It's the Most Wonderful Blog of the Year

Every year at this time, before I bid you and another year of Horror on Hump Day farewell I always post a list of last minute shopping ideas. Here they are below. Some new items, some hot items, some items that are favourites of mine. Check them out and make someone happy this holiday season. They are all from Amazon.com this year, not Canada.

I hope everyone has a happy, healthy, and safe Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanzaa, and a fabulous New Year. Speaking of which I will return again in January with more looks into all of the dark corners.

Stay safe, and think green!

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Facets, Contradictions, and Allegiances

Depth is always one of the elements I strive for when considering characters in role-playing games. Of course this carries over to writing any kind of characters for any story or script. I don't always do it for short stories or novels but I have created characters using role-playing terms and conventions as if I wanted to use them in a game and then used that familiarity with the character to write their part within the story. I recently read a review of a role-playing game and it sparked me to write a note about character diversity. By that I mean the details, the nitty-gritty that differentiate one character from another even though they fit the same social circle, economic strata, and have the same education. What makes one engineer different from another on the same team?

Character diversity can be made by allowing players to select the following. A home country. Political affiliations or leaning toward particular ideals. Additionally there are points where the character differs from the ideas espoused by the party or their group. An immigrant could grow into a new national identity, change politics or move toward a political sub-faction. They could be a part of a guild or association, and from there variegate into a guild-faction. In the context of the game I made the notes for I asked questions like: Is the character part of one nation's military? What is their view of their allies? What is their view of their enemies? Is there competition between units in the same military? Service branch rivalries? How do they compete with other nation's units even when in a united goal?

All of this asks and answers essential questions like what is my character's role in group X, what is it contributing to the local corner of the world, to the country, to the world at large? How does their beliefs shape their style and methodology to their work, job, military service? It speaks to the measure of their character and reveals or further asks how they will deal with situations under stress. When given time. When researching new skills, including magic in applicable settings. When collaborating with others on such skills. Further differentiation might come from another role-playing game approach where a character has their social face and their private face. Not everyone projects their true self all of the time. Even what they do and do not share about themselves could be an important detail.

Mood: disciplined.

Music: Disciples Of The Lie by Iced Earth and Book Of Thel by Bruce Dickinson.

Or get MP3s.

Now at Amazon.COM NOT CA. Buy these at Amazon.com Click Images to Buy

Or get MP3s.

Killing Time and Open Wound Marketing

It's good to be back from hiatus after the onslaught of the thirteen nights in October, even if it is only for a couple of weeks before the next one for the December holiday season. I thought that I would start the new entries with some news. I've released the first issue of my magazine Killing Time - Horror E-Rag™ in the Battered Spleen Productions™ store. I have also opened the Market section of the store with items in the Swag section. The Market section is where I hope to have other authors and artists sell their wares. They will provide me an image, a link to the sales page, and the name of the store or site that is directly selling their product. An author selling copies of their own book from their own site would send me that info. I will not handle the sales or take a commission, only charge for the space in the market.

I will of course have final say if a product is accepted. I want to view the promotional material to see if it's of proper professional quality, if it's going to offend people, and other similar things with which I do not want to be associated. Books for instance that are available places like Amazon or Barnes & Noble will get higher priority only because they've been through most of the checks I'd be concerned with. So why would an author do that? Authors often get copies of their book to sell for much more profit directly in their pocket. Signed copies are common in these cases. So why place a product with Battered Spleen Productions? Promotion. Your product available with those of others. This provides more variety and a chance to pick up a sale.

I'll be honest, I'm not entirely sure of the cost for inclusion at this point. I'm thinking a flat fee per item. Perhaps it will be an annual fee. My initial thought is it would cost about as much as your average paperback book. The main page for the market will have a primary featured item and then a selection of varied items. I have the market broken into three sections. Swag is for shirts, mugs, mouse pads and other similar items. Books is for printed books, which can be horror, thriller, sci-fi, fantasy or other similar related genres. E-books is for e-books only--in the same categories as the printed books. I'd also be interested in role-playing game books or art books in the same genres. Each product will have its own description page or go directly to your sales page as desired.

What do you think? Are you interested? Comments?

Mood: excitable.

Music: Against the Wall by Quiet Riot and Phantom Limb by Tourniquet.

Or get MP3s.

Now at Amazon.COM NOT CA. Buy these at Amazon.com Click Images to Buy

Or get MP3s.

13 Nights of Hallowe'en 2009: Night #13 Poltergeist

Ah! It's Hallowe'en! How are you my pretties? Ready with your candy and drinks to settle in for our movie of the dark night of nights? Good. Sit back and press play on the number one pick for Hallowe'en and my all time favourite horror movie, Poltergeist. This week I read more than one article talking about people's memories of their early horror movie experiences and the sense of great fear, dread, and trepidation of but immense attraction to particular films and shows. For me Poltergeist stands as one of my experiences like that. The commercials and trailers for Poltergeist were terrifying and I loved every jangly-nerve, heart beating hard moment until I could see the movie. I saw it short weeks after Xtro on that same video disc format. I don't know how many times I watched it that weekend, but it was a lot.

One thing I always say about Poltergeist is that it is the most beautiful horror movie I've seen. Some of the scenes are just as awe inspiring as they are creepy or scary. Beyond the visuals there is also the family component that adds so much to the movie. The horror is so much the better for the contrasting scenes and for the real tension created because we feel for this family. The movie touches on a lot horror staples providing a great smorgasbord of terrors. Then there are the imagined horrors behind the scenes. The Poltergeist trilogy has been considered cursed, what with the deaths of Dominique Dunne (murdered), Julian Beck and Will Sampson (cancer), and finally child star Heather O'Rourke (disease). On the other hand Craig T. Nelson has done more than all right.

Mood: festive.

Music: This Is Halloween by Danny Elfman off of The Nightmare Before Christmas (soundtrack).

13 Nights of Hallowe'en 2009: Night #12 The Crow

The night before Hallowe'en is infamously known as Devil's Night and is a time of trouble ranging from the annoying to the destructive to the violent. In some places, like Detroit, Devil's Night was known for its record number of arson cases. The Crow is one of the few movies about the night, which is somewhat understandable with Hallowe'en being a much juicier target. The Crow isn't necessarily a horror movie even though it is in the vein. It's more of a dark action movie. It is also one of those rare movies where the star met with an untimely death on the set with the accident that took Brandon Lee's life. The filmmakers turned the movie into something of an homage to this young talent. They also did an excellent job of completing the film in his absence.

When I first saw The Crow at the theatre I was left with two impressions. The first was that this was a very special movie. The second, during the viewing, was that it pulled in a lot of ideas from different places and had that feeling of reusing bits of others films. What is odd about this second impression is that it very quickly faded. Whatever movies I felt The Crow borrowed from were quickly subsumed by the movie and I quickly could not recall any of them, those elements, themes, and scenes now belong to The Crow. Put together with the rest of the movie they no longer belong to the original sources in any kind of important way, as odd as that sounds. As for The Crow's original graphic novels I only know what I've heard in the DVD extras plus a little from additional bits in the TV series.

Mood: mellow.

Music: Dead Souls by Nine Inch Nails off of The Crow: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

13 Nights of Hallowe'en 2009: Night #11 A Nightmare on Elm Street

Anyone who knows me had to know when I did favourites and classics that this movie would be near to the top of the list. In fact it would be second if I didn't have a more topical movie for the night before Halloween. Freddy Krueger is the man, the most iconic figure of all horror movies, known around the entire world. There is a reason for that, and this movie is the genesis of all of it. What makes A Nightmare on Elm Street such a great movie? Well aside from Freddy brought to amazing unlife by Robert Englund there is also the supremely deft hand of director Wes Craven guided here and there by Robert Shaye head of New Line Cinema. The story is very well done weaving its local mythos. The script is also very thematic and literate. Everything is just done right.

The success of A Nightmare on Elm is both critical and financial. New Line Cinema has earned the nickname of The House that Freddy Built. There is so much that can be done, and to a degree has, with Freddy Krueger. Lurking in nightmares, able to kill in dreams, but beyond that able to take control of the dreams and do as he wishes. It gives the filmmakers great latitude. There is an endless parade of ideas. A Nightmare on Elm Street also stands as one of the film franchises where the villain's foil is female and should to his reckoning be as easy pickings as the rest--starting of course with Heather Langenkamp's Nancy. This never seems particularly vexing to Freddy even though Robert Englund sees Freddy, and portrays him, with a sort of cowboy ethos right down to the gunslingers stance he adopts.

Mood: excited.

Music: Welcome to My Nightmare by Alice Cooper off of Welcome to My Nightmare.

13 Nights of Hallowe'en 2009: Night #10 Carrie

The movie for tonight is the classic, Carrie. It is based on the book by Stephen King. It is a story very close to me since I consider it the first adult horror novel I read. Sure there were those creepy book series but they were young adult, as good as they were, which was quite good. I even wrote a paper in English class on Carrie--as the only person in the class allowed to use King because I got around and found reference material on him and his work. For a short novel there is a wealth of material for discourse. There is great depth to it and not much of it lost in translation to the movie even with the differences. Brian DePalma was a good choice of director. The composer who wrote the score is Pino Donaggio who also scored The Howling.

Carrie has immensely talented main cast with Sissy Spacek and Piper Laurie who are both just incredible. The fact that Nancy Allen stands out as great too really says something in the shadow of the other two. The movie also boasts John Travolta in a really early role, and let's not forget P.J. Soles who later showed up in Halloween. Who doesn't remember P.J. in Carrie with that hat on her head even while wearing her prom dress? That's commitment to a hat. Speaking of incongruous, what about the tuxedo rental scene where De Palma speeds up the film and sound to leaven an already light scene? The climax of the movie is a double one and it's only too bad they couldn't have pulled it off the way that they intended special effects-wise.

Mood: slack.

Music: Bucket of Blood by Pino Donaggio off of Carrie (soundtrack).