David Moody's Blog, page 64

DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES and HATER

This post is really just a convoluted way of asking a pretty direct question, so please bear with me…

Summer’s definitely over now, and I’ve been looking back at some of the movies I managed to get to see. Without a doubt, DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES was the film I was looking forward to seeing most and, surprisingly, I thought it almost completely delivered.

It’ll serve little purpose if I review the movie this late in the day because I expect you’ve either a). already seen it and made up your own minds, or b). you’ve heard enough about it to know whether you want to see it or not. To summarise, though, it’s a technically stunning film with some great performances, an intense storyline, superb action scenes, and some of the most realistic animation you’re likely to see in a long time. I highly recommend it.

I’ve long been a fan of the APES movies. I’ve seen the original films countless number of times, and I’ve even managed to make it all the way through the abominable Tim Burton remake more than once. I was thinking about why I love the Apes concept so much when it struck me: it’s the same central conceit as zombies, isn’t it? Replace the apes with the undead, and you’ve got a very similar set-up. The apes are just another in a long line of variations on us versus them, and these movies work so well because of the increasingly thin line which separates one side from the other.

In fact, when I left the cinema after seeing DAWN, I couldn’t help thinking about HATER. With HATER, you could argue the only real difference between one side and the other is perspective. They’re pretty much otherwise indistinguishable from one another (unless you are a Hater, of course…).

Incredibly, it’s now seven long years since the HATER movie rights were first acquired, and although the cameras almost rolled back in 2009, there’s been very little movement on the project since then. But that might be about to change. I can’t say much at the moment (there’s not actually very much to say), but some positive initial discussions have been taking place with a view to getting HATER on the big screen.

So all this rambling finally leads me to my question. Seven years is a long time… do you still want to see a HATER movie? If so, what are your hopes and fears for the project? Personally, I think there’s never been a better time (as the success of our ape friends has illustrated), but what do you think? I’d really appreciate it if you could take a few minutes to let me know.

And as soon as I have any definite news, I’ll post it here.

DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES and HATER is a post from: David Moody - author of the HATER and AUTUMN books

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What’s THE DEAL? Free David Moody story up for grabs

You can get hold of a free and previously unpublished short story – THE DEAL – simply by signing up for my mailing list. A story of perverts and hit-men and contract killings, it’s available in Kindle, pdf and ePub formats, exclusively for newsletter subscribers. Fill in the following form and download details will be sent to you within the hour.

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What’s THE DEAL? Free David Moody story up for grabs is a post from: David Moody - author of the HATER and AUTUMN books

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ISOLATION – additional short stories

I’ve talked a lot about ISOLATION recently, but I’m conscious I haven’t told you very much about the four additional zombie stories which come bundled with the new novella. I’m going to put that right today.

THE COST OF LIVING and ISOLATION ebook releases represent all of my non-AUTUMN zombie output. If you remember, THE COST OF LIVING includes two previous versions of the story. With ISOLATION, I’ve included two previously published shorts, and two which were written specifically to close out this collection.

WHO WE USED TO BE

Originally appeared in John Joseph Adams’ excellent THE LIVING DEAD 2 anthology, and I’ve grown to think of it as the antithesis to THE COST OF LIVING. One minute, everyone in the world dies unexpectedly. A minute later, they all reanimate. The story focuses on a small family unit as they try to prolong their increasingly precarious existence for as long as possible…

MURIEL

Was written for an SFX magazine zombie special. I make no apologies for it being a more mainstream zombie tale than anything else I’ve written, as I was writing for a specific audience. It’s a quick, gory and fun tale of a lone survivor living on his nerves in his parents’ house.

TIGHTROPES

A brand new story set in a world which has just about managed to pull itself back from the brink of the zombie apocalypse. So when we’re used to living alongside the threat of the undead, how long will it be before we slip back into our old ways again…?

WISH I WAS HERE

I’ll say little about this final story, other than it was inspired by a thought that’s regularly struck me… No matter what the reason we’re given for the dead beginning to rise, at the outset there’s a stark difference between us and them. But the longer the situation goes on, the less noticeable those differences become. When the dead walk the Earth, can there be any winners?

I hope you enjoy ISOLATION – early reviews have been great (the ever-reliable BookBloke said: “I was once again blown away by the recognisable settings and relatable yet engrossing characters. A gripping read. Treated to four more short stories within this book, all with different takes on zombie fiction, it’s a must have for zombie lovers, people who love gore and violence and people who love stories with exceptional characterisation. It’s one that’s not to be missed”). And finally, for those who’ve been asking, in the coming weeks I’ll be formally announcing LAST OF THE LIVING – a new paperback release which will include ISOLATION, THE COST OF LIVING, and all the other stories I’ve talked about today.

ISOLATION – additional short stories is a post from: David Moody - author of the HATER and AUTUMN books

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The Black Fang Betrayal

And now for something completely different…

I made a decision early in 2014 to push myself out of my comfort zone more often this year, and the result of one such excursion is released today. THE BLACK FANG BETRAYAL is a collaborative novel produced by J Thorn and written by Thorn, TW Brown, Michaelbrent Collings, Mainak Dhar, J.C. Eggleton, Glynn James, Stephen Knight, T.W. Piperbrook, J.R. Rain, and myself.

Levi Phillips is a warlock living in the woods of rural Ohio. With his apprentice, Matthew, Levi operates one of the most ferocious covens in the world, known as The Black Fang. Managing the coven like an international corporation, Levi controls its enormous wealth while running a moonshine operation as a front. But when a plot to assassinate Levi is exposed, the warlock decides it’s time to destroy The Black Fang and the destruction could create a new beginning.

The Black Fang Betrayal features today’s best horror, dark fantasy and thriller writers collaborating on a unique and fascinating novel. Armed with nothing but a prompt and a character name, each author became a warlock of The Black Fang and wrote a first-person account as a member of the coven. Using themes and sequences woven throughout the complete narrative, a cohesive page-turner emerges.

It was great to be a part of such a unique project, and folks who’ve read the book so far seem to have really enjoyed it. It’s available at the astonishingly low introductory price of $0.99 for a limited time, so please do check it out. Visit www.theblackfangbetrayal.com for more information and an opportunity to enter an exclusive competition. Can you match the authors to their stories?

Available from: AMAZON.COM | AMAZON.CO.UK | IBOOKS | NOOK | KOBO

The Black Fang Betrayal is a post from: David Moody - author of the HATER and AUTUMN books

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Guest post – Death in a Northern Town author Peter Mckeirnon talks about his influences

Today I’d like to introduce you to PETER MCKEIRNON – author of DEATH IN A NORTHERN TOWN and its recently released sequel. I got chatting to Peter a while back and was really interested in his take on the zombie apocalypse (which feels similarly low-fi to AUTUMN, but far funnier). In this guest post he talks about his influences.

I have never seriously thought about my influences. Usually I am asked who my favourite author is or what my favourite zombie movie is, but when Dave asked me to write a guest article about what inspires my writing I began to consider, for the first time, what my real influences are. The answers take me back to my childhood and the horror movies, comedy shows and ultimately the town in which I grew up.

I grew up on a council estate in Runcorn, Cheshire, UK. One of the great things about the area I lived was that once a week a man driving an old Ford Escort would pull up at the top of our road, open the boot and rent out the shittiest collection of pirated movies you had ever seen. But within this mishmash of badly copied 1980s straight to video movies were classic horrors such as Killer Clowns from Outer Space, Munchies (camp Critters rip off), The Evil Dead, The Fly… the list goes on. What was so brilliant was you could rent up to 15 movies a week for £5 and the nice illegal video rental man really didn’t care that a kid who should be at home watching The Never Ending Story was instead renting copies of The Stuff, Class of Nuke ‘Em High, Troll, Garbage Pail Kids The Movie (not really for children, adults or anyone for that matter!) and Vamp.

Watching horror from a young age changed me greatly and where other kids on my estate played football and argued over who was going to be Kenny Dalgleish, Ian Rush or Peter Beardsley, I was busy scaring the shit out of family members by hiding behind doors and appearing at windows dressed up as a vampire or a werewolf! This was where my love affair with horror began.

I remember in my early teens my mother bought me a TV-video combo. With no TV guide and only 4 channels to choose from, I used to pick a station at random and record through the night. The next day I would examine my findings, hoping to uncover some horror gold I had never seen before. Admittedly, it was largely fruitless venture but it did introduce me to classic Godzilla movies that Channel 4 used to screen as part of their late night Creature Feature series, though they were televised so late that my video would only catch the first 30 minutes or so before the tape would run out.

It was also around this time my Dad had satellite TV installed and my long standing relationship with comedy began. My evenings were filled with British classics such as The Young Ones, The Comic Strip Presents, Kevin Turvey, Alexei Sayle, Monty Python, Ben Elton, Filthy Rich and Catflap, The Goodies, Red Dwarf and Black Adder. They all became part of my regular TV diet.

Rik Mayall, his characters and his writing, was a massive influence on me and I would re watch episodes of The Young Ones and Bottom over and over again until I could recite every word (something I can still do, much to my wife’s annoyance!). I bought a book of the scripts for Bottom and on reading them I began to imagine the writing dynamic between both Rik and Adrian Edmondson, how they would formulate their jokes and tie them into anarchic plot lines. From that point on comedy became more than just something I enjoyed watching, it was now something I wanted to do.

It wasn’t ’til years later, after several failed attempts at writing sitcoms and sketch shows, that my love of horror and comedy came together and I began developing Death in a Northern Town.

I was in a creative lull. I had an idea for a new sitcom but lacked the will to see it through. I had spent my 20s telling everyone I was a writer but in reality produced very little and what I did was rejected by every production company I submitted to. I was dejected and ready to throw in the towel and give up writing all together. Then I downloaded a Kindle app for my phone and everything changed. I discovered a whole new world of literature by authors I had never heard of before. Self-published authors that had gone it alone. I felt inspired to write again and in January 2013 and I began working on a zombie apocalypse dark comedy set in my home town.

Choosing to write about zombies was a no brainer (pun intended). I love zombie movies and I love zombie literature but I often found it difficult to relate to the characters. Everybody had guns, the military would always feature or one of the main characters would be ex-Special Forces, something to give them an advantage against the ever increasing undead population. I asked myself what would happen if there was a zombie outbreak in Runcorn. There are no guns here and the military wouldn’t bother with a small industrial town in the North West of England. We’d be left to rot!

I then began thinking about the people here. We’re strange bunch us Runcornians and we often find humour in the bleakest of situations. Here’s an example: My friend’s father passed away. It was expected as he’d been living with terminal cancer for several years. On the morning of his passing, about an hour or so after his death, my friend’s family had gathered together in the living room. Nobody was talking. Instead they sat in silence, quietly coming to terms with their loss. Nobody noticed that my friend and his brother had disappeared until they re-emerged, walking into the living room with a wardrobe on their shoulders like they were carrying a coffin.

“What the hell are you doing?” my friend’s mother asked.

“Practising,” he replied.

So, to conclude: pirate videos, Godzilla, alternative comedy and the glorious array of people I share my town are what have influenced my writing and I can honestly say that before I started writing this article I had never considered this before.

I would like to thank David Moody for asking me to contribute to this site. Not only is it a great honour for me, writing this article has given me the opportunity revisit memories and events I hadn’t thought about for a long time and for the first time, really examine what influences my writing.

Now I think it’s about time I finally got round to watching the classic Godzilla movies I started all those years a go!

Thanks Pete! You can download the first Death in a Northern Town book free (Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk | Smashwords), and the second book in the series is now available. Follow Peter on Twitter and Facebook.

Guest post – Death in a Northern Town author Peter Mckeirnon talks about his influences is a post from: David Moody - author of the HATER and AUTUMN books

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Isolation Locations

I hope by now you’ve had chance to read ISOLATION, and I hope you enjoyed it. Early reviews certainly have been reassuringly positive. Shadowlocked said “Isolation is a taut piece of character driven writing“, and BookBloke said “it’s a must have for zombie lovers, people who love gore and violence and people who love stories with exceptional characterisation“.

One thing you probably didn’t know, is that the park-keepers bungalow – the location where most of the action in ISOLATION takes place – actually exists. When we were planning the original short movie, I did a little location filming which you can see embedded below. It’s only a minute long, and it was filmed at completely the wrong time of year, but hopefully seeing where Keith and Anna make their last stand will enhance your enjoyment of the book.

This footage was, in fact, taken in a park near my parents’ house in Birmingham where I grew up. Like Keith, as a child I spent many days mucking around in the streams and fields in the park, building dens and hiding from imaginary monsters and aliens and the like. Fortunately for me, unlike Keith, all my monsters were make-believe.

ISOLATION is available from AMAZON.COM | AMAZON.CO.UK | AMAZON.DE | AMAZON.ES | AMAZON.IT | AMAZON.CA | AMAZON.COM.AU

Isolation Locations is a post from: David Moody - author of the HATER and AUTUMN books

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Isolation

Cast your minds back a few years, and some of you might remember ISOLATION – a short film project I announced along with Will Wright but which, for various reasons, never made it to screen (though I hope it still might). I’m pleased to announce the release of an adaptation of my original screenplay. You can pre-order it now, and it’ll be available to download from tomorrow (20th).

ISOLATION (which also includes four additional zombie short stories – two of which were previously unpublished) is a companion novella to THE COST OF LIVING. There are no connections between the stories, but they’ll appear together in a combined print edition later this year. Here’s the ISOLATION blurb:

Keith’s in his early twenties. No girlfriend, no hobbies, no future. He spends his days working in an office and his evenings, weekends and just about all his free time looking after his alcoholic dad.

And then the zombie apocalypse changes everything.

Suddenly Keith’s free. For the first time in a long time, he’s got nothing to worry about (apart from several hundred thousand reanimated corpses heading his way).

But then he meets Anna, and everything changes again. Cocky, cool, confident… she’s everything Keith isn’t. Holed-up together in an isolated bungalow, besieged by the living dead, will they survive, or will they tear each other apart before the dead can get anywhere near?

Download ISOLATION for the paltry sum of $2.99/£1.99 from AMAZON.COM | AMAZON.CO.UK | AMAZON.DE | AMAZON.ES | AMAZON.IT | AMAZON.CA | AMAZON.COM.AU

Cover art is again by the brilliant David Shires and, as with THE COST OF LIVING, I’m experimenting with Amazon exclusivity for now. If you want the ePub version of the book, simply buy the Kindle edition, then send me a copy of your receipt and I’ll email an ePub version back to you asap.

I’m very proud of this one. I hope you enjoy it.

Isolation is a post from: David Moody - author of the HATER and AUTUMN books

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What Works For Me

It’s been several months since I last posted anything in my What Works For Me series of writing tips/ thoughts. There are several very good reasons for that. Most importantly, I’ve been spending a lot of time trying to work out what exactly does work for me.

You’ll probably have seen endless debate online over the last few months about the merits of independent versus traditional publishing, and also about the position/ value of indie authors as highlighted by the ongoing Hachette vs. Amazon debacle.

I started out Indie. I was Indie before most. I’m so old school that I genuinely used to email pdf and Word versions of AUTUMN to interested folks back in the day. I did well from it, and if I hadn’t done what I’d done, I’d probably have never written HATER and it might not have found its way onto the desk of the folks who passed it on to Guillermo del Toro all those years ago… When Thomas Dunne Books of New York made an offer for the publishing rights back in 2007, I didn’t hesitate to accept.

So now we’re another seven years or so down the line, and the marketplace has changed beyond all recognition. Indie authors are in a better place now: more accepted, and with better tools and technologies at their disposal.

THE COST OF LIVING proved to be a turning point for me. I’ve been stunned by the success of my little ebook – it’s sold remarkably well and has opened my eyes to the full potential of independent publishing again. With the recent relaunch/ rebranding of INFECTED BOOKS, I feel like I’ve regained the control you inevitably lose when you publish traditionally, and I’m ready to take full advantage of that.

So, to stop a long story getting any longer, I’ll just say this: for now, although I’m technically what you’d call a Hybrid author, I feel 100% Indie again. So what does this mean? Well, for a start you should watch for another surprise release later this week (you can pre-order it now – I’ll tell you more tomorrow), and then look out for STRANGERS – my brand new, full-length novel, coming from Infected Books in November this year.

What Works For Me is a post from: David Moody - author of the HATER and AUTUMN books

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The Night of the Triffids

NIGHT OF THE TRIFFIDS is a book I avoided reading for a very long time. As many of you might know, whenever I’m asked to cite my favourite book or the book that’s had the biggest influence on me, I always talk about John Wyndham’s seminal DAY OF THE TRIFFIDS, and the idea of a non-Wyndham sequel never appealed to me in the slightest. But then I got to know the author, Simon Clark. I’d heard a lot about Simon when HATER was first released, with people mentioning my book alongside his BLOOD CRAZY (a great read which I must feature here in the near future). Simon and I both had stories appear in the MAMMOTH BOOK OF BODY HORROR and we met at an event to launch the book a few years back. I caught up with him again at a convention a while later, and was able to talk to him about all things triffid-related. It was immediately clear that this was no cash-in: he wrote a sequel because of his love of Wyndham’s original.

First published in 1991 and given a long-overdue re-release this month, the book takes place some twenty-five years after the events of DAY. Here’s the synopsis. Click the link below for my thoughts.

“In John Wyndham’s classic bestseller The Day of the Triffids, the world has been overwhelmed by killer plants that have blinded almost the entire population. As the novel ends, Wyndham’s narrator scientist Bill Masen is escaping, with his wife and four-year-old son, to the Isle of Wight where a small colony of survivors is holding out. Simon Clark’s sequel picks up the story twenty-five years on.

The survivors are safe, for the time being at least, on their island, where they have continued efforts to combat the triffids, while also striving in various ways to build a new civilization – in a Mother House, for example, women spend their lives endlessly giving birth. Elsewhere in the world, similar colonies cling to survival, while the triffids persist in their attempts to destroy humanity.

One morning Bill Masen’s son, David, now grown up, wakes to a world plunged into darkness. Now, the triffids have an advantage over even sighted humanity.”

It’s fair to say NIGHT OF THE TRIFFIDS wasn’t at all what I was expecting. I doubt any book could match Wyndham’s ground-breaking original, and all credit to Simon for taking on the challenge of trying to continue the story. He sensibly puts more than two decade’s space between DAY and NIGHT, and that works in his favour because it makes the book feel less like a direct continuation of the first novel, more an exploration of the vividly imagined post-apocalyptic world Wyndham created. As well as providing a fascinating look at how the Isle of Wight community has developed over the ensuing years, Simon also introduces another community of people who’ve adopted a wholly different approach to survival. After crash-landing a plane whilst investigating the reason for the sudden darkness which has overtaken the planet, David Masen is picked up by the crew of a steam ship from America. The bulk of the rest of the novel takes place in New York and surrounding areas, and the story takes on a wholly unexpected steampunk feel.

I very much enjoyed NIGHT OF THE TRIFFIDS. As I’ve already said, it wasn’t at all the kind of book I was expecting. It moves at a relentless speed and manages to maintain a respectful distance from the original whilst remaining indelibly connected. There are some great images to be found here: steam-driven New York is a particular highlight, and if the thought of sixty feet tall triffids rampaging through Times Square doesn’t get you, I don’t know what will.

Perhaps the only real part of NIGHT which didn’t sit well with me was the triffids themselves, and I think that’s purely because of the differences between mine and Simon’s interpretation of the killer plants. I’ve always envisaged them as relatively unintelligent organisms, instinctively hunting and killing to survive. For me, one of the most chilling aspects of Wyndham’s original was the way the human race was undone by the combination of the unemotional triffid menace and the blinding of the vast majority of the population. It seemed particularly frightening to see mankind overcome by a relatively unassuming enemy. In NIGHT, Simon has his triffids evolving, mutating and communicating to become an altogether different kind of threat; more mankind’s equal, they’re seemingly vying for control of the planet. Although that jarred somewhat with me and my interpretation of the original novel, it makes for some incredibly exciting scenes.

After my initial (unwarranted) reservations, I’d recommend NIGHT OF THE TRIFFIDS to anyone with an interest in the Wyndham original. Simon’s story is very entertaining and respectfully written. In some ways the book feels shackled by the reputation of the classic which precedes it and I can’t help thinking that had it not had triffids in the title, NIGHT might have been even more successful. It is, after all, a damn fine and very exciting post-apocalyptic novel.

NIGHT OF THE TRIFFIDS is available now from Robinson (Amazon / Book Depository / Waterstones). A full cast audio adaptation will be available soon from Big Finish – click here for details.

The Night of the Triffids is a post from: David Moody - author of the HATER and AUTUMN books

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THE SPACES BETWEEN – Competition winners

I’m sorry it’s taken so long to announce this… unfortunately I’m still waiting for one of the winners to get back to me and confirm they’re happy to take the prize. Anyway, without further ado, please join me in congratulating the following people who will be appearing in THE SPACES BETWEEN novels.

Overall winner (who will appear as a major character in all four books as well as receiving an illustration of themselves in a key scene and signed first editions of all the novels): Alexandria Amorim.

Runners up (who’ll appear as a supporting character in one book each and who’ll receive signed first editions of all the novels): Chris Shaver, Shannon O’Clair, Nicky Downes (and one reluctant other still to be announced!).

I received an incredible three and a half thousand entries to the contest, so thanks to everyone who entered. I’ve drawn an additional ten names which I’m keeping to myself at the moment. I have another project in the early planning stages which involves a serial killer and a large number of victims. I’ll be getting in touch with those ten folks at some point in the future to see if they want to play dead in another new book…

Thanks, everyone, for your tremendous support with this contest. Right – back to writing the books!

THE SPACES BETWEEN – Competition winners is a post from: David Moody - author of the HATER and AUTUMN books

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