All right. Chris says although the DEATHWISH cover isn't quite finished (ie approved by the art department) you can have a look on his website: http://www.christianmcgrath.com/mainpages/pages/page2.html. It's the fourth one over on the top row. Lots of snow, can't miss it.

As for Tyler Young:

 

First with the bad...Randall (aka the Cal cover model) moved from NYC and is no longer the cover model for our favorite Prozac poster child. I admit I was upset and, hell, *sad*. You get attached to the very first image you see of your characters and I'll miss seeing him on my covers terribly.

Now the good...Chris (All Hail, Articus), the most talented of artists, told me the new model, Tyler Young, was brilliant. Having seen one of the photo shoot shots, I must say he's not wrong. Tyler has an absolutely amazing face (a rather familiar looking one in fact, groan)--definitely born to brood, genetically predisposed to sulk. A Cal look through and through. His hair, however, is short (it keeps getting shorter in cover to cover. By book 7 Vin Diesel will be the model at this rate!)

So, be prepared for the change and when it happens welcome Tyler with open arms. He's even a Fantasy fan. Whew, and that face.  I'll always miss Randall, but am grateful Chris did such an amazing job filling his damn sexy shoes.

Goodbye, Randall. We'll miss you
Welcome, Tyler. Get a website and fangirls will bombard you with slobberingly lustful emails...you know, if that's your sort of thing. 

Dinner is Friday at 5:30. My signing is from 3:30 to 4:30 at booth 1119 mysterious galaxy/penguin putnam, so I'm thinking we can meet there to walk over since wedschilde says is a fair walk and we'll be fighting the crowds. We need a final head count. Any new comers? Any who decided they can't make it? 

Sound off!  

All right...according to the leaked schedule, I haven't seen anything panel-wise that would prevent an early dinner on Friday. Comments?

I usually don't comment on movies...mainly because most movies are crap these days, but I have to comment on this one.

Saw the adverts on TV: slapstick stupidity
Saw the trailer: maybe a little funny...maybe
Saw the movie: Quel surprise!

Hancock...to blow my tiny mind was the best, funniest movie I have seen in a long, long time and not slapstick funny either. It was more of a clever funny with a twist you don't see coming...and who can say that about movies these days? It's not dark and grim and anarchic like Batman will be (cannot wait for the Joker), but I was damn surprised at how much I laughed and how fun it was (without dropping to the level of 'stupid' humor.) It even had a few serious moments.  Not to mention I'm not much of a Will Smith fan, but I even liked him. I've never seen a movie that adverts didn't do it justice. It's usually the other way around. You get sucked in by the advert and then the movie is godawful. 

Hancock, you could do a helluva lot worse.

Prison scene: HA!

Here's a question for New Yorkers. We say 'cuss words' or 'curse words' down south, but tend towards cuss (especially at the age of, say, an anti-social twenty year old.) Which would an anti-social twenty year old in NYC use? Although Cal spent about eighteen years (or sixteen if you minus Tumulus years) traveling all over the country, since he's lived in NYC about two or so years now, he might have changed to what you all (er...youse guys) use. So...which?  One or the another? Both? Something entirely different... I know it can't be 'swear words' surely. Sounds like what a nun would say before smacking your knuckles with a ruler. 

I'm tentatively scheduled to sign books at the Mysterious Galaxy/Penguin Putnam Booth on Friday July 25th at 3:30. Now let us all sacrifice marshmallow peeps (loathe those things) to the hoodoo/voodoo gods that I'm not opposite a SPN panel. If that's the case, I'll have to sign SPN/Nightlife fans's books at the cookie cart afterwards or some such. 

Also signing from Thurs through Sunday is (tentatively now):  Chris Marie Green, Jim Butcher , William Dietz, Justine Musk , Jeffrey Mariotte, Marjorie Liu, Charles Stross. Pretty impressive crowd of talent, I'd say.

"The Mysterious Galaxy Booth number should be #1119, BTW, or something right in that vicinity.

Once we have a final booth schedule, not only will it be available on-site, but on our web site as well:

http://mg.booksense.com/NASApp/store/IndexJsp?s=storeevents&eventId=376397" says Mary Elizabeth of Mysterious Galaxy, who makes quite a valid point about peep sacrifices as well.


 

 wtf??? 
And I'm blind from the cave-like lighting that comprises a third of the show.

Hey, need a little info here. When Madhouse was released at  your B&N, was the cardboard dump holding it and the other two books by the Sci Fi/Fantasy section? Could you find it easily? In other words if you were a fan who doesn't follow the blog or website and wasn't updated the release date had been bumped up, when you walked in the store, would you have known Madhouse was out? Did you see the dump or was Madhouse in sci/fi fantasy new releases or was it on the shelf already? 

What about Borders? On the new release table? Someone said they actually found me in horror there. I'm flattered. :) 

Waldenbooks? New releases? (or do they have a separate new release section for Sci fi/fantasy anymore?

For those into the Japanese thing...the Nightlife books are now up on Amazon.jp, however the covers aren't yet. My translator says this is fairly normal as Amazon.jp is rather slow about that sort of thing. She also said there is more art inside the books that aren't seen on the publisher's website. Fumiyo says, "In addition, the books have a colored frontispiece each, but they are not on the web so you have to

Vegas has been wet, soggy, cold as hell and *still* not a single frigging Elvis! But happy birthday to liketheriverrun, my evil twin (who also flew me in with her frequent flyer miles...she works in the *real* world and makes *real* money. Good for her! Now if the bitch would only give me some.) But, I digress, happy b-day to the Niko to my Cal....if Niko had double D's...mmmm, disturbing image. Good thing there's no witchcraft in my world. That would be one pissed off Niko taking out Victoria's Secret with his katana. Lift and separate, my ass! Off to the desert and a ghost town. Yippe ki yay, mother fucker! 

The Japanese artist has a blog where she's posted some of the same pics from the publishing website, but I can actually see them as they download faster. If you hit the pic, it'll enlarge and show you the entire thing. The guy in the turtleneck is Niko...click on that and you see him with his braid and it is pretty damn HOT.) The last pic is Rafferty.

http://kazusa333.blog8.fc2.com/

And if you speak Japanese, you might enjoy the site even more.  
If she changes from day to day the pictures are posted on 5/18/2008

Here they are: Go to www.robthurman.net and hit the pics on the right to see the large versions. Laptop...pretty cool. Desktop computer much better. And if your socks aren't blown off...then you're not wearing any damn socks!

All right...the Japanese publisher has put up the link to the covers for Nightlife (as previously discussed they divided it into two volumes.)  Straight from my translator Fumiyo:

 Torchwood, a super secret (wink wink), above the law agency has exciting new positions open:

1)Familiarity with weapons, medical skills, and alien technology a plus, but will train.

2)*Must* have the ability to either hold breath for great lengths of time or possess no nasal blockages and have no former knee injuries that would prevent long periods of kneeling.  

3)Double-jointed applicants will be interviewed first. 

4)Poodles are *hot.*

As always, an EEE (equal everything employer.) 

Oh, man.

Davies pulled a Joss. He took unlikable and/or characters that blend blandly into the background and suddenly makes them nice or witty, dry, and gives them a cool attitude and then....

SWAT! 

I would've cried if I didn't have balls or, to be more appropriate, ovaries of steel.  

Normally I wouldn't pass this on...I get sent this type of thing every day as I volunteer for a rescue agency and as much as you want to do, there is so much you *can* do. I'm absolutely full to the gills with animals. I can't shoehorn in one more. As a matter of fact, the last time I went to the vet, the vet tech rather snobbishly referred to my number of cats as a 'cattery.'  I said, funny, I refer to it as a cathouse, only I make less money from it. Hmph.

Anyway, the Shelbyville Animal Shelter in KY ( 502-633-0009) is full and they start putting down animals with the next one that comes in. So if anyone has any room at all please consider going to www.petfinder.com or http://search.petfinder.com/shelterSearch/shelterSearch.cgi?animal=&breed=&age=&size=&specialNeeds=&declawedPets=&children=&status=&id=&internal=&contact=&name=&shelterid=KY139&sort=&preview=1

They've a gorgeous white poof ball of a dog named Stormy I'd scoop up in a second if I had an inch to spare (too bad he's not a girl...could rename him/her Delilah.) Was hit twice by two cars, came out unscathed, only to end up on death row. Call them if you can. They must have a firm commitment to pull the animal today to spare a life.

This is the only time I'll do this as it's too sad for those far away who can't do anything, but as it's my two home states, I wanted to do what I could for these poor guys this one time.

In other news: Speed Racer move....WTF?????

Yes, I'm going to San Diego Comic Con again this year and hope to be signing books at the Penguin Putnam/Mysterious Galaxy Booth again. I also hope it's at a time not opposite the Supernatural panel or I won't get  a single fan. Ha! Last year was great...the hour flew by and I had tons of fans (which I worried about as the Con is more geared towards gaming, TV, movies, anime, etc.) But there seems to be more of a literary presence every year other con goers told me...which is great, because I want to see the SPN boys, Clive Owen, the SGA actors, etc as much as anyone else. 

Now, I know some fans might not want to go to the con as it is insanely crowded and I have said in the past if that's so, I'd be willing to come outside the con at a prescheduled time and sign books if anyone wanted that. One fan (squirrel on crack icon...ha!) suggested that fans take me out to lunch. This sounds good in theory, however I will be at the con pretty much 24/7 from Thurs to Sat and will be heading home Sunday. So, it would either have to be in the gaslamp district during con hours (and it's so damn crowded it would be very difficult to find anyplace not jam packed) or Sunday before I leave. All this sounds good, but it depends on the number of fans that actually want to do this. I've found out in the past fans aren't always reliable when they say, 'Sure! I'll be there.' I did it once in the past and out of 15 'swear to the Great Spagetti Monster I'll be there', only *one* fan showed (a second one did have a good excuse.) Luckily I was having coffee with a bunch of friends and we just moved the coffee location to B&N's Starbucks so I didn't go out of my way too badly.

So, you San Diego fans weigh in. Meet me outside convention center, lunch, or there aren't enough to make it worth anyone's while. Although, I will come outside the Con and sign a book on the sidewalk for a single fan. That's doable, and as I respect the hell out of my fans, the very least I could do!

As for the Con....CAN'T FUCKING WAIT!  It's a blast. And then it's overload and you want to find a corner and go fetal (125,000 people!), but then you chug some caffeine and you're ready for more!  Best costume last year in my book...dead Spartan from 300. The guy had the outfit (skimpy thing that it was...hee) and was covered in blood with about twenty arrows sticking out of him. Snort. That was a good one.