Northern Lights: 20 MinnSpec Tales - Table of Contents

1. Kissing Frogs — Jaye Lawrence
2. Three Views of the Maiden in Peril — Catherine Lundoff
3. The Desires of Houses — Haddayr Copley-Woods
4. Come and Catch Me, Henry — Jason D. Wittman
5. The Disconnected — David Steffen
6. The Leviathan’s Teeth — Kelly Barnhill
7. Dinosaurs of the Great Depression — Damian Sheridan
8. Garbage Man — R. Scott McCoy
9. Guess Who’s Coming to Gotterdammerung — Terry Faust
10. Bright, Bright City Lights — Lyda Morehouse
11. Can’t Stop, Won’t — Carrie Devall
12. At The Edge Of Twilight, Melissa Remembers Flight — Michael Merriam
13. Daedalus — Patrick Sullivan
14. Sabine Baring-Gould and the Werewolf — Roy C. Booth
15. Oh, Hell — Britt Aamodt
16. The Question — Sharon Hanson
17. Narcissus in Links — Joel Arnold
18. The Radiator Burped — Abra Staffin-Wiebe
19. The Robber King And The Blood Orange Tree — Maggie Della Rocca
20. Run of the Fiery Horse — Hilary Moon Murphy

To be published and released by Sam’s Dot Publishing come late fall.

The Minnesota Shorts Play Festival, to be exact, and it had over 100 entries from across the nation submitted as well. The best part (other than the cash) is that the play will be performed Friday, Sept. 10, 2010, at the Fitzgerald Little Theater in Mankato, MN, which seats around 320 people.

The play? HOW TO MAKE A BRAIN SOUFFLE, which will be published by Stygian Publications as part of THREE ZOMBIES AND A DEMON later on this year.

Huzzah.

Enjoy:

http://www.lptv.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=35&Itemid=9&video=541

Here’s the air date promo for Lakeland Public Television’s (KAWE Bemidji, KAWB Brainerd) COMMON GROUND with my episode! It will air this Thursday at 7pm.

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=118977941466805

“On this week’s episode of COMMON GROUND, Ted Nienow and Nathaniel Nienow a father-son team of Bagley, create beautiful Wood wild-flowers. Bob Peters of Bemidji tells his story about coaching the men’s hockey team at Bemidji State University. Plus, Roy C. Booth of Bemidji, writes in many genres from children’s stage-plays to macbre’ tales for print and motion pictures…”

I was informed earlier by a mutual friend of ours that Frank Frazetta has passed away.

We shut the store down early today.

We sell his posters, comics, what-have-you at my store, and still marvel at his amazing talent after all these years. My folks gave me his first three Ballantine collected art editions in the late-70’s as a birthday present because I was so interested in his work due to his Conan Ace paperback and Warren (CREEPY, EERIE, et al) magazine covers AND due to the fact that any and every entry concerning Frank in Maurice Horn’s ENCYCLOPEDIA OF COMICS (another birthday present from 1976) I had reread many a time prior. I received the following editions as they were released later on.

To say that Frank’s work heavily influenced my early days as a writer and as an artist would be a strong understatement.

In late 1998 I had the Bemidji city attorney tell me I HAD to remove a certain poster of Frank’s from my store window immediately since it was deemed by another Downtown merchant as being “obscene.” I immediately called the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, and, to make a long story short, the CBLDF squashed said “obscenity” nonsense and I received got a nice interview/write up by Maggie Thompson in THE COMICS BUYERS GUIDE, and write ups in THE COMICS JOURNAL and in CBLDF’s own newsletter, BUSTED.

But the biggest thrill was when Frank called me personally at the store to thank me for standing up to the city and for taking such a strong, immediate stand against censorship. We must have talked for about ten minutes and I was in heaven.

He later sent me a signed lithograph of that scandalous painting, “The Egyptian Queen.”

http://www.excellentvirtu.com/frank-frazetta-egyptian_queen.jpg

Frank was a helluva nice guy and a consummate professional, and that is how I will always remember him.

R.I.P., Frank, R.I.P.

Here’s an Internet account of the incident you can still find online:

B&B Comics, Books and Games (Bemidji, Minn.)
“Minnesota Comics Store Harassed Over Frazetta Picture :
’Egyptian Queen’ at Heart of Complaint : CBLDF, Retailer
take Quick Action” p. 11-12 in The Comics Journal, no. 205
(June 1998). — (News Watch) — Store is B&B Comics, Books
and Games, in Bemidji. — Call no.: PN6700.C62no.205

Well, I broke down and finally did it — this past week’s haul pushed me over the edge to do this, from Brian Keene’s website:

“I’m offering five more readers lifetime subscriptions. For a one-time fee of $500, you will receive 1 (one) copy of each and every mass market paperback, trade paperback, trade hardcover, cover flat, comic book or graphic novel that I publish, beginning this month with cover flats for A Gathering of Crows (which will ship to the original ten subscribers next week) and continuing until the time I die or you die (whichever happens first). Copies will come flat-signed or personalized to you (whichever you prefer). Shipping costs are covered in the one-time fee.

This offer DOES NOT include limited edition hardcovers, lettered editions, foreign editions, multi-author anthologies I appear in, DVDs, audio-books, the Of Keene Interest newsletter or other miscellany. It is applicable only to US trade editions.”

There were two left, so I contacted Brian and cut and sent him a check this morning. I figure Cynthia and I would spend that much and more, anyway, and it makes for a good investment on many levels. (Now I’m tempted to invest in the DARK HOLLOW film now, too.)

Like I said earlier, it was a very nice advance that I received yesterday, and we are grateful and thankful for it.

Other stuff:

LUFBERRY resumes filming Monday at 2 PM in the basement bar of Keg ‘n’ Cork.

Did an “out of the box” book pitch on behalf of John F. Mollard and myself. See, we had this film script optioned a few years ago, and . . .

Looks like Brian may be getting back to me on some prior business later on this month, too.

Contemplating about going to Killercon in August.

SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE CASE OF THE DIABOLICAL NECROMANCER w/. Justin Holley had a scene tweaked, but the play is otherwise now ready for production. Debating whether or not I should do it myself, or . . . We’re also talking about what to do w/. THE DREGS now that Brendan Deneen is now an editor over at St. Martin’s Press.

Still picking at “The Azerbaijan Project.”

So far so good on THE ONE submission. Here’s hoping.

No word yet on the DAVI fantasy novella submission, but still very hopeful.

Finished Chapters Two and Four of PRIVATEER, still putzing w/. Chapter Three a bit, especially the beginning of it. Four is mostly done, Five hasn’t even been started yet, but Chapters Six through Fourteen are finished for the most part as well. (Yeah, when I work solo I bounce around a bit.)

Submitting another play to Heuer later on tonight after the Twins game.

Contacting Samuel French about A HALF DOZEN RAW EGGS AT AN AIRPORT Monday.

Tonight it is going to be press releases, finishing that pesky Chapter Three, and the start of that new project.

My eldest is having his first communion tomorrow and the fam is getting together to celebrate Mother’s Day.

And then, of course, the other stuff I presently cannot speak of.

Have a great and productive weekend all of you non-stalkers out there!!!

It’s snowing.

Yech.

But.

Today’s (e-)mail was far and beyond exemplary, so I guess I shouldn’t complain too much.

Heuer sent the signed by all parties involved contract for MARRIAGE . . . AFTER DEATH, so that’s officially now in the publication phase, and that means the proofs for RODRIGO GETS THE POSTMODERN BLUES should be arriving soon as well.

Received the e-mailed Sam’s Dot MinnSpec anthology contract for “Sabine Baring-Gould and the Werewolf.” The official title will be NORTHERN LIGHTS: 20 MINNSPEC TALES, and it is set for a September 1 release. A (really) small advance and a split royalty go with that one.

A royalty check from Skullvines Press for THEATRE OF THE MACABRE (thanks, guys!)

And the biggee: An advance check for xxxx figures, the details of which may be discussed at a later date. (Yeah, it’s for another one of those writing projects — I had the opportunity (and jumped all over it) to ask for something up front this time.)

But it’s still snowing outside.

Bah.

R Thomas Riley sez: “Looks like Roy C. Booth and I will be guesting on The Funky Werepig sometime in the very near future. Details are being hammered out now. Roy and I will be pimping The Official “The Day Lufberry Won It All” Film Page and discussing the experience of adapting the story into film form. There may also be some tease announcements, if I know Roy :)”

Just wrapped up the second draft of a play adaptation of a short story between Justin Holley and myself entitled SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE CASE OF THE DIABOLICAL NECROMANCER. I believe Justin will be quite pleased with it.

Editor Michael Merriam has informed me that my slightly revised cover short story Sabine Baring-Gould and the Werewolf from NECROTIC TISSUE #8 will be reprinted in the upcoming MinnSpec anthology published by Sam’s Dot Publishing out of Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

MinnSpec will also be hosting a reading and a signing at CONvergence, July 1 - 4 in Bloomington, MN, and I will be  part of all of that, too.

Huzzah.