Cover: Terry Pavlet

PRESS RELEASE:

A leader in New Pulp and Genre Fiction, Pro Se Productions announces the debut of a New Pulp Character cast in the grand tradition of sword and sorcery classics! From Author Ralph L. Angelo, Jr. comes TORAHG THE WARRIOR: SWORD OF VENGEANCE!

“Journey with me,” Angelo states, “back to a time unheard of, a land of myth, monsters and magic where a steel muscled warrior must battle against an entire nation to avenge the wrongs done to him as well as to avenge his father’s death! Without a doubt my favorite creation so far, Torahg is destined to take his place alongside classic heroes such as Conan, Tarzan, Kull, John Carter and many more.”

An honored prince stands first in line for the throne of his father, the most powerful King in the world. Young and unaware that the world he knows, his very birthright is about to be snatched from him by murder. In one fateful day, his own brother, in league with a malevolent sorcerer, kills the king. And The Prince, the rightful heir to the kingdom, becomes a wanted fugitive, forced to abandon his life, to exile himself seemingly forever.

Twenty years later, the fugitive returns, no longer the kind hearted youth who watched his father murdered before his very eyes. He walks with the confidence and scars of a hardened warrior, a veteran of many campaigns, and a trained fighter in many forms of combat. With a heart hardened by twenty years as an outlaw across the world, Destiny calls again, driving him to return to the land of his birth. No longer the Heir to the throne, he is instead a man with only one mission. He is TORAHG THE WARRIOR: SWORD OF VENGEANCE!

“TORAHG,” says Tommy Hancock, Editor in Chief and Partner in Pro Se, “is exciting for Pro Se on a couple of levels. First, Ralph’s novel is a great addition to the Pulp fantasy we’ve become known for thanks to Nancy Hansen’s work and it comes from a different angle as well. Also, though, Ralph’s narrative style and presentation overall is unique amongst what Pro Se offers. The story takes the reader and puts them in the flow of the tale actively and allows them to vicariously stand alongside Torahg as he fights his way through his home and his own history.”

Ralph L. Angelo, Jr. is an author who has written for many major motorcycle magazines as well as having written a ‘how to’ instructional book on motorcycling entitled “Help! They’re All Out to Get Me! The Motorcyclists Guide to Surviving the Everyday World.’

His first novel ’Redemption of the Sorcerer’ was recently released. Since then he has written several more novels, including TORAHG for Pro Se as well as the forthcoming Sci-Fi adventure novel ‘The Cagliostro Chronicles’ amongst others.

A young fugitive prince fled the land. Now he returns and he will be forever remembered as TORAHG THE WARRIOR: SWORD OF VENGEANCE! Written by Ralph L. Angelo, Jr., Edited by Nancy Hansen, Cover art by Terry Pavlet, Design and Print Formatting by Sean Ali, Ebook Formatting by Russ Anderson! Fight alongside TORAHG THE WARRIOR in his debut adventure from Pro Se Productions!

In print for$15.00 from Pro Se’s own store, Amazon , and Barnes and Noble.

This New Pulp Sword and Sorcery tale is also available as an Ebook for only $2.99 for your Kindle, on the Nook, and in nearly all available formats at Smashwords.

For interviews, review copies, and information, contact Morgan Minor, Pro Se Director of Corporate Operations, at MorganMinorProSe@yahoo.com.

For more on Pro Se, go to www.prose-press.com

Monster Earth Volume 1 cover

New Pulp Publisher, Mechanoid Press has announced Monster Earth 2, the second volume in the popular series.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Monster Earth 2 Is Coming!

Atlanta, GA—Mechanoid Press, a small imprint specializing in science fiction, New Pulp and more, returns to the exciting world of their popular giant monster anthology MONSTER EARTH with MONSTER EARTH 2.

Returning to the helm of this mammoth (pun intended) undertaking are editors James Palmer (Mars McCoy: Space Ranger Vol. 2) and Jim Beard (Captain Action and the Riddle of the Glowing Men).

“This is going to take the monster action to a whole new level,” explains Palmer. “I thing fans of the first book are really going to love this one.”

MONSTER EARTH 2 will bring the action closer to the present day, with the nations of the world experimenting with genetic manipulation of the various beasties. Add a secret death cult trying to herald the end of days, and you’ve got a volatile recipe for mayhem and destruction as only some of the hottest writers in New Pulp can bring it.

Returning for this volume are Edward M. Erdelac (Mighty Nanuq), Jeff McGinnis (The Beast’s Home) and Fraser Sherman (Peace with Honor). Joining them will be Thomas Deja (How the West Was Weird). Just as in the previous anthology, Beard and Palmer will also contribute stories.

“Jim did a great job with the bible on this one,” says Palmer. “Between that and all the readers who have asked about a sequel, I knew we just had to do another book.”

MONSTER EARTH 2 is scheduled for either a late December or early January release, and will appear in both Kindle and trade paper formats.

About James Palmer:
James has written articles, interviews, columns, reviews and fiction for Strange Horizons, Tangent Online, The Internet Review of Science Fiction, and New Pulp Publishers Airship 27, Pro Se Productions, and White Rocket Books. His books Slow Djinn and Four Terrors: Weird Horror Tales are currently available in PDF and Kindle formats. He also has a story in Mars McCoy: Space Ranger Vol 2. from Airship 27. For more, visit http://www.jamespalmerbooks.com/ or follow James on Twitter: www.twitter.com/palmerwriter and www.facebook.com/jamespalmerwriter

About Mechanoid Press:
Mechanoid Press is a new imprint specializing in science fiction, New Pulp, and steampunk ebooks and anthologies. For more, visit http://www.mechanoidpress.com/ or follow the robot revolution on Twitter: www.twitter.com/mechanoidpress. You can also like Mechanoid Press on Facebook.

I didn’t know that writer blockitis was catching, but it must be, because just like my buddy and fellow columnist John Ostrander, I seem to be suffering from the same ailment today.

Signs and symptoms include sluggishness, an inability to form ideas, a lack of imagination, a desire to smash the computer, great interest in infomercials, and reading the Sunday New York Times.

Oh. Wait. Here’s something.

It’s an article by Brooke Barnes in the Arts & Leisure section, and it’s called “Save My Blockbuster!” Considering all the words and thoughts that have gone into discussing Man Of Steel by the columnists (including me) here at ComicMix since its opening on June 14, as well as the other comics, science fiction, and pop culture cinematic adventures that have already hit the screen (Iron Man 3, Star Trek: Into Darkness, World War Z) or are still to come (The Lone Ranger, Pacific Rim, R.I.P.D., The Wolverine, Percy Jackson: Sea Of Monsters, Elysium, and The Mortal Instruments: City Of Bones) this summer of 2013 – all involved studios praying that their production will be The Blockbuster of the season – Mr. (or is it Ms?) Barnes’s article is not only interesting, but also relevant.

But just when did the summer become the season of the adventure/science fiction/fantasy/comics/pop culture Blockbuster?

The summer of 1975. Jaws.

In 1973, Richard D. Zanuck and David Brown were producers at Universal. David Brown’s wife was Helen Gurley Brown, editor of Cosmopolitan. He found a pre-publication copy Peter Benchley’s Jaws in the fiction department of the magazine. Cosmo’s book editor had written a detailed synopsis of the plot, which concluded with the comment “might make a good movie.” Zanuck and Brown both read the book overnight, decided that it was “the most exciting thing they had ever read,” and purchased the movie rights They hired the still chancy Steven Spielberg, although the 26 year-old director was starting to make a name for himself for directing Joan Crawford in the pilot of Night Gallery (“Eyes”), defining “road rage” in his adaptation of Richard Matheson’s Duel for an ABC Movie Of The Week – I clearly remember watching Duel perched on the arm of a sofa in my dorm’s packed-to-the-walls common room, every single one of us with eyes glued to the small 19” television set – and The Sugarland Express, his first theatrical film.

Jaws hit the movie screens of America in 1975. It became the archetype of the summer movie for Hollywood. It had a wide national release (“saturation booking”) and massive media buys, i.e., lots and lots and lots of television, radio, and magazine advertising. It made money, and now every studio wanted a Jaws. According to Lester D. Friedman’s book on Spielberg, Jaws “defined the Hollywood hit as a marketable commodity and cultural phenomenon.” Before Jaws, summer was the seasonal dumping ground for Hollywood studios, the home of films they were sorry they made. After Jaws, summer became “the prime season for the release of the…biggest box-office contenders, [studios’s] intended blockbusters.”

1975 was, let’s see, how many years ago?

38.

This summer Hollywood will have released, as the New York Times relates, “13 movies costing $100 million and up (sometimes way up), 44 percent more than in the same period last year. And because these pictures need to attract the global audience possible” to see any kind of profit, “they are increasingly manufactured by committees who tug this way and pull that way: marketing needs this, international distribution need that” and “the all-too-common result is a Frankenfilm” – I love that description! – “a lumbering behemoth composed of misfit parts.”

To test this assertion, Brooks Barnes conceived a movie titled “Red, White, & Blood” with the tagline “The only thing faster than her car was his heart.” The opening of the pitch reads “Think Fast & Furious meets Nicholas Sparks meets Die Hard.” He (she?) then presented it to a producer, a marketer, a studio executive, a researcher, a global marketer, and a writer.

This is what they said:

The Producer: “We need hotter weapons. Huge, big battle weapons – maybe an end-of-the-world device.

The Marketer: “There needs to be a wisecracking set of man candy here, and those actors are shirtless at least once in a TV campaign.”

The Studio Executive: “I’m a huge believer in a good tragic ending – it worked for Titanic.”

The Researcher: “If you try to appeal to everyone, you will end up appealing to no one.”

The Global Marketer: “Just be smarter then making a nationality or a culture the bad guys.”

The Writer: “Consider adding time-traveling aliens, or if that’s unrealistic, a regular alien and a time-traveling human.”

Jaws is a great movie. I have seen it at least a hundred times.

But it was a Trojan horse.

TUESDAY MORNING: Emily S. Whitten

TUESDAY AFTERNOON: Partly Cloudy, with a Chance of Davis

Murania Press’ Ed Hulse visits the Book Cave to let everyone know about this year’s PulpFest information.
The regular episode of The Book Cave will go live on Thursday.

Listen to The Book Cave Special: PulpFest 2013 now at http://thebookcave.libsyn.com/the-book-cave-special-pulp-fest-2013