Keith R.A. DeCandido's Blog, page 9

happy book birthday to Jack of All Comics!

Today Becky Books has released Jack of All Comics!: A Fan Conversation About the King of Comics, edited by the mighty Jim Beard. This anthology is full of essays about Jack “King” Kirby’s comics work between 1961 and 1978, during which he created or co-created some of the most iconic and enduring superhero comics ever.

Here’s the full table of contents:

Introduction

“Let’s Jaw About Jack” by Jim Beard

Marvel Comics 1961-1970

“Grandeur and Humanity” by Cliff Biggers (Fantastic Four)“Monster Mashup” by Will Murray (The Incredible Hulk (Vol.1), the Hulk’s stories in Tales to Astonish)“A World Without” by Bill Nedrow (Thor’s stories in Journey Into Mystery, Thor)“Fury Road” by Andrew Farago (Sgt. Fury & His Howling Commandos)“When the Mutant Revolution Began” by Forrest C. Helvie (Uncanny X-Men)“the Power and the Glory” by Van Allen Plexico (The Avengers)“The Suspense–and Urgency–of Kirby!” by Ed Catto (Captain America’s stories in Tales of Suspense, Captain America)“The Technological Toy Maker” by Robert Greenberger (S.H.I.E.L.D. stories in Strange Tales)“The Top 10 Most Furshlugginer bits of Fun in Jack Kirby’s Not Brand Echh” by Joe Crowe (Not Brand Echh)“The Inhuman King!” by Bobby Nash (Inhumans stories in Amazing Adventures)

DC Comics 1970-1976

“Jimmy Olsen’s Pal, Superman” by Charles R. Rutledge (Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen)“In Search of a Dream” by Tom Brevoort (Forever People)“Dr. New Gods, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Jack Kirby” by Michael Bailey (The New Gods)“Mister Miracle is a Great Escape” by Christopher Ryan (Mister Miracle)“Ghosts and Guns” by Paul Kupperberg (In the Days of the Mob, Spirit World)“Raising Hell…Two-Fisted Style” by Thomas Deja (The Demon)“A Case of Acquired Taste” by Sam Agro (Kamandi, the Last Boy on Earth)“One Man’s Weird War in the World that’s Coming” by John C. Bruening (OMAC)“Drawing from Experience” by Brian K. Morris (Our Fighting Forces)“Nightmares Aren’t Always Bad” by Anthony R. Cardno (The Sandman)“Well, Isn’t That…Special?” by Jim Beard (First Issue Special)“The King’s Forgotten Gems” by Frank Schildiner (Kobra; Justice, Inc.; Richard Dragon, Kung-Fu Fighter)

Marvel Comics 1976-1978

“Bicentennial Bombast” by Keith R.A. DeCandido (Captain America and the Falcon)“Of Gods and Monsters” by R P Steeves (The Eternals)“2001: A Kirby Oddity” by Joseph Dilworth Jr. (2001: A Space Odyssey)“Black Panther’s Cosmic Detour” by Dan Wickline (Black Panther)“Kirby’s Pinocchio” by Alan J. Porter (Machine Man)“Deep Time and Devil Dinosaur” by Josh Reynolds (Devil Dinosaur)

My essay covers Kirby’s run on Captain America and the Falcon, a run that coincided with the magazine’s landmark 200th issue as well as with this country’s bicentennial celebration in 1976.

The book is on sale now, and if you’re a fan of superhero comics at all, you should definitely check this book out!

back from Origins

This past weekend, Wrenn and I had a wonderful time at the Origins Game Fair, our second year in the Authors Alcove with a whole mess of nifty fellow word-slingers. I’m happy to say that I sold a ton of books, including selling out of most of my Precinct books and all of my Alien books. I also sold several of Wrenn’s stuffies.

Wrenn didn’t join me until Friday night. The original plan was for her to join me Thursday night. I drove out on Wednesday, and then set up Thursday morning before the con kicked off. Wrenn had concert tickets Wednesday night to see the Stray Kids at CitiField. Then Thursday she went to La Guardia Airport only to have her flight first delayed then cancelled.

She was at La Guardia, which is only a couple of miles from CitiField, there was a second Stray Kids concert Thursday night, and she has TicketMaster on her phone. So guess what she did?

Meanwhile, I did some excellent panels with my fellow authors, covering such topics as shared worlds, the business of writing, 19th-century genre lit, what to do once you’ve finished your story, cardinal sins of writing, and crowdfunding. If you’d told me before the con that we’d only get a small handful of people for shared worlds but a ton of people for 19th-century SF (rather than the other way around), I’d have laughed in your face, but that’s how it worked out. And the 19th-century panel was particularly nifty, as Kelli Fitzpatrick, Daniel “Doc” Myers, and I waxed rhapsodic about everything from Mary Shelley to Jules Verne to H.G. Wells to Bram Stoker to utopian fiction. And all the other panels were superb, as well.

We also got to socialize quite a bit. Each night was dinner with fellow Alcovians (a word I we made up last year), with everything from Asian to Mexican to food court food. And dessert each night was the same: Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams! (Which Wrenn and I also hit on our way out of town Sunday afternoon….)

One of the high points of the weekend was The 698, an Asian restaurant that had excellent bulgolgi and excellent sushi, and which also had a signature house drink. If you ordered it regular, you got “THE 698” written on top of the drink. But if you went online and uploaded a picture, they could make the drink with that picture. Carlos Hernandez uploaded a picture of his wife, the magnificent C.S.E. Cooney, and had a drink with her face made!

We drove home Sunday night, but a stop to do a livestream for the Return of the Living Dead RPG at a Panera somewhere in Ohio meant we didn’t actually get home until 4.45am. I spent yesterday pretty much dead, and today am trying to get back on the horse — and also get ready for Horror on Main this weekend. Blargle. Meantime, I’ve got an editorial project to finish, Patreon reviews to write, and Dragon Precinct: Origins stories to work on.

Babylon 5 Rewatch: “Ship of Tears”

Bester’s back, and he wants our heroes’ help! That can’t possibly end well, though it winds up being worst for Bester himself, to everyone’s surprise — including Bester. The Babylon 5 Rewatch boards the “Ship of Tears.”

An excerpt:

[Walter] Koenig’s performance is magnificent as ever. So many lovely touches: his brief moment of panic when Sheridan doesn’t answer his query about boarding the station; his brief knowing smile before he walks up to the army of security guards who greet him on B5; casually plopping himself down in Sheridan’s command chair on the White Star; his “duh!” response to a question as to how he gained the intelligence he’s brought to B5 (“I’m a telepath—work it out”).

Babylon 5 Rewatch: “A Late Delivery from Avalon”

A guy shows up on the station wielding a sword, wearing chainmail, and claiming to be King Arthur. And much wackiness ensues, as the episode follows the same plot as one of the best episodes of M*A*S*H (no, really!). The Babylon 5 Rewatch is a bit late with “A Late Delivery from Avalon.”

An excerpt:

To the episode’s credit, it never tries to seriously sell us on the idea that McIntyre is the real Arthur. (Cole presenting his “the Vorlons coulda done it like they did Jack the Ripper!” theory is mostly there to cut off fan arguments on the Internet at the pass.) But it’s also to the episode’s detriment that we spend so much time on McIntyre-as-Arthur that the PTSD story gets short shrift.

It’s not too terribly much of a detriment, though, because it’s Michael Fucking York, and he’s an absolute joy to watch playact at being the King of the Britons. He completely throws himself into all three roles he’s called upon to play: King Arthur, a soldier in a denial so heavy it sends him into catatonia, and David McIntyre. Honestly, I could just watch an entire episode of him and Andreas Katsulas as a drunk, adrenaline-soaked G’Kar babbling at each other over mead. On top of that, Jason Carter’s at the top of his game here, giving us a Marcus Cole who really really really wants McIntyre to be King Arthur because after all the shit he’s been through, a real hero would be a nifty thing.

my Origins schedule

I’ll be back at the Origins Game Fair in Columbus, Ohio from the 19th to the 22nd of June. I’ll be spending most of my time selling and signing books in the Authors Alcove, at booth 1918 on the exhibit floor, along with fellow word-slingers Laura VanArendonk Baugh, Donald J. Bingle, C.S.E. Cooney, Jody Ellis, Mary Fan, Kelli Fitzpatrick, Sarah Hans, Carlos Hernandez, Justina Ireland, Addie J. King, Daniel Myers, Kayden Phoenix, Cat Rambo, Aaron Rosenberg, Jenifer Purcell Rosenberg, James Daniel Ross, Tracy Ross, Christopher D. Schmitz, and Jeri “Red” Shepherd.

I’ll also be doing some panels, all of which will be in Meeting Room A212 (though some might be in the room next door, that’s not clear).

Thursday

4-5pm: “The Business of Writing,” w/Jeri “Red” Shepherd

Friday

12-1pm: “19th-Century Science Fiction,” w/Kelli Fitzpatrick & Daniel Myers

Saturday

11am-12pm: “Shared Worlds,” w/Justina Ireland & Aaron Rosenberg

3-4pm: “Crowdfunding Your Book,” w/Donald J. Bingle, Sarah Hans, & Christopher D. Schmitz

Sunday

10-11am: “What Comes After ‘The End’?” w/Mary Fan & Jeri “Red” Shepherd

12-1pm: “Cardinal Sins of Writing,” w/Justine Ireland & Mary Fan

Hope to see folks in Ohio!

updated the PRISM post with the table of contents as well!

I updated this post that was originally just the cover reveal for PRISM: The Mission Files to also include the table of contents, which editor Hildy Silverman has at last revealed! Check it out!

cover and TOC reveal: PRISM: The Mission Files

Crazy 8 Press has revealed the cover for PRISM: The Mission Files, the shared-world anthology edited by Hildy Silverman that was successfully Kickstarted earlier this year. The book will be debuting at Shore Leave 45 next month.

This anthology tells a complete story about the discovery of strange meteorites that have crashed on Earth that have odd properties. The storyline starts in the early 20th century and works its way to the 1980s. It’s very much a retro-spy-thriller anthology, and features stories by some great folks: Christopher D. Abbott, Russ Colchamiro, Mary Fan, Robert Greenberger, Paul Kupperberg, Aaron Rosenberg, Geoffrey Thorne, Dayton Ward, editor Hildy, and, oh yeah, ME! My story is called “Movin’ On Up,” primarily takes place in Florence, Italy, and features two PRISM agents that I had a lot of fun writing.

The anthology had its origin in the short-lived Kindle Vella program that Amazon did for a while. Crazy 8 used that particular mode to publish several of the stories in this milieu, but then Vella kinda fell into the swamp, and the storyline was left unfinished — until now! PRISM: The Mission Files will have all the Vella stories plus a whole bunch more!

Here’s the full table of contents:

Pre-Mission Stories: “Dispersion” by Aaron RosenbergMission 1: “Partners” by Robert GreenbergerMission 2: “The Golden Gamble” by Mary FanMission 3: “Worth Its Weight in Diamonds” by Paul KupperbergMission 4: “The Trust code” by Christopher D. AbbottMission 5: “Delivery Exception” by Dayton WardMission 6: “The Mind Game” by Hildy SilvermanMission 7A: “Sound of the Sea, Part 1” by Russ ColchamiroMission 7B: “Sound of the Sea, Part 2” by Russ ColchamiroMission 8: “An Atypical Robbery” by Robert GreenbergerMission 9: “The Locked Heart” by Hildy SilvermanMission 10: “Pointe Blank” by Mary FanMission 11: “The Medusa Maneuver” by Aaron RosenbergMission 12: “Nice Little Town” by Geoffrey ThorneMission 13: “The Film Fiasco” by Aaron RosenbergRecall Mission: “The PRISM Schism” by Hildy SilvermanMission 14: “Full Twisting Volkova” by Mary FanMission 15: “Movin’ On Up” by Keith R.A. DeCandidoMission 16: “My Favorite Flower” by Russ Colchamiro

Ordering links should be up some time between now and Shore Leave.

Babylon 5 Rewatch: “Sic Transit Vir”

Vir meets his fiancée for the first time and we also find out all kinds of secrets about him and about her. Plus Ivanova has bad dreams and Sheridan and Delenn have a dinner date. The Babylon 5 Rewatch looks at “Sic Transit Vir.”

An excerpt:

Unfortunately, he is betrothed to a psychopath. Carmen Thomas does a wonderful job of portraying Lyndisty’s bland sincerity, giving the same earnest tone to her description of Vir’s kind face that she does to her description of how she helped her father commit mass murder. But of course, she doesn’t view the Narns as people. I was going to say she views them as animals, but that’s not even fair, because you just know that Lyndisty would be kinder to an animal. (There has been no character on B5 more likely to own a puppy than Lyndisty.)

Babylon 5 Rewatch: “Ceremonies of Light and Dark”

Delenn gets kidnapped, Mollari confronts Refa, Cole kicks a lot of ass, and the crew get spiffy-keen new uniforms. The Babylon 5 Rewatch attends some “Ceremonies of Light and Dark.”

An excerpt:

Almost anything would be a letdown after “Severed Dreams,” and much of this episode sadly lives down to that expectation. The main culprit for the disappointment is, once again, bad guest casting, as Dan Stroud and Paul Perri are absolutely wretched as the NightWatch thugs. Stroud sounds like a cheesy villain in a bad Hanna-Barbera cartoon from the 1960s, and Perri conveys absolutely no sense of menace or craziness in a role that requires at least one of those things, and preferably both. It kind of takes the wind out of the sails of the kidnapping plot.

One of the reasons why NightWatch has been effective is that it’s been portrayed as reasonable sounding, with many of its representatives beautifully portraying the blandness of evil, sounding just like people trying to do their job properly, and played by actors who embody that nicely—Alex Hyde-White, John Vickery, Shari Shattuck, Vaughn Armstrong—so Stroud doing his Snidely Whiplash act just does not work.

the first time I met Peter David….

…is available on YouTube! Peter appeared on The Chronic Rift public access show in 1990. Hosted by Judy Furnari and I, produced by John S. Drew, and also featuring Orenthal V. Hawkins, we did a panel discussion on Peter’s work that included the man himself. See Peter when he was in his thirties! See me and Judy and Orenthal when we were in our early twenties! See Orenthal tell me to shut up! Face front, true believer, this one has it all!