Red Moon

     Hey everyone! Steve here with a quick heads up on where to find us at the SMALL PRESS EXPO (SPX) in Bethesda, MD this weekend, Sept. 11th, 12th. Here’s a map of the floor with our table, F12, circled…

     We hope to see some of you there! If you’re going, don’t forget to follow our twitter and our facebook as we’ll be giving away prizes at the show and you’ll need to be following those pages for clues on how to win!

     p.s.-Keep an eye out on the convention floor for Scruffy’s dog collar.

steve

     Hello everyone! Steve here with our Heroescon 2010 report!

     Dave and I were really excited for Heroescon this year because we were debuting the book at the show. It was going to be the first time anyone was able to purchase the book! All the hard work of the past 3 years has lead up to this weekend and we were just so happy and thrilled to have the book for sale and be able to have it finally available for people.

     So first things first. When we get to the con, we have to put up the Lost Dog flyers the day before.

     Next, it’s off to pick up our badges. This year’s badges were done by Skottie Young and featured baby X-Men! Exhibitors in the Artists Alley got Wolverine ones! How cool!

     Then it’s off to go set up inside. Heroescon the day before they open to the public is as deserted as the begining of that movie “I Am Legend” except Will Smith isn’t there…or the dog…or the creepy monster/mutated things. Yeah. Just like that movie.

     So we set up and then went back to the hotel room. But we barely slept cause we were both too excited for the premier of the book! We finally got a couple hours of sleep and woke up ready to go on the big day!

     Those that were following us on our twitter and on our facebook page got the opportunity to win some prizes by saying a “secret phrase” to us. Congratulations to Shannon and Sam for winning the Red Moon sodas. And remember to join us on twitter and facebook in the future for more contests from the shows!

     We had a really great response to the book as well as plenty of sales. We sold more graphic novels at this year’s Heroescon then we did with just prequels at last year’s show! And people kept coming up to us saying they read it the night before and well, here’s a taste…

     Snow Wildsmith, who has a quote on the back of the book, stopped by as well! Make sure you check out her interview with Dave on Good Comics for Kids that she conducted at the show!

     And speaking of interviews, Heather from Dollar Bin stopped by and did and interview with us! You can listen to that at The Dollar Bin’s website. Here’s some pics of Heather conducting the interview…

     Dave did PLENTY of commissions at the show too. Here’s just a small sampling of some of the pieces he did for fans over the weekend…

     Dave also did a piece for the Heroescon Art Auction…

     The piece seemed to really capture people’s attention as the piece went for WAY MORE than Dave and I expected. Seriously, there was a bidding war going on. Let’s just say that Dave and I had a guess as to what we thought the final price was going to be…and then the piece wound up selling for four and a half times that amount! Here’s a shot of the all the amazing comic book art fans at the auction Saturday night…

     We had a really great time at Heroescon this year. If you’ve never been, make sure to check it out next summer. And if you’re ever in Charlotte, check out the store that puts on the show, Heroes Aren’t Hard To Find. We stopped by there after the last day of the show and it’s an amazing store. They even bought a couple of our books and put it on their shelves! Thanks guys!

     And lastly, we would like to thank Sam for giving us the coolest piece of fan art in the world. It’s on a paper plate! That rules. Thanks Sam!

Hope to see everyone at a future con!

steve

Hey everyone, just a quick heads up. You can now buy Red Moon online at our etsy store! Click the link below to visit the store and please make sure to tell your friends. Thanks everybody!

Visit Red Moon’s etsy store.

     Dave here with the final character blog befor the release of the book and it’s a doozy! This is the last character blog but there’s much more still in the book.

     This character file is the ancient animal sage, The Colotal.

     In Red Moon, Mox and Daeden must seek this mystical sage to find answers to Mox’s visions of destruction. As you can see this is not your garden variety animal sage.

     The Sages are known in the animal world as Masters of Regions. They oversee the happenings throughout their region and help guide the lives that live within, settling disputes and advising group decisions that would otherwise disrupt the balance of nature.

     The Colotal was once a normal millipede — thousands of our years ago — until she was chosen in a very special way to be the Master of the Yurru Region, the land between the East and West Oceans, south of the frozen Regions of Barrah to the north and north of the tropical Regions of Tihree on what we know as the North American continent.

     Being chosen as Master of a Region brings special benefits. Colotal is not as affected by age as most living things are, it is slowed and nearly imperceptible. Growth however, is not. As a Sage she continues to grow until her reign as Master is over. She continually adds segments and now has an uncountable amount of legs. Her most notable asset though is a honing plate that has grown from the back of her head. It heightens her senses and abilities beyond that of a natural being.

     All Masters have special abilities unique to each individual; Colotal’s is healing. She can mend bones, remove wounds, strengthen flesh and, in rare cases, revive a lost soul… if soon enough after passing.

     But her abilities are only a back-up when her immense knowledge is not enough to help the situation. She was an intelligent millipede to begin with, but the thousands of years experience has made her almost infinitely wise.

     Find out what Mox and Daeden discover when they encounter the mystic Sage Colotal on their journey in RED MOON.

Dave

     Hey everyone, Steve here with some announcements concerning the release of Red Moon. If you absolutely want to get the book the first day it’s available, you’re gonna have to head on over to Heroescon in Charlotte, NC June 4-6 because that’s where we’ll be debuting the book! Online sales of Red Moon will start after the convention on June 9th.

     Can’t make it out to Charlotte? Not to worry, we’ll be on the road this year hitting 5 conventions. Here’s our 2010 tour schedule. We hope to see some of you at the shows!

     And if we’re not coming to a city near you this year, keep your eye out for our 2011 tour. We’ll be hitting many more conventions that year.

     And as a final bonus, here’s the back of our newest flyer. There’s a couple of new pics from the book as well as some new quotes.

Steve

     Hello everyone! Steve here with some exciting news. The book is done! All 200 pages are now complete and we are in the process of printing the graphic novel. Before we print the final book, we wanted to get some quotes for the front and back of the book. So, we printed up some review copies…

Not a very exciting cover, I know. We’ll be debuting the final cover soon. But for the review copies, it works. I sent copies to websites that review comics and to people in the industry that I’ve met over the past couple of years. So there are people reading Red Moon right now! Dave and I are now anxiously waiting to hear the first reactions come in. When we hear back from people, we’ll let you all know.

So while we wait, here’s another pic from the book. Enjoy!

And don’t forget to follow us on twitter by clicking here

and we just added a Facebook page which you can become a fan of here. Thanks everyone! Lots of exciting news and posts to come in 2010!

steve

     Happy Holidays everyone! Steve here with a Christmas gift for everyone as well as an update and some insight into the production of Red Moon.

     Since it’s Christmas time, I thought I would give you all a present. Here’s a scene from page 155 of the graphic novel…

CLICK HERE to see the full size image

     Yes, page 155! It’s gonna be a monster of a book (200 pages total). Dave is just about finished and will start working on the cover soon! That means we’ll printing the book soon and trying to get it into your hands. How is that going to happen?

     The plan is to focus on getting the graphic novel into comic book stores first. In order to do that, we’ll have to go through Diamond Distribution. They are the main distribution company when it comes to dealing with comic book stores. If we can get Diamond to distribute the book, then it’s just a matter of you walking into your favorite comic book store and asking for Red Moon. Your store will be able to order it. We honestly don’t know how hard it is to get approved by Diamond but we think we have a pretty good shot.

     We will also be selling the book at our online store as well as at convention appearances. Eventually we will attempt to get Red Moon into Book stores as well. Future blogs will touch upon that topic. For right now, we’re concetrating on comic book stores only.

     So the book is coming soon! Lots of excitement for 2010 everyone! Expect the blogs to pick up in the coming new year as we show you the printing process, how we’re going about getting quotes for the back of the book and finally it’s eventual release!

steve

     Hi all. Dave here with the winner of the “Get your pet in Red Moon” contest! And the winner is…Huasnia and her Chihuahua, Romeo!

     Romeo is a very heroic dog and will be a perfect addition to Red Moon’s story. Thank you, Huasnia, for entering Romeo in the contest. I can’t wait to draw him.

     And thank you to all of you who entered your pets, they were all great and it was extremely hard to choose just one.

     In some updating news, I’m sure you’re all kind of wondering where the book is since 2009 is almost over. Well, I don’t have to tell anybody that times are hard. I’ve had to do a few side jobs to get by so, after a lot of inner searching, I had to decide whether it was a good thing or not financially to try and release a relatively unknown book by an unknown author at this time.

     What I ended up deciding was to take more time to fine tune the book and try to do some more marketing strategy before it’s release. This way I can hopefully get some big names in the comic industry to perhaps give me some quotes for the back of the book and (fingers crossed) by the time it’s ready to be released the economy will be somewhat more accepting.

     I truly appreciate all the support and kind words that everyone has given us and I hope you understand and can hang with us just a bit longer. Again, “good things are worth waiting for,” right?

     And stay tuned, we do still have some surprises in future blogs.

Thanks,

Dave

     Hey everyone, Steve here again. The recession has affected everyone and everything, including the production of Red Moon. We still expect it to be done this year so don’t worry. But right NOW we have a great new contest for you to enter!

     During the course of Red Moon, many animals show up to help AND hinder Mox and Daeden in their travels. MANY animals.

     And now your pet can be one of those animals! We’re offering the chance to have your pet be represented in Red Moon! Send us a pic along with a brief description as to why your pet should be in the book to redmoon.novel@yahoo.com Dave will pick a winner sometime in October and will draw your pet into Red Moon!

     And don’t worry. Your pet will not turn into the evil villain, the bad guy, etc. Dave will represent your pet in a positive way.

Good Luck everyone!

 

Steve

     Hey everyone. Dave here again with a blog about how the animals in the world of Red Moon communicate with one another.

     Red Moon is a talking animal story. But it’s not the usual talking animal story because these animals can be seen by humans as they converse. How’s this? Well, first of all, their mouths don’t move when they speak like in the cartoons and movies. They communicate through telepathy. They project thoughts to convey a message.

     Even as a child it bothered me that animals’ mouths moved when they spoke EXCEPT when humans were around. Like it’s some sort of secret that the animal world has been keeping really really well from us. I didn’t really hate these movies but I was definitely irritated.

     So when I came up with the inkling of Red Moon I knew I had to make telepathy a major part of the story. It had to be at the heart of the story.

     I was inspired to write Red Moon by great books like Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH by Robert C. O’Brien, Watership Down by Richard Adams, and The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling. Aside from the intelligent mice and rats in the Rats of NIMH, the animals in these books were just like any animal you would see and in my mind when I read them they were speaking telepathically to each other. And even Bagheera and Baloo were speaking telepathically to Mowgli and Mowgli to them.

     I started writing Red Moon as a film script to be animated and I figured that once the audience heard a few characters speaking they would pick up on the telepathic premise, like the live action animal movies like Homeward Bound or even one of my all-time favorites The Cat from Outer Space. But then it became a graphic novel and I was faced with the dilemma of making sure the audiences new that these animals’ word balloons were not them speaking with their mouths. I thought for a long time and finally decided to make the directional arrows from the word balloons kind of whispy when the animals spoke and the traditional style for when humans spoke out loud.

     You may say, “What’s the difference? Who cares if they talk with their mouths? It’s just a comic.” And to that, all I can say is…

buy the book and read it all the way to the last page. There’s a reason. Trust me.

Dave