The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
600 people reached the top of Mt. Everest in 2012. This blog got about 11,000 views in 2012. If every person who reached the top of Mt. Everest viewed this blog, it would have taken 18 years to get that many views.
Where will I be hiding, this Saturday, for you?
I need to be found, so I’ll give you a clue
It’s on a type of bank down by the town river
And where the city cat has passengers to deliver
These parklands are popular and have a lot of appeal
There’s a cinema and markets and even a Ferris wheel
And quietly in this forest sits a pagoda of peace
Where I will be meditating, waiting for release
Where Am I?
Here’s your first clue!
Look for me! Find me! I’m on my way!
I’ll meet you at this place on a Saturday
It’s colourful and large and a holder of books
I’ll be somewhere outside, so you’ll really need to look
It’s a garden of benches, giant baubles and trees
It’s got places for your cravings for coffee and tea
It’s wide and well-loved and it’s not too bare
But most importantly, it’s a great big square!
Where Am I?
Know the answer? Be at the above place on Saturday Dec 1 2012 11am-2pm
and you might just find a free book waiting for you!
Good luck, book lovers and happy hunting!
OUROBORUS BOOKS TREASURE HUNT
Hi Book Fiends!
This December Ouroborus books invites you to join The Great Ouroborus Books Treasure Hunt!
Three free signed copies of Everdark Realms – Book 1: The Darkening are going to be left in 3 separate locations somewhere in Brisbane. It could be anywhere! It could be a park, or a bench, or a beach or a unicorn. Okay, maybe not a unicorn, an alpaca sure, just not a unicorn. They’re busy.
The first person who finds a book gets to keep it. Yep, a free signed copy of our latest release. It’s that easy!
Clues about where the books will be left will be put up on our site, on Twitter and on Facebook and also in some bookstores. Just look out for the above Ouroborus Books logo!
And just because we’re super excited about our treasure hunt and can’t wait to get excited – the first super awesome signed book will be released on Saturday Dec 1, 2012.
Good luck and happy hunting!
It’s really hard for me to hate something if everyone else thinks it’s amazing. I feel like I might not be ‘getting’ it, or that I don’t understand it. For example, I had ordered a new graphic novel that had been given 5 out of 5 stars in almost every review it had. The write ups about it had been extremely positive and it appeared in all the horror website lists and so forth. On top of that, it was written and drawn by someone that I’ve admired for a long time.
When it arrived I flipped through it, eager to look at the art and contents inside. It seemed ok. Just a horror story with some splash art. Reading the first few pages, I got confused. It was as if it started in the middle somewhere. I had no idea why the character was where he was, why they were buying this house or why their dog suddenly ran off. The story didn’t progress steadily, like I would have hoped. Instead it staggered into the basement and became a mash of strange flashbacks that never explained enough to fully grasp a hold of what the story was about. The artist/writer tried to give you someone to hate, to give you the person responsible for the horror that you saw, but you never saw him in that light because he was in it for two, maybe three pages. It missed the mark by a very long shot. Also, every panel was splash art, up-close shot of faces and over layered with computer effects. The whole book seemed like it was missing something form the story, and the art was totally over done.
This happens a lot with movies too. I wanted to love Dark Knight Rises, I really did. But it just didn’t hit the mark for me. It was pretentious, over written and skipped a few key elements that needed to be explained a little better. A few people I know also didn’t like it, but then there are those who loved it and I often wonder if they are afraid to hate it, or to say so. I remember seeing Phantom Menace on opening night and walking out thinking ‘did I like that? Am I allowed to say I didn’t.’ When people asked me next day, I said it was great, but I knew perfectly well I didn’t think that. It was heresy to say you didn’t like a Star Wars movie, especially one we waited so long to see.
I’ve been reading the DC comics New 52 run of Batman. Written by Scott Snyder and drawn by Greg Gapullo. Scott Snyder created, amongst others, American Vampire, which was awesome. There was even a short run where he wrote it with Stephen King. Currently Snyder is the big name in the comic writing field. I’d admit it, his writing is easy to read and the story chugs along nicely. Every twist and turn 
seems to be well thought out and planned a long time in advance, which is what I like from writers. I believe that makes you a good writer. But saying this, issue 11 of Batman, which rounded off the year long story arc and had the big reveal was hugely disappointing. The entire run up to this point had revolved around an ‘underground’ group called the Court of Owls. For a start, I thought was pretty cool having ‘Owl’ vs ‘Bat’, but however, if you google a real bats enemy, you’ll find its main predator is the owl (also the hawk and snakes). So, it kind of left my initial impression in shreds as I felt that if I could find this out in three seconds, there wasn’t much pre-thought into the new Batman villain. Maybe not though? So, back to my point, I’ve picked up issue 11, and the big reveal is about to happen, who is this mysterious Talon that has been kicking Batman’s ass the whole year, turns out ***SPOILERS*** its someone who claims to be Batman’s brother. I wanted to slam the comic closed and throw it out onto the road for the vultures. For me, and this may be because I write a lot and read a lot, this was a stitch up. I felt robbed. This, in my opinion, was an easy go-to. This was the first exit door and was very obvious. But, can I tweet Scott Snyder and tell him? Nope. Too many people praise him and tell him he’s the new king of comic writing. I’m guessing I’m not the only one who felt robbed of a good twist, but we are few and far between.
Since I’d read issue 11, I’m really not that keen on Scott Snyder’s work. I’ve looked him up on Goodreads and he’s given himself 5 out of 5 stars for every comic he’s ever written. To me that’s a sign of an egomaniac. However, I gave my book (Everdark Realms) 5 out of 5 also, but 80,000 people aren’t reading that every month. I find it hard to be a critic at times in fear of being wrong, even though an opinion can’t be wrong, it does feel that way. If I swap positions and someone is criticizing my work, I get defensive and 
quite attacking. It’s part of being creative, it makes you vulnerable and overprotective. But saying that, if you’re in the spotlight, like Snyder, maybe negative feedback is what you need from time to time.
Mitchell Tierney
Saboo flew through the air. He tumbled and somersaulted, head over tail. The wind slapped against his face, burning his skin and ripping out his hair. He closed his eyes tightly as he fell, his arms waving around recklessly. The Calavera’s hand snatched him from his freefall, jerking him from side to side. Its morbid eyes glowed in the darkened sky. Saboo was dropped again, the air tore past him, coursing up his arms and tearing his clothes. He was swiftly caught once more, this time by a different Calavera. It flipped him around and tore at his backpack. Its grotesque hand reached inside, blindly grabbing at something. It pulled its hand out, dropping the pack. Saboo watched it fall away and disappear in the flurry of tree tops. Saboo tried desperately to punch at witch as they wrestled in the air, but its hands were too quick. He was now being held by the neck. He squirmed to get free but the Calavera’s grip was too strong. Saboo gargled, managing to get a few words out.
‘Let…me…go!’ he choked, his face going blue. The witch’s octopus-like legs wrapped around his body and squeezed him tight. Saboo could feel the remarkable pressure they housed. The Calavera’s gold chains clanked against its chest, its yellow, round earrings glimmered and reflected the moon’s glare. Saboo tried to push it away, his fest hitting the witch, its body as hard as steel. The Calaveras took turns carrying him. They tossed him to one another, recklessly throwing him high into the air and catching him like a play-toy. The speed they achieved was inconceivable; Saboo’s ears were pushed flat against his head, his tail streamed out behind his body. Saboo was panicking, he didn’t know where they were taking him, and he had lost all bearings of his surroundings. One moment he was standing on the stage in the Monkish City, the next thing he was being taken by the Calavera witches. He had seen the comet descend and everything had illuminated in all its glory.
Saboo looked up at the witch and saw the malevolence in their face, and knew they were going to kill him. He thrashed about, but its grip got tighter, almost cutting off his airway completely. Saboo reached up, his lungs restricting, and snatched Calavera’s necklace. He pulled down on it hard, breaking it in half. The Calavera screeched, falling from the sky, as they swan-dived towards the ground at a remarkable velocity. Then, as Saboo started to lose consciousness, he noticed it was holding the Mask of Ebb in its free hand. The tusks jutted out, carved with alarming detail; the small inscriptions glowing and radiating before him.
Saboo reached for it, his finger tips caressing the mask.
The witch screamed, sending its morbid howl out over the lands of Amitav. Suddenly he gathered its strength, after losing one of its neck pieces and flew in a quick arc, away from the ground.
They flew higher and higher. The other witches started circling them. The Calavera holding him, brought the mask up over his head, its laughter was frantic and supernatural. With one quick strike, the Calavera slammed the mask onto Saboo’s face. It burnt like nothing Saboo had ever felt before in his entire life; even when the Lepordconda bit the end of his tail off, this felt a million times worse. The wood seared to his flesh, burning the hairs around his face. Saboo screamed in pain. He could feel his hair being singed, and he could smell it. The Calavera felt the mask give off a sonic wave of energy and it screamed in terror, dropping Saboo. He fell from the hovering creatures, desperately trying to pull the mask off his face. It was searing. He could hear his skin moulding to the wood. The tusks felt alive, as if it had become part of his face now. His eyes were fused shut.
Saboo was dropping like a stone from the sky. The Calaveras watched him fall, their long tentacles wavering in the clouds around them. They stared with grotesque eyes, waiting for him to hit the ground. Saboo tried frantically to tear the mask from his face, his fingers gripped the sides and he pulled and pulled. His ears rung out loud and his hair was being pulled by the friction. Then, his eyes shot open, he could see normally out of the mask, its wooden jaw moved and he was able to scream for the first time since it was scorched onto his face. It was a gut-wrenching howl of pain. The ground was coming up faster and faster, he looked down and his heart sunk low into his stomach. He wasn’t about to fall upon the hard ground, instead, he was about to land in water.
Over the last few weeks I’ve received two batman comics in the mail; one was Batman: The Killing Joke by Alan Moore and the other was Batman: Cacophony by Kevin Smith and Walt Flanagan. Now, I’ve never been a huge Batman fan, but I was more interested in who wrote these titles than the Dark Knight himself. Alan Moore and Kevin Smith both wrote about the Joker. Although both their ‘Jokers’ had similar qualities, they were written differently. It got me thinking, out of all the villains they could have chosen to write about, why Joker? They could have picked Penguin or Riddler or Poison Ivy or whoever, but both these writers chose the same villain. Why?
Luke Skywalker has Darth Vader, Harry Potter has Voldermort, Optimus Prime has Megatron. With heroes that live up to a high caliber, they have to have an equal and opposite opponent. Penguin is short and can’t really go one on one with Batman by himself. Riddler has riddles? (and not much else). Mr. Freeze has his equipment etc. But the Joker has something the rest really don’t have. He wasn’t born disfigured, but he doesn’t look quite normal. He doesn’t have gadgets or cars or planes. He has the Charles Manson quality that these writers want to write about; an ultimate villain, a completely twisted and deranged psychopath.
Without a major villain, who would Batman fight? Street gangs, shop lifters, muggers. All of these enemies are faceless and pointless. You don’t need a bat-cave and bat-mobile and bat-copter and gadgets to beat off some junkies snatching a handbag. In order to justify a lot of heroes you need the rival to be beyond the normal street crook. All these faceless enemies are used as fodder. Take the Stromtroopers or the Foot Soldiers, they have no character, no back story, nothing. They can be thrown into the meat grinder and no one cares.
With Luke Skywalker, the rebel alliance was created to rise up against the Empire. It makes you want to cheer for the underdog, especially when the villain is a military-type, nazi-esque brigade with countless soldiers and weaponry. The Rebels are dressed almost haphazardly, with no distinct familiarity or recognizable figure head. Now the Empire on the other hand has Darth Vader, who is very recognizable. He’s tall and solid with large shoulders and points a lot. He seems to not even care about his own men, choking one at the table in New Hope. With Vader, the whole idea of the Rebels winning is so farfetched that you believe it’s nearly impossible. If you look at all the Star Wars toys and games and posters, they all have Darth Vader on them, either his whole mask, or full body. He’s recognizable and you’re instantly attracted to walk over and check it out because he’s the ultimate villain.
In The Killing Joke by Allan Moore, Joker broke out of Arkham Asylum and shot Chief Gordon’s daughter (Bat-girl) and put her in a wheelchair. Moore wrote the Joker as a Manson type leader with a band of merry, deformed, individuals that did his bidding. Joker was written as someone pushed to the brink of lunacy that never really came back from it. He wasn’t Batman’s equal in physical strength or mentality, but was so insane that it brought him up higher in the scale of opponents. Joker didn’t care about the law or human life one iota. His clown makeup really drove home the point of his state of mind.
When I write, I try to invent a great villain. Someone who is above the hero, so the hero becomes the underdog. It’s important to show how strong the villain can be, and also to show the hero’s limitations, this way, we, as readers, can compare the two. Who ever thought a moisture-farm boy, who wasn’t even allowed to go see his friends because of his chores to do, would take on a great sith lord, and win?
Heroes and Villains should balance like yin and yang. But Villains rarely get any victory. We don’t hear of villains winning. This may be deliberate to introduce this to children, to let them know the good guys always come out on top, but in the real world…it may be a different story. Maybe that’s why we can’t stand by and let awful things happen, because we can see when a savior is needed. I wrote a short story once, a long time ago (and I’ve forgotten the name) where an old hero is wandering the streets with his 
cape and boots on, looking for crime. A van pulls up and it’s the old age home coming to get him because he escaped. They tell him that he fought all the crime, and there were no more villains. He’s rejected from society now because he did his job, now everyone lives in peace and no one cares about him. Heroes exist because of villains, and villains exist because of heroes.
Mitchell Tierney
*please note this blog was written before the Aurora Dark Knight Rises shooting. Ouroborus Book Services and all of its writers wish to send our deepest sympathies to those affected.
I normally have a few writing projects on the go at once. As you’ve may have read in my previous blogs I have a book I’ve been working on for about four years, which I have no intent on really ever finishing, but I do get the motivation from time to time to work on it. I have about two or three books that need editing and rewrites and I have to try and submit a blog every two weeks. This is on top of little things I write down as they come to me, normally ideas for short stories to write later or plot twists for books I’m yet to write. But lately, I’ve been busy. I haven’t had time to sit down and write or get up Saturday morning with a coffee and write a blog. I’ve been running around doing things that have a higher priority than writing.
Last night I sat down to write a blog and didn’t have any ideas. I brain stormed for about half an hour and couldn’t come up with one thing. I thought ‘do I have writers block?’ I’ve never had it before and didn’t think I ever would. But what I released was I’d fallen into the trap I had known about since I started writing and Chuck Palahniuk put it best when he wrote ‘You don’t sit on the toilet if you don’t need to shit.’ I was sitting at the computer, with nothing to write, trying to force myself to write, and it just wasn’t happening. In the past, if I didn’t feel like writing, I would edit. If I didn’t feel like editing, I would write a short story, or not write at all. Usual my writing ‘tank’ is full by the weekend and I have enough fuel to just sit down, at any time, and write until it runs dry. With work and other commitments I hadn’t been able to fill this tank, so I was running on empty.
Sometimes it’s hard to switch on the motivation. When I’ve worked on books in the past, and known I had to finish them, it was hard to force myself to sit in the chair and write. I had figured out a trick though. If you don’t feel like writing, reread the last two or three pages you wrote and I almost guarantee that you get instantly motivated. Your brain is transferred back to that point, exactly where you left off and you’ll soon be typing away. That’s why I like to start new books only after my tank is overflowing with motivation and ideas, so when I sit down to start, I can crank out two chapters in an hour or two and get a good start on the book.
A couple of years ago I was writing a book called ‘Raul the Son’ about a race of very old, potato-men like creatures. Raul was the youngest and had to leave the colony to search for the sun. When I was writing it, it became very complex. There was a lot of back story and different clans after different things…then I went on holiday for six weeks. It was already up to about 300 pages, so when I got back I had forgotten all the twists and turns and the sub-plots, not to mention a lot of names of characters and places. I liked that book a lot and would have sent to publishers, but it was too hard to jump back into it, so I just left it. I’ve tried twice to go through it, jotting down all the characters and where the story lines were going, but it was a mess. It needed to be rewritten and edited, badly. So, Raul the Son sits half finished in writers limbo. I have the fuel to finish it, just not the time. I’d written it so long ago that I feel like I had moved on to other projects.
I don’t think writers block is a real issue. The issue is sitting down to write when you have nothing. Maybe the time that books has been sitting idle will draw you back to the keyboard and you’ll sit and stare at it saying ‘come on! Come on!’ and your fingers just won’t move. If you’re halfway through a book, surely you have a vague idea where its headed. I normally know the ending, not in great detail, but enough to write towards it. Think of where your characters are going and what they have to do, or go through to reach the end.
Mitchell Tierney
I was going to base this blog on the dwindling horror genre, but because my horror book knowledge is fairly limited, I had to do a little more research before I started talking about it. I knew horror had branched out into sub-genres, but what direction was I supposed to head? If horror literature is almost extinct, how could I possibly write about it? But little did I know, I had just answer my own question.
For research, I went to Dymocks book store in Brisbane city. I had been up there a few times before but couldn’t remember what their horror section looked like. Coming up the escalator I imagined isles of horror. As I rounded the boxes upon boxes of Hunger Games books and wondered through the sci-fi section, which was a full isle, I got to the horror section and couldn’t quite believe what I saw. It was maybe one metre long, with only four shelves. I thought, ‘no, this can’t be all of it,’ so I walked around the isle to the other side into the fantasy section. That one, small, section was all the horror they had. What happened to the horror section? I went back around and stared at the books, just to see what they had. One and a half shelves were Stephen King, no surprise. Then it went to Dean Koontz, for one whole shelf. More than half their allocated horror space was dedicated to just two authors! The next half was Lovecraft anthologies and short stores. So that left one shelf, one meter long, for all other horror books. I couldn’t believe my eyeballs. I was sure the horror section was bigger when I was a kid and the sci-fi section was smaller. I kneeled down to look at what this last shelf had to offer, as it was the bottom shelf and if you were standing close to the books, you wouldn’t be able to see it at all. They had a few zombie books, one Walking Dead book and a few other horror titles that looked and sounded awful. Is this what horror had become?
Even the second hand book store I used to go to had a small horror section way at the back near the birdcage. This was where the owner used to sit and have his soup for lunch. Even then, that section was dominated by King and Koontz. Way at the front of the store was an equal sized section dedicated to twilight. I was mortified and disgusted, but also motivated. I went home with the thought, ‘that’s it! I’m bringing horror back!’ For a few years now I’ve wanted to write a strict, down the line, horror book. A book that can’t be confused with paranormal, thriller or fantasy. Back to the root of all evil. I don’t have the time right now to complete a horror book, but I started it anyway, trying to make myself feel better. It’s called Sore Bones and I had made a mental list of all the things I wanted to have in it – a haunted house, a haunted lake with a dark past, creepy locals and the main characters should, at least once, run for their lives with an ending so horrific that it would make you wonder why you stuck with it all the way to the end when you should have slammed it shut and hid it in the bottom of your clothes hamper.
A couple of nights later I happened to be walking past a Blockbuster video and peered in. Their horror section is massive, almost equal to, if not a bit bigger, than comedy. They had all the titles there, all the classics, the sequels and prequels and remakes. The romance section, on the other hand, was small. So, I thought, nodding my head, horror hasn’t gone away, it’s just transferred to movies. Look at Saw, or Scream for example, these might make alright books, but they’re not going to win any awards or stand out as best sellers. But as movies, they clean up. Scream cost 15 million to make and grossed over 161 million. It did have several sequels to follow, which were below average, but they still made a ton of money. Back in 1996 when Scream was made, the only popular romantic movie out were Jane Eyre, and that grossed 5 million. You also had Tin Cup and Bed of Roses, which don’t score very high on IMDB and didn’t make that much money. There really wasn’t much competition and there certainly wasn’t any supernatural fantasy heart throbs yet.
Horror movies, I believe, will be forever strong in the cinema. But the more sequels they make, and the dumber and more embarrassing it gets, the worse it gets for the horror book reputation. People may assume that if you’re a horror movie fan, your only watching it for the blood and guts. I admit, if there is a scene that is practically well done that involves something horrific happening, then I do appreciate good amounts of blood and guts, but books have a different appeal. It’s much harder to make a reader jump when they’re reading a book. You can’t simply film a scare scene where something jumps out, the writer has a lot more ground work to cover.
It’s been a few weeks now since I had that burst of motivation to write Sore Bones and nothing more has been written. What I have found out, or concluded, is that horror is hiding in other genres. A lot of kids books now days are horror, just toned down for their age group. Clive 
Barker, who wasn’t even in the horror section, but in fantasy, is mostly horror. Harry Potter and Hunger Games have hints of horror. So maybe it isn’t disappearing, but has broken up and merged with other genres. I still pray to the writing gods that horror will come back and be massive again because once King and Koontz are gone, we’ll have a legacy, but nothing new.
Mitchell Tierney
I actually saw the movie on opening week but I thought I’d give everyone a chance to see it before I wrote this blog. Firstly, this is your warning: here thar be spoilers, so if you haven’t seen or read The Hunger Games, you might want to stop reading now (although I will try and keep them to a minimum). Granted most people seem to have the gist of the story any way so make your decision.
Firstly I would like to address an issue I have come across. This series seems to be a love it or hate it book series. The movie seems to be much the same. I am a fan, albeit only a new one to the series so that’s the angle I’m coming from. If you hate the books you will probably hate the movie, for good reason, but I’ll get to that in a minute.
For those who are yet to hear anything about the Hunger Games, here’s a brief run down. The region of Panem is led by The Capitol. The Capitol is in charge of the 12 downtrodden and pretty much slum-like districts. In punishment for past defiance, the Capitol makes each district chose two children (one boy and one girl) each year to be entered into the Hunger Games; a to the death battle royale, put on purely for the entertainment of the Capitol and to watch the districts squirm in subordination. From the coal district (District 12) come our heroine Katniss Everdeen and her team mate Peeta. The rest I will leave for you to watch/read.
I had read the books first, having practically inhaled them the weeks previous. I had approached the books with curiosity but no expectations, expecting another monstrosity like Twilight. Instead I found a story that was actually well written, had strong characters, interesting (although sightly rehashed) plot points and a well flowing backstory. As I read though I was wondering how it would translate to film.
This is probably one of the better movie adaptations I have ever seen done by Hollywood. What does make it into the movie from the book is 95% accurate to source material. This I believe is for one reason alone: the screenplay was mostly written by the author of the books.
I’m a fan of movies being as ‘canon’ as possible. Sure there are some things that couldn’t be done on screen without killing the pace of the story, or just couldn’t have been done successfully (for the fans of the books, the mutts resemblance to former contestants doesn’t make it in, but the mutts do), and then there is the removal of characters (the mayors daughter which sort of removed some of the backstory of the mockingjay pin, that could have been done but wasn’t) which I felt lessened the strength of the film. I must say though, characters appeared on screen as I imagined them, the costumes as well. Scenes seemed to have been taken word for word from the books. It was a novel experience seeing it so faithfully reproduced in parts.
However, as usual the movie is the weaker of the two. There was too much added and unnecessary Capitol related scenes on how the Games were being run, in favour of the back story between Katniss and Gale, reducing him to such an unimportant character that I fear his role in the future movies will not be as strong or as conflicted as it needs to be. The movie is slow in parts where it doesn’t need to be and rushes through large parts of the Games footage that could have been extended. But all in all, I was happy with the film.
My recommendation is see the film first, and let the book fill in whatever gaps the movie missed. However if you have read the books, you should still go see the film (as I’m sure most fans already have) as it has many of the moments from the book as you would imagine it.
The book I rate a 4/5 and the movie a close 3.5/5, both on my must do list. Now to see what they do with book two.
~Sabrina RG Raven
