Warhammer Wednesday: The Dead and the Damned is 20 years old!

Unbelievably, my very first published novel, the Warhammer short story collection The Dead and the Damned, is 20 years old today! What's more, it is still available to buy from the Black Library as an eBook.

The Warhammer universe explodes with adventure and sudden violence as Badenov's Band, rogues and brigands all, take on all comers as they roam the Old World. Led by their raven-haired commander Torben Badenov, whose lust for glory is only surpassed by his ferocity in battle, the motley gang roams the wretched towns and haunted forests fighting until every last unholy creature they encounter joins the dead or the damned.

One of the best things* about The Dead and the Damned being published, apart from the fact that it was a proper novel**, was that Clint Langley produced the cover. Since 2002, I have written another 15 novels, many of which are also still available to buy as eBooks.

* One of the worst things was it was the first book of mine that was reviewed in SFX Magazine, and the reviewer gave it one star. That was a humbling experience.

** Although it wasn't. Not really.

The Wicked Wizard of Oz two weeks in

The Wicked Wizard of Oz Kickstarter has now been running for two weeks, and with just over half the time left for the project to run we are almost three-quarters funded.

The Wicked Wizard of Oz has been receiving some love online recently from numerous sources. SFX Magazine tweeted about the project on Wednesday.

On Thursday both Starburst Magazine and the guys at Geek Syndicate gave the project a plug, with the Geek Syndicate piece being particularly complimentary about my previous crowdfunded gamebook, Alice's Nightmare in Wonderland. The project also got a plug at the end of this week's Nerd Vs World podcast (at around the 37:50 mark).

Thanks are also due to Megara Entertainment, for sharing the project with their own gamebook backers and, of course, a special mention must go to Scifind.com, who previewed the project before it even launched on Kickstarter.

Remember, Kickstarters only succeed if enough people get to hear about them, so please consider backing the project yourself, but even if it's not your thing, please spread it among your friends, because it might just be theirs.

Thank you.

Anno Dracula - SFX #269 Book Club

SFX #269 is out now, in time for Christmas, and this month's Book Club feature is another piece by Yours Truly, this time about Kim Newman's sublime Anno Dracula (which might just have had a small impact on the creation of my own Pax Britannia universe).

This is my seventh Book Club piece. The complete list to date reads as follows:

SFX #219 - Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
SFX #225 - The Warlock of Firetop Mountain
SFX #232 - The Tripods Trilogy
SFX #239 - The Haunting of Toby Jugg
SFX #254 - The Iron Man
SFX #259 - On Stranger Tides
SFX #269 - Anno Dracula

So, what's next...

Sir Terry Pratchett - 1948-2015

I first discovered Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels in the late '80s when a friend of mine lent me a copy of Mort, saying, "Terry Pratchett could have been as famous as Douglas Adams."

In 1994 I joined the queue in WHSmith, Nottingham, to meet my idol and have my brand new hardback copy of Interesting Times signed. To cut a slightly longer story short, our meeting wasn't all I had hoped it might be and I was left mulling over the old adage, 'Never meet your heroes'. The experience certainly influenced how I interact with my own fans today, but the man remained an inspiration (even if I didn't dare speak to him in 2010 when we both attended the launch of SFX's Summer of Reading - because of what had happened 16 years previously), and it certainly didn't stop me from looking forward to every new Discworld release.

Of course, he wasn't only an inspiration to readers and writers. When he was diagnosed with his 'embuggerance', as he referred to the Alzheimer's, he became an inspiration to fellow sufferers and their families. And as a consequence he also ended up championing the assisted dying cause.

66 is no age, and it is certainly far too soon to lose our very own modern day Dickens. My thoughts are with his family at this time, but also with the rest of us, his readers, who won't get to enjoy another new book by our greatest comic writer, after The Shepherd's Crown is published later this year.

This book has sat on my 'To Read' pile for too long...

... so in memory of a great writer and an inspiration to thousands, including myself, tonight I shall start reading Raising Steam.

I don't normally feel the need to comment on the passing of public figures, but in the case of Sir Terry Pratchett, I'll make an exception. His passing earlier today has also brought to mind another old adage I used to live by, and need to remind myself of again, 'Carpe Diem'. Or to put it in the words of Sir Terry himself, "So much universe, and so little time."

Sir Terry Pratchett - 1948-2015

On Stranger Tides - SFX #259 Book Club

Today sees the release of SFX magazine issue #259, which just happens to include, as this month's Book Club feature, my review of Tim Powers' On Stranger Tides - the book that influenced the creation of my own Fighting Fantasy adventure Bloodbones more than any other.

This is my sixth Book Club piece. The complete list to date reads as follows:

SFX #219 - Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
SFX #225 - The Warlock of Firetop Mountain
SFX #232 - The Tripods Trilogy
SFX #239 - The Haunting of Toby Jugg
SFX #254 - The Iron Man
SFX #259 - On Stranger Tides

Hopefully Tin Man Games and Snowbooks will be pleased. ;-) 

SFX #254

The latest  issue of SFX is rather a special one for me, as it turns out.

I've known my Book Club piece on Ted Hughes' The Iron Man was going to be in there for a while.

I also had an inkling that a write-up of Fighting Fantasy Fest 2014 might appear as part of Event Horizon.

However, I had no idea that friend of Fighting Fantasy, and this blog, Group Editor-in-Chief Dave Bradley, would have this on his bio bit this month...

Fighting Fantasy Fest 2014 - Hitting the Headlines!

Well, the geek press anyway.

YOU ARE THE HERO and FIGHTING FANTASY FEST both get a mention in the latest issues of SFX and SciFiNow magazines.

In SFX, FFF 2014 appears in the 'Event Horizon' part of the mag*, while SciFiNow features a full interview and six-page article with Messrs Jackson and Livingstone**.

Ian Livingstone on Blood of the Zombies, Fighting Fantasy Fest, and Karen Gillan. Obviously.

Perhaps you've stumbled across this very blog because of the aforementioned magazines. Well, have no fear, tickets for FIGHTING FANTASY FEST are still on sale here, and you will soon be able to pre-order your very own copy of YOU ARE THE HERO - A History of Fighting Fantasy Gamebooks (all 270 pages of it!), which now has an official publication date of Sunday 7 September - the same day as FIGHTING FANTASY FEST!

YOU ARE THE HERO in big, bold letters. Cool. 

Curse of the Mummy features one of the ten nastiest deaths in Fighting Fantasy, apparently. 

* Although the piece was written by the work experience girl and features one glaring inaccuracy.

** And Curse of the Mummy even gets a mention!

My Annotated Workspace - July 2014

Back in February I posted this, in which I annotated my workspace and explained what all the projects were I was working on at the time. Well I'm going to do it again, five months on, so here we go...

1) I've been proof-reading YOU ARE THE HERO - A History of Fighting Fantasy Gamebooks. Here you can see art by Martin McKenna, Les Edwards and Pete Knifton.

2) The 350th issue of the Judge Dredd Megazine - I've had a couple of short stories in this over the last couple of years and it's time I came up with some more story proposals. 

3) Christmas Books - I'm re-vamping What is Myrrh Anyway? Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Christmas in time for Christmas 2014, including additional content. The new edition of the book will go by the name A History of Christmas.

4) My laptop, open at the Eventbrite ticket page for Fighting Fantasy Fest 2014. Buy your ticket today!

5) Sharkpunk is an anthology I'm editing for Snowbooks, that will be published in May 2015. The story you can see here is by David Tallerman.

6) The 250th issue of SFX Magazine and a commissioning form for a piece I'm writing for a future issue about Ted Hughes' The Iron Man.

7) Take Back the Skies by Lucy Saxon - I've recently reviewed this book and there's even a competition to win a copy of the book. Check it out!

Gamebook Friday: Steam Golems, Stormslayers and Sunday the Seventh of September

As a result of being tagged in a recent post on the British Steampunk Community Facebook page, I discovered Micro Art Studio's Steampunk miniatures, amongst which I found this Security Golem...

After reminding me that I need to write a piece for SFX magazine about Ted Hughes' The Iron Man, the miniature made me think of my own Steam Golem from Stormslayer...

Stephen Player, the artist who illustrated Stormslayer, teaches an illustration class and has used the art brief for the book with his students. As a result, every once in a while new interpretations of his original illustrations appear online, usually over on DeviantArt, such as these...

The last of these images is by the artist Emerson Tung. Emerson also created an alternative image of the Eye of the Storm (the giant fish-shaped brass flying machine) from the book, which appears in YOU ARE THE HERO - A History of Fighting Fantasy Gamebooks.

And of course YOU ARE THE HERO is going to have its official launch at FIGHTING FANTASY FEST 2014 on Sunday 7 September. Buy your ticket now and become a part of Fighting Fantasy history yourself.

Thought for the Day

"I tend to find in writing that a lot of my characters can get quite forceful when I'm trying to create them. It's almost like they are fully formed and I'm just trying to figure out what they are."

~ Lucy Saxon, Novelist

 

FIGHTING FANTASY FEST around the Internet - Part 4

More on FIGHTING FANTASY FEST from the World Wide Web.

Fighting Fantasy was the focus of the Friday Five on Pornokitsch on Friday (funnily enough)...

On Saturday, backers of the YOU ARE THE HERO Kickstarter got the first look at Martin McKenna's wraparound cover art for the book...

And on Monday, this guest blog post went live on SFX.co.uk...

FIGHTING FANTASY FEST around the Internet - Part 3

More on FIGHTING FANTASY FEST from the World Wide Web.

This piece appeared on the Starburst Magazine website on Monday...

And on the same day, FFF 2014 was mentioned in a news round-up on SFX.co.uk.

Steampunk Thursday: Lucy Saxon

Lucy Saxon is one to watch in the world of Steampunk fiction. At only 19 she has had her first novel Take Back the Skies published by Bloomsbury and is the featured author in this month's SFX Magazine.

Lucy Saxon signing at the Bloomsbury stand at the MCM Comic Expo in London.

Lucy wrote the first draft of the novel at age 16 and Steampunk was a massive influence on the work. Take Back the Skies features grand skyships, mechanical servant 'mechas' and other wondrous inventions.

Catherine Hunter is the daughter of a senior government official on the island of Anglya. She’s one of the privileged – she has luxurious clothes, plenty to eat, and is protected from the Collections which have ravaged families throughout the land. But Catherine longs to escape the confines of her life, before her dad can marry her off to a government brat and trap her forever. 

So Catherine becomes Cat, pretends to be a kid escaping the Collections, and stows away on the skyship Stormdancer. As they leave Anglya behind and brave the storms that fill the skies around the islands of Tellus, Cat’s world becomes more turbulent than she could ever have imagined, and dangerous secrets unravel her old life once and for all...

You can pick up a copy of the limited edition hardback here.

2013 - The Year in Review

As a number of people have remarked on various social networking sites over the last few days, many will be glad to see the back of 2013. It's not been the easiest year for Family Green either but it's also been a year of firsts for Jonathan Green, Author, including writing my first movie novelisation, attending my first movie premiere and running my first Kickstarter project. So following the example set by several of my writing colleagues, here's my writing year in review.

In 2013 I wrote a couple of pieces for SFX Magazine, five short stories and a novella - The Serpent's Egg - which were all published this year. I also wrote three Moshi Monsters books, one of which was the novelisation of the new Moshi Monsters Movie.

2013 also saw the publication of my first Warhammer Path to Victory Gamebook Shadows Over Sylvania, and my Tin Man Games app Temple of the Spider God ported to Android devices. Spider God also came out in French, as did my most recently published Fighting Fantasy gamebooks, Night of the Necromancer and Stormslayer, while my first Steampunk Pax Britannia novel Unnatural History appeared in German.

I also attended a number of events up and down the country, including The Sci-Fi Weekender, Steampunk Doncaster, the first ever Geekfest, Weekend at the Asylum, the MCM London ComicCon, World FantasyCon, and Dragonmeet.

However, my writing year was mainly filled with writing YOU ARE THE HERO - A History of Fighting Fantasy Gamebooks (the aforementioned Kickstarter project) and prepping a number of other projects for the New Year. So what does 2014 have in store?

Well, all being well, as well as the publication of YOU ARE THE HERO, there's a new novel in the works, a new gamebook and a short story anthology, but more on that another time.

So all that remains to be said is to wish you all a Happy New Year and very best wishes for 2014. May it be better than 2013.

Gamebook Friday: The Way of the Tiger

The Way of the Tiger New Collector's Edition Kickstarter ends today at 9:00pm.

The project has already achieved almost four times its original funding target, so this is definitely going to happen, and you still have twelve hours (from when this post goes live) to be part of something special.

Creators Mark Smith and Jamie Thomson recently spoke to SFX and SciFiNow Magazine about the revival of their classic '80s gamebook series.

To find out more about the Kickstarter and to pledge your support (before it's too late and you miss out) follow this link.

SFX Book Club: The Haunting of Toby Jugg by Dennis Wheatley

The latest issue of SFX magazine (#239) is now out and includes a piece by Yours Truly, assessing the impact and importance of Dennis Wheatley's occult thriller, The Haunting of Toby Jugg.

So why not pick up a copy of the mag today and let me know what you think of my assessments and opinions?