A Creative Endeavor in a new Journal.

In an attempt to start the new year off right, and because I feel I don't have enough on my plate these days (ha!), as I made my rounds through my favorite websites last night I returned to the blog dedicated to the legendary Moleskine notebook, Moleskinerie.

While on there reading through recent and older posts, I found an interesting post about an initiative by the Art House Co-op in Brooklyn. And I signed up. Here's a quick quote from the Molskinerie website:

Exciting update from Shane Zucker at the Art House Co-op:
"(Our) latest Sketchbook Project ended up with 3,600 artists participating in it! ...We just launched a new project called The Fiction Project which focuses on telling a story through writing and art, with the Moleskine being the vessel. Each person will receive a randomly assigned theme and a ruled Moleskine Cahier journal to create a work of fiction in. In the end, each book will be included in the permanent collection of the Brooklyn Art Library..." 

You can read more about it, here. Note that there is an $18 contribution fee, but they do send participants a small Moleskine notebook to use and it is for a good cause. Also there are samples from a previous project displayed on the site - and they are pretty cool looking.


Anyone who knows me, knows I've been a life-long journal writer. Even as technology has progressed, and despite the fact that I've even entered the blogosphere, I always found solace and release writing in the pages of my various notebooks. This is something that will always be a part of my life.

This Fiction Project sounded like a great way to be creative and be part of more than my pile of journals dating back to high school. I loved the permenance of the idea, the notebook I create becoming part of a permanent collection, helping to build the Brooklyn Art Library's collection.

If anyone else reading this decides to participate, please email me, I'd love to share in the experience, and I will try to give some updates on progress here.

[Edit. note: The photos in this post are not of my own personal notebooks, just images I found on the net to add to this piece. I hope to have journals nearly as pretty].


Carpe Diem!

Where did the film THE BOOK OF ELI come from?

I'll be honest. I was watching football on Sunday, and out of nowhere I see the trailer for a new post-apocalyptic film with a lone warrior walking down a desolate road. Sword slung over one shoulder, shotgun over the other, and that beat up trench coat the superhero cape of the post-apoc warrior.

I likey.

Then I saw it starred Denzel. What? Awesome.

Then I saw that Gary Oldman was in it. Excuse me? Even more awesome. Mila Kunis is in the film as well.

But being the bookish fellow that I am, whenever I see an interesting movie trailer and I can't identify the source of the work, I get curious because, could something that doesn't look half-bad actually be conceived in a Hollywood studio boardroom?

So I did some research. The film is helmed by the directing duo -- and identical twins -- Hughes brothers, whose last film was 2001's From Hell. Interesting. They are also known from their debut hit, Menace II Society.

The screenplay, originally written by Gary Whitta, was rewritten by Anthony Peckham in 2008, and they began filming in New Mexico in 2009. The work does not look to be based on any existing book or comic book.

The basic plot is that Denzel's character wanders across a wasted landscape, protecting a mythical book that could mean the redemption of all mankind. I don't know more than that, and I don't think I want to.

Sure, this will be hard to get to see in the theater with a new baby at home ("go to the movies while you still can" was the second most recommended thing after "get some sleep" from everyone), but I very much want to see this as I'm a big fan of the post-apoc genre of books, comics, and films ever since seeing the Mad Max films in my youth.

It'll be interesting to see if a comic book publisher inks a deal to bring Book of Eli comics soon. This is probably already a done deal or in the works.

It's a long road...

[addition: very cool trailer I just found, here]

New Edition: James George Franco arrives just in time for the holidays.

Hi Friends,

I wanted to report the birth of my wonderful son, James George, whom arrived on 12/11/09 at 1:44 a.m. weighing in at 7 lb. 2 oz.

Things are going well, I'm out of the office for a few weeks, then back some time after Christmas.

Too tired to go into lengthy posting right now, but I'll be back at some point. The little guy is doing well and so is his mommy.

One neat surprise was this wonderful Maurice Sendak theme at Columbia Presbyterian hospital. I snapped this one pic, but they had many wonderful images in the main lobby and I just loved it -- saw it as a great sign that books will be a big part of James' life.

Back to my duties. And yes, I mean that quite literally. I'll write again when I can.
Keep reading~

Check out the LEGO mashup.

In continual support of the amazing LEGO Star Wars: Visual Companion, they'd just added more LEGO fun on the site with this new mashup game. Check it out here. Now have some fun.

In other news, I saw THE ROAD at the Sunshine Theater last week and it was simply amazing. The film captured the desperate tone of the book precisely, with each moment of anxiety on the long road traveled brought to clarity on screen. It is a world of grayness, a harsh world, but one realized in this film. Bravo.

Very busy with new job and pending arrival of our baby boy. I will do my best to keep the few and faithful readers of Bookrastination informed. Forgive any prolonged absence, for I realize I am already a slacker. This site should be called Slackrastination. Ha.

SFWA Annual NY Reception 2009

Attended the SFWA event on Monday night, the annual NY gathering of SF-ish folks at a new location, Planet Hollywood in Times Square, although I loved the Society of Illustrators location on East 63rd street, where it had been for several previous years.

Returning to 1540 Broadway was a bit nostalgic for me, having started there as an Editorial Assistant for the Mystery Guild back in 1997 on a rainy day in May, and eventually working my way to become one of the Editors of the Science Fiction Book Club. In fact, several SFBC editor alumni were in attendance as well [Ellen, Moshe, and Andy].

I had a good time, enjoying the flowing red wine and conversing with old friends as well as make a few new ones, like Lauren P. from Orbit Books, whom I chatted with for a while about book design, SI, and comics, of course. The locale worked out fine, albeit with the backdrop of tourists dining below us, amid dated Hollywood memorabilia, little of which I'm sure is authentic anymore.

The good folks at SFScope posted some photos here. I appear in the upper right hand corner of the 12th photo, in full beard. And with that, I bid you Happy Thanksgiving.

The New York Times asks what is the future of e-reading...

In my new guise, I've been pondering the very same question that the Times reported on in their Technology section yesterday: here. What is the future of e-reading?

This question seems to be on everyone's mind working with ebooks of one kind or another. And I'm sure we'll soon see a convergence, as I discussed with a publishing contact of mine over lunch yesterday on 24th street.

Sure, a bookish fellow like myself will continue to buy actual books--and of course comic books. But I plan to walk in both worlds, reading digitally as well as carrying around printed  books as well.

I want to embrace the technology that will continue to usher us into a new era. And at the same time, keep an eye on the very objects that have been such a large part of my life--and which also take up a large amount of the space within my home.

The story continues...

A conversation about tie-in fiction

The Angry Robot blog just posted a link to a conversation between Mark Charan Newton and Dan Abnett, which took place on Jeff Vandermeer's blog. The topic of conversation is the tie-in novel. It is a fascinating read if you're at all interested in this part of sf/f related books.

 

I'm one of those people interested in such things.

Not only because for many years I was responsible for acquiring tie-in books while an editor for the SFBC, and had the pleasure of finding many great reads over the years, which serviced many a fan base of the respective tie-in properties. But also because I'll soon be involved with developing tie-in fiction, which I'm psyched about.

Unfortunately there is a stigma associated with this type of writing. Some of it rings true of course, as with any work-for-hire work can be "hacked out" by a writer looking for little more than a pay check. But I feel that can be true of any segment of publishing whether it be other categories of fiction, or writing in general. My experience has been that certain authors take this work very seriously and fans of the tie-in property can spot a writer not giving his all.

Dan Abnett, having made his bones writing both comics and fiction on both sides of the pond, makes an interesting point how writing as work-for-hire for big comics companies is something everyone aspires to, and how this is the complete opposite with most tie-in novel work. There is a long history of it being looked down on. And that is sad, because if you're a fan of, say, Star Wars, there are so many more adventures waiting for you in the pages of the tie-ins.

I really enjoyed the post, and comments section, and I'm glad to see people in the field discussing this important part of SF-related writing.

I'll end with one of my favorite tie-in novels, in this case a comics tie-in by the man who wrote the original story in the comics, the legendary, Marv Wolfman. I read and bought for SFBC the Crisis on Infinite Earths novel tie-in published by ibooks, and found it to be amazing.

As a fan, it was incredible to see the story through the Flash's perspective, and the detail really added to the legacy of that infamous DC storyline. I'm sure several fans may have missed this book simply because it was a novel tie-in, but I thought it was brilliant.

As a publishing professional who is about to step back into the ring with tie-in novels, and be involved in their development, there is no greater conversation for me to see taking place right now.