Bear Alley: Comic Cuts - 19 February 2016

BEAR ALLEY BOOKS

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The Bill Kellaway Quartet by Gwyn Evans
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"The narrative is packed with action and I think readers will have a lot of fun with [Hercules, Esq.] and there are some genuine moments of laugh out loud humour. I can understand why the film rights for this book were snapped up and even today I could envisage it being a very enjoyable one-off TV series." — Cross Examining Crime.
"Although there’s some criminous stuff going on and Bill often finds himself vying against or working with various lawbreakers, the stakes are never really life and death in this book ... There is some slam-bang action, though, as well as a smart, really likable protagonist and a lot of really clever plot twists, but what really makes HERCULES ESQ. work is Evans’s style, which is consistently breezy, fast-paced, and funny." — James Reasoner, Rough Edges.

Friday, February 19, 2016

Comic Cuts - 19 February 2016

I had hoped to have some news on the Harry Bensley book, but at the time of writing I'm still waiting for the proofs to come through from the printer. At 42 pages it's tempting to call it a booklet, but as it's A4, same as my other Bear Alley books, I don't want people to think it's a little pamphlet. I'll do it cheap, as I'm not expecting to sell many copies... it was written for e-book publication, but I thought I'd do a print version to show off some of the pictures I've accumulated and the family trees I compiled to help make sense of his complex family background.

But at least I can show off the cover!

Hopefully I'll have ordering information up and running by next week's column for the one or two of you who might want a copy.

Talking of covers, artist Jim Burns and a few other people recently pointed me in the direction of a short animated feature based on the old Terran Trade Authority books by Stewart Cowley. Folks of a certain vintage will remember them as they repurposed a lot of cover art that appeared on SF books in the 1970s and 1980s. I don't have them all—shame!—but I have some and they're full of artwork by the likes of Tony Roberts, Angus McKie, Colin Hay, Bob Layzell and Peter Elson.

The animation was the creation of Adrian Mann, who originally posted it on Vimeo but who has now reposted it on YouTube—but I'll embed it into this post below as I know I'll want to watch it again!

I was surprised to find that those old covers had also inspired another series of videos under the title Visions of the Future, which I'll post here. They're each about 10 minutes long, so it's a substantial series showing off lots of covers.

If you're interested in seeing some more Chris Foss artwork, way back in 2008 I did a post identifying sources for Diary of a Spaceperson which included lots of scans. A lot of these old covers have also turned up in various galleries over the years, including A. E. Van Vogt, James Blish, E. E. 'Doc' Smith, etc. Do a Google search with the name and 'bear alley' and you should easily find them.