Bill McSciFi's Blog

This has been a fun week and there are bunch of flaming bowling balls I need to keep airborne. Which is fine. I just have to make sure I keep paying attention. Before we get to the fun stuff there are a couple of important anniversaries to note. First, and vitally important to me, it was six years ago this week Kim and I had our first date. Given that it was not my finest moment, I was kind of drunk by the time she arrived, the fact that she married me this summer still has left a few people confused and curious. Which is fine. That day we took the first of, what would become, many selfies together.

Thanks to having her in my life I was finally able to calm down enough to truly focus on my craft and not react like a toddler on meth every time I saw a pretty girl. And that’s good, since apparently I have some good looking fans. One, a fetish model and comic book fan, Sabrina Zaremba posted some risqué shots showing off her Legends Parallel collection, among other things. One year ago this week, LP‘s artist, Leslie Tejlor celebrated that by creating a pin-up poster of her in all her glory reading Issue #1 of Legends Parallel. Try not to click that link if your boss is looking over your shoulder. Save it for your alone time.

Welcome to my world. You’re going to like it here. Keep scrolling for more adventures.

Over the last couple of years, in part due to the pandemic, I have crossed paths with some publicists who took pity on me and tried to help me not look like the forgotten step-child who keeps missing the bus. Thanks to them I was introduced to a company whose sole purpose in life is to sell books. They don’t care about social media impressions, they sneer at “popular posts,” and not much else seems to impress them other than sales. I proudly sent them everything I had hoping they would be dutifully impressed and jump right in to make me rich. They jumped in, all right, mostly to ask if I was inebriated twenty-four hours a day. Then they sent me a list of what the real world needed. All of it is within our grasp, so Azoth Khem Publishing and I are busting a move or two to get it all together. Everything, from wholesale price breaks to color schemes, has to be assesed, altered, and brought up to their standards.

All of this means that, starting around September 19, promos for SPLICE: HIT BIT TECHNOLOGY will begin appearing in places where people buy books like SPLICE. And only those places. It won’t be paired with Costco or Victoria’s Secret ads. Their motto, “We don’t care who sees the book, only who buys it” is more focused than I could ever be.

As I work with them I realize why they don’t advertise. While there are many authors who could afford their services, they aren’t nearly as expensive as you might think, they require a solid infrastructure to insure that all sales will be fulfilled, large quantity orders won’t be a problem, that there’s a guaranteed method for returns, and so on. That “and so on” part is the most daunting. You really can’t make those guarantees without having many ducks in a row.

Fortunately, thanks to the diligence of the nice people at Azoth Khem, our quack-quacks are quacking quite nicely.

The goals here are simple; (1) sell more books, and (2) make this an ongoing relationship.

Bonus for the fans? Later this year there will be a repackaged edition of SPLICE, a box set of The Brittle Riders, book two of Goptri of the Mists, and a new head shot of me which I have been promised won’t make me look like a bridge troll.

Yeppers, it’s an exciting time to be in McsciFi-Land. Still the best amusement park you’ll never visit. Until next week, stay safe, sane, and occasionally sober.

Okay, before we begin, if you’re offended by a naughty word here or there you might wish to go to my blog and relive happier times.

Everyone else have their weapon of choice, a/k/a morning beverage? Good. Here we go.

While the big, sexy, stuff, a/k/a the bikini models at the car wash, are my novels, the greasy ladies in the diner, a/k/a my short stories, are often what keep my family fed.

Thanks to the nice people, a/k/a off their meds and violating gender norms, at Sci-Fi Lampoon I will be appearing in two different releases. The first is an incredible anthology with the gloriously self explanatory name, The Fuckening. My story, The Writer’s Stuff, follows the misadventures of Layla le Lips and Thor Liebenhammer as they dare the unthinkable in the self-published fantasy-land they live in.

As to the rest of the anthology, The Fuckening is finding out, thanks to some idiot at the train depot, your plans of world domination are in ruins and the police would very much like a word. Told by twenty-three award-winning and critically-acclaimed authors who also happen to be world-renowned experts in the field of general fuckery.

BUT WAIT! THERE’S MORE!

Oh, you knew that since I said there were two, which is more than one, releases.

The second is my classic, THE SPACE CLOWNS OF ZOIMBA PRIME. Originally published by the late, lamented, SciFi-Fantasy Hub, this slightly updated, possibly grammatically correct, version will grace Sci-Fi Lampoon Issue #7. Make sure to bookmark that link so you don’t miss a thing.

Slappy McClownDick thinks he’s the best clown in the history of clowns. Sadly, for him, all the other clowns think he’s just a clown, and not in a good way. But Slappy’s got a plan to show them all and earn the respect he so richly deserves. It involves juggling nuclear bombs. Because …. reasons.

Scrollin’ scrollin’ scrollin’ keep ya fingies scrollin’ ….

On Friday, August 26, 2022, the end of an era happened when the final episode of The Big Wakeup Call aired on WBIG 1280 AM. Begun in July of 2010 by Ryan Gatenby the show featured everyone from the Sex Pistols to Dick Van Dyke. If you know the history of Penis van Lesbian that could have been a single episode.

On October 12, 2010, I got dragged into the fray as a the official something or other to support an existing guest host. Other humans came and went but over the next decade and change, but Ryan and I remained Friday morning constants knocking out over 600 episodes during that time. The first time I met a listener in the wild she yelled into her house; “Hey, Larry! It’s that libtard you love to hate!.

Good times.

In all seriousness, Ryan took a throw away time-slot stuck between morning traffic and afternoon sports and built it into a regional juggernaut of 40,000 listeners per episode. While I’m happy to have been along for the ride, and part of some of the odder moments such as the Fan Club in India and the nice lady on Facebook who informed me I was “much uglier than (I) sound,” none of this could or would have happened without Ryan.

He’s moving on to new opportunities and those are his stories to tell, not mine, but we are in negotiations to make The Big Wakeup Call a commercially supported podcast. No matter what happens, it has been an honor just to be there.

I think that’s enough excitement for one day. Until next week, stay safe, sane, and healthy.

Apparently my not offering critiques on various and sundry popular offerings makes me less of a sci-fi writer. I can live with that. I’ll be honest here, there are many entertainments spewed forth that I simply don’t like. Millions of other people do. These things make stupid amounts of money. And I think that’s great. I want everyone to succeed. It’s not pie, there’s something for everyone. But there is no part of my saying “Sorry, I don’t like this” that’s going to help anyone in any way. I understand that social media has allowed everyone to have access to a megaphone without any filters attached. That can not, and should not, mean everyone has to use it. Otherwise the resulting cacophony blurs into meaningless background noise. Which, as I type this, seems to be where we’re at. No matter how I look at things I can see no positives if I add my voice. So, I stick to what I know and hope everyone has fun watching whatever they watch.

Back in the day when I was first hired to write a script for SPLICE: HIT BIT TECHNOLOGY I was given the kind of free reign authors can only dream of. The only rule was that Splice had to be high tech super villain. After that I was on my own and I had a blast. I sat with my thoughts and started figuring out how to introduce him to the world. Originally I wrote an action scene, you know the kind – car chases, guns, well dressed Olympians uttering pithy one liners at just the right time. As trite as that sounds, and it was trite, it read well and was propulsive. But it didn’t get me anywhere. Short of innumerable flashbacks there was no way to tell any sort of story. So, I tossed that into the hopper and rethought my plan. I think I tried four or five alternate beginnings before I hit on the one I used. I decided to tell Splice’s story from the beginning. Him as a ten year old boy, abused and beaten, tossed to the side of the road (literally), and forced to make a life for himself or die trying.

Over the next few months it all came together. Some characters I wanted to add did nothing to advance the action so I left them in a folder for later. I ended up using a couple of them in the novel later, but the script was becoming a well honed entity all on its own and I didn’t want anything to hamper that. The final script left beta readers breathless. Many commented on how the ending made them gasp out loud. In once case causing them to scare the family pet.

When this gets made, and thanks COVID for seriously screwing up our time-lines, the production team, once assembled, may have to make some changes in locales to bring this in at budget. But the story is there and I’m convinced it will survive any minor alterations like that. God knows the resulting book caught people by surprise. It was voted The Best Sci-Fi Novel of 2020 by the Critters Readers Poll and followed that up with a highly laudatory review from Kirkus Reviews, which is the industry standard when it comes to what distributors and libraries will, or will not, purchase.

Scroll down for more fun.

On the other hand, The Brittle Riders has been a completely different experience. First, and this seems important, it was never meant to be a film. Oh, sure, I’d joke with other writers about my dreams of Spielberg helming the director’s chair and, at least, one Kardashian doing a gratuitous nude scene, but that was about as serious as things got. Then, one day, I was chatting with a nice human who makes films and they said nice things about The Brittle Riders and went so far as to claim it could make a quality movie or streaming show. So, in 2022, with their help, I enlisted a few film professionals to read the Omnibus. In return they agreed to grade it on a lengthy set of criteria with the understanding that anything above a 60% would be considered a good score. As you can see by the screen shot below, they gave it a 97.92%.

That’s more than 60% never mind what form of math you use to measure results. And now some very important people are saying nice things about it and meaning them.

That has led me deep into a world I know little about. While there are similarities from my experiences in the music industry, I find myself relying on advice from professionals who have taken pity on me and keep me from doing anything egregiously stupid.

While there are no guarantees that any of this stuff will ever grace a silver screen or two, I do know now my writing has value. Like many writers, that was something I doubted. I’ll never be the jerk who starts every conversation with “Do you know who I am?” but it does take some weight off my shoulders. And, I find myself writing more often and feeling better about the results. Oh, yeah, there are days I cough up a smelly hairball or twelve instead of a story, but that happens to all writers. And those days are fewer now.

Until next week, light some sage, toss a prayer my way, wish me luck, or just buy me a drink. Everything’s appreciated.

Take care and stay safe.

A couple of happy events led to today’s missive. First, there’s nothing urgent burbling up that requires my immediate attention and, second, it seems that signing up for this mailing list has become the hot new fad. No complaints from me, but it does mean there are more than a few people who are looking around the inside of my squishy brain and wondering what the heck is going on. So today will be like one of those refresher courses you took in college. Sure, you know this stuff, but dusting it off and giving it a quick once over can’t hurt.

And Away We Go!

SPLICE: HIT BIT TECHNOLOGY is the complete package. There is a novel, a movie script, a wildly laudatory Kirkus Review, and it was voted the Best Science Fiction Novel of 2020 by the Critters Readers Poll. The book is continuing to spread across the globe and even got a four star review from Readers Judge in India. Now is as good a time as any for you to take a moment out of your busy day and get your copy.

Next up on our nostalgia tour is The Brittle Riders. When writers say “I don’t care if it sells, I just hope to make an impact” they are summing up my experiences with The Brittle Riders trilogy. While always a steady seller it has never topped any sales charts. But, it still managed to get banned outright in Russia and shadow banned in China, where they won’t even admit I exist. The good news is that dictatorships, no matter their name, tend to be slow and stupid. Which means smart people can figure out ways around any limitations. If you want to know how to smuggle some McSciFi into those countries, and a few others, just click here for a complete primer from How I Travel magazine. In the meantime, The Brittle Riders, click to get your copy, has found new fans in the ranks of Hollywood producers and has been slowly wending its way from a fun fever dream into something much larger. By “larger” I mean there now exists a treatment for a pilot, verified reviews from all walks of life, and supporting materials for a full presentation are currently being developed in two different countries. Even if nothing comes of this, we’re positioned far better than we ever have been before.

You’ll note I said “trilogy” when referring to The Brittle Riders. That specific term has lost it’s meaning as Book IV of the trilogy, entitled Goptri of the Mists: Kitaab Ek has hit bookshelves the world over and is picking up steam. Oddly, and everyone is fine with this, people are discovering Goptri, liking it, and then going back and picking up The Brittle Riders to fill in the gaps. This is not how things were planned on the old drawing board, but it works. While Goptri is firmly planted in The Brittle Riders’ universe, it has all new characters, new locations, and a villain that shocks even the most dedicated readers. That’s the kind of compliment writers love. Well, that and “You have such pretty eyes, here’s a million dollars.” Like all my books, it’s being sold on two continents and has fans on both. Book V of the trilogy is currently being edited and Book VI is on my computer looking for an ending. Don’t worry, I’ll find it … eventually.

Keep scrolling.

In comic book news, the happy elves over at Hadithi Sambamba Comix have been working overtime. Legends Parallel has emerged from pandemic hell and issue #4 is on its way to you. The critically acclaimed comic was also a best seller for Nerdanatix Distribution for three solid years. Now that Nerdanatix is also emerging from pandemic hell, they closed their doors in June of 2020, the band is getting back together and is ready to rock.

In the fun multiverse of Hybrid Zero there’s a ton of stuff happening. Book #3 in the Juggernaut saga is scripted and being laid out. The story of little Zoe, genetically enhanced super soldier, and her family of violently weird misfits, has garnered rabid fans and is spreading like COVID without the ugly side effects. A new title, Neutrinos is being inked as I type and should be in your sweaty hands this fall. The happy tale of the multiverse’s first all silent, NC-17, rock opera is exactly the kind of comic you need in your life.

Above and beyond all of that there are several other projects in development that will be coming to you in 2023. I will share more info once I have it.

Just a skosh more.

I keep getting asked if I’ve seen this or that public entertainment and the answer is usually yes. Then I get asked why I don’t write about them. That answer is simple. First, I can’t imagine a multiverse where anyone would give a damn about my opinion and, second, it’s not like any of these shows or books need the publicity.

If you’re looking for reviews to help you know what to think about this week’s most important thing ever, I’m not a good choice. If you want to buy me a drink and let me regale you with my opinion, we can make that happen.

Until next week, stay safe and sane.

We recently received an offer to have hard copies of SPLICE: HIT BIT TECHNOLOGY and The Brittle Riders released in the United Kingdom. That’s the good news. But, and you knew there was a “but” hiding in here somewhere, many chains in the U.K. pay differently than they do in the states. Enough so that, were we to offer the wholesale discount needed in the U.S. we would be paying them to shelve the books.

“Thank you for carrying these titles, here’s ten quid apiece for your troubles.”

BUT WAIT! THERE’S HOPE!

U.K. wholesale prices are higher than U.S. ones so there is now room to make a profit. But, there’s that sneaky word again, the way our manufacturing and distribution is set up we are only allowed one price structure per title.

So, we had to make a choice. Do we keep our wholesale prices at the American level, or do we increase our wholesale costs so we can all eat while shipping to the United Kingdom?

Pip, pip, cheery o, and all that English speak I learned from Mary Poppins.

Yeah, not that hard after all.

Not to worry, you’ll still be able to buy online from all our U.S. affiliated stores. And there will still be autographed copies you can order, and so on. Honestly, not much will change. Over ninety percent of our U.S. sales are online based at the moment. As things develop, and related projects become more public, that could change. In fact, we all hope it will.

The whole process is going to take a couple more weeks, but you’ll soon be able to buy SPLICE: HIT BIT TECHNOLOGY and The Brittle Riders off shelves in England. All the money talk aside, this is not some weird “get rich quick” scheme. More of an exciting way to break even for a bit. Still, it is a viable way for us to have a legitimate presence in a foreign market and to build on an existing fan base. That’s not something to be sneezed at. You can already order my books at Waterstones in the U.K. and they’ll hold them at a desk for you without judgment.

Fun fact, Waterstones discontinued selling the Brittle Riders Trilogy separately and instead will only sell you the Omnibus version.  This has nothing to do with them being greedy jerks. People were only buying the Omnibus so they saw no need to keep stuff around no one wanted. You can also get your personal copies of SPLICE: HIT BIT TECHNOLOGY and Goptri of the Mists: Kitaab Ek at the same locations.

God bless English people.

Also, God bless the Japanese. If something sells semi-well they’ll print and store copies simply because it will make the next customer’s life easier. So, if you’re in Japan, you can order the Omnibus edition now but you need to do it fast. There is only one copy left.

In the real world if you have the budget to print a few thousand copies and a place to keep them so you can ship them out as needed, being a publisher is a good deal. You can get printing discounts, offer reduced wholesale pricing, get bulk shipping rates and so on. That is the goal and it’s one we can now see, we’re just not there yet.

When The Brittle Riders came out in September of 2016, it was to little fanfare and fewer hopes. I had no family to pawn copies off to and there was no guarantee the small, but mighty, legion that liked my short stories would want something as dense as this. While it was true beta readers had said nice things and promised to tell their friends when it came out, that’s not really the kind of stuff you impress your landlord with.

The first person to offer me a chance to mad pimp my book in public was, fellow author and eventual groomsman at my wedding, Steve Silver. I walked into a room that had a few people I knew and many more I did not. I spoke for a bit, told the funny story of how I’d just been bootlegged in Russia, and took my seat near the front door of the bar. My shiny new girlfriend, who is now my wife, Kim sat with me, made my array of comic books and novels (one issue of each) look good, and we hoped and prayed to make enough money to afford a couple of drinks. By the end of the night we’d not only crossed that incredible threshold, we’d sold out of everything. The next day found me delivering the last two copies of The Brittle Riders that could be found anywhere in the world, to a customer who’d ordered them over the phone the night before. That meant I had to call Nancy, the owner of Azoth Khem, and see if I could get a few more author copies. She said yes, because she’s nice that way, and we both beseeched our personal gods that people would actually like this thing.

They did and were even willing to say so in public. Since we were still arguing with the Russian government over the bootleg it was hard getting any reviews published on Amazon. It seems they weren’t convinced we, or the reviews, were real. However, humans are resourceful creatures. They posted on Facebook, added their thoughts on Goodreads if they were members, sent emails, took pics, and then told their friends, “Yo, home-slice, ya’ll need to read this shit!” And their friends, God bless them, did just that.

As the dust from our Russian misadventure cleared, the original art by, internationally renowned artist, Jiba Molei Anderson got flagged as “adult content” and no one would carry the title. Long story short, after many profanities we got new covers and set about marketing this to wider audiences. And they told two friends, and so on.

In 2020 SPLICE: HIT BIT TECHNOLOGY came out and people did more than just say nice things. They helped it get voted the Best Science Fiction Novel of the Year on the Critters Readers Poll.

All of that laid the groundwork for a couple of film deals to move their way out of the “pure fantasy” camp into the “we should talk” camp. Those are baby steps, I’ll admit, but they’re exciting baby steps. And those baby steps have now led us to talking to stores in foreign countries and figuring out how to make it all work.

As I’m typing this some very frantic people are crunching numbers, parsing out gummies, and making the haunted spreadsheets stop their infernal screaming.

It will all get done and my multiverse will be a slightly better place.

Until next week, stay out of jail, don’t catch monkey pox (it seems like it hurts like foaming hell), and make sure to tell your friends so they can tell two friends and …..

I can’t begin to tell you how many times, over the last few weeks, a billion dollar check made payable to me has completely failed to materialize. Nor did anyone magically transfer even a mere million dollars to me in any way. Not even in bitcoin. Suffice it to say, I’m not rich.

I did get a few hundred bucks for an anthology I can tell you about next year, but that didn’t even cover rent.

I bring all this up for those who also follow me on Twitter. Apparently someone conflated the verifiable facts that (1) a successful Hollywood film producer said nice things about The Brittle Riders and (2) I could finally afford to get married and came up with “BIG OL’ BILL’S A BILLIONAIRE!”

Anyway, after some awkward back and forth, they took down the post but things have a habit of burbling back to the surface on the Internet so I wanted to try and get ahead of it here.

Yeah, because that always works.

To quote the immortal Mr. A.L.I., “Back to Reality, Back to Life.”

On the good news front, after burning in the flames of pandemic hell, Nerdanatix is back. This is great news for all the comic book titles over at Hadithi Sambamba Comix. If we’ve learned anything during this mess it’s that being a comic book distributor is hard, and expensive, work.

The good news for each and everyone of you is that there will be a series of promotions allowing you to catch up on the – many ongoing and critically acclaimed – series I pen for free. Digitally only, but you can still buy hard copies, autographed upon request, by CLICKING HERE and having a valid credit card or PayPal account.

This works out well for everyone since we have new titles being released over the next six months and now we can get some nice promo under our belts while, hopefully, whetting the appetites of the uninitiated.

Keep-a-scrollin’ for more!

Back to my evil plot to become a billionaire and the exclusive ruler of Latveria – not to be confused with Latvia which is well known for exemplary human rights, excellent education, and exceptional beers, all of which make being an evil dictator difficult – quite a bit has been accomplished.

The treatment for the pilot of The Brittle Riders is in the can and it’s truly impressive. Just knowing that there is a ‘number larger than zero’ amount of people who want to read this thing makes me nervous and happy all at once. I think that’s known as “giddy.”

The fun part was finally having a legitimate reason to figure out what this could look like on a screen. While some scenes in the book transfer perfectly others would leave an audience yawning. The battle, bar, and other action scenes work beautifully cinematically. The strategy planning, along with the “HEY THERE! IT’S GOOD TO MEET YOU,” scenes work in small doses but not in the depth presented in the book. Simply put, letting a reader do a deep dive into the minds creating an event is wonderful brain food. But, on screen, it’s naught but talking heads and stale appetizers.

So each scene needed to be pulled apart, assessed and rated for it’s visual value, and then added, or discarded, as needed. Not to worry, some of the cool brain stuff survived. It has to for the story to make any sense. But it got rewritten to work on screen.

The other thing that needed consideration was that we were creating a pilot, not an eighteen episode series. That meant we had to get the most Brittle Riders possible on screen in an hour and a half or less. Considering the whole story knocks in around a thousand pages, that required some trimming.

We focused on introducing the characters, the world they live in, and enough of the history behind it all to make it make sense.

Don’t worry, there’s still plenty of nudity and hyper-violence to keep you entertained.

After multiple peer reviews, and more edits than ever should be allowed, we feel we’ve accomplished what we set out to do.

Additionally, promotional materials for the Brittle Riders continue to be created by people who keep getting paid by other people who are trying to dazzle Azoth Khem Publishing and me and who continue to do a masterful job at it. Bonus? Being dazzled is fun, even at my age.

As a side note, if someone offers to spend third party money to dazzle you, let them. It really feels good.

If any of this confuses you, please feel free to ask me for clarification prior to firing off a tweet with fifteen people tagged. It will make everyone’s lives easier.

Until next week, stay safe and sane. Also, and I don’t believe I have to say this, don’t lick random monkeys.

First off, as I announced on social media, The Big Wakeup Call, starring Ryan Gatenby (and occasionally tolerating me), is going on a brief hiatus. I did not say it was “yanked off the air by the man.” Nor did I say “(our) witto feewings got hurt” so we shut it all down. Just for the record, after twelve years of this I can assure you more than one keyboard warrior has tried to hurt our “witto feewings” and we’re still around. Heck over the years I have managed to quit smoking, drinking, and being single. My “witto feewings” are just fine. No, simply put, we’re freaking busy. Ryan’s in the process of expanding his media empire and setting the stage for global domination. Or more money. I think he’d be fine either way. As for me, last week I shared two important developments in the land of McSciFi and this week I will share more.

Scroll down to keep reading. I wouldn’t want you to get bored.

First off, the lovely and talented Cyril Brown is diving back into the deep end with a brand new title for the Hybrid Zero multiverse. For those of you who may have recently arrived, allow me to quickly summarize Cyril’s mad genius. In his multiverse everything happens contemporaneously but each universe is at a different chronological point. So, one may be in the thirtieth century while it’s next universe neighbor might just now be learning about their version of Boy George. It’s a lot of fun keeping those time lines straight.

Thus far, the multi-dimensional epic Juggernaut – often lauded as the perfect skewer for the military industrial complex, Jungle Grrl – a biting satire aimed at capitalist hypocrisy, and Cassandra and the Changeling Sword – a glorious look at mythoi throughout time that has a singing sword and a galactic turtle, are all out now.

BUT WAIT! THERE’S MORE!

Into the fray comes Neutrinos – a pan-galactic mockery of the music business, capitalism, and anything that gets in its way. Neutrinos is the multiverse’s first, all silent, NC-17 intergalactic rock opera. Think of it as the story you never wanted but always needed. Hearkening back to legendary, and salacious, creations from the 70s such as Flesh Gordon and Fritz the Cat, Neutrinos manages to hide deep social commentary amidst copious amounts of laughter and sex.

Actually, that can be said about all of Cyril’s works.

Use the links above to catch up, if you haven’t already done so, and strap in or strap it on (as the case may be) for another exciting adventure set in the Hybrid Zero multiverse.

As any indie science fiction author can attest, unless the first book in your absolutely awesome, totally epic, series sells around a million copies, by the time you get to the fourth you’re pretty much selling to friends and family only. And the number of friends can be counted on a closed fist.

But, sometimes, reality takes a back seat and starts making out with the sexy beast known as absurdity (with thanks to Camus and Kierkegaard) and all sorts of odd noises and wonderful things begin to happen. Such is the case with Goptri of the Mists: Kitaab Ek. The fourth release in the The Brittle Riders trilogy, Goptri has benefited from a confluence of unusual events.

Between The Brittle Riders generating interest from film production companies to reviewers in Asia trying to make sense of Goptri there is renewed interest in this odd little universe I’ve created. And, because God looks out for fools, drunks, and children – making me His favorite son, people discovering Goptri first are backtracking to get The Brittle Riders and some, but not all yet, are also starting to check out everything else I’ve written. That should keep them busy.

Oh, go ahead and click on those last two title links. They’re brief video teasers for each series. They have pretty music and easy to follow graphics.

Anyway, here’s a glimpse at what some new Goptri fans are saying.

• There’s a horny squid and nukes. What more could I ask for?
  – Mike B
• I never considered giving my spouse a year’s worth of meat for our anniversary.
  – Linda H
• Okay, wow, did not see this villain coming. The evil unleashed is beyond daunting.
  – Aariz M
• No matter how much you’ll want to you can never look away from the mirror McCormick sticks in front of your mind.
  – Tina U
• (McCormick’s) always been LGBTQIA+ friendly, but this subtly raises the bar and I, for one, am thrilled.
  – Ashanti D

That’s enough for this week. Stay safe, sane, and hydrated. I like having you around.

Well, it’s officially been ten days since Kim and I got McMarried. As is common with middle-aged couples, who collect AARP coupons, we’ve been enjoying carefree days of ziplining, parasailing, nude skydiving, and – obviously – zorbing. New readers are thinking “Sweet mother of the immortal possum, these folks have got it going on!” Everyone else knows I’m lying between what’s left of my teeth. Still, it’s nice being married even if it’s more “Netflix and chill” than “Getting tossed out of perfectly good planes.”

Okay, enough happiness. Onto the stuff that justifies my existence.

There are two cool things happening right now. One I can speak freely about and the other I need to keep three lawyers on speed dial while having a representative with a stun gun near me at all times. We’ll tackle the first one first.

Fans of the rollicking multiverse known as Legends Parallel will be thrilled to know that we are back in production. I have rewritten the script for Issue 4 and it is wending its way across the ocean blue into the hands of the legendary artist Leslie Tejlor where he will begin the arduous process of turning my scribblings into art. Since Leslie doesn’t speak much English, and I don’t speak any Hungarian, we have learned to use emojis, sample graphics, and we’ve even stooped so low as to use Google translate. Yet, somehow, we not only communicate, we get along quite well. Our safety net, his daughter who teaches English, has been removed from our arsenal as she got married and moved to Finland. Nevertheless, we seem to be doing okay.

You may have noticed the word “rewritten.” Back in the halcyon days of yore I wrote twelve issues which compiled a single story arc. The overall story will not change but a lot of things have happened since then. You may have heard about the pandemic and some low-key political stuff. While Legends Parallel (cool teaser video via the link) has taken most of it’s social commentary shots via allegories and metaphors, something that will not change, it would be foolish to ignore the world around us.

Also, while some people have micro-focused on the sexuality in the books, more than expected understood we were using boobs and dongles (yes, those are the Latin terms) as flash grenades to obfuscate the deeper messages. Simply stated, we wanted the gist of it all to sneak up on people and force them to go back and re-read everything to see what they’d missed. And, surprise, surprise, surprise, according to the reviews, it actually worked.

There is much to ponder here in terms of thought-provoking issues of race, sexuality, culture and society’s attitudes to history and relationships.

You want anthropological context and sociological commentary? This has jugs of it.

But, yeah… BOOBS.
– Zak Weber – Sci Fi Comics Nexus

Okay, onto the one I have to be veddy veddy, thanks to Elmer Fudd for the verbiage, careful with.

Back in January I spoke with one of those silly humans who makes money making movies. He thought there might be value in packaging The Brittle Riders (another cool video teaser via the link) to producers and seeing if any would like to have some fun and make this a movie or TV show or something cool like that. In an effort to keep it from feeling like Bill & Bob say so ergo it must be, we enlisted the help of a few other industry professionals, i.e. producers, writers, directors, etc., and sent them the Omnibus edition.

To understand how odd this was imagine a conversation that begins like this; “Hi, my name’s Bill and you don’t know me but I need you to read a thousand pages of my mental breakdown, write a critique, and get back to me in a couple of weeks.”

Against all odds they did just that. When the dust settled, and the reviews had been tabulated, they had given The Brittle Riders a 97.92% score, out of 100%, as far as its ability to be adapted into a film related project. The majority of films rated via this method land a little closer to 60%. Suffice it to say we paid heed.

And thus did our quest begin.

While finding enthusiastic professionals is a feel good moment, we needed to talk to someone who was used to tossing around a hundred million dollars, or so, at a project and finding out if they could justify moving this dystopian fun factory up a level or two. Long story short? Apparently this isn’t a bad idea.

A very unique tone and world, reminiscent of GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY meets a MAGNIFICIENT SEVEN/DIRTY DOZEN – type set up, but with a look, flavor, and lexicon all its own. In a world where studios and streamers are looking for IP that’s expansive, both narratively and in terms of ancillary possibilities (prequels, offshoots, video games, etc.), (The Brittle Riders) certainly seems to offer up a number of possibilities.

– Garrick Dion – Producer
Drive
Joker
Nightcrawler

All righty, time to pay attention.

While Garrick, I can call him by his first name as we’re basically BFFs – well, close enough for Hollywood, liked the project he hasn’t cut a check yet. However, just having his review changed everything. Suddenly people who couldn’t be bothered to hire me as an unpaid intern were intently interested in all things McSciFi (all sorts of cool video teasers via that link).

One company has even begun developing 3D renderings of the characters (sample graphic included below) to see if they can justify making an animated series out of it. While nothing is written in stone, hell – nothing’s even written in flowing sands at the moment, they have joined the slowly growing pantheon of companies that are showing an active interest in foisting The Brittle Riders on an unsuspecting populace.

Another thing that has happened is we’ve begun, with the help of people who know what the heck they’re doing, actively creating a treatment for a pilot. Since there is a pilot being considered that indicates a series can (SHOULD! GOSH DARNIT!) follow, it gives you an idea of where the focus is at the moment.

Given the fact that Black Adam took over a half a decade to get in the pipeline, and it had Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson behind every aspect of it, we have to be pleased with the progress we’ve been making, and we are.

There’s more coming, and I will update what I can when I can, but, until then, be fierce like the dino at the bottom of this message and stay safe and sane until we meet again.