A few words on the origins of Dino Force

Dino Force started as a concept among dozens of others I came up with as a teenager. I can trace that earliest incarnations' origins to my frustration with the kind of kids shows currently running on television right around my fifteenth birthday. I looked at shows like Power Rangers and Captain Planet, or even older fare at that time like Voltron and the Mighty Orbots with frustration. Here were great concepts at their heart that were filtered by awful children's television standards into claptrap that at best was mindless and at worst talked to its young viewers like morons. It always annoyed me as a child and it annoyed me even more as a teen. So I created a team of five young heroes with the idea they would fill the holes I saw in all those concepts.

I created a reason for their powers, a brief back history and even the saurid threat the initial team would face. But I never set out to really plot their adventures.

Fast forward twenty years. While going through old files and putting together some of the background material for Quadrant, I stumbled upon the old micro-plots I made for the "issues" of Dino Force I wanted to create. I dusted them off, and thought back to all the Godzilla, Ultraman and Super Sentai stuff I'd seen since, even later Power Rangers shows I enjoyed like Dino Thunder and In Space. I realized in those plot points, I had something that might be interesting to develop as a shared world anthology.

Super Kaiju Battle Squadron Dino Force was born. I recruited five other writers to help bring the concept of an international contingent of young heroes coming together to save the world. Two later dropped away from the project and I moved my prologues and epilogues into forming the tale of the team's leader rather than a sixth member. I then took up Dino Green's story in Brazil as well, setting up a full contingent of warriors by the book's end. Along with T. Mike McCurley, Don Gates and Travis Hiltz, we created a novel length anthology introducing our characters to the world.

That anthology is now funding on Kickstarter.

This is one of those weird ideas that came from a place of love and I hope you'll join me in helping making it a reality.

WIP Wednesday: Early April 2017

April this year, much like last year, has been all about Camp Nanowrimo. And while last year's project ran into roadblocks that caused me to at least temporarily abandon it after the Camp, so far this year's project is firing on all cylinders.

This year I'm deep at work on a project called Outlaw, a mixture of super powered fiction, classic action adventure and urban fantasy. It is also planned as the first book of a proposed multi-author series. Regular Metahuman Press cohort Travis Hiltz is my co-creator on this one and will have his own volume down the line. Right now, I'm working to lay out the basic world and supporting cast so other writers can see where we're going with the character.

I expect to work on this one both this month and at the next Camp Nanowrimo in July. While it won't see publication to (at the earliest) this time next year, it will have an important part in a new Metahuman Press project down the road. But I may have already said too much about that one...

I also continue work on Dino Force. I am just about done with the main section of my contribution with only a brief epilogue to the shared universe anthology to add on. Fans interested in this one should stay tuned for next week, when the Kickstarter launches for the project!

And that pretty much wraps up my work on the writing front. But if you're a wrestling fan, don't forget to check out my thoughts over at The Wrestling Weekday.

The Horror Heroes are here!

As announced yesterday at the new Metahuman Press, Horror Heroes 2 debuted on Monday. The new book features three new tales of monsters turned heroes. Travis Hiltz and Darrin Albert anchor the book, but I am happy to have added my own contribution in the form of “The Beach House”.

My new story takes sea creature and fish man legends, wraps them together with the Deep Ones, and creates a bit of romance around all of that. It is a wild little story different from just about everything I have ever written and I think it definitely takes a different twist on tales of monsters and heroes in modern fiction.

My Deep One hero as visualized by John Davies.

The new story joins two other great tales by a pair of talented young authors. Travis opens the book with a tale of the Frankenstein monster and a strange batch of new allies as modern day crime fighters. Darrin delivers a novella introducing the world to Littlefoot, a sasquatch hero looking to bridge the gap between her people and humanity.

Horror Heroes 2 is now available at Amazon.

The Horror Heroes are back!

I am proud to announce the new edition of Horror Heroes is on its way with a planned release date of October 19. I am equally proud of my story contribution to the new book continues my fascination with H. P. Lovecraft’s Deep Ones as I continue to carve out a place for the undersea race in the pages of the Quadrant Universe.

While the new story does not have any connections with Dracula from Horror Heroes, it does continue my expansion of the darker side of the Quadrant Universe. Read the full press release from Metahuman Press below.