Jason Rodriguez's Blog, page 14

Today will most likely be the last day that you can download...

Today will most likely be the last day that you can download Pinocchio, or The Stars Are Not Wanted Now for free. Downloads have been really good. We’re currently at 325 and I’m hoping it can get to 400 by the end of the day. As an added bonus, The End of Stars is free for today only. The End of Stars is my most downloaded title to-date, coming in just shy of 1,000 so far. People seem to dig it and maybe you will too. The End of Stars is a fairy tale about the repercussions of climate change; the story about a girl who discovers the sky is falling and tries to warn the people of her village before it’s too late. 

Pinocchio, or The Stars Are Not Wanted Now also has a back-up story in it, as well, called “Anita’s Dreams.” Here’s an excerpt:

Anita always seems to dream about things that really happened, even if she never knew they happened. Like the time she saw President Lincoln give a speech. She had this dream after her teacher taught her about slavery. Anita thought slavery sounded like a terrible thing, which it was. Anita’s mother told her that the world has changed a lot since then, but nothing ever changes all at once. Her mother looked upset, kind of like the T-Rex who couldn’t catch the dinosaur no matter how hard he tried. Anita didn’t understand what her mother was talking about, but that night she dreamed about President Lincoln. He was talking about ending a war that was being fought to free the slaves, but it didn’t sound like he was talking about freedom.

“What did it sound like?” her mother asked the next morning.

“It sounded like he was talking about saving the country.” Anita replied.

“Well, that was the first step,” her mother said.

Go jump on it, before the book goes up to $1.99.

My buddy Chris Piers got to patrol with real-life superhero...

My buddy Chris Piers got to patrol with real-life superhero Phoenix Jones while he was in Seattle. Today starts the first of his four-part interview with the masked vigilante and…honestly…it’s looking like it’s going to be pretty awesome. You should read it.

Good morning everyone! Yesterday was a strong day for Pinocchio,...

Good morning everyone! Yesterday was a strong day for Pinocchio, or The Stars Are Not Wanted Now, which was downloaded 173 times over the past 24 hours. It’s still free today and tomorrow, so be sure to get it! If you already downloaded the book, please feel free to leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads. 

Today I have two bonus freebies up. The Little Particle That Could (illustrated by Noel Tuazon) and The Boy Who Could See Through Mountains are both free for today only! So get on it!

"Uniquely American institution known as the neighborhood bar. Reading left to right are Mr. Anthony..."

“Uniquely American institution known as the neighborhood bar. Reading left to right are Mr. Anthony O’Toole, proprietor who waters his drinks like geraniums but who stands foursquare for peace and quiet and for booths for ladies. This is Mr. Joseph J. Callahan, an unregistered bookie, whose entire life is any sporting event with two sides and a set of odds. His idea of a meeting at the summit is any dialogue between a catcher and a pitcher with more than one man on base. And this animated citizen is every anonymous bettor who ever dropped rent money on a horse race, a prize fight, or a floating crap game, and who took out his frustrations and his insolvency on any vulnerable fellow barstool companion within arm’s and fist’s reach. And this is Mr. Luther Dingle, a vacuum-cleaner salesman whose volume of business is roughly that of a valet at a hobo convention. He’s a consummate failure in almost everything but is a good listener and has a prominent jaw. And these two unseen gentlemen are visitors from outer space. They are about to alter the destiny of Luther Dingle by leaving him a legacy, the kind you can’t hardly find no more. In just a moment, a sad-faced perennial punching bag who missed even the caboose of life’s gravy train will take a short constitutional into that most unpredictable region that we refer to as the Twilight Zone.”

-

“Mr. Dingle, the Strong” may not be the best Twilight Zone episode but it has some serious charm and, my God, that opening. And these guys…best/worst alien design of all time:

Good morning!No, seriously…this is a Good. Morning. Free for...

Good morning!

No, seriously…this is a Good. Morning. 

Free for the Kindle Fire, Kindle Fire HD, Kindle for Android, Kindle for iPad, and the Amazon Cloud Reader (which is basically a free Kindle reader for your web browser) over the next three days: Pinocchio, or The Stars Are Not Wanted Now, an 11-page comic story that I did with Scott White. The story was originally published in Dark Horse Comics’ Once Upon a Time Machine, a collection of 24 futuristic fairy tales. Think of this book as a teaser to the larger anthology which, I must say, would make for a wonderful present for that special geek in your life. If you don’t believe me, just ask the LA Times. If you want to see how beautiful it is…well, here’s a page:

But wait! There’s more! Also in this collection is my new short story “Anita’s Dreams,” about a young girl whose dreams take her to remarkable places and times. This story is part of my monthly sci-fi stories for kids and young adults which so far include:

The Girl Who Could Live in Yesterday -A fairy tale about not being able to change the past, no matter how many times you try.
The Little Particle That Could (illustrated by Noel Tuazon) - The story about a graviton who wants to meet a photon but just can’t seem to catch him.
The Monster Hunter - The story about a boy who learns how to keep the monsters out of his bedroom, but soon learns that “monster” is a relative term.
The End of Stars -  A young girl discovers that the sky is falling and tries to warn her neighbors before their village is destroyed.
The Boy Who Could See Through Mountains and Other Stories - Indalecio can see his family’s vile and evil enemies through the neighboring mountain range but can’t get close enough to see what makes them vile or evil.

These short stories are occasionally free but, when they’re not, they’re only 99-cents each! And you don’t need to own a Kindle for any of these books! You can read them on your iPad with the Kindle app, any Droid-tablet with the Kindle app, and even in your web browser with the Amazon Cloud Reader.

Are you still reading this? FREE COMICS GO DOWNLOAD!

DONE-ZO!

Formatted the 11-page comic story “Pinocchio, or The Stars Are Not Wanted Now” for the kindle - panel magnification and everything. Edited and formatted the back-up story “Anita’s Dreams.” Dropped in a table of contents, an author/artist bio page, a related works page. Got it checked-out, uploaded it to Amazon. It should be available tonight. I believe I’ll make it free Sunday through Wednesday.

The bad news is the file size was larger than previous books, being a full-color comic and all, so I wasn’t allowed to list it at the usual 99-cents. I had to list it as $1.99. So it’s even more important that you all get it while it’s free or else it’ll cost you TWO WHOLE DOLLARS!

You know what TWO WHOLE DOLLARS FEELS LIKE?

That’s right, Pinocchio. 

It’s been a while since I shared this AND Bendis just...

It’s been a while since I shared this AND Bendis just posted the Mack/Quesada tribute to Bill Sienkiewicz’s cover for Elektra Assassin #4 cover that inspired it PLUS Scott White, the guy who drew it, is the artist on my Pinocchio story for Once Upon a Time Machine which we’re releasing as a single story this weekend SO…the cover to my wedding comic/party favor. You can still read the entire comic on USA Today’s Pop Candy.

A million links, basically. 

Calculating Panel Magnification Offsets for Kindle Comic Books

This is interesting to no one, but on the off-chance some poor jerk is desperately searching the internet for tips like I was, here is the algorithm I came up with:

Map the left corner and right corner of your panel (in percent) using Photoshop.
In your CSS code, your tap target is then:
top: [Vertical displacement of top left corner]
left: [Horizontal displacement of top left corner]
height: [(Vertical displacement of bottom right corner) - top]
width: [(Horizontal displacement of bottom right corner) - left]
Then figure out the size of your panel magnification window by calculating a size ratio (called Ratio, bellow). If you’re going from a 600x1024 to a 900x1536 the size ratio is 900/600 or 1.5.
In your CSS code, define your magnification position and size:
top: [ <= 100 - Mag Window-> height]
left: [<= 100 - Mag Window->width]
height: [Ratio * tap target-> height]
width: [Ratio * tap target-> width]
Then calculate the offsets and put them into your CSS code.
top: -(tap target->top / Window mag-> height) * Ratio
bottom: -(tap target->left / Window mag->width)*Ratio
Notice those negatives. They will most likely need to be there UNLESS you fall into a situation where a dimension of your small image times the corresponding Window mag->top/left is greater than the dimension of your magnified image times the corresponding Tap target->top/left. Basically, this would mean you’re shifting your panel down and to the right, which you probably won’t be doing. However, if a panel looks way incorrect either perform this check or just take out the negative sign in 5. You probably won’t have to worry about this.

You may have to do some minor tweaking, but 95% of your panels will look pretty perfect on the first shot. When I was looking for help all I found was a bunch of folks charging $50 to $100 PER PAGE to do this formatting.

Now you can do it, no prob.

Final cover.Coming this weekend, most likely. Will be free for...

Final cover.

Coming this weekend, most likely. Will be free for the first three days. Get ready to jump on it, then jump on it.

Art by Scott White.

I modeled my Pinocchio character in “The Stars Are Not...

I modeled my Pinocchio character in “The Stars Are Not Wanted Now” after myself, obviously (art by Scott White).