ELEPHANT WORDS

I’ve mentioned the Elephant Words site here before. it’s a place where six writers create a new story, poem, written piece, based upon a new image that is uploaded every Sunday. the trick is that the writers are on a rotating schedule so that a new piece is on the site every day. So, writer 1 must create a new story within a rough 24 hour window in order to have a new piece on Monday, writer 2 creates a story for Tuesday, and so on until 6 puts up his (there’s yet to be a female in the fold) piece on Saturday. Then everyone shifts, and writer 1 now posts the new image for Sunday and everyone moves up one space, allowing the "bearer of the image" to have nearly six days to conceive a new piece. And so on.

Well, with the first anniversary of the site a few of the regular writers have decided to walk away or take some time off to recharge their batteries. This means there are a bunch of new writers taking a whack at this crazy experiment and I’m lucky enough to be on for the next six weeks.

The new season actually began this past Sunday with a new image from regular contributor Andrew Cheverton. And, since I spent much of the first five to six months throwing my own contributions up in the public forum, Nick Papaconstantinou – who came up with the idea – pegged me to be writer 1 and have the first 24 hour window.

You can check out the image here and my piece can be found here.

Check it out and let me know what you think. I was going for a particular feel with the story and would love to have a chance to really revise it so that it feels more balanced, in my opinion, but for a 24 hour window, I’m pretty happy with it.

chris

Next chapter of my serialized novella goes live

The latest chapter of my serialized novella over at 50 Years From Nowwent live earlier this week. Bringing one of our protagonists into NYC where she is trying to cope with the big city and the pitfalls and troubles that greet her, Karen Kaczmerak is wondering if coming there was the right decision. She is searching for her brother and is sure she will find him there. But her search may be cut short before she is even able to get started. Part VII can be found at the link below:

In Search of VII

And for anyone that wants to read it from the beginning:

Part I
Part II
Part III
Part IV
Part V

Moonstone’s Twilight Crusade @ Pulse

The latest installment of my Pulse column, has gone live. Spotlighting Moonstone’s new "Twilight Crusade" initiative, this is a group of books you might want to check out if you like the supernatural. Five books that will tell different aspects of the war between Heaven and Hell, ENVOY, SUCCUBUS, TEMPLAR, GABRIEL, and WOLF were all released one book a week over the five most recent weeks and should be available from your local shop. Head on over to the Pulse and check the piece out

MOME w/ Gary Groth @ Pulse

My latest column went live on Thursday. Spotlighting MOME from Fantagraphics with an interview with publisher/editor Gary Groth, the entire piece can be found here

thanks,
chris

POSTCARDS with Jason Rodriguez @ Pulse

The latest column of my weekly spotlight on independent comics hit last week. Focusing on Jason Rodriguez’s great anthology – POSTCARDS: TRUE STORIES THAT NEVER HAPPENED – this is the first of six weekly spotlights on indy anthologies and it comes with an interview with the editor himself.

Go check it out

For Your Consideration returns

The Pulse has had issues with its server recently, but now that things are running smoothly once more FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION has returned. This latest installment is an introductory piece for a series spotlighting Independent anthologies that will be running over the next 6 weeks. In the introduction I give a quick history of comic anthologies, making some observations on why they work and why readers should be checking them out. You can find the entire piece here. Go check it out, and let me know what you think and what your favorite anthologies are. I want to discover something new and hopefully turn you on to books of which you were unaware.

Thanks,
chris

EAGLE AWARD nominee

No, not me, but an artist I worked with. Two years ago, my buddy and I were putting together our second self-published issue of our b/w comics/prose anthology, WARRIOR27. Being writers, we put ads on Digital Webbing for artists and found some amazing ones to work with. One artist, Azim Akberali from Tanzania, helped create a 7-page story with me for the book, and now he is up for two Eagle awards – Favourite Newcomer Artist and Favourite Artist: Fully-Painted Artwork – for his work on another self-published anthology, 11th Hour, which was recently picked up for continued publication at Markosia.

The story that he and I created is here.

Take a minute and head on over to the Eagle Awards and vote for your favorites. It doesn’t take long, and it’s rather humorous to note that Matt Fraction is nominated for best "new" writer.

It’s a pretty cool feeling to know I worked with an Eagel nominee, before he was discovered, and we’ve discussed working together again. Hopefully that will be sooner than later.

thanks,
chris

Nexus w/Steve Rude interview @ Pulse

My latest column went live last night over at the Pulse. Spotlighting the new Nexus series, the first one in ten years, with a short interview with artist Steve Rude.

"THE PULSE: Why choose to start RudeDude at this juncture?

STEVE RUDE: The right time to do anything is when you feel it

Latest chapter of my serialized novella hits

Hey all,

Not only have I co-self-published two issues of the comics/prose anthology WARRIOR27 as well as producing a weekly column spotlighting small press and web comics, but I am also serializing my speculative fiction novella, IN SEARCH OF…, over at the 50 Years From Now site. The latest part, chapter 5, went live this past weekend. Still setting things up, but it’s going to get very interesting in the weeks to come. You can check it out in the link below:

Chapter 5

and if you need to catch up, the first four parts are below:

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4

Thanks for checking it out, and feel free to let me know what you think. All feedback is appreciated, good or ill. You can contact me here

take care,
chris