It’s that time of the month again. June is over, so I can look back and see what my subconscious was doing that month while I slept. Popping up in the dreams I reported on Twitter were Philip Seymour Hoffman, Walter White, Mindy Kaling … and, as usual, many of my old comic book friends.

June 2014

I dreamt I was checking into a hotel, but was weirded out that registration was a hospital nursing station. What kind of room would I get? Jun 30

I dreamt I was Louis C.K., and was hired by a mob boss to pitch a softball game. I suspected something bad would happen to the losers. Jun 29

I dreamt a movie in which Philip Seymour Hoffman and Helen Hunt were scientists on a satellite trying to stop a meteor from striking Earth. Jun 28

I dreamt I asked @MindyKaling on a date, only when I picked her up, she’d transformed into @KChenoweth dressed like Glinda the Good Witch! Jun 27

I dreamt my wife and I were at a banquet where only Italian food was served and everyone but us had thick New Jersey accents. But … why? June 27

I dreamt I got into a fight with a guy during which I hit him in the jaw with my shotgun. Machine parts flew from his mouth! He was a robot! June 27

I dreamt my son and I were in the Breaking Bad universe, about to get in a jam with Walter White. But my boy managed to talk us out of it. June 27

I dreamt that due to a natural disaster we hosted college students in our house. They were ungrateful, upset we didn’t give them chocolates. June 26

I dreamt we were on an alien world, and heard the screams of a massacre in the distance, so locked ourselves in a cage where we’d be safe. June 26

I dreamt I drove down an alley and discovered life-sized mannequins dressed like superheroes, including one of the Martian Manhunter. June 25 (more…)

In today’s Washington Post, Michael Dirda recommended a grab bag of books from horror and specialty presses—and one of them was The Monkey’s Other Paw, a recent anthology which contained a story of mine.

Here what he had to say.

“The Monkey’s Other Paw” (paperback, $13.95), edited by Luis Ortiz for Nonstop Press, offers stories in which 13 contemporary writers re-imagine or pay tribute to the work of various classic horror authors. Don Webb’s “The Doom That Came to Devil’s Reef” opens quietly: “Among Lovecraft’s papers at Brown University was a large manila envelope containing . . .” and then reveals what may be the true origins of “The Shadow Over Innsmouth.” Scott Edelman’s “A Most Extraordinary Man” neatly imagines a sequel to Saki’s most famous and witty shocker, “The Open Window.” Set against the loneliness of New York City, and in homage to Dylan Thomas’s “The Followers,” Paul Di Filippo’s “Ghostless” focuses on a spectral matchmaking service for ghosts and mortals.

Nice to be name-checked—and positively—by a Pulitzer Prize winner!

Last week, I shared my tentative Readercon schedule. Since then, the committee’s finalized what’ll really be happening in Burlington, Massachusetts next month, so here’s my final agenda.

Being an Editor Who Writes
Friday July 12, 12:00 p.m.
Few people haven’t heard of the editor-as-failed-author stereotype. Being both an editor and an author means living with your own harshest critic—yourself. While some editors-to-writers avoid this pitfall by writing nonfiction, there are those who manage to straddle the line, and even find success as fiction writers. How do they manage to quiet the inner editor, and how do they know when to turn it back on?
with Michael Kandel, Sandra Kasturi, Barbara Krasnoff (moderator), Warren Lapine, and Ian Randal Strock

Kaffeeklatsch
Friday July 12, 2:00 p.m.

Reading
Friday July 12, 3:30 p.m.
I’ll read a new, as-yet-unpublished story, “And, Behold, It Was Very Good.”

The Shiny, Candy-like Zombie: Commoditizing the Undead
Saturday July 13, 1:00 p.m.
On Twitter, M. John Harrison wrote about the appeal of zombies: “You can hate them without feeling wrong. You can kill them like eating sweets. Then you’re hungry again & you can kill more. They’re fully dehumanised. There’s no off-season, no moral limitation. They’re the *enemy*. What’s not to love? They’re what we really want.” So do we like zombies because they’re the consumer-friendly, ambiguity-free face of implacable evil? Are they, in fact, the most perfectly commoditised monsters?
with Dale Bailey, Catt Kingsgrave, John Langan, and Sarah Langan (leader)

I hope to see you there!

The New York Times ran an article today about how artist John Romita Jr. was jumping from Marvel Comics over to DC to draw Superman, calling it “the equivalent of Derek Jeter leaving the Yankees to play for the Mets.”

I was touched to see that John mentioned me by name in the piece, repeating a comment of mine which he’s shared many times before. (more…)

On Friday, Irene and I drove more than 300 miles to the small town of Chilhowie, Virginia for dinner. Why? It was a celebration of sorts for the 40th anniversary of the day we met, June 24, 1974, which was when I started at Marvel Comics.

But why Chilhowie?

The New York Times asked the same question back in 2009 when chefs John Shields and Karen Urie, who’d worked at Alinea and Charlie Trotter’s, chose to open Town House there rather than launch a Las Vegas Charlie Trotter’s spin-off. And what they whipped up at Town House earned them raves from bloggers and John a nod for Best New Chef from Food & Wine.

John and Karen left Town House a few years ago in the hopes of opening a restaurant in Washington, D.C., a plan which they’re still hoping to pull off. But until then, they’ve decided to offer dinners a few nights a month—only three each in June and July, for example—at Riverstead, a beautifully renovated 1903 home on 30 acres. It’s an intimate experience, with a maximum of 14 diners per seating, I believe, and only two rooms for overnight guests.

Once we realized that the June 20th opening night was close to to the date of our anniversary—and exactly how luxurious the renovated accommodations would be—and that it would be a straight shot for us down I-81—we snapped up a reservation. (more…)

Over at eBay, someone just picked up a bound volume of Incredible Hulk 167-182 which had my name embossed on the cover in gold. (The cognoscenti among you will recognize that run as including the origin of Wolverine.) And he wondered … what’s up with that?

I’ve only been asked about this sort of thing once before, by someone who wanted to know whether receiving bound volumes of comics was a perk regularly given to Marvel Bullpenners in the ’70s. (As if!)

So why does this artifact exist? The short answer is … it seemed like a good idea at the time. (more…)

Daniel Keyes, author of the classic short story “Flowers for Algernon” as well as the best-selling novel that followed, died Sunday at age 86. He deserves accolades not just for the tale itself, but also for his determination to resist those who wanted him to turn its tragic ending into an upbeat one, a change which would have robbed the story of its power.

I was privileged to have met him in 2000 when I was Toastmaster at that year’s Nebula Awards weekend, where he was presented with SFWA’s Author Emeritus award.

When I learned earlier today of his passing, I suddenly remembered that though I had a recording of that night and had previously shared with you the presentation of the Best Short Story, Best Novella, and Best Novel awards, as well as my introduction of then-president Paul Levinson and my singing of an Elvis standard, I had never uploaded any video of Keyes being given that honor.

Sadly, it’s now time to correct that omission. Watch as he explains how the character of Charlie Gordon came to be …

“P.S. please if you get a chanse put some flowrs on Algernons grave in the bak yard.”

R.I.P. Daniel Keyes.

It seems as if I’ve barely gotten back into the rhythm of my regular life after the one-two punch of the World Horror Convention and the Nebula Awards on consecutive weekends. But since it’s summer, there are two more cons around the corner to discombobulate and energize me—Readercon in Burlington, Massachusetts and Loncon 3, the 72nd World Science Fiction Convention, in London.

The con committees have released their tentative schedules to the program participants, which obviously will be subject to change as the final tweaks are made. But just to tease you, here—as of today—is where you’ll be able to find me during these two events. (I’m leaving out my co-panelists for now, since that’s also subject to change.)

First up—Readercon.

The Shiny, Candy-like Zombie: Commoditizing the Undead
Friday, July 12, 3:00 p.m.
On Twitter, M. John Harrison wrote about the appeal of zombies: “You can hate them without feeling wrong. You can kill them like eating sweets. Then you’re hungry again & you can kill more. They’re fully dehumanised. There’s no off-season, no moral limitation. They’re the *enemy*. What’s not to love? They’re what we really want.” So do we like zombies because they’re the consumer-friendly, ambiguity-free face of implacable evil? Are they, in fact, the most perfectly commoditised monsters?

Reading
Sunday, July 14, 9:00 a.m.
I’ll read my new story, “And, Behold, It Was Very Good”

(more…)

Judgment Day and Other Stories, reprinting 23 classic EC tales drawn by Joe Orlando, has just been published by Fantagraphics Books. The volume contains many science fiction classics, including “Judgment Day,” an anti-racism allegory that ended up being the last story in EC’s last comic book, plus many adaptations of Earl and Otto Binder’s Adam Link robot stories.

Which seems like a perfect reason to post yet another of the drawings I got when I was an annoying kid with a sketchpad who wandered conventions pestering artists. Here’s one Orlando did for me of Adam Link, years before he became my editor on such comics as Welcome Back, Kotter.

I’m not sure exactly when he drew this for me, but my best guess is that it was at the 1972 EC Fan Addict convention, where I also got sketches from Al Williamson, George Evans, and many others.

It was a much different world back then, one in which artists would happily (well … willingly, anyway) draw for fans for free. These days, all those annoying kids with sketchpads are paying for their art … which, I imagine, makes them a heck of a lot less annoying.

2014 marks the 25th anniversary of the launch of Stephen Jones’ Best New Horror series, and PS Publishing has just announced that to celebrate, it’ll start reissuing all of those volumes. I’m pleased that this will bring back into print the fourth book, which led off with my short story “The Suicide Artist.”

Even cooler is that all of the covers for the series will be repurposed art from pre-Comics Code comic books. (more…)