Posted by Meg
What better way to keep away the demons of 2012 with your very own warded calendar! Margherita, winner of the Cosplay Contest, and entrant in the most recent Fan Art Contest, sent her creation to Peat. It happened to arrive while I was at his office, so I had the privilege of flipping through the decorated pages and snapping a couple of my own pictures to share with everybody.
Posted by Meg
Tattoos play a major role in The Demon Cycle series; the ink holds power when shaped into wards. It may be the most fitting and daring tribute to pay as a fan. So we are super excited to announce that Maria’s tattoo of Arlen and One-Arm (modeled after the beautiful French cover for The Warded Man) is done! Complete with an excellent forgery of Peat’s signature.
Here’s what Maria had to say about her experience choosing Arlen and One-Arm and what the process of getting such a complex tattoo is like:
Why did I choose this motive? I had to think about the right words for that. I had the artist first before I had the motive. When I first saw Benjamin’s work, I knew I had to get my next tattoo from him, and then I thought about the motive. Somehow, I found the L’Homme Rune picture, and I thought: Wow, that’s it; I need to get that. Then I asked Peter if he would mind if I stole that picture, and he said he’d only mind if I didn’t post a picture of it.
Then last year, in June or July, I went to the tattoo studio to fix a date with Benjamin in October. It’s not comfortable to get a tattoo in the summer because it’s so hot and sweating is not good for a new tattoo.
In August, I went to New York, and we met Peter there, and he signed all my books. That was a really cool experience, and I decided to put his autograph on my leg too.
The time went by quickly and October was there, and we had the first session. I was a little afraid of the pain, but it wasn’t that bad … but after 5 hours of getting tattoos it hurts like sh**. The healing process was okay, but the itching is even more annoying than the pain. But seeing how awesome the tattoo looked, I never minded.
Tattoo in Progress
After the First Session
In November, we had the second session, and this time it hurt a bit more. We did another 6 hour session.
After the Second Session
In January, we had the 3rd and last session, another 5 hours. It hurt again, and Peter’s signature hurt the most because we had to use thin needles for it. Now, two weeks later, it is healed and finished, and I love it. It looks so awesome, and I am warded against rock and mind demons now 
) I’m looking forward to showing it to Peter in person when i’m in NYC again, maybe in September…
Oh and all sessions cost 800 euros together. That’s approx. 1,100 dollars …
Maria won Third Prize in the last Fan Art Contest for her beautiful tattoo. You can check out the original entry here.
Posted by Meg
As we know from Peat’s last blog post, Myke Cole’s book Shadow Ops: Control Point went on sale yesterday! In honor of Myke’s publication, Peat is giving away 3 copies of the book.
If you win, you will receive a paperback copy of the book plus a signed bookplate from Myke Cole himself and a challenge coin.
What’s a challenge coin, you say? Myke describes them as business cards that are actually more like shiny medals used in the military. He designed and commissioned (with the help of Peat) his own set of challenge coins based on the Supernatural Operations Corps in Control Point. Here’s what they look like:
Hop on over to Myke’s blog post to learn more about the making of these beautiful coins.
The signed bookplates and challenge coins will be sent out by Myke himself, separately from the books.
And so … the giveaway ….
The first 3 fans to respond correctly to the following question will win the book, the signature and the coin:
What did Myke originally want to call the “hydromancers” in Control Point?
The clock is ticking! Please leave your answers in the comments.
UPDATE: We will be giving away more copies of Control Point sometime next week!
Tomorrow, January 31, 2012, marks the official launch date for Shadow Ops Book 1: Control Point, by Myke Cole.
You should totally buy it.
It’s no secret that Myke and I have been friends a long time. Heck. I remember back in 1991, when he spelled his name M-i-k-e like a normal person.
Yeah, yeah. Like I should talk…
Anyway, Myke and I have a long history of kicking each other’s asses editorially (and with weapons). I met Myke briefly while we were in High School. It was the early 90′s, and we both had crazy heavy metal hair. We didn’t really become friends until college, where we played a lot of Dungeons & Dragons (For those who speak fluent geek, we played Edition 2.0 which evolved into 2.5, Forgotten Realms setting) together.
I’ve spoken before about how Dungeons & Dragons has made me a better storyteller. I used to run friggin’ EPIC games, where I would take the map of Faerun in the Forgotten Realms, pick a spot that hadn’t been explored in any of the novels or boxed sets, and write up a huge, complex story set in that obscure place. I would create plots, sub-plots, characters, backstories, twists, turns, and emotional motivations.
Then my players, Myke included, would just go in and kill everything. And I would have to toss aside my careful plans and dance like a motherfucker to keep up with them, and more importantly, keep them going in the direction I intended. They would deliberately seek out loopholes in my storytelling and try to game the system, or just ignore the boring “talky” parts and get down to dicing and dividing treasure.
Because there are two parts to storytelling: What you want to say, and what your audience is going to hear. Sadly, the two are almost never the same, and the purpose, after all, is to entertain an audience, yourself included.
A year or so later, Myke ran a game, and I gleefully fucked with his the same damn way.
We were also preparing for the pain of rejection letters by ritualistically hitting each other with bamboo swords:
Fast forward to 1998. I have moved to Brooklyn and he to DC. We don’t talk much anymore. Myke tell me he’s been working on a fantasy novel. I say, “Huh. Me too.” I sent him whatever shit project I was working on at the time, and he sends me the first draft of a book called “Latent”.
It would later be renamed, “Control Point.”
In the ensuing 15 years we have relentlessly broken each other’s books, finding tiny weak spots and driving knives into them, forcing each other to improve our craft and pass the other’s gauntlet. We would cover each other’s work in red ink, and call each other saying, “Nice try. Here are the parts that suck, here’s WHY they suck, and here’s my suggestions on how to fix them.”
So there are a lot of Myke’s ideas in my work. The Krasian Watchers, for instance, are laddermen on his suggestion. There are also a lot of my ideas in Myke’s work. For instance, he wanted to call the water sorcerers in Control Point “aquamancers”. I told him tying them forever to the lamest of all superheroes was a bad idea, and suggested he go with “hydromancers”. True story.
Sometimes, we would argue:
So believe me when I say, I couldn’t be more excited about this launch if it was my own book. Because in some small way, it is.
This is not to say that Myke doesn’t deserve all the credit for how awesome Control Point is. The man works obsessively and ruthlessly to make ever second of his books riveting.
Seriously. Stop reading this and go read his reviews. There’s like a million of them already, and they’re all glowing.
Control Point is a military fantasy story set in an alternate version of our modern world where magic ebbs and wanes over the course of every thousand years, much like the waxing and waning of the moon. When it waxes, people with latent magic ability suddenly manifest incredible powers.
They are then drafted, broken down, and trained to fight America’s enemies in the Supernatural Operations Corps. They’re the lucky ones. Those who manifest prohibited powers like necromancy (zombies) are shot in the head.
Lt. Oscar Britton starts as a ‘normal’ human, serving the army in hunting down magical fugitives. That is, until he manifests a prohibited magic himself, and overnight becomes Public Enemy #1.
The fun starts there, and doesn’t stop till the end.
Oh, and I’ve read the sequel, Fortress Frontier. It is even better.
If you want to hear us discuss writing and our history of alpha reading, you can check out our recent podcast interview with The Functional Nerds.
Posted by Meg
I really enjoyed receiving and posting all the amazing artwork that came in throughout the month of December for the Fan Art Contest. We didn’t have a ton of entries, but it seems that each of the entries was chock full of hard work and exceptional artistic talent. So, first and foremost, Peat and I want to thank everyone who took some time to create something wonderful for this contest. Everybody will be receiving a prize for entering.
So, without further ado, the winners.
The Grand Prize is a very special Stephen King Library Desk Calendar. A Science Fiction Book Club exclusive, this calendar features a gorgeous holographic cover, essays by awesome writers and facts, quizzes and trivia themed around Stephen Kind’s The Dark Tower. It has also been signed by many of the contributors (including Peat!).
I am pleased to announce that the Grand Prize goes to Kym who created the demon horn from one of the last scenes in The Desert Spear with Leesha and Inevera and a beautiful warded box.
There is a lot more where that came from! Check out her full entry here. We also did another entry concerning the awesomeness that is Kym.
Congrats Kym! We are sending you this very special calendar.
Two copies of The Warded Man Graphic Audio Discs. Recorded like an old time radio show with sound effects and music, this is a whole new way to experience The Warded Man! Also, each winner will receive a poster signed by the cast AND Peat in shiny silver and gold pens.
I am a huge fan of Birte. And her entry to the Fan Art Contest was no exception. Combing words, music and painting, Birte created a beautiful story. This is just a small portion of her creation.
Go to her original entry to see the rest of her fantastic mural and listen to her beautiful composition. Birte is also quite prolific. You can check out all other Birte-related posts here.
We love Margherita. She was the winner of last year’s Cosplay Contest with her beautiful reenactment of Inevera. For the Fan Art Contest, she created something really special: a Warded 2012 Calendar. She chose a ward for each month and decorated the finished product. Here are some choice shots of her calendar.
She also sent the whole thing to Peat! Quite the New Year’s gift.
Congrats to Birte and Margherita! They both made complex and beautiful projects that Peat and I found absolutely stunning.
Renna T-Shirts designed by Lauren Cannon (otherwise known as navate) and printed by Graphic Audio.
And the shirts go to …
Maria with her seriously kick-ass tattoo modeled after the original French cover of The Warded Man.
You can click her name to check out her original post. She later went back and got the rest of the tattoo done … complete with an excellent forgery of Peat’s signature. Check it out …
Carol for her beautiful sketch of Twilight Dancer. I am a huge fan of Twilight Dancer, and Carol’s picture is spot one and detailed.
Check out Carol’s other posts here.
A set of four warded dice in a velvet bag.
Congrats to everyone else! Check your mailboxes for these very special dice.