Over on Facebook in a Marvel Comics alumni group, Ted Jalbert has posted a July 1976 Get Well card to Stan Lee which I’d completely forgotten I’d ever signed, dug out of the archives The Man had donated to the University of Wyoming.

It shows Stan on crutches wearing a cast, so I’m guessing he’d broken a leg—though perhaps that was only metaphorical—and was drawn by Paty Cockrum. Included are caricatures of Stan, John Verpoorten, Archie Goodwin, and many other Marvel staffers, plus the signatures of John Romita (both Sr. and Jr.), Walt Simonson, my wife Irene Vartanoff, Steve Edelson …

Steve Edelson? Wait—who’s Steve Edelson?

I’m Steve Edelson!

The reason I signed the card that way was because even though I was the one who organized the panels for the 1975 Mighty Marvel Con and edited the program book (so you’d think Stan would get my name right), when it came time there for him to introduce all us Marvel staffers from the stage, he pointed me out and called me … you guessed it … Steve Edelson.

So, of course, I’d tease him about that whenever I’d get the chance. When this card was put in front of me the following year, I apparently couldn’t resist.

Can you blame me?

So I was searching for comic books which contained references to ukuleles—as one does—and came across Blue Ribbon Comics #2, which has a cover date of December 1939. A one-pager titled “Strange But True” featured the following fact.

I’d have reproduced the whole of the page, but unfortunately, one of the accompanying strange facts was head-slappingly racist, so I don’t feel I should spread it around. (Though those who’d like to see how clueless folks were back in 1939 can go to the scan of that issue and click through to page 34.)

But what I found more fascinating about the issue was an editorial which advised that since “Dad may seem a bit worried at times recently” because of things like “war and poor markets and slow business,” the kids who were the presumed readers should leave it around where Dad could find the comic so he’d then read it and cheer up.

That’s right, in a message which likely would have gone to press in September or October of 1939—almost immediately after World War II began on September 1 of that year—kids were being told comics could help Dad get over it.

Somehow, I doubt the adventures of Rang-a-Tang the Wonder Dog and Buck Stacey, Range Detective were going to be enough to take Dad’s mind off what at the time surely seemed like the beginning of the end of world …

While digging out that 44-year-old Analog rejection letter I shared with you, I also ran across one of my own letters, sent just a few years later, which speaks to the ambitions of me at 19.

Because (as the letter reveals) I was trying to become George R. R. Martin’s publisher.

Back in 1975, when I was still living with my parents, flush with earnings from my new job at Marvel Comics, and feeling myself then to be more a part of comics than science fiction, I decided I’d start a publishing company which would do for comics what Advent Press was then doing for SF.

At the time, George had only published around a dozen short stories, had yet to come out with a novel, and I knew him best for his prose appearances in the pages of Star-Studded Comics, a fanzine out of Texas.

One such superhero adventure was “Powerman vs. the Blue Barrier,” which had appeared 10 years earlier. (more…)

Earlier today, the Horror Writers Association announced the final ballot for the 2015 Bram Stoker Awards, and I’m thrilled to see that my story “Becoming Invisible, Becoming Seen” is one of the final five in the category of Superior Achievement in Long Fiction.

Here are the five stories which survived the voting process and are now Stoker nominees.

Gary A. Braunbeck – Paper Cuts (Seize the Night) (Gallery Books)

Lisa Mannetti – The Box Jumper (Smart Rhino Publications)

Norman Partridge – Special Collections (The Library of the Dead) (Written Backwards)

Mercedes M. Yardley – Little Dead Red (Grimm Mistresses) (Ragnarok Publications)

Scott Edelman – Becoming Invisible, Becoming Seen (Dark Discoveries #30)

This marks the sixth time a story of mine has been voted onto a final Stoker Awards ballot. I previously appeared there with— (more…)

Early Friday morning, I headed into D.C. to record the second episode of my new podcast Eating the Fantastic, which seemed a perfect opportunity to check out Pineapple and Pearls, a cafe which opened its doors exactly one week earlier. It’s the latest restaurant from Rose’s Luxury chef Aaron Silverman, and will soon include a high-end, full-service restaurant of the same name—one which, unlike Rose’s, will allow reservations. Yay!

Because getting into D.C. for me involves taking one of a limited number of possible MARC trains out of Martinsburg at a completely mind-numbing hour, I arrived at Pineapple and Pearls exactly one minute before its 8:00 a.m. opening. But once that minute passed, and I could hear the sounds of reveille from the Marine barracks across the street, the door opened, and I learned what was for breakfast that morning.

I’d already decided I was going to order the entire menu, for a number of reasons.

One—I’ve told you before how amazing Rose’s Luxury is, right? How could I not order it all?

Second—restaurants often dispense with some of their initial menu offerings once they gauge which are selling and which are not, and I wanted to check them all out before any were removed.

But don’t worry—though I did order the whole menu, I didn’t actually eat the whole menu! That, after all, is what friends and relatives are for. (In this instance, my son, whom I’d be meeting later that day.) (more…)

Yesterday, Bud Sparhawk and I met for lunch at Cafe Mozart in Washington D.C., where we recorded the second episode of Eating the Fantastic. (You can find information about the first episode, which featured Sarah Pinsker, here.) That’s Bud below, digging into the remains of his Linzer tartlette.

I chatted with Bud—a three-time Nebula finalist and Analog magazine regular—about how Harlan Ellison’s Dangerous Visions anthology inspired him to become a writer, what it was like to write for three different Analog editors over four decades, the plotters vs. pantsers debate, and more.

There are three ways you can join us at the table:

1) You can subscribe at the iTunes store. (Note that though this specific episode isn’t yet visible there, it should be within the hour, and if you subscribe you’ll get it on your iPhone immediately whether it’s visible or not, as you can see I already have.)

2) You can use the RSS feed of http://eatingthefantastic.libsyn.com/rss to download the episode to the device of your choice.

3) Or if you’d prefer, you can simply click below to listen to it here. (more…)

I received the latest PS Publishing Weekly Newsletter this morning, and in it, the full Table of Contents for Postscripts #36/37—which has been given the subtitle “The Dragons of the Night”—has been revealed.

Which means I now feel free to share the title of my story therein—one of my longest titles ever—as well as the names of the other writers and the titles of the other stories which will be surrounding mine.

And here they are!

Darkness, and Darkness by Robert Freeman Wexler
S.K. by James Cooper
A Reverie of Time by Allen Ashley
The Wedding Photographer by Robert Guffey
Machinists by Andrew Jury
The Second Runner by John Grant
Surfacing by Lisa L. Hannett
In Passing by Robert Reed
The Dragons of the Night by Darrell Schweitzer
Last Post by Robert Edric
Texas by James Cooper
Untanglement: The Leaving of the Quantum Cats by John Gribbin
Karen Coxswain, or Death as She is Truly Lived by Paul Di Filippo
Rewrites by Keith Brooke
Everything Finishes by John Grant
The Day My Heart Stood Still by Andrew Hook
Madam, I’m Adam by Gary Fry
In the Macabre Theatre of Nightshade Place by Cate Gardner
Happy Sands by Stephen Bacon
The Man Without the Blue Balloon and the Woman Who Had Smiles Only for Him by Scott Edelman
Blesséd by Bruce Golden
The Hutchison Boy by Darrell Schweitzer
Abundances Above by Brian Aldiss
The Beachcomber by Lavie Tidhar

What wonderful company I’m keeping!

Since it’s not self-evident from my title, “The Man Without the Blue Balloon and the Woman Who Had Smiles Only for Him” is a post-apocalyptic tale set an unspecified number of years in the future. Should you read it, I hope you enjoy it.

While I don’t yet see a link so you can order a copy of Postscripts #36/37, you can reach the full PS Publishing site here, where I’m sure purchasing information will be listed once it’s available.

If what I’ve been told by various editors and publishers comes to pass, I may have more stories published in 2016 than any single previous year. Fingers crossed!

UPDATE: This workaround is no longer required, as Eating the Fantastic has been accepted and added to the iTunes store. You can check it out and subscribe here!

My food-centric science fiction podcast Eating the Fantastic launched yesterday, and though I provided an embed via which you could listen on your computer, I know many will instead want to download the episodes to their iPhones. Since it’ll likely take a few weeks before the show will be available there, I’m glad I was able to figure out a workaround for those who’d like to listen while away from their keyboards.

Actually …

I didn’t figure out anything.

Gil Roth of the Virtual Memories podcast explained it to me, and now I’m explaining it to you. Though I suspect many of you are far more advanced than I am, and could do without any of this, needing only the url of my RSS feed. But for anyone else out there who’s as clueless as I am …

First, find the Podcast app icon. You know, the one that looks like this—

Once you’ve clicked it and are in, click the plus sign in the upper left corner of your screen. (more…)

Are you ready to have lunch with me and writer/musician Sarah Pinsker? Because the first episode of Eating the Fantastic is now live!

If you want more details about what the Eating the Fantastic podcast is all about, check out my earlier post.

But if you’re a TL;DR type of podcast listener, then simply click play below and join Sarah and me for lunch at Baltimore’s Family Meal.

I hope to eventually get Eating the Fantastic into the iTunes store so you’ll be able to listen on the go, but until then, I think you should still find the episodes enjoyable enough to listen to here.

UPDATE: Eating the Fantastic has been accepted and added to the iTunes store. You can now check it out and subscribe here!

And if you’d like see what the two of us were putting in our mouths on Sunday rather than just being teased by our descriptions (and quite audible groans), check out the photos below. (more…)