The Night’s Watch is coming soon… to a gaming store near you.
Or you can just pre-order it here: http://greenronin.com/2012/09/nights_watch_pre-ordering_now.php
The good folks at Green Ronin Press are about to roll out the latest supplement to their SONG OF ICE AND FIRE rpg. This one is THE NIGHT’S WATCH.
So all you gamers out there, act now… defend the Wall. And expect the usual great art and exciting play.
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… again.
DYING OF THE LIGHT was first published by Pocket Books back in the dawn of time (that’s 1977 to you young punks), when Jimmy Carter was in the White House, and I was a college journalism instructor with dark brown hair. I had already been writing and publishing science fiction for six years, many of the stories set against the same future history, a very loose background I later named the Thousand Worlds. Novels were long and scary, but I finally decided I was ready to tackle one in 1976. I wrote the entire thing start to finish before giving it to my agent to sell. My title was AFTER THE FESTIVAL. Pocket, after winning the auction against three other publishers, decided that wasn’t science fictional enough and made me change it. I didn’t mind… much. DYING OF THE LIGHT fit the book just as well.
By any title, it was a Thousand Worlds book, probably the culmination of that phase of my career. A melancholy, romantic, elegiac sort of novel it was, but then I was a melancholy romantic myself in those days. It did pretty well. Even made the Hugo ballot that year, losing to Fred Pohl’s GATEWAY at Iguanacon II in Phoenix, 1978. The reviews were good too.
But don’t take my word for it. Subterranean Press has just published a lovely new hardcover of the book, copiously illustrated by the talented Tom Kidd, signed by both of us, and limited to 500 numbered and 26 lettered copies.
The lettered edition is already sold out, I fear, but SubPress still has copies of the numbered edition available at $125. To order yours (and see some more of Tom Kidd’s gorgeous artwork), go the Subterranean website at:
http://subterraneanpress.com/store/product_detail/dying_of_the_light
I hope you will enjoy your visit to my past… and the distant world of Worlorn on the edge of the galaxy, in the far distant future.
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Life is full of ups and downs… especially for fans of the NFL.
Both of my teams played squeakers today. The Giants pulled out an amazing win over a game Redskins squad in the last minute of play (Eli! Cruuuuuuuuz!!!), while the Jets lost a heartbreaker to Evil Little Bill and hated Patriots in overtime. The morning game left me flying incredibly high, the afternoon game felt like someone had kicked me in the balls. And all I was doing was sitting in my Chair o’ Sloth in the TV room. It is kind of strange how these contests engage one’s emotions, even if you have nothing personally at stake. But that’s the life of a sports fan.
Even though the Giants won the Superbowl last season, they managed to lose both contests to the Redskins, a team that has been the perennial doormat of the NFC East ever since the franchise was purchased by Dan Snyder (read Jerry Jones, but shorter), so I sat down to watch today’s game with a certain amount of trepidation. Well justified trepidation, as it turns out. Washington has added a pair of stellar rookies to their squad since last season. Their highly-drafted and much-touted rookie QB, Robert Griffin III, proved to be all that the talking heads claimed he was and more. He gave Big Blue’s D fits all day, both with his running and his passing. And the Skin’s sixth-round rookie RB, Alfred Morris, was if anything even more impressive. He looks to be just the kind of hard-nosed between-the-tackle cruncher that I love… when he is on my team. I have a feeling that Washington’s days finishing fourth in the NFC East may be drawing to an end. Barring something unforeseen, I fear that RG3 and Morris will be giving my Giants fits for years to come.
Today, though… well, despite some great play from both of the Redskins rookies, Big Blue played solid football, and late in the fourth quarter had a lead. When RG3 fumbled with five minutes left to play, and the Giants recovered, the game seemed safely in hand. All the Giants had to do at that point was turn to their own running game, hammer the ball down the field with Brown and Bradshaw, burn up the clock, maybe add a clinching field goal.
Instead, inexplicably, the Giants called a pass on first down, and Eli threw a truly terrible interception, giving the ball right back to Washington. RG3 promptly took advantage by driving the Skins down the field for the FG to narrow the gap. The Giants got the ball back again, still with a lead, though a smaller one. “Okay,” I think, “THIS time we’ll pound them for sure, burn up that clock, ice the win.” But no, we came out passing again on first down, and that turned into a three-and-out. By which point I was yelling at the screen. What the hell was Gilbride thinking? I still don’t know. And sure enough, given the ball back once again, this time Griffin engineered a touchdown drive. Now the Skins were ahead, and I was sick to my stomach. We had blown the game with a mystifying series of play calls.
Griffin made one mistake, though. He scored too quickly, which meant Eli got the ball back again with a minute and a half left. That’s way too much time to give Eli. I believe it took him all of four seconds to find a streaking Victor Cruz (CRUUUUUUZZZZZZZZ) and drop the ball into his hands for a game-winning seventy yard TD. Cruz is amazing. Eli is amazing.
Kevin Gilbride I’m not so sure about. I hope someone asks him, “What the hell were you thinking.”
In conclusion… WHEW. Confusion, trepidation, fear, despair, elation… only the NFL.
The Giants are now 5-2, in sole possession of first in the NFC East.
But then came the afternoon, and the Jets game.
Sigh.
What can I say? It was the Patriots, our archenemies, led by the Great Satan himself. And this year’s Jets are the walking wounded, with our best players on both sides of the ball gone for the season. I went into this one fearing a blowout. The game began promisingly enough. Gang Green’s D stopped the Patriots, after which our O took over and drove downfield for a TD. Jets lead, 7-0. For a few seconds, till the Patriots broke the ensuing kickoff to tie it up, then took the lead with another TD, tacked on a safety when Marc Sanchez kicked the ball out of the endzone on a fumble, and…
The rest of the first half was pretty grim. The Patriots dominated, and the Jets O could not get anything going. Our D was playing well, though, stiffening up whenever the Pats got deep into our territory. And somehow the score stayed reasonably close. And then, come the fourth quarter, miracle of miracles, the Jets started coming back. Tough D stifled Brady, we got a few breaks, Sanchez started playing well… and holy hell… a FUMBLE, and suddenly we have the lead with barely a minute and a half left.
Alas. Too much time. The Jets made the same mistake the Skins did. You can’t give Brady that much time… and if you do, you CERTAINLY can’t start rushing three and falling back into a soft prevent defense. Brady, of course, shredded that scheme, took the Pats right down the field, and they kicked the tying FG with seconds left. Overtime.
We lost the coin toss. The rest… ah, the rest was painful. A Pats field goal and a Sanchez fumble ended it. Like a knife through the eye. A hideous way to lose a hard-fought game.
So there it is. Another Sunday in the National Football League.
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Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist is having another of their giveaways, and this time the prize is stack of the new trade paperbacks editions of some of my old books.
(Yes, I did write stuff before A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE).
You can find all about it from Pat at:
http://fantasyhotlist.blogspot.ca/2012/10/mega-george-r-r-martin-giveaway.html
Go ye and enter, and good luck.
And if you don’t win… hey, you can still BUY the books, y’know.
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And you thought Robert was a bad king!
No, there is not an English language version. The American MAD has yet to tackle GOT.
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I’ve always said that I had the best fans in the world.
Now VULTURE has made it official.
See here:
http://www.vulture.com/2012/10/25-most-devoted-fans.html?mid=nymag_press
Take a bow, all of you. Westeros rules… because of you.
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What’s German for “yadda yadda yadda?”
There’s a brand new interview with me up on the web, for those of you who cannot get enough of hearing me sound off.
Thing is, it’s in German.
I don’t actually speak German, mind you, so the interview was conducted in English, but it was a German interviewer, so the translation/ voiceover is in German, and I’m not sure to what extent my own English answers remain audible. But here it is, for my German fans:
<lj-embed id=”334″/>
If nothing else, there’s lots of cool shots of my collection of toy knights and model figures in this one.
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Life is magical and filled with joy.
NEW YORK JETS 35
INDIANAPOLIS COLTS 9
NEW YORK GIANTS 26
SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS 3
The Jets game was even more one-sided than the final score would indicate. Indy’s rookie phenom Andrew Luck looked every inch a rookie this morning, and not the least bit lucky. Gang Green should actually have posted two more TDs, but two terrific pick sixs by Antonio Cromartie were called back by bogus penalty calls. (It is almost enough to make one want the replacement refs back. Almost). Mark Sanchez only passed for 82 yards, but that was more than enough, since Shonn Greene was rushing for 161 and the New York D was playing lights out. Ground and pound offense and stifling D… that was the formula that got the Jets to two successive AFC championship games. Nice to see it back again. Impressive as Greene’s running was, the real hero of this game was Cromartie, who has really stepped up his game since Darrell Revis went down for the season. Gang Green STILL has a shutdown corner, it would seem. I was also thrilled to hear the announcers mention the name “Quinton Coples” several times. Maybe the Jets first round draft choice is not the second coming of Vernon Gholston after all.
The Giants started pretty slowly out in the City By The Bay, sandwiching in a sad little three-and-out between two long Niners drives in the first quarter. But the defense stiffened towards the end of both those drives, so all that San Francisco had to show for them was one field goal. And then Eli and the O woke up, and the rest of the game was Big Blue all the way. The Giants D line harassed Alex Smith relentlessly, sacking him six times and intercepting him thrice. Two of those INTs were by safety Antrell Rolle, the game’s defensive standout. And for the second week in a row, New York’s running game was fearsome. All the commentators and analysts agreed, no one could run on San Francisco, but Ahmed Bradshaw punched holes through their line time and time again, becoming the first back to run for 100 yards against them in their last upmty-ump (23, I think it might have been) games and scoring the first running TD against them all season. And Giants rookie David Wilson gashed them for several big runs as well. As for the Niners O, the Giant D made QB Alex Smith look like the Alex Smith of two years ago, not this year’s Alex Smith. All told, a very impressive, dominating win that left the G-Men atop the NFC East.
And then, just to put some nice fat cherries atop my Sunday sundae, the Cowboys, the Patriots, and the Eagles all lost horribly in the final seconds of their own respective contests. Oh, yes yes yes, the gods are good, the sun is shining over New York City, and all the pretty girls are blowing me kisses…
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It’s Banned Books Week, and there’s nothing I hate more than banning books (no, not even the New England Patriots and Dallas Cowboys), so I’m doing my little bit with a fundraiser for the COMIC BOOK LEGAL DEFENSE FUND.
The CBLDF is a non-profit organization dedicated to protecting the rights of free speech and free expression in comics books, graphic novels, and related fields. My own roots as a “funny book” fan go all the way back to the letters of comment I published in FANTASTIC FOUR, AVENGERS, and other Marvel comics back in the early 60s. I also attended the very first comicon, and won my first writing prize for an amateur prose superhero yarn (an Alley Award, which I never received, sob), so comics are a medium dear to my heart… as anyone who has ever read my own long-running WILD CARDS series of mosaic novels surely knows.
Accordingly, I’ve donated one hundred (100) signed hardcover copies of the Wild Cards mosaic novel INSIDE STRAIGHT to the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, to be offered to the first hundred donors making contributors of $100 or more.
The copies have all been signed by yours truly… as well as by my assistant editor, Melinda M. Snodgrass, and writers Daniel Abraham, Carrie Vaughn, Michael Cassutt, John Jos. Miller, and Caroline Spector. Which is to say, by ALL the contributors save for the elusive S.L. Farrell. This “Seven Signature Special” will continue only so long as the supplies last.
All contributions to the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund are tax deductible.
For more than 25 years, the CBLDF has been protecting the comics medium in courtrooms, libraries, and classrooms all over the United States by providing legal counsel and education on issues relating to comics censorship. A proud sponsor of Banned Book Week, the CBLDF is supporting several events around the country supporting the Freedom to Read, and offers a rich range of resources about banned comics and how to defend against challenges on www.cbldf.org.
Most recently, the CBLDF has called for a school district in Connecticut to rescind a graphic novel ban carried out against the district’s own policies. In the past year the Fund prevailed in a case defending an American comic book reader who faced wrongful criminal charges in Canada because of Japanese comic book images on his laptop computer. An amicus brief they authored was also cited by the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to strike down an unconstitutional California law seeking to regulate violent content in the case Brown v. EMA.
“The CBLDF is a small organization with a powerful mission, and that work is only possible because of the generous contribution of our supporters,” CBLDF Executive Director Charles Brownstein says. “We’re extremely grateful to Mr. Martin for this generous contribution, and to everyone who will have the opportunity to own one of these unique signed novels. The CBLDF is a tremendous team effort between the creative and readership communities who value the importance of intellectual freedom for comics and all media. We’re thankful to be celebrating Banned Books Week with George in this extraordinary way.”
To make your contribution, and order your copy of INSIDE STRAIGHT, go to:
http://cbldf.myshopify.com/products/inside-straight
All monies should go direct to the CBLDF, not to me.
Sorry, I cannot add a personal inscription to your book. The copies have already been signed by all concerned (save for Mr. Farrell), and are on their way to the CBLDF.
Free speech is one of the cornerstones of our democracy, yet somehow it is always under attack. The world is full of people who think they know better, and want to tell you what you should read, what you should write, what you should see. Christian fundamentalists, Muslim extremists, the right, the left… everybody seems to have a book or two they want banned, an idea or two they don’t want expressed. Well, I say it’s spinach, and I say the hell with them.
Donate some money, get a tax deduction, visit the world of the Wild Cards, and add a swell signed collectible to your collection… that’s a win, win, win, win if I ever heard one.
And thanks.
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This blog is the only place for official communication from George R.R. Martin. For press inquiries, please contact David Moench
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