days before the show, it turned out pretty well—and it was funny, too!

The gathering was scheduled to end with a showing of episodes from Land of the Lost (the 1970s kids’ TV show on which that god-awful Will Ferrell movie was based) and the 1954 TV version of Flash Gordon (starring the late Steve Holland, Bob Larkin’s old Doc Savage model), but at that point I figured it was time to pack up and get some dinner. So, just before they turned out the lights, Soda and I had time for one more picture—and then it was time for Taco Bell!

Thanks go out to AL J. Vermette and D. W. Jones for inviting Frank and me to the show. Hopefully we’ll be able to do it again next year!

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StarWarp Concepts’ 2012 Convention Season Starts This Weekend

Posted on March 21, 2012 by Steven

The annual gathering of the Institute of Horror, Fantasy, and Science Fiction—hosted by Blood Moon Rising magazine—is being held this coming Saturday, March 24, at the main branch of the Queens Public Library, in Flushing (just a few blocks from Main Street—the final stop on the #7 train—and smack in the middle of the borough’s own Chinatown). Not only will I be manning the StarWarp Concepts table, but I’ll be doing my first public reading of Blood Feud. (Now that’s terrifying!)

On sale will be copies of Blood Feud, Carmilla, A Princess of Mars, and The Bob Larkin Sketchbook, as well as the Official Pandora Zwieback T-shirt. I’ll also be handing out Pandora Zwieback bookmarks—while supplies last, of course. The print version of the free Saga of Pandora Zwieback #0 introductory comic won’t be available, unfortunately—I’ve burned through its 3,000-copy run (so where are the sales?!). At the moment, I’m still debating whether or not to go back to press (three thousand 16-page, full-color freebies don’t come cheap, after all).

After this weekend, on March 31st The ’Warp will be appearing at the New York Comic Book Marketplace—more details on that next week—and then in April we’ll be heading back to Beantown for the Boston Comic Con. For us, the 2012 convention season has officially begun! Check out the Events listing for all our upcoming appearances and come out and see us, if you get the chance.

The Institute of Horror, Fantasy, and Science Fiction runs from noon to 5:00 p.m. on March 24, and admission is free. The Queens Library is located at 41-17 Main Street, in Flushing.

For more information, head over to the Blood Moon Rising Web site.

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The “Blood Feud” Experiment

Posted on March 12, 2012 by Steven

March 4–10, 2012 was the eighth annual Read an E-Book Week, and with the goal of expanding our readership The ’Warp joined e-book distributor Smashwords’ tie-in to the event by offering our young adult dark-urban-fantasy novel, Blood Feud: The Saga of Pandora Zwieback, Book 1, for $1.00 (a 75% discount from the $3.99 we normally charge at Smashwords, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and DriveThru Fiction).

It was very much a last-minute decision: Smashwords didn’t send out an advance notice about the Read an E-Book Week promotion until Saturday, March 9—the day before it kicked off. That meant hitting the ground running if we were going to get the word out about the sale.

Promotion: Posted news and links in the SWC and Pandora Zwieback blogs, as well as their Facebook pages and my DeviantArt page (where Bob Larkin’s covers for the Pan series have become quite popular). E-mailed all my contacts at the Jacketflap YA book community. E-mailed press releases to comic, sci-fi, goth, and horror news sites, as well as io9, Jezebel (they’re always discussing Twilight and The Hunger Games, so why not?), Publishers Weekly, and School Library Journal. Asked family and friends to spread the word via Facebook and Twitter; provided an ad jpeg they could pass around. Posted topic threads on Goodreads’ Blood Feud page, as well as comic and Kindle message boards, touting the sale. Contacted Richard Boom, a major Lorelei and Pandora fan who owns the comic-art agency Boom Art Department. Richard has a network of friends and followers who have a talent for placing material onto news sites and message boards I never knew existed or that ignore my press releases (that’s how word on Blood Feud initially spread last year).

Results: Comic Related, Forces of Geek, and First Comics News ran the press release, as did—through Richard’s efforts—Broken Frontier, Comic Bastards, Word of the Nerd, Geek Girl’s Manifesto, and Comic Buzz. My buddy J. D. Calderon posted the news on his Oswald Chronicles site and DeviantArt page. “The Dome,” host of the weekly podcast Sci-Fi Saturday Night (where I was interviewed back in December), passed the word on Twitter, which was in turn passed along by others. Friends posted the ad on their Facebook pages. Goodreads mentioned it in a YA e-book sales thread. Found the topic thread deleted(!) at one comic site forum. Got scolded at the Kindle fan forum for posting a press release as a topic instead of making a more personal “Hi, I’m a small-presser and would you please please buy my book?” cry of desperation. A British site called Local UK News picked up the press release from Comic Related (…the hell? But, hey, I’ll take whatever press attention I can get.). Got ignored by io9, Jezebel, School Library Journal, and Publishers Weekly. No great shock there—unless you’re a medium- or large-sized publishing house, or an e-book self-publisher who’d already sold tens of thousands of copies before their journalists ever knew you existed, they ignore everyone.

Nevertheless, word did get out. According to Smashwords’ statistics, there were over 150 views of Blood Feud’s page between March 3rd (when I started announcing the sale) and March 10th, and a sharp increase in downloads of the free sample chapters.

So, how’d we do?

Books sold: Two.

Wow. That was even more unexpected than the Local UK News link.

I can’t say I’m totally surprised; disappointed, but not surprised. Not everyone has a Smashwords account, and I can see how having to set up one before you can purchase the book would be a headache for potential buyers. And SWC wasn’t the only participant in the event—just the list of publishers offering the 75% discount ran over 1,200 pages on the Smashwords site! It was pretty easy to get lost among the mountain of available titles.

Still… two? Geez, I hope this works better when I eventually offer it for 99¢ at Amazon and Barnes & Noble…

Postscript: In an odd turn of events, news of the Smashwords $1.00 sale resulted in a small increase in Blood Feud sales at Amazon—where the Kindle version sells for $3.99. Huh.

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John Carter: Now in Theaters

Posted on March 9, 2012 by Steven

Disney’s John Carter is probably the most talked about genre movie of spring 2012, with a great deal of praise being heaped on this first-time adaptation of Edgar Rice Burroughs’s science fantasy epic A Princess of Mars—and today is the day it finally hits theaters. So while you’re standing on line, waiting to meet the gentleman from Virginia and his soul mate, Martian princess Dejah Thoris, why not pass the time by reading The ’Warp’s special edition of the classic novel, which celebrates its 100th Anniversary this year?

A Princess of Mars features six incredible black-and-white illustrations by artist Eliseu Gouveia (Carmilla, The Saga of Pandora Zwieback #0) and an introduction by science fiction expert John Gosling. This first entry in the “John Carter of Mars” series is available from online retailers and the StarWarp Concepts store. Order a copy today!

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Stan Lee’s What, Now?

Posted on March 5, 2012 by Steven

A non-’Warp topic for today, but don’t worry—my involvement will become clear enough (otherwise why would I be discussing it?).

A few months ago, I saw this solicitation for a new miniseries from Archie Comics:

“How it all Began!” – Stan Lee Comics presents “MIGHTY 7,” a sensational new superhero property from the creator of Spider-Man, the X-Men and more!! When a crew of sinister, alien prisoners and their jailers are blasted across the galaxy, their ship lands smack dab in front of legendary comic book creator Stan “the man” Lee! What does this alien arrival mean for planet Earth?! Reality meets fantasy as the “Mighty 7″ journey begins!

Evil superpowered aliens arrive on Earth, right in front of an esteemed comics creator who probably convinces them to become costumed superheroes? Man, I so know what a concept like that feels like…

Say hello to Stan Lee’s Alexa #1, the first issue of a very short-lived series (like, this one issue!) published by ibooks, inc. in 2004. Plotted by the comics industry’s premier superhero-idea factory and scripted by me—and loosely based on a trio of novels titled Stan Lee’s Riftworld, written by New York Times bestselling author Bill McCay—it introduced readers to Alexa Moran, the writer/artist of The Voluptuous Vixens, a superheroine team comic published by The Fantasy Factory. The Factory was a Marvel-like company run by “Happy” Harry Sturdley, a publisher who (no surprise) was based on Stan himself. What no one—including Alexa—realizes is that she possesses the power to open dimensional rifts: doorways to other dimensions.

One day, during an editorial meeting, Harry announces he wants to have a major crossover event in the company’s titles. A sleep-deprived, deadline-late Alexa takes Harry’s order literally and unwittingly opens a portal that results in two (apparently) do-gooding giants crossing over to Earth—and Harry wastes no time in convincing them to become superheroes… under an exclusive contract with the Fantasy Factory, of course…

For a comic that was canceled after its first issue, it got some surprisingly positive reviews:

The Fourth Rail: “Roman and Lee generally do a pretty good job of presenting their new ‘superheroes’ in a different light from what has been seen before…. In addition, I like the touches of subtle alien invasion flavor that Roman gives the story, giving it a science-fiction edge to what is otherwise a straight superhero concept.”

Comic Critique: “The story line is fresh in that it approaches the superhero genre in a different way. It’s set in ‘the real world.’ The protagonist is a regular human being (or at least she thought she was). The ‘heroes’ aren’t what they appear to be. And a light cynicism pervades the atmosphere.”

“Light cynicism.” Could there be any greater indicator that I wrote the thing, and not Stan?  😉

Hmmm… I wonder if, in his new miniseries, Stan signs up his alien superheroes for comic licenses, too…?

 

Stan Lee’s Mighty 7 goes on sale March 21st. A French edition of Stan Lee’s Alexa  (with new cover art by Chris Malgrain that you see here) is currently in development. There’s talk that if the re-release does well enough the rest of the story might be completed—so, keep the faith, True Believer!

Excelsior!

Stan Lee’s Alexa and Stan Lee’s Riftworld copyright © 2005 Byron Preiss Visual Publications.

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Blood Feud E-Book Sale

Posted on March 4, 2012 by Steven

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Starting today, March 4, StarWarp Concepts is participating in Smashwords’ annual Read an E-Book Week, and we’re offering the e-version of the first Pandora Zwieback novel for just $1.00! Buy it for your Kindle, Nook, Kobo, iPad, Sony Reader, or your home computer.

Please help spread the word. The sale runs from 12:01 a.m. (Pacific Time) on March 4 until 11:59 p.m. (Pacific Time) on Saturday, March 10. Sign up for a Smashwords account and use the Coupon Code you see in the ad to receive the discount on BLOOD FEUD—it’s available only to Smashwords customers.

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Snow White, the e-Book: Now on Sale

Posted on February 28, 2012 by Steven

It’s here—the official release date for our e-book-only edition of Snow White!

Starting today you can purchase a copy of the Brothers Grimm’s classic fairy tale (now celebrating its 200 Anniversary!), which features fantastic design work by Mat Postawa and five incredible full-color illustrations that were published in 1883. (Unfortunately, we don’t know the identity of the artist—the original publisher never credited him or her in the storybook in which the art was used.)

Snow White is about to make her latest motion picture debut on March 16th in the live-action adaptation Mirror, Mirror (and then again on June 1st in Snow White and the Huntsman), and here’s your chance to catch up on Snow’s harrowing adventures. Six out of seven dwarfs recommend our Snow White e-book for your daily fairy-tale requirement (the seventh was too Sleepy to respond to the questionnaire).

Snow White is a full-color PDF e-book available for download for $1.99 from DriveThruFiction.com, or you can buy it directly from the StarWarp Concepts store.

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Snow White: An e-Fairy Tale

Posted on February 24, 2012 by Steven

As I discussed back on December 19, 2011, in the post “How About a Nice Shiny Apple, Dearie?” fairy tales have never been more popular—at least according to recent Hollywood TV and movie trends—and nineteenth-century writers Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm (The Brothers Grimm) are the source of this mania.

Just how hot are fairy tales right now? Try two movie versions of Snow White, one of the Grimms’ most famous stories—both set for release this year! Mirror, Mirror debuts on March 16th; Snow White and the Huntsman opens on June 1st.

To introduce the classic tale to a new generation of readers and moviegoers, and to celebrate its 200th Anniversary appearance in the Brothers Grimm’s 1812 collection Children’s and Household Tales, we here at The ’Warp will be publishing Snow White as our first e-book-only title—a PDF download for the low price of $1.99.

And what an edition it is! Behind that great cover by designer Mat Postawa that you see here, you’ll find five full-color illustrations that were originally published in 1883. Check out the book’s product page for samples.

Great story and art, coupled with a great price? How can you say no to that?  😀

Snow White goes on sale February 28, 2012, from StarWarp Concepts.

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Chatting About a Goth Adventuress

Posted on February 22, 2012 by Steven

Today at the book-review blog Fiction Fascination you’ll find an interview with me, conducted by the site’s owner, Carly. It’s one more part in my ongoing effort to make fans of dark urban fantasies aware of the exciting world of Goth adventuress Pandora Zwieback, starting with her first novel, Blood Feud. And since Carly is a major fan of Ms. Zwieback’s, how could I say no to a chance to talk about her?  😉

Carly and I cover such topics as my favorite books, my personal quirks, and what some of my writing inspirations are (a topic I’ll be discussing further at the Pandora Zwieback blog in the days to come). And then there’s this:

“At some point I became obsessed with a TV show on the Food Network called Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives, and I’ve been experimenting with recipes. I haven’t killed anyone yet…”

Not expecting a comment like that in an interview about a monster-hunting teen, were you? Hey, it can’t all be about gun-toting vampires and heroic Goth chicks, y’know!  😀

In addition to the interview, we’re giving away a signed copy of Blood Feud (still on sale in print and e-book editions). If you haven’t gotten around to picking up a copy, here’s your chance to get one for free!

Read the interview, and find out more details on the giveaway, by clicking on the Fiction Fascination logo.

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