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secret identity

What’s Happening

May 16, 2012
appearances, secret identity
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The month of May, which is only half done, has already been a busy one for me. I’ve been doing edits on the stories for Fungi, and various other things have kept me running as well. Last weekend I took a couple of days off and went on a trip with my wife down to the Flint Hills Scenic Byway, which was a lot of fun. Lots of pretty country, and old towns, as well as a surprisingly good restaurant and a surprisingly good art gallery.

Maybe the most notable thing we saw was a “hermit cave.” (It’s #3 on this list, but unfortunately all the best info isn’t on the website, of course.) According to the historical marker thingy next to it, an Italian priest lived in the cave for roughly five months. Which is pretty cool. But the really good part is that the priest in question was pretty much a character from a Gothic novel. He was the son of a wealthy man who had to leave Europe because he fell in love with a young lady. He traveled around America under several assumed names, living in caves and, at one point, in a hollowed-out tree. He purportedly spoke nine languages, and later he was “mysteriously murdered.” (This is the wording on the marker.)

So that was last weekend. This coming weekend is the Spectrum Fantastic Art Live show. I’ll be there on Saturday, and will be hanging out with folks all around it. I only recently got a chance to take a look at the full exhibitor lineup, and it is, to put it mildly, damn impressive. On top of Mike Mignola, who we all know is a sufficient draw for me by himself, there’s also folks like William Stout and Gary freaking Gianni, among about a billion others. I am going to be hauling around so much stuff to get signed! If you’re going to be there, drop me a line and maybe we can catch up.

A Week

February 10, 2012
cinema, secret identity
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Wow. Well, so, this week. It’s been a week. Tempting as it is to blame the slush picking up, or my recent illness putting me behind at everything, I think it’s been a week for pretty much everyone I know, so maybe there’s just something in the air.

Anyway, I have been exhaustingly busy and, predictably enough, whenever I wasn’t I was too exhausted to do anything, including post, hence why you haven’t heard about, say, The Innkeepers or The Woman in Black yet, and why, now that you are going to hear about them, it’ll necessarily be pithier shorter than I would have liked. So: I saw both of them last weekend, along with catching House of the Devil a second time. They were both quite good. Both were sort of quiet, simple ghost stories, unambitious in scale, but very effective in their own ways. The Woman in Black, I think, lost out a little bit by being in such close proximity with The Innkeepers, which I liked the best of the two, but it also wasn’t helped by the theatre full of fourteen-year-old girls who had come to see Harry Potter square off against a ghost.

I found The Innkeepers to be a big improvement (for me, at least) over House of the Devil, though it had maybe fewer bravura scenes. It was still just as quiet and slow-burning, but instead of just feeling slow, it was charming and funny up until the last few minutes, which were, frankly, harrowing.

Anyway, both were good, though I don’t think that either would be harmed by waiting for DVD. (And, assuming your audience was anything like ours, The Woman in Black might be improved.)

What else? After coming very late to the game with “Chelsea Dagger,” I’ve been listening to a lot of stuff by The Fratellis, especially their second album Here We Stand, which I pretty much love from top to bottom. Call this my second big musical discovery of the year, after The Bird and the Bee.

Finally, thanks to Eric Orchard, I started up an account over on Pinterest. I can’t vouch for how much I’ll be using it or not, but so far I’m mostly sticking up Mike Mignola and Richard Sala drawings. So, y’know, if that sounds like your cup of tea, feel free to give it a look.

This weekend, my lovely wife and I are getting dolled up and going out to see Amelie at the Screenland and then going out to a fancy dinner. I bought a new hat for the occasion, and she bought some very nice shoes. With any luck, there will be pictures.

The Curse of the Forgotten Fedora

January 10, 2012
cool stuff, friends, secret identity
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I forgot my hat when I left the house today, which was an unusual and discomfiting experience for me. As such, I of course posted about it to various social media, explaining how, if I were a character in a turn-of-the-century book, this would be indicative of panic or emergency of some kind. It was generally agreed upon by my commentors that even in this enlightened era, it could not be looked upon as anything less than a dire omen. So traumatic and far-reaching was the experience, that it was actually immortalized in art by the supremely talented Drazen Kozjan, as can be seen below:

Birthday Loot

October 31, 2011
cool stuff, secret identity
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I’m not normally one to post things like this, but this year my friends and family were so incredibly generous with birthday gifts, that it just seems like it would be ungrateful not to share tales of their largesse. The photo below is a record of what I believe are all the presents I received for my birthday this year, except for the already-documented awesomeness of Playmobil Solomon Kane.

From the top, left to right, that’s a new pair of headphones, four bound volumes of books of weird phenomena and conspiracy theories called The Unexplained, The Book of Cthulhu, the Leonard Cohen Complete Columbia Albums set, The Collected Ghost Stories of E.F. Benson, The Best of Gahan Wilson, a Warner Bros. Horror/Mystery Double Features set (including Sh! The Octopus), a copy of Dominion (which is maybe my new favorite game ever), and a copy Mansions of Madness (which I haven’t gotten to play yet). Thanks for the bounty goes (in no particular order) to Jesse, Lydia, Sandy and J.T., Larry, Jessy and Allen, Christine, Christy, Charlotte and George, Kenny and Nicole, Richard, Lindsay, Jason, Veronica, and of course my lovely wife.

The star attraction was the aforementioned Leonard Cohen collection. Let’s get a shot of that here:

Nom!Omitted are the pictures where I’m rubbing them on my face and/or putting them down my pants. Seriously, these albums are amazing. First of all, pretty much every Leonard Cohen album. Second, holy shit remasters! These albums sound incredible. I’d try to come up with some kind of metaphor for what they sound like, but in my efforts to do them justice I would just end up descending into complete nonsense and compare them to diamond unicorn kisses or something, and nobody wants that. Short version, these albums are amazing. I had been publicly drooling over them over on my Google+ and Facebook accounts, and my wife (who is the best person ever, it’s just science) got several friends and family members to chip in to buy them for me. For everyone who threw money into that pot, you have my thanks. It might be the best birthday present I ever got. And to everyone else who got me presents this year, thank you too! Your presents are all close seconds to that Leonard Cohen set.

What’ve I Been Doing?

June 7, 2011
cinema, reading materials, secret identity
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A lot has been going on, which, as usual, means I’ve been posting less. Honestly, while I’ll always keep updating my site here, the best place to keep up with me these days is probably over on my Facebook (I know, I know).

So what’s up? Well, my ninth anniversary came and went on June 2nd. Nine years I’ve been married to my very favorite person in the world, which is pretty good, I think. We didn’t do much to mark the date this year, but next year we’re planning to go to Hawaii.

I’ve seen a lot of movies lately. I re-watched Revolutionary Girl Utena for the first time in many years, and the very first time all the way through. It was still good. Then we watched the movie, which was flat crazy. I also caught X-Men: First Class, which was better than I could’ve reasonably expected. I would’ve liked more Magneto/Xavier/Mystique/Shaw, and less weird Z-list mutant supporting characters, but it was mostly pretty great.

Besides that, I watched a bunch of stuff for my column over at Innsmouth Free Press, and I also caught a weird anthology horror flick on Watch Instantly called Trapped Ashes. I watched it because Joe Dante directed the framing sequence, but I actually found it to be a lot more enjoyable than I was expecting, in spite of a pretty stupid ending. The framing sequence had a great Mario Bava/Dario Argento homage house setting, and while the rest of the movies had the (sometimes uncomfortable) eroticism of a late-night cable show, I found that almost all of them had something going on that I could enjoy. I think my favorite was probably “Stanley’s Girlfriend,” which, though it didn’t really bring anything new to the table, had a tone of lingering regret, rather than horror, that I found interesting.

Those who follow me on Goodreads will note that I’ve not been reading much. That’s not actually strictly true, but I’ve been working my way through a massive pair of tomes collecting the macabre short fiction of Basil Copper from PS Publishing. I’ll post reviews eventually, but I’m still getting through them. I’ve also been going back through in an effort to thin out my comic collection, which means reading a lot of my old comic books. And, by and large, they’re terrible. Man. But I still love some of them anyway.

Tonight I’m going to Tessa Gratton‘s book launch at Rainy Day Books, so I’m looking forward to that.

I think that’s about it for me, though. What’ve you guys been up to?

Free Comic Book Day & Others

May 8, 2011
cinema, comics, friends, mignola, secret identity
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I had a surprisingly good Free Comic Book Day yesterday. I made it out to Elite, where I was surprised to see Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt, which is always a pleasure. I wish I’d known they were gonna be there, I’d have planned for more time out.

I picked up the Baltimore/Criminal Macabre issue, as well as the Mouse Guard/Dark Crystal issue. I also picked up while I was out a copy of the latest issue of Rue Morgue, which has an artist’s tribute to Vincent Price, including work from Mike Mignola, Belle Dee, and Gary Pullin, among others. Really awesome.

Then, because the optometrist had unexpectedly gotten my glasses in that morning, I went out with Jay to see Thor. The short review is that I really liked it, and don’t have any relevant complaints. It did everything I wanted a Thor movie to do, short of having some Jack Kirby-style trolls, but I guess frost giants, some kind of Kothoga-like monster, and the Destroyer will have to suffice.

In the evening, Grace and I went out to The Steel Show, where we were able to catch a couple of acts, notably John McKenna and the Blue Sea Fishermen’s Union, featuring the husband of one of my wife’s coworkers on drums. Unfortunately, we had to turn in before we could catch most of the rest of the show, but what we heard was pretty fun, and hopefully we’ll be able to make it out for something like that again soon.

All in all, it was a really pleasant day, though I spent less of it at home than I had anticipated. Today gets to try to make up for that, because I’ve got a lot of writing to do, and there are old movies sitting on my shelf just begging to be watched.

Day from Hell

April 8, 2011
news, secret identity
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OK, fine, I’m sick. Fine.

It’s been sort of up and down this week. Tuesday I woke up with a sore throat that got worse all day. Wednesday I stayed home from work, in the hopes of heading the cold off at the pass, and it was a good thing, too, because coughing had joined the sore throat. Thursday I felt better than I had til then, in spite of some trouble sleeping due to the cough, and so I went in to work. The sore throat got better all day, the cough got worse. Cue last night, when I slept maybe two or three hours, at most, because I was too busy coughing. Nothing I took helped. (This of course happens just after we move the couch out, so if I want to sleep somewhere I won’t bother Grace I have to sleep on the floor.) Anyway, this morning I was sicker than I’d been so far, and my chest hurts so much from coughing that I can barely breathe. Needless to say, I am home from work, and not being terribly productive. On top of that, I seem to have lost my glasses somewhere in this whole debacle, and I’ll be damned if I can find them.

About the only ray of sunshine in this day so far has been an email from the folks at Side Real Press telling me that Delicate Toxins is back from the printers, and the first copies ought to be shipping out as early as Monday. Seriously, if you haven’t ordered yours yet, there’s no better time. This looks like one of the most beautiful books I’ve ever been in, and I bet it’ll sell out fast.

Also, you can still get Historical Lovecraft at a 20% discount for awhile longer, or on your various mobile devices, if that’s more your style.

OK, I’m going to go crawl back under a rock until it’s time for my doctor’s appointment. Hopefully I ride this thing out soon

The Results Are In!

March 15, 2011
news, secret identity
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About two weeks ago, I fell on some ice and hurt my shoulder (actually more my neck, it would seem). Ever since then it’s been bothering me on and off, and this last weekend it got worse, so I finally went to the doctor. I spent about two hours waiting to be seen, and then got told, basically, “You hurt your arm. You should take it easy.” Thanks, guys. I was given some drugs, and later I went to see the chiropractor, who was more helpful. Today I’m doing a bit better, and hopefully this’ll be the first step on the road to recovery, rather than whatever road I’ve been on for the past two weeks.

But I didn’t start this post to complain about my injuries or about the vagaries of the medical profession. I started this post because I just learned the other day that my article about monsters and supernatural fiction (“The Condition of a Monster,” you may remember it) has won first place in the Strange Horizons readers’ poll for articles! Thanks to everyone who voted for it, and congrats to fellow articles winners Molly Tanzer, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, and Selena Chambers, as well as to Saladin Ahmed, whose story took fourth place in the story section! And, of course, congrats to everyone else who placed, too, these are just the people I actually know.

Year in Review

December 30, 2010
lists, news, secret identity
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2010 was quite a year.

I figured, since so much had happened that I was having a hard time keeping it all straight, I’d try to do a “year in review” post summarizing all the crazy stuff that happened this last year, to the best of my ability. Of course, probably the biggest thing is that I was contacted by Jason Yarn, an agent with Paradigm after he saw my submission to the Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities call for micro-submissions. He and I have been talking since, and hopefully there’ll be some big related news on the horizon.

Three of my stories appeared this year. “Nature vs. Nurture” appeared in the third fiction issue of Innsmouth Free Press, where it also won the readers’ poll for best story in that issue. My flash story “Ex Libris” appeared at Everyday Weirdness. And “The Clowder,” which I sold years ago, finally appeared in the Cat Tales 2 anthology from Wildside Press.

While “The Worm that Gnaws” was published in 2009, in 2010 it was voted the best Pseudopod of 2009 in an annual forum poll, which made me very proud.

That was it for fiction in 2010, but it was the Year of Nonfiction for me. Back in February I started my column on international horror cinema at Innsmouth Free Press (the latest installment of which is here), and I participated throughout the year in Vampire Awareness Month and Ghost Appreciation Month. This coming February I’ll be one of the MCs for Monster Awareness Month, which I am very excited about. I also wrote a piece on Mignola, Wellman, and Modern Myth-Building for IndiePulp. But my proudest nonfiction moment of the year was being asked to write a piece for Strange Horizons on a subject very near and dear to my heart, which you can take a gander at over here, if I’ve not already pointed at it and jumped up and down enough times.

The end of 2010 saw a fairly unprecedented flurry of short story sales that should all be appearing in 2011 sometime. First “Letters from the Monster Show” sold to the forthcoming YA ezine Scape, then, in rapid succession, I sold three stories to anthologies that should be hitting next year. “Black Hill” will be in Historical Lovecraft, the first anthology from Innsmouth Free Press. “Count Brass” will be in The Burning Maiden from Evil Eye Books. And “The Devil in the Box” will be in Delicate Toxins from Side Real Press. In every one of those I’m in some very august company, and I’ll keep you updated about ordering information and such as it becomes available.

A lot of stuff happened in my “real life” this year, too. I got a new job, for starters. My lovely, smart, and talented wife was diagnosed with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, went on short term disability, had to quit her job, and found a new one that suits her much better. Our cat had a brush with death, and we learned that she needs some extensive dental work done. Ups and downs, in other words, but I think we came out of it better than we started, which is good enough.

I could go on and on about things that happened to friends, movies I saw, books I read, but I’ve mostly talked about those things before, and this is getting long enough. I’ll close with a few links to a couple of other fun things I participated in this year: a micro-interview with me at Innsmouth Free Press, Vincent Price Day live-Tweeting with me and Selena Chambers, and my 74* favorite horror movies.

That’s the short version of 2010, anyway. (God help you if I’d gone with the long one.) It was an exciting year, if not always a pleasant one, and 2011 is shaping up to be just as exciting and hopefully even more pleasant. See you then!

The Bad News

December 4, 2010
secret identity
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Yesterday our cats went in to the vet for a checkup and vaccinations and suchlike. During which time we learned that one of them (Abby) will be needing a pretty expensive dental procedure. Which we were worried might be the case, but still. Fortunately we think we can afford to give her this procedure. Just not, y’know, easily. That’s all still the good news.

When it got bad was when she got home from the vet. She hid behind the water softener downstairs, like she always does, and then she started vomiting. She didn’t stop. I wasn’t home at the time, Grace had taken them in to the vet and was home with them. Thankfully she had her head together more than I probably would have and took Abby back to the vet. Which is good, because if she hadn’t Abby would probably have died. She had some kind of adverse reaction from the vaccine, and by the time they got her back to the vet had gone pretty seriously into shock.

Fortunately, the vet took care of her, and she seems to be doing just fine now. When we got her back home she was scared for awhile, but by this morning she was sleeping on the bed with us again. Both cats behaved remarkably when gathered up to go to the vet in the first place (this is an accomplishment with our cats, who were abused or feral or both before they were taken in by the place where we adopted them and who have taken years of acclimation to get as calm as they are now) and both have recovered very well and very quickly from the trauma. So, in all, big scare aside things are really pretty OK. If a big dental bill is the price of taking care of such good kitties, then we’ll happily find a way to make that work.

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