Michael A. Arnzen's Blog: News from Gorelets.com, page 23

New Art Series Begun: Demons of the Dark

“Gruester” — one of the “Demons of the Dark”

I’ve begun a new series of original digital art called “Demons of the Dark” on my flickr gallery. Demons of the Dark will be an imaginary bestiary from the shadows of hell.  It kind of scares me. (Even scarier: in the spirit of the original gorelets poetry series, I’m creating these by ‘fingerpainting’ on my iPhone (using the great ArtStudio app)!

Returning visitors to gorelets.com may recall that the site once hosted a gallery of its own (and information about all my books in a bibliography). These elements of the site are being rebuilt from scratch, and are not ready for formal opening yet. But even though it’s under construction, the gorelets gallery page is available for browsing if you don’t mind tripping over the wet dustcloths at this link: http://www.gorelets.com/gallery/. Restoring the bibliography right now, however, is my highest priority, and I hope to have a full catalog of my books up soon, which will likely include a way to order signed editions directly from me, for those who collect such things (e.g., the cool kids).

Comments appreciated if you want to give feedback on what you’d like to see on this site.

On the Irrelevance of Genre Poetry [Live]

Photo by Jessica McHugh

At the fun “Raw Dog Screaming Press Book Party” at the Morgantown Poets group in West Virginia last month, I opened my reading by sharing a piece I’d written for Locus Magazine, a poem about why I write poetry, which I contributed to their running Roundtable series on speculative poetry.  Here’s my recitation of “On the Irrelevance of Genre Poetry,” recorded during the reading. I don’t often write things like this — an opinion essay told in the form of a poem — but the audience really seemed to laugh and also get charged up by the poem.

Press the play button below to listen, or the link below it to download the file for your own devices.

[download "On the Irrelevance of Genre Poetry" - 6.42mb mp3 file]

Open Locus Magazine’s page in a new window if you’d like to read along. Please also consider leaving a comment on their site or below.

Locus Magazine is a long-running trade magazine for publishers, writers and dedicated fans in the genre, featuring reviews and coverage of trends in science-fiction, fantasy and horror publishing. While you’re there, read the other great articles on the Roundtable by Marge Simon, Robert Frazier, David Kopaska-Merkel, Denise Dumars, F.J. Bergmann and plenty of other great practicing sf/f/h poets on the Locus Roundtable Blog.

If you’re a genre poet, be sure to check out the Science Fiction Poetry Association and join the community. I’ve been a member since something like 1988, and their annual Rhysling Award anthology and journal (Star*Line) alone are worth the dues. Plus they do lots of fun things, like post audio readings of horror poetry every Halloween — check it out.

 

Click Saturn to Join the SFPA!

Preview of New Broadside: “Anonymous”

Earlier this year, the first people who kindly pre-ordered the hardcover edition of The Gorelets Omnibus after it was initially announced by the publisher were promised a free exclusive broadside as a bonus. If that’s you, let me assure you the delay was entirely my fault — the poem that I wrote for this cause just wasn’t quite right, and I try to treat these things special. But now I’ve got something done that I’m proud of and it is heading out in the mail to you. Enjoy!

Here’s a purposely-blurry preview, so you can see what’s to come.

This Exclusive Broadside Could Be Yours!

The broadside poem is entitled “Anonymous” and is limited to twenty-five signed, numbered copies, uncannily dated 6/6/12. Some of these will go to lucky subscribers of The Goreletter newsletter, so if you haven’t signed up for that yet, there’s still time and please do (or please make sure your email address is correct by signing up again — the server will tell you if you’re good to go).

I like doing quirky and creative things like this when I can. You can get a whiff of some other broadsides I’ve done in the past on scribd.com — and they sometimes are reprinted in collections, like my book awhile back from Dark Regions Press, called Proverbs for Monsters.

To learn more about The Gorelets Omnibus, see posts tagged Omnibus on this site. To order, visit Raw Dog Screaming Press. The book is also available in ebook and other editions on amazon.com and all the usual booksellers.

Crosswords of Death

666 Across: 4-letter word for nerd.

I’m just kidding… I’m only an occasional puzzler, but I fully approve of The Grid Reaper. Spotted it at Barnes and Noble the other day and felt it was required to take a snap shot, because I am compelled to catch publishers trying to cash in on goth and horror conventions that have absolutely nothing to do with the content of their books (such as Zombie Sudoku). But this one is actually legit. Its author, NY Times puzzle consructor David Kahn, thematizes the puzzles he writes for the NY Times and elsewhere in the form of tributes to celebrities after they die, among other things. (For example, here’s one he did for Dick Clark, reprinted in the neat NY Times in Gothic blog). He’s quite talented at this sort of thing — obituary games? — and deserves nothing but respect for it.

Besides, the reaper in that cover is a cool tribute to horror comics of the 50′s. But more importantly, I think I need that particular brand of scythe!

These “puzzles to die for” are available on amazon.com for around $7. If you die for them, though, then it’ll cost you more.

Of course, I also approve of the impossible-to-find book, Backpack Power’s In-CRUD-ible Gross-word Puzzles by “I. Seymour Crudd,” too — which at one point refers to a puzzle as a “pustule.” Gotta love that. Though I hate to depart with it, I will be tearing pages out of my recently discovered copy of this book and sending them at random to readers when I correspond with them by snail mail. If that’s you, enjoy!

100% Arnzen by Nathan Rosen

Some readers of this blog may know Nathan Rosen as the editor of the website dedicated to microscopically short-short horror stories, Microhorror. Nathan was enrolled in a design program this year, and chose Michael Arnzen as the “product” he had to focus his final term project around. What he came up with is a fabulous array of funky items and I am happy to share a sampler with you here.

He called his project “100% Arnzen” and put all the print designs into a cellophane-wrapped meat tray with this funny “meat package” sticker on it:

For Your Imbalanced Diet!

 

Here’s a gallery of the full package along with some of the wonderful contents it contains:

 

 

Nate really went beyond the call of duty here, and I am very impressed. He also had to present his final project to the class at the end of the term.  He took it up a notch and made a full-fledged mini-documentary about me and posted it on youtube.  I liked it so much, I’ve put it on my bio page, on amazon.com, and now here for posterity:

If you’d like, you can download the full brochure. We may make more of this available in the future, for those interested.

Support Nathan Rosen by dropping by his website, Microhorror.com, and giving a listen to his audiobook or shopping on his website. If you’re a fan of my book, 100 Jolts, you will really appreciate what he’s been doing there.

Photos from Morgantown Poets Event

Just back from Morgantown, WV…here are some visual impressions of the Raw Dog Screaming Press book party — sponsored by Morgantown Poets and the Mon Arts Center — to celebrate the release of Jason Jack Miller’s Hellbender and my book The Gorelets Omnibus (both are available from the publisher). I only managed to snap a few shots — not nearly enough — but I’ll let the images speak for themselves for now, and will try to share audio snippets and links to other coverage from the fun reading shortly.

 

May & June 2012 Appearances for The Gorelets Omnibus

Friday, MAY 25th. 7-9pm. Morgantown, WV

Raw Dog Screaming Press Book Release Party at Monongalia Arts Center

Morgantown Poets is hosting a RAW DOG SCREAMING PRESS book release party Friday May 25 from 7-9pm at Monongalia Arts Center (MAC), featuring the debut of Jason Jack Miller’s HELLBENDER and Michael Arnzen’s THE GORELETS OMNIBUS. Arnzen & Miller will read their work, followed by a signing. A limited number of Raw Dog Screaming Press books will be available for purchase.

Public parking is available near the MAC in the parking garage at the corner of Pleasant and Chestnut Streets and at the city lot behind 142 High Street (enter off Spruce). The MAC is accessible to individuals with special mobility requirements; schedule ahead at least two days prior to the event by calling 304-292-3325, or write to info@monartscenter.com. More details available at http://www.monartscenter.com/

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Friday, JUNE 22nd. 7-10pm. Greensburg, PA

“In Your Write Mind” Book Expo at Seton Hill University

Arnzen, Miller and Raw Dog Screaming will be available again to sign books at this mass autograph session featuring alums, faculty and guests shared by the Writing Popular Fiction MFA Residency and the In Your Write Mind Workshops at Seton Hill University. More details on the alumni page at SHU and the IYWM website. A large number of the contributors to Many Genres, One Craft will also be available for autographs, including Michael Knost, Shelley Bates, Victoria Thompson, Heidi Ruby Miller, Lawrence C. Connolly, William Horner, Rachael Pruitt, Scott A. Johnson, Maria V. Snyder, and many more!

The signing is tentatively scheduled from 7-10pm in the McKenna Center Foyer at Seton Hill University.

Many Genres, Many Awards…and One Great Year for Our Writing Guide!

As the writer’s guide I co-edited with Heidi Ruby Miller — Many Genres, One Craft: Lessons in Writing Popular Fiction — comes to its first year anniversary, I was happy to learn this morning that it just won another book award. Here are the accolades I know about so far:

Order at Amazon.com!

Winner, “Business: Writing and Publishing” category, 2012 International Book Awards.
Winner, “Education/Academic” category, 2012 Next Generation Indie Book Awards.
Winner, General Non-Fiction Award. 2011 London Books Festival Award.
Listed 5th in “This Year’s Ten Most Terrific Writing Books” by The Writer magazine (Dec 2011).
Finalist, “Business: Writing and Publishing” category. USA Best Books 2011 Award.
Finalist. 2012 Eric Hoffer Book Awards.
Finalist, “Writing” category. ForeWord Review’s 2011 Book of the Year Awards.

I can only thank the contributors, really, for doing such a phenomenal job. Kudos to publisher Cathy Teets and the team at Headline Books for being such a great indie and regional press to work with. They really treated this book well, giving it the over-sized hardcover textbook treatment and high production quality on the interiors. And they’ve rewarded us all with lots of promotion and support, like submitting our title for these industry awards.




But most rewarding are the reviews in the trade and those by fans. If you’ve read the book, please do post a review on amazon, goodreads, facebook or your blog. Heidi and I put this book together to help other writers, and to pay back what we’ve learned from others in the field. Your review is like royalties on that payment. Thank you.

If you are a writer of any genre and haven’t yet experienced Many Genres, One Craft, you should check this book out. Visit the weblog devoted to the book’s many contributors, or buy a copy on Amazon.com or elsewhere. If you want to get a SIGNED copy, we will have copies available at the RDSP Book Party in May, and at the In Your Write Mind workshop at Seton Hill in June, among other places.

Puzzling Banner

I have to assume this banner was won by an impressively hungry cannibal.

Onomatopoeia Gone Wild!

For your next movie night, rent:

Sssssss (Kowalski, 1973)

Kaw (Wilson, 2007)

Eegah (Hall, 1962)

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This triple feature brought to you by Jeffrey Thomas’, Aaaiiieee!!!