Jonathan Green's Blog, page 146

Free Comic Book Day 2015

As it was Free Comic Book Day today, I dragged the family to Forbidden Planet in London so that I could pick up the special FCBD 2000AD.

As it turned out, m'colleagues Al Ewing and Cav Scott, along with Rob Williams, were all signing the special FCBD Doctor Who comic from Titan, so I picked up that as well.

Rob Williams, Al Ewing and Cav Scott at Forbidden Planet for Free Comic Book Day 2015
While I was in the store I stumbled across this...

You Are The Hero on sale at Forbidden Planet London
and this...

I have a short story in Resurrection Engines, although strangely there were no Pax Britannia books on the Steampunk bookcase
and this...

Remember - the official launch of SHARKPUNK is being held at Forbidden Planet London next Saturday, 9th May 2015
I also picked up these objects of desire...


and then headed over to the Covent Garden Games Workshop store to check out the new Assassinorum Execution Force boxed game.



So all in all, not a bad Free Comic Book Day. :-)

Sharkpunk Saturday - Sharkpunk making waves already

It's only been out a day, but SHARKPUNK is already making waves across the Internet.

You can read two ace reviews - one here and another here - and then there's this...

SHARKPUNK - Publication Day!

After many months - nay, years! - of preparation, SHARKPUNK is finally here!


SHARKPUNK An anthology of killer shark stories
"This collection is well worthy of your time. Every story is a winner"
The Eloquent Page

Sharks – the ultimate predators, masters of their watery domain, a world that is entirely alien and inhospitable to man. So many aspects of the shark are associated with humankind’s most primal fears. The tell-tale dorsal fin slicing through the water, the dead eyed-stare, the gaping jaws full to unforgiving teeth, the remorseless drive to kill and feed…

Inspired by such classic pulp movies as Jaws and Deep Blue Sea – as well as such ludicrous delights as Sharknado and Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus – the stories contained within are rip-roaring page-turners and slow-build chillers that celebrate all things savage, pulp and selachian.

Covering the whole range of speculative fiction genres, from horror and Steampunk, through to SF and WTF, these are stories with bite!

Come on in. The water’s fine…


Peter and the Invisible Shark, Jonathan Oliver Blood in the Water, Den Patrick The Lickspittle Leviathan, David Lee Stone Sharkadelic, Ian WhatesShirley, Amy & Andy Taylor Deep Black Space, Toby Frost The Shark in the Heart, David Tallerman Deep Red Bells, Josh Reynolds Sharkcop 2: Feeding Frenzy, Alec Worley Sharkbait, Richard Salter Goblin, Kim Lakin-Smith Blood Relations, Andrew Lane Feast of the Shark God, C L Werner Le Shark, Laurel Sills The Serial Killer Who Thought She Was a Shark, Jenni Hill Rise of the Übershark, Robert Spalding Swimming with the Fishes, Steven Savile Ambergris, Kit Cox Silent Waters, Running Deep, Gary McMahon YOU ARE THE SHARK, Al Ewing & Sarah Peploe

SHARKPUNK - the first review!

SHARKPUNK  is published tomorrow, but already the reviews are starting to come in.

The first can be read here at The Eloquent Page. Here's a taster:

Sharkpunk is twenty unique visions of what it means to be either predator or prey. This anthology contains stories that don’t just feature sharks, they also dissect the mind of a perfectly evolved killer. Nestled deep in the pages of this collection you’ll find everything from stories set in feudal Japan to tales featuring men with an impressive olfactory sense. Steampunk, horror, science fiction and thriller blend together to create a collection that revels in the raw, bloody savagery of an apex carnivore... this collection is well worthy of your time. Every story is a winner in my opinion and they are all a great deal of fun. In all honesty I’d have great difficulty picking a favourite.

Don't forget, you can purchase  SHARKPUNK  direct from the publisher and from midnight tonight until midnight Friday you can use the discount code SHARKS! to get 10% off anything on Snowbooks.com.

The Sharkpunk Interview - Laurel Sills

Laurel Sills is a fantasy reader, scribbler, and co-editor of holdfast magazine. She is also now a SHARKPUNK contributor...


Sharkpunk: What, do you think, is the reason for people's enduring fascination with sharks? 
Laurel Sills: As an English girl growing up on an island where all of our natural predators have been wiped out, the idea that something that powerful, something that might actually want to eat me, could just swan up to our beaches if it wanted, scared the living bejesus out of me as a child. Maybe that has something to do with our collective fascination. The ocean has few barriers, and although logic tells us that the great white is unlikely to be hanging out around Brighton pier, it’s hard to escape the idea that it could be. It goes back to the idea of something wanting to eat us. We have a rather reduced risk of being eaten by badgers, and the idea of being eaten is so alien, so bizarre, that perhaps we latch on to the one, tiny shred of possibility that we could be eaten by sharks on our bank holiday day trip. There are of course still a lot of other animals out there that would like to eat us, but, you know, lions can’t swim over and drag themselves onto our shores to feast on our blue goose-pimpled bikini-clad bodies...can they?!

SP: What was the inspiration behind your story Le Shark? 
LS: As much as I love Jaws and other shark films, I’m sure I’m not alone in thinking, how hard is it really to just stay out of the water?! So I wanted to play with that a bit. I also love a good old-fashioned deal with the devil gone wrong (that deal can never really work out can it?) so thought it would be fun to combine the two.

SP: What challenges, or surprises, did you encounter in writing your story? 
LS: I think I went into it thinking I’d just write a silly story about a shark god, (which I did!) but it surprised me that it got a lot darker than I thought it would. There is a point in my story where you’re not sure whether The Shark is real or a figment of Carlos’ imagination, and I think a lot of the story is about Carlos’ inner shark. How far is he willing to go for success or to protect himself? I also wanted to make sure that Leslie, the other main character in the story, was not purely a love interest or a victim. I had to think hard about making sure I didn’t fall into the tired tropes women often fall into, and I hope I’ve achieved that.

SP: If you had to pick a favourite shark, which would it be? 
LS: Probably the basking shark, because me and a friend of mine found a dead baby one (which was still pretty big) washed up on the beach in St Ives when I was little. I liked the fact that they were gentle giants.

SP: Do you have a favourite fictional shark (in books, comics, films, or video games)? 
LS: It would have to be Sharky of Sharky and George. I used to watch it with my dad and it reminds me of eating Rice Krispies in my pyjamas. Also, a shark detective? Yes. Just yes.

Thanks, Laurel!



Laurel Sills co-edits holdfast magazine with Lucy Smee. Holdfast is a free, quarterly online speculative fiction magazine, which is bringing out its first print anthology in 2015. She used to be in a touring band but gave that up in order to be able to afford regular meals. Laurel now works in publishing and holds a Master’s degree in creative writing from Goldsmiths University. She was also on the judging panel for the British Fantasy Society Robert Holdstock award for Best Fantasy Novel 2014. Go to www.holdfastmagazine.com and follow her @laurelsills and @holdfastmag.

Guest Author April - Lavie Tidhar

My latest novels are A Man Lies Dreaming, which is out in the UK now in paperback (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Man-Lies-Dreaming-Lavie-Tidhar/dp/144476294X/) and is about Adolf Hitler as a disgraced private eye in 1930s London, and The Violent Century, which just came out in hardcover in the US (http://www.amazon.com/Violent-Century-Novel-Lavie-Tidhar/dp/125006449X/), which is a sort of parallel history of the 20th century with Nietzschean Ubermenschen, a love story and a murder mystery. I also just published the dual anthologies Jews vs Zombies (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Jews-vs-Zombies-Rebecca-Levene-ebook/dp/B00TQT6L9K/) and Jews vs Aliens (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Jews-vs-Aliens-Naomi-Alderman-ebook/dp/B00TQT6L4U/) co-edited with Rebecca Levene, which raise money for charity.

The Sharkpunk Interview - Jenni Hill

I first met Jenni Hill when she worked as an editor at Abaddon Books. (It was Jenni who saw  Pax Britannia: Anno Frankenstein  through to publication.) Jenni is currently Commissioning Editor for Orbit UK, but as well as guiding writers to publication she is also a writer in her own right...


What, do you think, is the reason for people's enduring fascination with sharks?We’re fascinated by anything that can knock us off the top of the food chain. Us monkeys worked hard to get up here at the top, but we fall in the water with a shark and bam, another species makes us its dinner. We can’t help but be fascinated by it. People’s fascination with predators – from serial killers to endangered species, is a big part of the story I submitted for this anthology.What was the inspiration behind your story ‘The Serial Killer Who Thought She Was A Shark’?I enjoy shows such as Hannibal and Dexter but I wanted to write about a female serial killer, as they’re so rare in fiction. I also discovered that in Australia,sharks ‘tweet’ at surfers when they’re nearby, and I wondered how we might use that technology in future. I also started reading about shark fin soup, how we’re combating the cruel fishing practices around that, and how absurd yet kind of wonderful it is that some of us – charities, ecologists etc. – are often trying so hard to help all these endangered species that want to eat us alive.What challenges, or surprises, did you encounter in writing your story?I discovered that death scenes, especially gory ones, can be really difficult to write. I think I put the manuscript away for at least a month or two, and only urging from Jon and from my husband made me pick it up again, grit my teeth and write!If you had to pick a favourite shark, which would it be?Stethacanthus, a.k.a. the anvil shark. He’s a prehistoric shark I saw on Walking with Dinosaurs and he looks absolutely ridiculous.


Do you have a favourite fictional shark (in books, comics, films, or video games)?I’ve a soft spot for another ridiculous shark –King Shark in DC Comics, especially when written by Gail Simone in Secret Six, where his battlecry was “I’m a shark! I’m a shaaaarrk!” Memorably, when the team were shown their personal hells by a supervillain, the rest of the team saw some pretty angsty, dark stuff, whereas King Shark found himself trapped in a restaurant where all the food was vegetarian.
Jenni Hill has written short stories for several anthologies and is also working on a fantasy novel. She lives in London with her husband and their several million books, but you can find her on Twitter at @Jenni_Hill.

Thought for the Day

"Comic writers don't eat SCONES! We live on a diet of booze, ego and self-loathing!"

~ Gordon Rennie, comic writer

Guest Author April - Graham McNeill

The project taking up the bulk of my writing time just now is a Horus Heresy novel called The Crimson King, which is a direct follow up to my previous novel, A Thousand Sons.

At the end of that novel, Magnus the Red - the titular king - and the Thousand Sons legion had barely escaped the burning of their homeworld at the hands of the Space Wolves and found themselves exiled on the Planet of the Sorcerers. The Crimson King follows the remnants of the Fifteenth Legion in the wake of that battle as they seek to restore their former greatness in the face of inevitable damnation, relentless hunters and revelations from their own ranks that threaten all they once believed in.

The Crimson King will be available later in 2016, but you can prepare for that moment by reading A Thousand Sons by following this link.

Sharkpunk Saturday - Ian Whates

To fans of science fiction, Ian Whates will need no introduction. An award-winning writer, editor and publisher, I was delighted when he agreed to submit a story to  SHARKPUNK .
Sharkpunk: What, do you think, is the reason for people's enduring fascination with sharks?Ian Whates: Sharks are streamlined killing machines, perfectly adapted to their environment.  Enough of the hunter-gatherer’s fear of predation lurks in our genetic heritage to make them unnerving.  At the same time we can’t help but admire just how fit for purpose they are.  Add to that the fact that because of their habitat you don’t see a shark coming (unless you’re tooled up with specialist equipment) until that ominous fin breaks the surface (cue theme music to Jaws), and how could we not be fascinated?  People are intrigued by killers in general, whether human or animal – raptors, big cats, wolves – sharks have all that going for them with an added dose of the sinister.
SP: What was the inspiration behind your story “Sharkadelic”?IW: A few years ago I watched a documentary investigating why great white sharks had disappeared for more than a year from a territory they were known to frequent.  The conclusion was that a pod of orcas were responsible, that this particular group had perfected a method of preying on sharks, even great whites, and their presence was enough to cause the sharks to flee.  I found the idea that even an apex predator such as the great white had reason to fear, and possessed the intelligence to know it was outmatched and communicate that to others of its kind, remarkable.  That was the starting point for the story.  Where the rest of it came from, I’ve no idea, except that I was able to weave in persistent but unsubstantiated reports of great whites being spotted off the coast of Cornwall.  Other than that, well… making stuff up is what I do. 
SP: What challenges, or surprises, did you encounter in writing your story?IW: I’d never honestly considered writing a shark-related story before being approached for this anthology.  When I was, two stories occurred to me, both very different.  One was a fairly action-packed pulp-ish tale involving genetically enhanced sharks being utilised to guard a precious shipping convoy (which seemed perfectly in line with the anthology’s brief), the other was a psychological horror set in the art world.  It was the latter story that gripped me, that demanded to be written. To be honest, the story itself flowed with uncharacteristic ease, though I reworked the end section a couple of times before I was happy with it.  My greatest challenge was whether or not the anthology’s editor would like a story whose nature veered away from the guidelines.  Fortunately, he did, and “Sharkaneer”, the sharks-guarding-shipping story, remains unwritten.  Sharkpunk 2, maybe? [SP: Definitely!]
SP: If you had to pick a favourite shark, which would it be?IW: Ooh, that’s a toughie.  I’m going to keep the definition of ‘shark’ pretty narrow, so that I’m not tempted to consider such graceful giants as the manta ray, but even then I’m not sure I can decide between three: the basking shark because they’re so huge and atypically harmless, and because I stand a chance of actually seeing one off the UK coast someday (I haven’t yet, though I have twice been out on boats looking for them), the great white because they are so formidable, not to mention persecuted, and the hammerhead, because, I mean, how could you not?  They are so stunningly bizarre.  Okay, three is cheating, but hey, I’m an author, I’m allowed to bend the rules.
SP: Do you have a favourite fictional shark (in books, comics, films, or video games)?IW: I’m going to have to be very predictable here and go with the shark in Jaws, primarily because I’ve never really taken note of sharks in fiction, being fascinated enough by them in real life.  So, when it comes to picking a favourite fictional shark I’m choosing from a field of, ehm… one. (Unless you include the sequels, but hey, we all know that the first was the best.)
Thanks, Ian!

Ian Whates lives in a quiet Cambridgeshire village with his partner, Helen, and Honey, a manic cocker spaniel.  Ian is the author of six novels to date, most recently  Pelquin’s Comet , released in April 2015. Also, the City of 100 Rows trilogy (Angry Robot), and the Noise duology (Solaris). Sixty-odd of his short stories have appeared in various venues, two of which were shortlisted for BSFA Awards, and his second collection Growing Pains (PS Publishing) appeared in 2013. Ian has edited some two dozen anthologies and in 2014 one of these, Solaris Rising 2, was shortlisted for the Philip K. Dick Award. He has served a term as Overseas Director of SFWA and spent five years as chairman the BSFA, stepping down in 2013. In his spare time Ian runs multiple award-winning independent publisher NewCon Press, which he founded by accident in 2006. Find out more at www.ianwhates.co.uk.
And don't forget - SHARKPUNK is published on Friday!