Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Weekly Update

Wednesday's Blog ... sounds much better than Monday's blog doesn't it? No? Okay I'm late again. It was a Bank Holiday here so things got mixed up and the days blurred. I did get to see Skyfall though so that's a plus.



I always enjoy a good Bond movie - and this is very much a good Bond movie. No gimmicks, no exploding pens - just good scripting, great acting and a well spent 2 hours and change. If you haven't seen it then you should. This isn't the same on a small screen.

There will be an announcement soon on the Vampire Apocalypse series- so stay tuned over the next week or so. In the meantime my HMS Swift Adventures novel Crimson Seas is doing really well - so thank you all for buying it. It would be great to get a few reviews if you have the time - especially if you liked it.

Now the serious bit. We only see pictures over here of the devastation from Hurricane Sandy but our thoughts and prayers are with everyone affected on the East Coast. Stay safe. The stories of heroic rescues serve to ground me and remind me what the human spirit is capable of achieving.

Until next week.

Stay safe

D

Thursday, October 25, 2012

Weekly Update:New Ebook now available at Amazon and other news!


Another week and another book available on Kindle. This one is ‘The Last Stand’ and comes in at 350 or so pages. It’s an Anthology – most of the stories feature Apocalyptic themes, hence the title. There’s zombies, vampires and just plain strange in this collection. Before you rush off and buy it please be aware that it includes some old and some new stories. It includes The End of Things – new novella, A Prelude to the Apocalypse – novella (Vampire Apocalypse series), The Diabolical Plan – story (HMS Swift series), The Island – novella (HMS Swift series), The Third Option – short story, Payback – short story, It’s Your Turn – short story, School’s Out – short story, Collection Day – new novella.

A Prelude to the Apocalypse, The Diabolical Plan and The Island are all also currently available individually in Kindle editions priced at 99c at Amazon.com so
it’s great value at $2.99 (£1.92 Sterling) when you get so many other stories. If you have these stories then please be aware before you buy. For anyone looking to dip into either my Vampire Apocalypse or HMS Swift series this collection is well worth it for the introductory novellas.

This week also saw the reduction in price for The Estuary. I love this novel, zombies, small town, oncoming Apocalypse – I mean what’s not to like? It’s even set in Ireland so the action is up close and personal, there’s no gun shops here, so it puts a different slant on how to deal with zombies. If it’s one of those you were looking at but putting off buying then this is the perfect time at $2.99 (£1.92 Sterling).

Vampire Apocalypse 4 is coming along and I hope to have some news soon on this series...

Until next week.

Derek


Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Weekly Update: New Ebook coming and Octocon

Well, it's Tuesday and Monday's blog is a tad late. Sorry about that. It's been a hectic week and everything got thrown out of kilter due to a family berevement (hence no post last Monday). On the positive side I have a new Anthology coming out that, hopefully, will make up for the late blog. The End of things includes two new novellas as well as a number of short stories that have been published over the years and might be hard to get now. I've also decided to include the 'Prelude to the Apocalypse' short stories and the HMS Swift introductory stories, 'The Diabolical Plan' and 'The Island' as an added bonus for anyone who has put off buying them individually.

This is great value as the three of them alone would cost the cover price and you get so much more with the novellas. This is a great opportunity to introduce yourself to the HMS Swift series and Vampire Apocalypse series. It should be appearing in Amazon listings next week as an ebook edition.

Octocon has come and gone for another year. It was great catching up with old friends and meeting new ones. The panels were as mad as ever but at least we now have a plan for the Zombie Apocalypse. Cork seems to be the consensus as the best place to be - so book your tickets early. Pictures and comments are available on the website, http://www.octocon.com/

Next week's blog will be on time, no matter what happens. How's that for tempting fate? Until next week then.

D

Monday, October 1, 2012

Weekly Update - October 1st 2012 - Whatever happened to the Vampire Apocalypse movie and graphic novel?



Monday again, they seem to come around so quickly. I saw a review today for the third Vampire Apocalypse Book, Fallout, where the reviewer loved the book (thank you for that) but was disappointed that all the story lines were not tied up in the trilogy. I must admit I don’t know where the term ‘Trilogy’ came from in relation to the Vampire Apocalypse series. I suppose it’s because there are three books available and I have taken a break to write other stories. There were, however, a few reasons for this.

Movie?     The first book A World Torn Asunder was optioned for a movie. This was very exciting at the time. First it was optioned as a low budget movie – any movie was a shot in the arm I must admit. Then it was optioned as a TV series – this made me over the moon, especially as there were a lot of really good TV series out at that time and I had great plans. Then that changed again and it was back to being a movie – but this time as a big budget movie with actors’ names I had actually heard of. I mean you would not believe the people who were offered the roll of Harris, I was in seventh heaven. Unfortunately the movie was not made as it turned out. There were many reasons for this but the final decision was to shelve it. So no movie I’m afraid. They paid me for a few years options so I can’t grumble and it was really exciting at the time. Maybe they will pick it up again – who knows?

f     Graphic Novel? The books were optioned for a graphic novel. I love and have always collected comics. I must admit to always having a dream of writing for Marvel and this was somewhat of a breakthrough for the realisation of this dream. It wasn’t Marvel who bought the rights but it was close enough for me. A prologue was produced of twenty or so pages and some lucky Con visitors will have copies that I signed! I still have copies in my room. It was beautifully printed artwork and covered the whole Prologue of the first book. I even took to writing some of the chapters, a totally new experience for me. Unfortunately, issues with late art deliveries and the project taking too long to finish made the publisher decide to go on to other projects. Ah well, Marvel will have to wait for me a bit longer I suppose.  

      Anyway with all the re-writes, screenplays and comic adaptions I was feeling pretty sick of re-writing the VA books so I took a break and went on to write The Gatekeeper, Gemini and Crimson Seas a novel set in the HMS Swift series. This allowed me to recharge and I am now busily writing the next installment in the Vampire Apocalypse series. And it is a series - please don’t assume it will be a quartet! I will continue to write books as long as I can come up with good ideas and as long as people are buying and enjoying the books. Thankfully people are still buying them, long may that continue, and I do have enough ideas – for now anyway.

Okay, that’s it for today – see you all next week.

D

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