Canister X – A.P. Fuchs: Zombie, Paranormal Romance and Superhero Novelist, Blogger, Artist, Publisher

Given today’s current publishing climate of Kindle hype and all sorts of commercialism where the value of a book is completely thrown out in favor of creating something marketable–with “marketable” being the focus, not the work itself–I thought this interview clip with Alan Moore appropriate.
Alan is arguably one of the greatest modern writers and has been around the block more than once. He’s extremely intelligent and it would advisable to take what he says in the following clip to heart. Aside from the bit about treating writing like a diety, of course, but the message of taking writing seriously is advised.
He is also a true artist–a non-pretentious one; no Buddy Holly glasses and plaid shirts for this guy–and puts the art above all else.

Last night close to 11pm, I finished the first draft of the third full-length Axiom-man novel, City of Ruin. This now brings his book total to five. First draft clocked in at approx. 61,000 words. I started getting back into it on August 16 and maybe put in around 3,000 words over the following three days, so last Monday, when I decided to get hardcore into it and finish the thing, the amount of work already done on the book was around 15-16,000 words, which means that since last Monday to last night–with last Tuesday and Sunday off–I was able to pull off roughly 45,000 words in 5 days. Not bad. My math could be slightly off, but it’s over 40,000 for sure.

Anyway, the point is, this is the shortest amount of time I’ve taken to write a book, the runner-up now being April under my pseudonym Peter Fox. If memory serves, I did that book in about a week back in 2002. I think A Red Dark Night is the next shortest. 2 weeks to write that one sounds about right.

Doesn’t matter. It’s not about speed and at no time over the past week did I go, “Okay, I have to write so I’ll just writing something because I have to write something.” Instead, I was fully immersed in the story, lost in Axiom-man’s world of Good vs Evil and superpowers. Inspired by Brian Keene and Carlton Mellick III in terms of just going hardcore and banging the book out, I got the job done without sacrificing quality. All that’s left to do is drafts 2 and 3 then the book goes off to my editor for stuff I missed.

Besides, I read in an issue in Alan Moore’s Dodgem Logic that back in the pulp age of fiction, it was not uncommon for writers to pound out a 40,000-word book in a week to keep up with a crazy publishing schedule of getting stories to readers frequently.

I’m taking today off in terms of writing and am handling business duties. Tomorrow I go head first into finishing Redemption of the Dead, which I believe sits at around 3-4,000 words at the moment. It’ll be 75-80,000 when done. I have about two weeks to crank that one out, or 12 days as I don’t work Sundays.

Let the madness continue!

March 8, 2006

Dear Dave:

Thanks for your recent letter, the latest having covered a lot of ground. I’ll just go through yours in order and do a point-by-point/section-by-section reply in the interest of staying organized.

My rate for copyediting is 1 cent US per word and for a Canadian client it’s still 1 cent US per word but then come invoice day, whatever the US total is, it is exchanged at that day’s current exchange rate to arrive at the Canadian dollar value of the total. Since the Canadian dollar is doing well these days (lately we’ve been hovering around 1.11-1.13 on the exchange), it’s not too big of a deal. If this was a few years ago where our dollar stunk and the exchange averaged at around 1.65, then unfortunately for the Canadian client, the service would cost them more.

The comment about “by Dave Sim as told to so-and-so,” I see where you’re coming from. I don’t believe it’s an editor’s job—copyeditor or just proofreader—to rewrite anything or “redo” anything. The job is to point out to the author where he/she messed up regarding continuity, grammar, spelling, etc. Sure, an editor corrects words or puts question marks beside word choices (especially ones that don’t fit the context of any given statement), but it’d have to be a super heavy “redo” for them to have any righteous claim to a joint byline. That, and any suggestion/correction an editor makes, the author can say no to especially if they’ve hired someone on a freelance basis to go over the manuscript. There’s always a written agreement, too, that so-and-so was hired for such-and-such a service, he/she is to be paid X amount for said service and that’s where the relationship ends.

I liked your idea of just stepping back from all this “creative” stuff and getting a McJob. Trust me, I hear you. I’ve toyed with that idea too and instead of being glued to my work station for 10-12 hours a day, it’d be nice to do my 8 hours and not worry about work until the next block of 8 hours rolled around. Ah, the price we pay for following our dreams and seeing our goals through. And, in truth, I wouldn’t trade this job for anything. Well, maybe being an action star.

You haven’t sent me a copy of the Cerebus Guide to Self-publishing, but it’s okay; I already have a copy (see my first letter to you). Thanks for the offer, though.

So on to the “meat” of our correspondence: our foray into the world of the gray stuff. You had used abortion as an example in your comments. After I first read it, I quickly saw that such a topic could open a door into a discussion on one’s morals and religious beliefs (yours, mine, whoever’s). But I’ll try to keep that separate for now as best I can because, since you and I are dealing in the medium of letter writing, I’ll attempt to keep things simple instead of sending you a 10-page letter each mailing and vice versa (though, of course, I’m not opposed to long letters written and sent by either one of us). So in summation, if I understood your point correctly, we take an issue like abortion, create a “spectrum of extremes”—so Abortion Yes on one end and Abortion No on the other—and then with our pens draw up lines where each line is connected to a “reason” for the abortion and depending where that line is on the spectrum, it would either be closer to Abortion Yes or Abortion No. Or am I making it too complicated? Before delving into that, I’m not sure if the jurisdictional approach to abortion (or the prison terms for a certain crime or whatnot) would work in that if I live in the north end of town and want an abortion but in my jurisdiction abortion is illegal, what would stop me from going to the south end, where it is allowed, to get it done? Unless, of course, that the jurisdiction you live in is the one you have to adhere to lest you face a fine or jail and even if you went to the south end they wouldn’t perform the procedure for you because you would be required to produce two pieces of ID that state your address and what jurisdiction you’re in. You’re from the north, tough beans, buddy!

The spectrum approach is an interesting one, but by allowing different nuances to see where upon it you fall, are we not then opening up the door to more gray stuff? If one end is white, the other black, the stuff in between has to be varying shades of gray. For the record, I’m pro-life (which we can always get into a discussion on at a different time) as murder’s murder no matter which way you slice it. Even when you kill someone in self-defense, you’ve still killed them. And depending how you look at it, abortion is a form of self-defense as the female is “saving” herself from something—fill-in-the-blank, here. But then what of our incest victims or our rape victims or our twelve-year-old teens who were taken advantage of by Daddy’s friend and are now with a thirty-year-old’s child? Wherever that situation(s) falls on the spectrum, should they be allowed to end a life if either a) it’s just a cluster of cells in the womb so by ending it you’re denying it the right to develop into a child and live or b) it’s a maturing fetus that’s four months into development but then you’re disallowing his/her birth? I think the real question is: where are we getting our laws from and what are we basing them on? This, of course, could sidetrack us into the religious arena so I’m trying to avoid that for now, but it does make one wonder from where/when we got our laws and who made them. The nuances thing could work but it would have to be on a very tight and, dare I say, rigid platform without room for leniency, because the thing with nuances is, in the context we are talking about here, each circumstance is different—especially when dealing with rape or incest (i.e. was the defendant coerced into the intercourse? Was it forced? Did they go into it willingly but then things got out of hand and so it was rape? etc.)—it opens the doors to a plethora of nuances and thickens the gray area. In Winnipeg alone, there are around 700,000 people and over half are women, so for the sake of discussion, if all the women in Winnipeg ended up being either rape or incest victims, we’re dealing with a possible 350,000+ unique circumstances that each carry nuances of their own. I know from this and from my previous letters to you that my personal desire to see the restoration or black and white in society may come off as if I want to live in a dictatorship or under a similar type of government. That’s not the case but I thought I should clarify that just in case. My main issue would be to challenge those “in charge” (and I use the term loosely) and Mr. Everyday Joe to take a real hard and objective look at how things are run, how we’re living our lives and, further, why we are heading down the road of “anything goes.” Which then kind of takes us back to the “each circumstance is different so yields a unique outcome” argument, the “we’re all different and unique so what I view as wrong might not be what you view as wrong” thing, which then takes us back again to why we think/feel the way we do. We only have three possible scenarios of outcome if two disagreeing people were to find out why they thought something: either I would be wrong, you would be right, or I would be right and you would be wrong, or we’re both wrong. The thing of it is, we can’t both be right when you’re dealing with yes or no, true or false, up or down, left or right, black or white issues (which most issues are if we dare to trim away all the “fat” that we’ve layered around the things of everyday life). But those “outcomes,” referring to the aforementioned “each circumstance is different so yields a unique outcome,” each yield a different specific result but on a broader scale. For the sake of example, let’s take murder. Whether I killed someone intentionally, killed them in self-defense, or abetted a murder, they all resulted in the specific outcome of someone’s death. Then the real question is to what degree should I be held accountable? Dare I say fully? Regardless of the original intention or circumstance, the way it panned out resulted in the loss of life. I’m responsible for that loss of life because of my actions. I was involved therefore I am responsible. Then what of my punishment? Should it be the same as that if I went out and killed someone I disliked or if I instead shot you because you had a gun aimed at my head? This is why other evidence comes into play when they sentence someone: was it premeditated? Was it done out of malice or out of defense? As a thought, how about a set penalty for a crime that can be added to based upon the “other crimes” perpetrated at the time of said crime? Example, the penalty for murder is ten years in the pen regardless of circumstance. If I pre-planned the murder, another five years. Was it one victim or two? If it’s one and it was intentional, I get put away for 15 years. If it’s two people, then I go away for 30 and/or a sentence where the death of each person on your deathlist has to be paid for in increments of, say, 5 years. That’s not to say a person’s life is only worth 5 year’s in the pen—as obviously the victim’s family would no doubt like to see you hanged or put away for good—but the point would be to set a set penalty for whatever crime. I’m not a lawyer, a cop nor politician nor will I pretend to know the law inside out and backwards. Maybe this approach is far too simple. But then again, maybe it isn’t.

Moving on…

I’m pleased to hear you possibly doing future Collected Letters editions. I’m still reading the first one. I admit to taking a break from it as I just dove in to and completed a 12-book fiction series so wanted to take the time to read those. But I’ll be getting back to your book any day now. As a suggestion—and also from the point of view as a consumer/reader—please consider making them at least 200 pages long, 250 being ideal, if/when you release more. From the consumer’s point of view, it’s the whole bang for your buck thing. The current 2004 edition is printed at 8.5” x 11”, right? If you decided to pursue POD for it, and utilize the Lightning Source option I suggested, as a FYI, to POD print at anything larger than 6.14” x 9.21” it increases your per unit cost (I believe that’s the top size before it costs more though I don’t have my notes in front of me; I know there is a page size limit before increase though). A suggestion might be—depending on how much material you have—to publish each volume as a quarterly publication, where, say, Jan-Mar ’05 would be in one book, Apr-Jun ’05 in another and so forth. Of course each book would be slightly bigger or smaller than the previous based on the volume of mail you received. Then if you took your reply letters and formatted them at, say, 5.5” x 8.5” or 6” x 9”, to fill that 200-250 pages wouldn’t be a problem and you’d save a little on your per unit print cost. As an idea, too, I wonder if adding even a three-page Cerebus story or one-panel/page Cerebus gag would get readers from the regular storyline to pick up the Letters book(s) because of the included art?

The other day I thought, “Gee, I wonder if Dave has ever thought about crossing over into the electronic publishing business either through Aardvark-Vanaheim or via a partnership with another firm?” I’m referring to eBooks. Though I don’t see them ever replacing an old-fashioned print book, they do open the doors to readers who prefer the electronic reading format. There’s 10+ different e-formats ranging from a simple PDF file you can read on your computer screen to a format where you can download the text into a handheld device that’s akin to a Tricorder and you can tote it around like a regular print book. I had thought, “I wonder if Dave has considered doing this for either his text-based Collected Letters volume(s) or even for the Cerebus trades?” Obviously the goal with any creator is to share his/her work with as many folks as possible. As a thought, putting the Cerebus trades into e-format might be beneficial to the sales of your phonebook volumes. Your phonebooks retail for about $25-30 Canadian. Well, if I’m new to Cerebus and his world or just have a partial interest in it, I might not be willing to spend the $25-30 for the book. However, I might be willing to spend $10 for the eBook edition (eBooks typically retail for less than the print version by about half). If I liked what I read/saw in the e-version, I might get the next volume in print and/or replace my e-version by shelling out for the print version (I know of some people who do this for novels). EBooks are a good way for people to try out authors they’ve never heard of or are just interested in but are unsure if that author can deliver the same wallop every outing like, say, Stephen King or Alan Moore. Anyway, it’s just a thought, Dave, but since eBooks require zero maintenance save the initial work to format them, the profits yielded might be a nice additional income during your retirement. Passive income. I believe Gerhard has a site set up for auctioning off some original art, right? If you pursued the “e-option,” he could put up some links on there as to where online readers can purchase the e-versions of Cerebus, make an announcement to the Yahoos, send out a press release online, and all the rest.

Anyway, I’ve rattled on a little longer than I originally estimated. I hope all is well with you. I look forward to your reply.

Sincerely,

For those who follow me on Twitter and Facebook, you know I’m a huge American Splendor fan. Harvey’s autobiographical comic book series is sheer genius and displays not only his writing talents, but also fantastic art from R. Crumb, Gary Dumm, and even *gasp* Alan Moore (back when he did cartooning). Of course, a ton of other awesome artists have illustrated Harvey’s stories over the years. The more American Splendor I read, the sadder I get that Harvey is no longer with us. Would loved to have met him at one point.

The movie, American Splendor, is awesome. The following graphic novel gives you a look behind-the-scenes at how the movie came to be, Harvey’s adventures and misadventures while promoting it, and an inside look at a man who found out that fame isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be.

Pick up this book. It’ll be good for you.

November 3, 2010
Blog: Reading Angel
Web: http://www.readingangel.com/2010/11/scott-nicholson-guest-post-and-kindle.html
Comment:

“Yet clearly I don’t want to believe it, or I would have embraced that incident as proof of the afterlife.”

This statement piqued my interest. Do you have any idea why you don’t want to believe in an afterlife?

Actually, to fine tune the question even more: what is it about the possibility of an afterlife that scares you hence, it seems, making you not want to believe in one? Because, frankly, what each and every one of us believe has no bearing on what really is. Truth is truth, fact is fact, and beliefs–no matter how varied–don’t change that.

Thanks.

November 4, 2010
Blog: The True Book Addict
Web: http://thetruebookaddict.blogspot.com/2010/11/scott-nicholson-guest-post-and-kindle.html#idc-container
Comment:

Never got into reading during the school years, mainly because you were forced to read certain books and, frankly, none of them really appealed to me. However, after high school, I started reading books I wanted to read and suddenly a whole new world was opened up.

Terry Goodkind, Stephen King, John Grisham, Alan Moore, Warren Ellis–man, just such good material.

These days, my influences are from all over the place, especially as I’ve been exploring the world of indie comics and have been finding some real cool voices (Alec Longstreth, for example).

I agree. With all the options out there in the digital era, we’ll never be bored.

November 5, 2010
Blog: Chrissie’s Corner
Web: http://www.chrissiescorner.co.uk/?p=3122
Comment:

Good post. Thanks, Scott. Please put me down for Kindle.

November 6, 2010
Blog: McQuestionable Musings
Web: http://mcquestionablemusings.blogspot.com/2010/11/guest-post-with-author-scott-nicholson.html
Comment:

Ahh, the beauty of the Internet: the ability to publish a rejected manuscript and no one says boo about it.

However, at least you took the time for rewrites, edits, overhauls, etc., the stuff sometimes needed to make a book worth reading.

If anything, you’re kind of straddling the line here, yeah? The idea of a writer taking a rejected book and self-publishing it because he believes in it?

(And, yes, I crossed that line many years ago. However, the difference between you and I is I subsidy-published mine out of naivety and not really know what the reading audience required, whereas you’re doing this properly and with experience built in when creating the final product.)

Let’s hope this “sucky” book does real well for you, man.

November 7, 2010
Blog: Sparkling Reviews
Web: http://www.sparklingreviews.com/2010/11/kindles.html
Comment:

I’ve been debating for a while on which e-reader I want. A Kindle would almost seem like the default, but at the same time, I like the idea of color as I would want to read comics on it as well, so at present I’m leaning toward the iPad with the Kindle app.

I know that Kindle is where it’s at in terms of the action and selection, but yeah, that color thing for a comic geek like me . . .

Another year of reading has gone by.

In 2010, I read 48 books, the majority of which were graphic novels and, yes, I consider graphic novels “real” books, as they carry the same depth and amazing storytelling ability that novels have.

Below is what I took in last year (<- weird saying that). I also linked the books up to Amazon (where able) in case you wanted to add one or more of these titles to your personal library.

Books Read in 2010

1.) The Holy Spirit by Billy Graham (finished from 2009)
2.) Sin City by Frank Miller
3.) How to Make Webcomics by Brad Guigar, Dave Kellett, Scott Kurtz and Kris Straub
4.) Gross Movie Reviews Volume One by Tim Gross
5.) Jumpstart Your Book Sales: A Money-making Guide for Authors, Independent Publishers and Small Presses by Marilyn and Tom Ross (finished from 2009)
6.) MacFish by Sean Simmans
7.) Animal Behavior and Other Tales of Lycanthropy by Keith Gouveia
8.) Bigfoot War by Eric S. Brown
9.) Zombie Fight Night: Battles of the Dead by A.P. Fuchs
10.) Alec: The Years of Have Pants by Eddie Campbell
11.) Judenhass by Dave Sim
12.) Do Anything by Warren Ellis
13.) All Star Superman Vol. 1 by Grant Morrison and Frank Quietly, with Jamie Grant
14.) All Star Superman Vol. 2 by Grant Morrison and Frank Quietly, with Jamie Grant
15.) Transmetropolitan: Back on the Street by Warren Ellis and Darick Robertson
16.) Praise the Dead by Gina Ranalli
17.) Transmetropolitan: Lust for Life by Warren Ellis and Darick Robertson
18.) Transmetropolitan Vol. 3 by Warren Ellis and Darick Robertson
19.) Stargazer Vol. 1 by Von Allan
20.) Magic Man Plus 15 Tales of Terror by A.P. Fuchs
21.) Madman Vol. 1 by Michael Allred
22.) The Superman Madman Hullabaloo by Mike Allred
23.) The War of the Worlds Plus Blood, Guts and Zombies by H.G. Wells and Eric S. Brown
24.) King-Cat Classix: The Best of King-Cat Comics and Stories by John Porcellino
25.) Luke’s Story (The Jesus Chronicles) by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins (finished from 2009)
26.) Possession of the Dead (Undead World Trilogy, Book 2) by A.P. Fuchs
27.) Transmetropolitan: The New Scum by Warren Ellis and Darick Robertson
28.) Transmetropolitan: Lonely City by Warren Ellis and Darick Robertson
29.) Transmetropolitan: Gouge Away by Warren Ellis and Darick Robertson
30.) Supreme: The Story of the Year by Alan Moore et al.
31.) American Splendor: The Life and Times of Harvey Pekar by Harvey Pekar et al.
32.) Invincible Vol. 1: Family Matters by Robert Kirkman and Cory Walker
33.) Invincible Vol. 2: Eight is Enough by Robert Kirkman and Cory Walker and Ryan Ottley
34.) The Walking Dead Vol. 1: Days Gone Bye by Robert Kirkman and Tony Moore
35.) The Walking Dead Vol. 2: Miles Behind Us by Robert Kirman and Charlie Adlard
36.) Phase 7 #001-004 by Alec Longstreth
37.) Supreme: The Return by Alan Moore et al.
38.) Spawn Vol. 1 by Todd MacFarlane
39.) Spawn Vol. 2 by Todd MacFarlane, Alan Moore and Frank Miller
40.) Our Cancer Year by Harvey Pekar, Joyce Brabner and Frank Stack
41.) Spawn Vol. 3 by Todd MacFarlane et al.
42.) Superman: Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? by Alan Moore and Curt Swan
43.) The Walking Dead Vol. 3: Safety Behind Bars by Robert Kirkman and Charlie Adlard
44.) The Weaponer by Eric S. Brown
45.) Final Crisis by Grant Morrison et al.
46.) Transition: Phase 7 #010-011 by Alec Longstreth
47.) The Black Cat and the Ghoul by Edgar Allan Poe and Keith Gouveia
48.) Making Comics by Scott McCloud

Canister X Newsletter Vol. 1 No. 7

October 2010

As noted in the last newsletter, September was a whirlwind, and in a lot of ways, October was, too. It was very much a month of aftermath of all of September’s hard work.

The beginning of this month was difficult for me after September’s all-out writing-fest. I was pretty burned out and, though I worked during the day, my productivity level was down. Thankfully, by the second week or so, I had recovered.

I launched Possession of the Dead earlier this month, both in print and in eBook. I was also in the newspaper and on the radio. Tonight I’m off to sign books at Coles, then this weekend is the Central Canada Comic Con so I’ll be selling a TON of Coscom books there.

Go, go, go. That seems to be the mantra here.

My wife, Roxy, is in the same boat. She just launched her webcomic, Fuzz Society, and aside from her posts on Tuesday and Thursday, she also got her art ready to sell as prints at the con. We’re off to the printer this afternoon to pick up the hardcopies of issue one, and we’ll be picking up the prints tomorrow. You should also join her Facebook group.

I’m also excited for her because Coles has graciously allowed her to sit in on my signing tonight to hand sell her comic without paying any commission to the store. (Good deal; if I could do that for my own books, I’d avoid that 40% discount they require, but ’tis the biz.)
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Got good news from Hollyweird as there’s been interest in one of Coscom Entertainment’s properties. Here’s hoping the book in question gets optioned for either film or a TV series.
____________________________________

If you haven’t already been tuning in to Zomtropolis every Friday, please do so. My hope is to get the book going twice a week, but until things settle down, I simply can’t. Hopefully at some point during November, but no guarantees.
____________________________________

In reading news, I’ve been gorging (almost literally) on graphic novels. Since I last wrote, I must have read at least five or six of them. For sure I read: Invincible Vols. 1 and 2 by Robert Kirkman, Cory Walker and Ryan Ottley, The Walking Dead Vols. 1 and 2 by Robert Kirkman, Tony Moore and Charlie Adlard, Phase 7 #001-004 by Alec Longstreth. American Splendor by Harvey Pekar et al. is there, too, along with Supreme: The Story of the Year by Alan Moore et al.

All of the above was just terrific. All completely different comics, all differently paced, all with different styles. And they were all pure good.
____________________________________

Also, Axiom-man trading cards came in the mail the other day. He’s part of the massive comic book crossover, War of the Independents. Creators with characters involved who also wanted to be part of the trading card set sent in art for it. In return, we got a free deck of the entire set (50 cards). I also ordered in an extra set at discount and 100 Axiom-man cards for the con this weekend. Not sure if I’ll sell them or give them out as incentives for the books, or whatever. We’ll see.

Speaking of the con again, Axiom-man cover artist Justin Shauf is coming into town. Originally from Saskatchewan, he moved here for school (where I met him), then a few years later he moved back. It’s awesome that we’ve stayed friends for about ten years now despite living so far apart. He’ll have a table in Artist Alley at the con, so if you’re in Winnipeg this weekend, stop on by the Convention Centre and say hello to both of us.
____________________________________

That’s pretty much it for me. The clock is ticking and there’s loads to do.

Peace out for now.

Best,

A.P. Fuchs
Winnipeg, MB
October 28, 2010

I bought this series originally because it was written by Alan Moore. I knew going into it that it was kind of like Superman but still it’s own thing.

Wow. This series remains in my top ten graphic novels of all time. Though called Supreme (created by Rob Liefeld), it is Superman. Even while reading it, you envision Superman doing all the things Supreme does. It even has it’s own Lex Luthor-like villain (Darius Dax), and Batman and Robin parellels.

So amazingly good.

If you’ve been longing for a good Superman story that conveys the awe and wonder associated with the Man of Steel, though this isn’t Superman, these books are the best places to get your fix.

Click the Image to Order from Amazon.com

Unfortunately, Amazon doesn’t have the other one, Supreme: The Story of the Year, listed, but it’s definitely worth hunting around for.

Unlike the From Hell movie–which was basically just a Reader’s Digest version of the tale–the From Hell graphic novel is sheer genius. It runs the size of a phonebook, though doesn’t read like one.

Alan Moore’s writing, like always, is a wonderful dissection of the Jack the Ripper murders as well as clean blend of the various rumors and theories thereof.

Eddie Campbell’s art gives the book a very raw and authentic feel, adding a grittiness to the narrative that only enhances the story.

For everything you missed in the From Hell movie, read the From Hell graphic novel.

It’s brilliant.

Click Here to Order from Amazon.com