My Nerdy Life in 100 Geeky Objects - #2 - Super Spider-Man and the Titans

#2: Super Spider-Man and the Titans, Issue 203 (1976) 

When I mentioned last time (for object #1, the Corgi James Bond Lotus Esprit) that my parents were ‘enablers’ of my nerdy life, I’d almost forgotten an even earlier moment. 

Set the wayback machine to the mid-1970s. Living in my favourite home in my small coastal town with my parents, I was about 7 years old and one Saturday morning my went with my dad to the local newsagents (one that is still there today!). I have a strange memory that the shopkeeper was someone called Mr. Jenner, and it was at this newsagents that my dad had a couple of standing orders. One for a morning paper - the typical tabloid that was full of cheap headlines, and one for an evening regional newspaper. 

While there, I think dad was there to pay the monthly bill for the papers, and he said to me that I was allowed one weekly comic. We’d put it on the order, and it’d get delivered on Saturday with the morning paper. I had a look at the comics on offer, most of them were war titles or traditional British action comics. But one really stood out. It was the wrong way up, but had a bright cover with Spider-Man on the front. I’d heard about Spider-Man from when my grandfather had visited (with his wife - who preferred to go by ‘Aunt’ and their son who told me about Spider-Man - he was only a couple of years older than me). 

So Spider-Man was the obvious choice. 

In the UK, this comic was “Super Spider-Man and the Titans”. A cool landscape format comic that reproduced the US comics in black and white, two pages of the original comic per page. It meant that when you opened the comic, you got four pages in a spread, and they could reprint loads of storylines in each issue. 

It wasn’t just Spider-Man in each issue. It included Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, and Doctor Strange. I loved every darn issue of it. It was amazing. When Marvel decided to print their Essentials range - huge phonebook collections of the old comics in black and white - I had to get the Spider-Man ones, as they were how I remember them. And the black and white artwork was awesome. 

It was where my love of Marvel started. It was just as things were getting really serious, and when they (spoilers) killed Gwen Stacey, I was shocked! 

I even got to see the Spider-Man cartoon when we went to stay with my granddad in East London (the TV regions ‘up north’ didn’t show it). Just the one episode though, while I was visiting, I remember it had Rhino in it. 

My love of this comic continued until, in a truly fickle way that kids are, something new came along. My dad stuck to his ‘one comic per week’ rule, and TV was becoming more interesting to me and I changed to reading Look-In - that strange British hybrid of comic and TV guide. But I soon learned that something bigger and better was out there. I was a week late, but starting with issue 2, I switched over to the powerhouse that was 2000AD… but that’s another story.

My Nerdy Life in 100 Geeky Objects #1

Corgi James Bond Lotus Esprit (1977)

When thinking about geeky objects that made an impression on me, I struggled to think of what could be the moment that I became a geek.

1977 was definitely the year the world changed for me. So much happened, but the first instance of true geekdom involved James Bond.

I didn’t realise it at the time, but my parents had nerd tendencies. Maybe the term should be geek-adjacent. Nerd enablers.

“That’s a funny word, isn’t it? Enabler?”

My mum introduced me to Doctor Who, as she was a fan of Jon Pertwee from his comedies, but she also had a complete collection of Ian Fleming’s James Bond novels - a collection I still have now. She was always an enthusiastic reader, and had a complete Agatha Christie collection too (kinda wish I still had that).

My dad could be just as enthusiastic when it came to some fandoms, but it wasn’t quite so obvious. It just crept to the surface when he got really invested, something that would be most evident in the hunt for a Darth Vader helmet in the following year or two.

However, they both were supportive, and liked introducing me to cool things. Many of which will appear on this list. From the comics that were subscribed to at the local newsagents that introduced me to the worlds of Spider-Man, Captain America, and Doctor Strange, to the beginning of a lifetime obsession with Star Wars.

Bonding with my Parents

My parents liked movies and TV. I guess that’s where I got it from. I have distinct memories of being taken to the cinema as a child. My earliest memory of this was being taken to see The Three Musketeers, the 1973 Richard Lester movie that starred Michael York and Oliver Reed. It was good swashbuckling fun, but I must have only been about six years old so it didn’t really have much of an impact on me.

The next cinema trip was The Man With the Golden Gun. It came out around Christmas 1974, so I must have seen it in 1975 towards the end of its run. Cinema trips were always a big deal and usually on quieter days for the movies. My mother was paralysed from the waist down by polio as a child, so moving around wasn’t easy, but thanks to metal callipers she could walk about. Add to this that the local cinema was fifteen miles away in the city, a place my dad didn’t really enjoy driving, you realise that the movie had to be something really special for them to venture out to the cinema.

I remember sitting on the back seat of the car, a big estate car so that it could carry my mother’s wheelchair, and asking my dad where we were going. My dad had a wicked sense of humour, and for the whole journey (what seemed like forever, but was actually only about 45 minutes) he insisted that we were going to see Gary Glitter. A joke that has aged particularly badly looking back on it now…

We entered the cinema - I was still confused as to what we were going to see - and my mum had to make her way up the many stairs to the screen itself. (Something that would put a pause in her cinema attendance in years to come, until cinemas became more wheelchair friendly). And, then, on came The Man With The Golden Gun. My mum was suitably enthralled - not only did she love James Bond movies and books, but it also starred Christopher Lee, and she was also a big fan of his Hammer movies.

I was hooked from that opening sequence in the funhouse arena Scaramanga had created. Of course, I’d not seen a Bond film before, so had no idea of the relevance of the dummy at the end of that sequence, but I soon caught up. It was great, and we discussed our favourite parts on the way home in the car. Of course, at this time I must have been about seven years old, so I just liked the car chases, the action, and the gadgets. A lot of the plot was lost on me, but it was great.

Cars & Gadgets

As I mentioned at the start, the real revelation of both mine and my parents’ geekdom really comes in 1977. We had another cinema trip between to see Disney’s The Rescuers, but it was probably late 1977 when the next James Bond movie, The Spy Who Loved Me, became quiet enough at the cinema to warrant a trip to the movies.

I was older and wiser, and knew a bit more about Bond by then. My mother had told me all about the books, telling me stories about how the plan was to kill Bond off at the end of the first book (something I believed for years - I don’t know if this is true), and letting me watch Bond movies on TV. After all, they were (and on some channels still are) the traditional bank holiday movie on TV.

The Spy Who Loved Me was more over the top, more guns, gadgets, girls, and introduced Jaws, the legendary Bond villain with the steel teeth. However, the standout moment in the movie was the introduction of Bond’s new car, the Lotus Esprit. It was cool, white, and best of all, could turn into a submarine when necessary.

It was so darn cool. I could see my dad’s eyes light up at the moment it dove off of the pier and the fins came out. And that’s when the hunt began…

Still from The Spy Who Loved Me, with the Lotus diving into the water

We left the cinema and dad got it into his head that we needed to buy the Corgi James Bond Lotus Esprit right there and then. Dad always had a thing for toy cars, collecting vintage cars and even those partwork James Bond cars right up until he died. We tried shop after shop in the city, but alas, no sign. We started the journey home, even stopping at a couple of tiny independent toy shops on the way, but still nothing.

Dad tried a few more shops over the next couple of weeks, eventually coming to the conclusion that we’d missed the opportunity and they’d sold out everywhere. He came home one day from work with the Corgi Stromberg Jet Ranger helicopter, like the one piloted by Caroline Munro in the scene, but I could tell dad was a little disappointed.

Corgi Stromberg Jet Ranger - image from 007Magazine.co.uk

Swapsies

Remember the old days of being at school and swapping stuff? Trading cards, stickers, even toys. I remember a friend of mine called Darren had the Lotus Esprit, and he’d already become bored of it, and offered to swap it for something of mine. I honestly can’t remember what I swapped. I do remember he was slightly obsessed with the “Little Big Man” I had, Palitoy’s miniature version of Action Man… it may have been that. Anyway, swap done, I took the incredibly battered and bashed up Lotus home and my parents were suitably confused and slightly concerned.

I do remember there was a phone call, and Darren’s mother came around with him, and we told both of our respective parents that neither of us had stolen anything off of the other, it was a swap, we were both happy with the arrangement.

Of course, dad wasn’t happy with that. The Lotus I’d gained was very beaten up. No box, some of the missiles were missing, and the fins had a tendency to pop out when you least expected it.

The Hunt Is Over

Finally, many, many month later, long after the movie finished its run in the cinema, dad managed to get a pristine and new Lotus Esprit from one of our local stores.

Corgi James Bond Lotus Esprit - image from 007magazine.co.uk

Thus ends the story of the first of the 100 Geeky Objects that really define my sad, little, nerdy life. It’s strange, but I loved that car, loved that movie, but the enthusiasm my dad showed trying to find it made it more special and certainly more memorable. I think I still have it somewhere, though the missiles are long since lost, and while it has the box, I don’t think the inner cardboard with the submarine printed on it, or the black plastic clips that kept it in place have survived. And I don’t think the little 007 sticker on the bonnet survived either. In my pre-teen head I probably wondered why a spy would advertise their presence on their own car.

If you want to keep up to date with the other objects, be sure to subscribe to my Substack (there will be other things on there as well, don’t worry).

I Didn't See That Coming - Watching the Walkers

 

Watching 'Fear the Walking Dead' has reminded me of one of the biggest rug-pulls in my roleplaying game playing.

Let's set the scene - in one of my recent blog-posts I mentioned that, after I stopped watching The Walking Dead when they killed off one of my favourite characters in the most brutal way, I finally went back to watching the series, and kinda binged the last five seasons in a couple of weeks. I must say, considering I couldn't see the appeal of Negan, especially after that scene, and wondered why they'd chosen him for a sequel series with Maggie - I finally see it. Negan's story arc was actually really good, and by the end I could honestly see a guy who felt remorse for the horrific things he'd done, and was trying to do better.

We finished season 11 last night, and my wife surprised me by saying she actually missed watching the series already - so I dug out the first season of Fear the Walking Dead that she'd bought for me on DVD back when we were really into the series and the comics... just before we stopped watching completely. About half-way through the incredibly tense first episode I had a weird flashback to an RPG we played as teenagers - and how Free League could do the same with their cool The Walking Dead Universe RPG.

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Back in the 80's, one of our usual GMs (Pete) ran a game for us using his homebrew Odyssey game system. He said it was just to test things out and make sure it all worked, and we generated some pretty ordinary characters. As it was a homebrew, we had generic character sheets, and we all played ordinary people invited onto a cruise ship as a prize for a mysterious contest, and we figured it was going to be one of those murder-mystery type games. 

The sessions continued, and suddenly the ship started sinking, and disaster! We washed up on an island, and figured 'oh, it's going to be a survival game, where we're shipwrecked and there will be badguys and stuff like that'. (Bear in mind, this was decades before Lost. 

But that wasn't it. Something happened, and suddenly we gained superpowers. Yes, we'd started a superhero game, but had no idea that we were playing a superhero game until the powers mysteriously kicked in. I did not see that coming. None of us did. Pete looked pleased that his plan had come together, and his RPG based on the comic series The Elementals came into fruition.

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Why did Fear the Walking Dead remind me of this? Watching that first episode I just thought how cool it would be to be a player in a The Walking Dead Universe RPG campaign, but not actually know that was the game you're playing. 

Have character sheets that don't have the logo, or any really obvious rule bits. Have the players generate generic characters, and make them think they're going to play a cool murder-mystery game or something else - anything that doesn't involve the walking dead. Play a couple of intriguing games with the players thinking the game is one thing, maybe some news reports in the background of rising tensions, and then... the murder-mystery changes genre suddenly when the body at the murder scene gets back up and starts attacking!

I know it's unlikely with licensed games like this, as you kinda have to have the logo and copyright on the character sheet, but it's certainly something that can be done easily by GMs with a bit of tweaking to the sheets. It's like taking a 'Session Zero' in a different direction.

Like the prelude bit in the old Vampire: The Masquerade games, but if you didn't know you were going to play Vampire. 

I could really see Free League doing a 'set up' book, just filled with GM advice and campaign ideas so that players could experience that same rug-pull moment. It'd be awesome. 

In the mid-80s, when we played that Odyssey game, it was amazing and revolutionary. I'm sure you're all doing something similar in your games now...

Go Play Your Video Game (Part 1)

Remember Covid? Jeez, everyone seems to be acting like it's all over now, but looking back on my blog it was a great motivator for writing blog posts. To stop myself from going a little mad during lockdown I took it upon myself to blog about everything I could imagine...

The 20 albums that shaped me...

The 7 TTRPGs that shaped me...

The 10 TV Shows that shaped me... (surprised I managed to limit myself to 10)

The 14 Comics that shaped me...

The 24 Movies that made me...

and the 10 Books that hooked me...

It was fun, and kept my mind occupied during the dark times, and got me back into the habit of writing when I was just really wanting to sit in a corner and hide. And I really want to get back into the habit of blogging - though with a dayjob that is sitting on the computer all day looking at words it can be hard to be motivated to write about other stuff.

So what to write about? I pondered this for a long time, and I had a sudden moment of realisation. I was using blogging as something to do while my wife is hogging the TV playing The Witcher 3, and I realised, I hadn't looked at video games. 

Video games were a HUGE part of my life until a couple of years ago when I realised (a) I was rubbish at them, and (b) I don't really have too much time to sink into playing them. But maybe, just maybe, doing a retrospective of video games that had some sort of impact on me will get me motivated not only into writing the blog, but also possibly picking up a controller once again and playing a game...

So here goes:

Go Play Your Video Game (Part 1) - Invaders from Space

I grew up in a seaside town in Yorkshire. It's weird, I spent the first twenty-odd years of my life thinking it was tiny and boring, and I was desperate to leave (while simultaneously being terrified of going anywhere else). Now, after thirty years away, all I really want to do is move back to that quiet, to the seaside, to the familiarity and safety. 

Anyway, being at the seaside in the seventies there were the usual seaside attractions. There was a helter-skelter, some little cars that went around on a wooden track like a giant Scalextric, a boating pool, and a couple of amusement arcades. Of course, in the seventies they were mostly those penny-drop machines like that Tipping Point quiz, one-armed bandits, fruit machines, and those things that read your palm and printed out your fortune.

I have a very weird recollection about some buzz at school that there was a new type of game in the amusements, and discovering the little huddle of kids standing around the now iconic cabinet, and the resonating *thump* *thump* noise as the little aliens advanced on the city below...

Space Invaders was revolutionary at the time, and so many 10ps were pumped into that machine. Weird thing is, while it was possibly my first video game I'd played, I was never a huge fan. I just already had a bit of an addiction to video games. 

Before I ever got a home console, I had the Grandstand Invaders from Space game, a little (I say little, it was huge) electronic game that tried hard to simulate the Space Invaders experience with its tiny, tiny, tiny display...

And then, along came the Atari VCS and its Space Invaders cartridge with it 112 game variants (including invisible aliens if I remember correctly)... 

I played the heck out of that (not the invisible one, that was reeeeaaally hard). 

Anyway, that was the first video game I remember playing, all those many, many years ago. I'm going to have to ponder really hard about what the next one will be!

Until next time, stay safe and stay multiclassy. 

2022 - A year in the rearview

 

Sunset over the street - photo by Debra Chapman

We're getting to the end of the year, and it's time for my usual review of what's happened. Another year I'm glad to see diminish into the rearview mirror. 

What actually happened? 

Work

This is where it gets tricky. Work-wise, I'm bound by lots of NDAs, but needless to say lots of things happened, there was lots of writing, approvals, checking, more approvals, and my line at Cubicle 7 put out some cool Doctor Who related stuff, including a Starter Set, a book of connected adventures, a guide to planets and alien worlds, and we did what was assumed to be impossible - convert Doctor Who for 5e Dungeons & Dragons, allowing non-violent conflict and encounters to really shine in 5e. When "Doctors and Daleks" was announced there was so much backlash it was ridiculous. Nearly half of the comments were "why don't you use another system?" - there already is one! Doctor Who: The Roleplaying Game has been around for nearly 13 years.

Social Media

Comments like that nearly drove me off the internet entirely, and I tried to avoid social media for a bit. Of course, with the purchase of a certain large social media platform by another idiot with more money than sense, last month I finally pulled the plug on my Twitter account. 

It's been weird without it. I still have the twitching urge to sit and doomscroll, but I've deleted my account and the app, so maybe my need to constantly do something else while I'm watching stuff on TV will subside eventually. Sometimes I just can't switch my brain off...

Entertainment

Still of Scully and Mulder from The X-Files

As mentioned before, I find it really hard to concentrate on TV and movies. I need to keep my computer/phone/ipad away from me and actually force myself to sit and watch something. There have been two exceptions to this - one has been my rewatch of The X-Files. I started rewatching it a while ago when we got Disney+, and I've been really enjoying rewatching one of my favourite series ever (The X-Files is up there at joint number 1, sharing the position with Twin Peaks). I'm currently in the middle of Season Eight, and my lovely wife has bought me the bluray collection so it's even shinier than the Disney+ streaming rate (I don't think our X-Box does it justice) and there are loads of extras to immerse myself in. When I finish Season Eleven, I may start again, only going through all the extras as well, or watching episodes with commentary. 

Sell Your Haunted House

The other exception has been watching loads of cool series that require subtitles. That really means I can't get distracted with social media, and have to concentrate on the TV to take in the story. It has opened my eyes to a whole world of amazing series. I really enjoyed 1899, from the makers of another great favourite of mine, DARK. And I've been watching loads of fantastic South Korean series, such as Alchemy of Souls, Hotel Del Luna, and the fantastic Sell Your Haunted House. 

Games

When it comes to games, I kinda just mean tabletop roleplaying games. I've discovered I'm awful and very, VERY, out of practice when it comes to video games. And I mean real video games. Sure, I play things like Hogwarts Mystery on my phone, but when it comes to console games, I'm pretty crap. I tried playing Star Wars: Fallen Empire for the first time yesterday and I died a dozen times on the first level while it was trying to teach me how to play. And that was on 'Medium' difficulty...

On the TTRPG front, outside of some playtesting at work, I guess I've been mostly playing The One Ring. Okay, I have a confession to make - I'm not really one for 'fantasy' RPGs, though I still play D&D on a monthly basis with my old gaming group. The One Ring (we're playing Free League's 2nd Edition) has been fairly epic, but we're frequently getting killed in it and have recently started with a new set of characters after a stream of disastrous rolls lead to another TPK. It's been okay. I don't feel quite as invested as the Tales from the Loop games or the Star Wars ones have been, but it's been fun and we'll see how it progresses. There are some epic plots going on in the background we keep touching upon (though when we get close, I usually roll really badly and get my ass kicked). 

Very interested to actually play Blade Runner to experience the investigation side of it first-hand... 

IRL

Otherwise, it's been okay. I still dream of moving out of the city (it's too busy for a country boy like me). I'm still very reluctant to leave the house... there are scary people out there! I'm still convinced that the guys who fixed our roof were scammers who ripped me off, and I shouldn't keep reading the local news.

I did leave the house this year though, and in May I took to the air again for the first time in seven years, flying to Dublin to visit Cubicle 7's head office. I have to say, for someone who doesn't like being around large groups of people, Stanstead Airport is not a great place to be. 

At the airport, looking at a RyanAir plane

Compared to the 18-hour flight to Australia, this was thankfully short, and certainly a lot more cramped. But, I made it both ways. I think I have a similar trip to look forward to in the New Year, but at least I know what to expect this time around.

Looking Ahead...

With another trip looming on the horizon, what else can I expect from the new year? I have no idea. Only thing I can be certain of is that I'm going to try to host #RPGaDAY again in August - it's 10th year and we should hopefully do something cool for the anniversary. Don't know what yet.

I'm doubting the name of my various pages/handles, using Autocratik. I'd originally used the name when I wanted to do things for myself, and it began as a play on the REM album "Automatic for the People" when I published as "Autocratik for the Masses". But now I'm doubting it. A rebrand may be coming... 

I want to draw more. I started an autobiographical graphic novel... three times I've started that now... one day I may actually be happy with what I draw. Mostly, I think it sucks.

I want to get off of social media, and stop relying on it for everything - but on the other hand I want to return to blogging on here more. But does anyone actually read this? 

Above all, I want the fighting to stop. I want the rich to use their money for good for a change. I want people to care about each other, and the world they live in. 

And I want you all to have a peaceful, prosperous, and a healthy 2023.

Stay safe everyone, and stay multi-classy.

Who Do You Think You Are?

I'm not sleeping very well. I don't know if it's the lack of physical activity in this (third) lockdown, or if my head's too busy worrying about everything, but I spend a lot of time just staring at the ceiling and thinking. Wondering. Wondering why I'm not able to sleep. Wondering if Star Fleet uniforms in Star Trek: Discovery are so comfortable that you don't need socks - let's face it, Burnham wasn't wearing socks when her boots were ripped off by that baddie in the Jefferies Tube.

Anyway, at three in the morning a few weeks ago I had this idea. I wanted to write my autobiography. 

Crazy, huh? First of all, I'm not a great fan of autobiographies. I know a lot of people do get a kick out of them, but they really don't float my boat at all. I've read a few - one of the few I really did enjoy was Wil Wheaton's 'Just a Geek'. There was something about its honesty and the way it was written that meant I actually enjoyed it. 

But secondly, I don't think I'm actually very interesting. I had this conversation in my head at 3AM where I thought...

Why would anyone want to read an autobiography of you?

Well they wouldn't. But, then there are others out there who have done the same and I didn't know who they were either. Look at that Mark Barrowcliffe chap who did the one about growing up while playing Dungeons & Dragons? 

Yeah, but you didn't enjoy that one did you? 

It's no fault of the author, I'm just not a big fan of autobiographies! I know lots of people who loved that book.

But he was basically saying the same thing. About growing up in the 70s and 80s and playing far too much D&D. What could you bring to the table that's different?

That's the thing isn't it? What would make my boring autobiography different?

I had this idea many years ago about doing some of my Roll Your Own Life entries as some form of webseries - this was back when I used to think webseries were cool and before everything went horribly wrong. Of course, not only did the webseries thing come to a grinding halt, I had that realisation that (in the long run) no one would want to stare at my big bald face for any length of time.

How to make it different? And not boring?

One way of avoiding looking at my boring face is doing a podcast. But then there's editing, recording it without any background noise, adding music and stuff like that. It's doable, but is it the best way forward?

The other option is going for the comic strip. Heck, I used to draw comics. When I thought the RPG writing thing wasn't happening I wrote and published comics back during the UK Indie Comics boom of the late 90s. Admittedly, it has been a long time since I've drawn comics. I've done some drawing recently for illustrations for WILD, but I'm convinced I can't draw. 

But, I may give it a go anyway. 

So here's the pitch. My life, retold in comic strip form, in small episodes from different eras, badly remembered and slightly fictionalised, from the perspective of a long time tabletop gamer who really should get a life. It'll get me away from looking at computers in the evening (when I've spent most of the day looking at them) and it may be a laugh. It may also be rubbish. 

Now... where to start...???

[Roll Your Own Life] The Books That Hooked Me (Part 10)

READY PLAYER ONE - ERNEST CLINE

The final entry in my ten books that have had a massive impact on me, and another one I came to rather late. I know lots of people who had read and loved Ready Player One but it wasn't until the film came out that I felt the need to satisfy my curiosity.

It was a weird one - there was that awful marketing campaign with the poster with Wade's leg being ridiculously long, and the 80's movie tie-in posters that were parodies of things like Back to the Future and The Lost Boys, but echoing at the back of my head was the constant voice saying "didn't people I know love this book?"

I was curious, but was no longer working in the book industry so I did what anyone did and I got the free sample 20-odd pages as a download on iBooks, just so I could check out the style and whether I'd like it.

It was great, but there was something weirdly familiar about it.

The film came out, and it was just as the local cinemas were having this realisation that attendance was down - no one wanted to pay £15-20 a ticket, and in order to get bums on seats they dropped all their prices to £5. Debs was at work, and I had a day off, so I paid my £5 and saw it one afternoon shortly after it came out.

I really enjoyed it. Far more than I thought I would. So much so, I told Debs about it and we went to see it together the following week.

The movie came out just before my birthday, and Debs always struggles to think of what to get me - and I really don't want or need anything. But that year I asked her to get the me book so I could finish reading beyond the sample, and see how it differed from the movie.

Didn't take long to finish the book, really enjoyed it (though I could see The Shining sequence working better for the movie than the repeating the whole of Wargames line for line...

But the thing that really stood out was the writing. Over the years, I've read so many books that have inspired me to write, and a few that have really heavily influenced my style. I mentioned my write like Chuck Palahniuk phase, that followed my write like Stephen King phase. But when I finally started writing for myself, especially for the NaNoWriMo novel I did, and the start of its sequel, I felt I stopped trying to sound like other writers and just be me... and that's what Ready Player One sounded like in my head as I read it.

It read like something I would write. Not just for its obsession with the 80s, but the language just felt like someone (Ernest Cline) was tapping into the way I thought and wrote. Really weird...

I read Armada, his follow-up book which is heavily influenced by the classic 80's movie The Last Starfighter. Probably owes as much to that movie as Ready Player One owes to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Tron.

But if anyone wants to know what my fiction writing style is, without actually reading any of my work, just check out Ready Player One and you'll get a good idea. It's quite uncanny.
--

That's it. Final blogpost about media for a bit. The dayjob looms ever closer, as the lockdown is easing (far too early if you ask me).

I'll post as often as I can, but until the next time, stay safe and look after each other.

[Roll Your Own Life] The Books That Hooked Me (Part 9)

THE MAGICIANS - LEV GROSSMAN

Okay, confession time. You know there have been things in these blogposts where I've confessed that there have been films, TV series and the like that I dismissed completely - only to actually check them out for myself and discover that they are fantastic. Well, Lev Grossman's The Magicians trilogy is one of those.

I remember the first one coming into the shop about the time I left the bookshop. The cover was trying to jump on that Dan Brown vibe that was big at the time, following on from Lev Grossman's previous book, Codex. The covers kinda matched - you know, keeping the theme for the author just like Dan Brown, and then I read the back of the book and the blurb made it sound like Harry Potter meets Dan Brown. And foolishly, I discounted it. Didn't give it another thought.

What a doofus.

Debs, being the massive Harry Potter fan, and fan of all fantasy novels, read the trilogy (she was still working in the bookstore) and really enjoyed them.

Then, along comes the trailer for SyFy Channel's new TV series The Magicians - based on the trilogy of books. The trailer looked brilliant, and Debs said to me "You should read the books, they're really good!!" and after the second season aired in the UK (at some stupid hour in the morning because UK TV has no faith in good genre TV) I finally did.

I honestly don't know why I didn't read it the moment it came in. I absolutely love them. The added advantage is that the novels kinda start the same with Quentin Coldwater going to Brakebills University for Magical Pedagogy, meets Penny, Alice, Eliot and Margo/Janet, and learns about magic and the costs it brings. But, about a quarter of the way through it goes off in a different direction. Sure, there's Fillory, the Narnia that Quentin used to read about like an obsessive Potter fan, and The Beast, but it's very, very different in places.

There are huge sections that made it feel almost like you're reading a really cool Dungeons and Dragons game (especially the end of the first book).

Man, just thinking about it makes me want to reread it.

Maybe that's another one of its strengths. While I know the TV series really well, and love it, the books are different enough to make me want to reread them multiple times to experience a different timeline. (Something the TV series cleverly addressed, making it feel like the events of the books could be just another timeline up to a point).

Awesome.

Since the trilogy, and the TV series, there's been a graphic novel retelling the first book from Alice's point of view rather than Quentin's, and there's been a cool comic series of a new class going to Brakebills - a class of Hedges.

If anything, I actually think that The Magicians has even more potential as a tabletop RPG than Harry Potter. Certainly more possible. Especially when you think you have the "magical college" side of it, along with the non-academic magic users, and then there's the whole of Fillory - a whole magical world to game in...

Maybe one day...

[Roll Your Own Life] The Books That Hooked Me (Part 8)

JOHN DIES AT THE END - DAVID WONG

Onto part eight of my series of blogposts about the books that had an impact on my life.

David Wong's book, John Dies At The End, is a weird one in many ways, but the way I discovered it was a purely selfish one. Inspired by reading Chuck Palahniuk, I'd come to the stupid conclusion that I should give up on comic writing and RPG writing - I couldn't draw, so I should try to tell stories the traditional way and write a book. I didn't (and still don't) have a publisher for fiction, and I had a look online to see how the indies did it. After all, indie publishing was the way I went with comics...

One that really stood out was David Wong's web story. Published in instalments online, John Dies At The End had thousands upon thousands of readers, attracting the attention of publishers - which lead to the eventual book years later.

I read about this, and read the first handful of chapters online, and thought, "Hell, this is it! This is how I do it!"

Feeling full of renewed vigour, I started writing my awful fiction - The Case of Lost Possibilities - in instalments on a new blogsite (an offshoot of this one) and put up new bits every week. I figured, this was it - this was the way to attract the attention of publishers, show I can write fiction, and get my crazy-assed stories out into the world.

And you know what?

It didn't work.

I think the site had less than a dozen readers, and the story was a bit lame anyway. I liked elements of it, but I really should have had it all planned out beforehand. John Dies At The End always felt like it was being made up as it went along and I really enjoyed it, but I wasn't anywhere near the league of David Wong.

The book came out, and I was working at Ottakar's/Waterstones when it was released - I bought it first day it came in. I read it in a week, and loved it. It was crazy, strange, and sounded just like the weird s*** I would have written given half the chance.

It was the first book I read and got to the end, and then flicked straight back to the beginning and started the book again. That's how much I enjoyed it.

It has been very high on my "you must read this" recommendations list since then.

The movie adaptation is rather excellent too. Brilliant cast, great director (Don Coscarelli - director of Phantasm). It's well worth a watch. Just be warned, it's like watching The Lord of the Rings and the movie gets to Rivendell, then skips straight to Mordor. The movie's great, but to squeeze it all into 90mins it had to miss out a huge chunk in the middle.

Maybe one day they'll make it into a TV series, so they can continue into the crazy adventures of John and Dave in the sequel books...

The second book of John and Dave, This Book Is Full Of Spiders: Seriously, dude, don't touch it is just as crazy, and was recently followed by the third book, What The Hell Did I Just Read. All of them read like the sort of thing I would have written back when I was roleplaying a lot with the old game group in my tiny hometown of [undisclosed].

Very highly recommended.

Hell, just writing about them makes me want to reread them again. Or write a roleplaying game set in their universe...

[Roll Your Own Life] The Books That Hooked Me (Part 7)

HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE - J. K. ROWLING

Sorry I was late putting up a post yesterday for the books that had an impact on me. It was a combination of being busy with writing, and the timing after JK Rowling latest tweets...

I'm just going to post to say I love Harry Potter. I loved the movies first, then finally read all the books. But it was the sixth one - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince that really struck a chord. Mostly because there is a lot of cool background in there, masses of story that they didn't have time to put on screen, detailing Tom Riddle's background and upbringing, that was fascinating.

I just wish that Warner Bros. bought Harry Potter off of JK outright, opening up the world to other creators to set stories (and games *hint*) within the Wizarding World.

One day I'll write a Harry Potter RPG...

One day...

[Roll Your Own Life] The Books That Hooked Me (Part 6)

FALLING OUT OF CARS - JEFF NOON

Part 6 of my little series of blog posts about books that had an impact on me, and we come to the book that has been on the top of my favourites list for quite a while now. Jeff Noon's Falling Out of Cars.

There is just something about this book that I absolutely adore. It's a surreal road trip as a group travel the country on a bizarre mission. Henderson, Peacock and Marlene are on a mission to recover fragments of a mirror that may be at the heart of a strange affliction that is hitting the population of Britain - images, information, and signs all start to become unintelligible. People get lost staring at mirrors, and the world is covered with fabric or paint to try to mask every reflective surface. In order to keep sane, the team take regular doses of a drug called Lucidity, but even that cannot hold back the weird effects of these mirror fragments.

There's an amazing sequence of them going into a building where a fragment is, but the text repeats as they are trapped in a loop of events, seeing themselves on CCTV repeating the actions. It's brilliant and mindbending.

I bought it back when I was working in Ottakar's, and since then I've bought many, many copies when I've found them at a good price so I can give them to people I think would enjoy it. I even bought the ebook of it so I can carry it around with me on my phone in case I'm stuck waiting for a train, or in a waiting room somewhere. It doesn't matter if I can't remember where I was on the reread, the fluid nature of the narrative means you can jump in at any point and it's still brilliant.

Recently I've been reading Jeff Noon's more recent work, a cool series of detective novels set in a weird 1950's. A Man of Shadows details the PI John Nyquist as he tries to track down a missing girl between two parallel cities - Dayzone and Nocturna. One where it is kept permanently day, the other permanent night. Really cool stuff, and I'm about half way through the second book The Body Library, where Nyquist is caught up in a city where narrative and stories are key, and writing can shape reality.

There was talk about Falling Out of Cars being made into a TV series, and I hope one day it happens. I always get the feeling of a darker version of 28 Days Later for the look (without the zombies) of them travelling motorways in a weird road movie.

[Roll Your Own Life] The Books That Hooked Me (Part 5)

HOUSE OF LEAVES - MARK Z. DANIELEWSKI

Another book that has seriously influenced my writing style is Mark Z. Danielewski's House of Leaves. I was working in Ottakar's, looking after the SF/Fantasy/Horror section, and there was this awkward book that was just huge. Not just a thick book, but in all dimensions. There was the usual debate over whether it should be shelved in Horror or in General Fiction, but as there was supposedly an element of weirdness it usually ended up in my department on the Horror shelves.

I remember flicking through it and thinking "WHAT?"

It's in the inside of House of Leaves that really makes it stand out as being something different. The book itself is a book-within-a-book. It tells of Johnny Truant, who is reading the manuscript of an academic study of a documentary film called The Navidson Record that he found in the apartment of a recently deceased elderly man.

The Navidson Record is a film about a family living in a house whose interior dimensions do not match the exterior. The dimensions change, and then a door appears in a wall that leads into an impossible hallway... which leads to a labyrinth, and a hall, and an impossibly deep chamber down a spiral staircase, and...

Well. It's a bit crazy. As you read Johnny reading the Navidson Record, it's kinda like watching The Blair Witch Project. As close to a found footage movie as you can get in a book. Especially as you can't entirely trust Truant's account.

But it's the layout that makes it special.

Each character's section is written in a different typeface so you can tell which section is which. As the family investigates further into the anomalous room, the more bizarre the layout of the book.

There are weird sidebars of nouns, spiralling passages, footnotes, and pages with single words spinning in the void.

Out of curiosity I ended up buying it, and read it about about a week. It was actually seriously unsettling and left me looking at the walls of our house with a new level of uncertainty.

Seriously cool.

I did some internet research and discovered that there was a different edition of the book - the American edition of it was in colour! Nothing major, but to add to the weird typography, every instance of the word "house" was in blue, and there were another couple of words like that in there too...

In addition to that, Mark Z. Danielewski's sister, who records under the name Poe, recorded an album called Haunted, inspired by House of Leaves. The album has tracks that directly relate to the book, including 5 1/2 minute Hallway, something they call the mysterious new hall that appears in the Navidson Record. Never heard any Poe before, and I took a chance. What a brilliant album! Well worth checking out, and cleverly incorporates found recordings of Poe's (and Mark's) father, who notoriously wasn't very supportive of his creative efforts. Hence the book's dedication - "This is Not for You".

Again, though, I have to confess I didn't feel the same connection, intrigue and excitement with the follow-up book Only Revolutions. Two parallel narratives telling the same story from two points of view - only they're usually in the same place. And you read one narrative one way, then flip the book and read the other upside down. It's recommended you flip every ten pages...

Unfortunately, it kinda read like a shopping list.

Not the last of the experimental books I dipped into - I checked out the rather good Raw Shark Tests by Steven Hall (say the title quick and you'll get it), and this kinda peaked with "S." by Doug Dorst and J J Abrams, where you read a book but also read the storyline of two people checking the book out from a library and communicating by writing in the margins - and tucking in postcards and newspaper clippings that are presented as removable props.

It's the sort of thing I really want to do with an RPG...

[Roll Your Own Life] The Books That Hooked Me (Part 4)

FIGHT CLUB - CHUCK PALAHNIUK

Next on my series of Books that Hooked Me, books that really had an impact on me is one that really changed my writing style massively. I was working in the cinema while Debs was working in graphic design and magazine layout, and (I've mentioned on this blog in the movies that made me series) there was a movie that I really wasn't interested in. One that was so badly marketed that I remember saying "Why would I want to see a movie about bareknuckle fighting?"

I was an usher for that first showing in the cinema, and hung around to make sure the very few people who had come in for that midweek lunchtime performance were settled and sat... and those first ten-twenty minutes of the movie Fight Club just had me absolutely hooked. I was stunned - a combination of the visuals, the flashback, the narration. Mindblowing.

I remember going back to work thinking "I need to watch the rest of it", and it wasn't long before Debs and I checked out the wonders that was David Fincher's Fight Club. I loved it, and saw it multiple times when it was screening.

It was only a few days after seeing the movie that I decided I needed to check out the book it was based upon. The book of Fight Club is surprisingly close to the movie except for a couple of small elements - there are whole chunks of the movie, especially Jack's narration, that are word-for-word from the book. There was an energy to the style, the way it addressed the reader, that was completely new to me. It was incredibly eye-opening.

Of course, that lead on to Survivor (which was brilliant), and Invisible Monsters (which has one of the greatest opening couple of pages I've read)... I was hooked.

On to Choke, a tale of someone who lives off of donations from people who "saved" him from choking in restaurants, and then onto my favourite of Palahniuk's books - Haunted. I've never been much of a short story reader, but Haunted addresses the short story in a new way. A tale of seventeen writers who go to a writers retreat where they have three months to write their magnum opus. They have food and drink, but cannot leave until it is complete.

The chapters are each of the characters' stories, and bridged with a linking narrative of these writers gradually sabotaging the food, and descend into a mass of self destruction. I guess you could say it's allegorical for how writers sabotage themselves...

On came Rant, which was really clever in the way it told its tale by second hand accounts of witnesses, but it was with his next book, Snuff, that I kinda gave up. Sorry Chuck... Couldn't finish that one.

At the peak of my reading Chuck Palahniuk, when I did try to write fiction it was really like I was channelling my inner Palahniuk. There were flashbacks, asides, weird narration. C'mon, Dave. Have your own voice...

Anyway, Fight Club was a real eye opener for me, and changed my reading and writing habits tremendously.

[Roll Your Own Life] The Books That Hooked Me (Part 3)

THE ILLUMINATUS! TRILOGY - ROBERT SHEA & ROBERT ANTON WILSON

I owe the owner of the local comic shop a lot when it comes to recommendations of great comics. He was the reason I started reading The Crow, Bone, Hellboy, and so many more. However, he's always been great at recommending other media too. Without his recommendations I would never have watched the TV series Misfits. So when he recommends something, I listen.

One of his earlier recommendations, when I confessed I loved things like The X-Files and David Lynch, was that I should read The Illuminatus! Trilogy by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson. He said it would open my mind.

I know this sounds like some weird literary version of drug deal, and I guess it kinda was. From his recommendation I got it out of the library, and started...

Before I go on, I have to say, I've only read it once - and it was so, very, weird. I remember starting to rereading a few years ago, but there are so many books and so little time to read them in.

Anyway - The Illuminatus! Trilogy is a bit like The DaVinci Code, but many, many years before it. And if Dan Brown was experiencing dimensions not usually seen in our reality. Following a couple of detectives - jeez, how did I forget that one of the characters is called Saul Goodman? - looking into a conspiracy behind the bombing of a magazine, you discover the theories of the Illuminatus and are introduced to Hagbard Celine, head of the Discordians, who are trying to stop the Illuminati - the secret organisation that controls the world. Hagbard, a modern Captain Nemo, aboard his golden submarine, is hoping to stop the Leviathan, hibernating Nazis, Yog-Sothoth... and it all switches from third- to first- person and changes viewpoints of characters mid-paragraph and...

Well, it's all a bit weird.

But I really enjoyed it. It was a bit of a gateway-drug though, and I followed it up with the Masks of the Illuminti, and the excellent Schrödinger's Cat Trilogy. But the next in the recommendations was Umberto Eco's Foucault's Pendulum - a similar tale of uncovering conspiracies throughout history, which I particularly enjoyed as well. Though, being by Umberto Eco, I felt like a lot of it was about a bazillion times smarter than I could actually comprehend.

It did lead down a bit of a rabbit hole though...

Yes, I read the DaVinci Code - well, I did it as an audio book while I was travelling a lot on the train. The audio book was good though, mostly as the guy doing the reading did some excellent accents for the characters - slipping almost into Monty Python at times.

But it did lead to some non-fiction as well, including Everything in Under Control (which was great when I was writing Conspiracy X), and a totally mind-blowing screenplay called Reality is What You can get away with.

It is a great exploration into changing your reality tunnel. Almost like a self-help book, if you don't like the world around you, or your situation, you can change the way you perceive the world by changing your reality tunnel.

Hell, maybe I should give that one another read now...

[Roll Your Own Life] The Books that Hooked Me (Part 2)

DUNE - FRANK HERBERT

Onto the second of the books that have had a bit of an impact on my life. DUNE. Another one of those books that I came to too early. I'd seen the movie, the awesome David Lynch adaptation of Dune that I still absolutely love to this day. I watched it with the old D&D group, "the Eight", and I felt like I was in a minority that I hadn't read the book. Heck, if I remember correctly, when I joined the D&D group one of the characters was called Muad'dib. We watched the movie, and the others kinda chimed in to say "that's not like the book", or "that's wrong". So, I felt like I had to check it out.

This was back when I wasn't really reading a lot - roleplaying, movies, and videogames were the primary forms of entertainment to me at that time. I bought the novel, gave it a go, and I probably did the same thing I usually did which was give up after about a hundred pages as the payoff wasn't fast enough.

So stupid.

But I loved the movie, and the setting was fascinating. And I ended up buying this cool book on a whim - the Dune Encyclopedia. It was a mammoth reference work about the Dune books, and I found that even more intriguing. It was great. I devoured that book, possibly more than I should have done, and watched the movie multiple times.

Skip forward many years, and I discovered reading for pleasure - thanks to Stephen King (see yesterday's blogpost). It must have been after I left University, after I'd read Lord of the Rings and loved it, I thought to myself - 'You know, you really should read Dune.'

So I did. I blasted through the first four books, loving every moment. We relocated across the country, and without a job I needed to read to keep my head busy, and Dune was where I went. I remember going into the Waterstones in our temporarily adoptive new hometown and asking for the final book - Chapterhouse Dune - and they didn't have it but would order it. All the rest were on the shelves, except that one. A few days later, book six arrived and it had the old cover before the reprints - with the old logo that matched my beaten old copies of the rest of the series. I was ecstatic.

Illustration of Paul Atreides from the
Dune Encyclopedia 

We located again, and I started working in Ottakar's, and the prequel trilogy just started to come out. I picked up the paperback of House Atreides, the start of the Prelude to Dune series. I have this weird memory of starting to read the first volume and finding a typo early on - and stopping reading right there. I mean, a typo. I remember it being something obvious like Atreides. I honestly don't know if it was actually there, or me misreading it. I've just had a look through my copy and can't find anything - though I'm not very awake...

After I got over myself - and working in a bookstore those covers kept tempting me - I finally gave House Atreides another go and devoured the Prelude to Dune series, loving those as well.

I'm sorry to say that it was the Legends of Dune series that stopped me. I tried. I started reading The Butlerian Jihad, the legendary story of why sentient machines were outlawed in the Imperium that I was eager to read. I just couldn't get into it. I still have the paperback, and I even have the hardback of the next volume - The Machine Crusade - but never got any further.

Maybe one day I'll go back to it, but the lure of rereading the original six again is always on my mind.

Especially with the new adaptation coming later this year. Can't wait!!

[Roll Your Own Life] The Books that Hooked Me (Part 1)

Over the last couple of months I've been keeping my brain occupied, and distracting myself of the horrific state of the world, by writing regular (if not daily) blogposts of nonsense. Looking at the comics, the movies, the TV series, and the RPGs that have all had a massive impact on my life.

Those days of daily blogposts may soon be coming to an end as I can see the need to return to my dayjob is looming ever closer. Unless something horrible happens with the R-number, despite it not actually going down at the moment, I'll be back at the day job in just over a week. I must admit, on one hand it'll be great to see the rest of the staff as I've missed them, but I'm really not looking forward to being out there - exposed to the world and its current potential dangers. How all those who have been doing it for the last ten weeks or more have been coping, both physically and mentally, astounds me, and I can only thank them for their efforts of ensuring we can still eat, get the necessary items to live, and to look after those in need. Thank you.

Anyway, with the return to work looming, there really is only one subject I haven't covered in these daily blogposts of media that has had an impact on me - Books.

I'm going to try to do them in chronological order of me reading them. Some are classics, some a little more left field, but each one of them has had an impact on me, and shaped my reading choices - and in many cases, my writing style.

So let's start at the very beginning. It's very good place to start...

IT - STEPHEN KING

I have a confession. My youth was not filled with reading books. Sure I read comics, but my very early years were mostly spent watching movies, TV, and playing with Lego and Star Wars figures. I distinctly remember reading The Secret Seven, and strangely I have a memory of reading the Action Man novel, The Taking of Monte Carrillo. Why I can remember that, I don't know...

Otherwise, I bought a lot of paperbacks - all of them movie adaptations. I have boxes of them still. It started with the novel of Star Wars, and it just kept going. Through the foil covers of the Raiders of the Lost Ark, to the weird, fake romance novel covers of Romancing the Stone and the Jewel of the Nile. I bought them all. If they had a colour photo bit in the middle, even better. It was like being able to see the movie again before VHS existed. I would read some of them them, others I'd just read the exciting bits I remembered from the movie, or skim for the extra bits that weren't in there - like some in the Ferris Bueller novelisation.

I mean, I tried other books. When I started playing D&D and Middle Earth Roleplaying I tried to read The Lord of the Rings, but really couldn't get into it. It wasn't until I went back to it over a decade later when Babylon 5 was on that I actually read it and loved it.

Anyway, I used to buy these novelisations of movies, even after VHS started being a thing. It was just the collector in me - if I liked a movie, I'd get the book of it.

In my little home town there was a little store near the biggest junction in the town. It was tiny. I mean, the whole store was about the size of a small terraced house's kitchen. You could get two customers in there at most, with a tiny counter at one end. However, they sold books, and records. I bought a lot of music in my teens, listening to vinyl with my enormous headphones on while playing games on my ZX Spectrum.

The owner of the shop was a middle aged Chinese lady who was lovely. We used to chat, and she used to order the weird records I wanted as special orders for me. And some of those weird movie novelisations too, looking up what was available from her supplier's monthly printed catalogue that looked more like a supplement to the phonebook than anything glamorous. I think outside of my family she was the only person I used to talk to for weeks on end. She probably dreaded me coming in. I'm sorry if you're reading this now...

When I went in there, there was this book on her spinner rack of novels that just kept staring at me. Literally. Because it had freakin' eyes on the cover...

IT.

This must have been 1987, as it was the paperback and it wasn't a brand new release, but I was out of school, out of work, and in a limbo - trying to write on my ancient electric typewriter.

I'd been in a few times to get various records over a number of weeks, but that cover was still there - staring at me. So bloomin' unsettling.

Eventually, I caved, and bought it. It really wasn't the sort of thing I read - it didn't tie into anything (at least not yet) but I'd seen the movies - Carrie, The Shining, Christine, The Dead Zone, Silver Bullet... And on top of that, it was HUGE. I wasn't a big reader, and I hadn't managed to get through The Lord of the Rings, and here I was buying a book that was longer. Over a thousand pages of it...

Anyway, I bought it. And blasted through it. Not the fast speed of most dedicated readers, I'm never a fast reader, but I did get through it pretty swiftly for me. I was hooked. Mostly because it had the weird nostalgia element, and playing upon your childhood fears. I loved it.

So much so, that when I finished it, I started reading the rest of Stephen King's work. I moved on to Christine - which I also loved. I knew the film really well, so the extra stuff in the book that wasn't in the movie was brilliant. It was like a massive director's cut of the movie. And then I moved onto The Stand, Carrie, The Shining... and kept going.

Stephen King is the reason I read.

Simple as that. I owe it all to him.

I've kept reading his work too. I'm a bit behind - I think I got sidetracked about Duma Key era, but I loved the Dark Tower series, and especially loved Insomnia and Rose Madder.

I've mentioned on this blog before the surreal moment when I finally got to meet Stephen King. My reading had got to the pitch that I was working in Ottakar's bookstore, looking after the SF/Fantasy section and becoming an advisor to the chain of 140+ stores to recommend titles to the genre ranges. I was even editor of their chain-wide SF/Fantasy/Horror newsletter.

Thanks to this, the sales reps from various publishers knew me, and the awesome rep from Hodder - Stephen King's publisher in the UK - invited me and my wife (who also worked for Ottakar's at that time) to go to the big book launch for Stephen King's new book, Lisey's Story. It was more like a weekend, as we had tickets to the talk one evening, and the following evening there was a launch party in a weird building off the Strand in London. It looked like a masonic temple, but within its walls Alabama 3 were playing.

The evening went on, the publishers and booksellers were mingling, and eventually - tired from a hammering six hour book signing in a supermarket - Stephen King came in, got up on stage, and sang along with Alabama 3 (see the blurry photo to the right)...

Our sales rep from Hodder spotted me and Debs, and said - "Have you met him yet?" - Hell no, not yet! "He'll head this way when he gets off stage, wait there..."

So we did. And Stephen King was introduced to us by our lovely Hodder rep. We shook his hand, Debs gave him a bar of chocolate (as the UK chocolate is far superior - you don't know what you're missing, honestly), Debs thanked him for his books really changing our lives, and I kinda just stood there going... "errrrr"...  And off he went, chocolate in hand.

Anyway, that's about it really. All I can say again is thank you, Stephen King. Without you, I doubt I would have been as big a book reader as I've become. I doubt I would have ended up working in book retail for eight years. Thank you.