Off to Cornerstone!

I'm off to the Cornerstone Festival in beautiful Illinois. I don't know how much blogging I can do on the road, but I'll let you know how it goes!

13 Weeks

Regular visitors already know the meaning: it's been thirteen weeks that D2L has been between 2,000th and 12,000th on Amazon's sales ranks. And today, rather at the high end of that, at 2921st.

Zombies are Our Friends!

Great info reel, nice imitation of 50s style film making:

http://www.atomfilms.com/film/guys_guide_zombies.jsp

Both Copies Checked Out!

That's pretty neat!

http://catalog.denverlibrary.org/cgi-bin/cw_cgi?fullRecord+1384+10+624203098+8+0

The Surge!

D2L was at 2,100th on Amazon this morning, which I thought was pretty nice, and then it shot up to 1884th, which I know is the highest it's ever been on Amazon. Who buys books early on a Sunday morning? But thanks! I'm sure it's just what Dad wants!

International Horror Guild Award!!!

GOTLD is now a finalist for this award as well!!

http://www.ihgonline.org/

I kind of thought I might make the cut, but it's still a thrill of the first order!

Hot Dog Buns!!!!

A couple years ago I had this intense recollection that HoJos used to serve their hot dogs on rolls that did NOT look like regular hot dog buns, but like a piece of toast folded in half, with crusts at the edges of the opening at the top. My dad (since deceased) swore I was crazy, that there was no such thing. So did my friend Bill, who remembers a lot of stuff, but grew up in that slightly culturally and culinarily deprived province, northern New Mexico. But then today I was in a tiny market here (not a regular chain market) - AND THERE THEY ARE! They go by the name "New England Hot Dog Buns"!!!

More proof - http://www.portuguesefood.com/acatalog/copy_of_JJ_Nissen_Frankfurt.html

I was so happy!!! I was right all along!!

I'm One of the "Good" Christians!

Not one of those "bad" ones!

I thought this review of GOTLD just posted on Amazon was a little funny for taking that tone:

"At times, I felt this book was overreaching a bit in its textual analysis, which irks me. Still, I really liked it. The idea is great, and the movie summaries are worth the price alone. I think some Christians might be upset by Paffenroth's compassionate, anti-Fundamentalist Christian beliefs, but I guess if you're buying this book that probably won't be an issue. (It actually really pleased me to find that that was the case.) "

I constantly misjudge the level of antipathy to Christianity that has been stirred up by the religious right in our country. But I'm here to help!

12 Weeks

That D2L has been between 2,000th and 12,000th on Amazon's sales rankings. Just keeping track.

Reincarnation, or Resurrection?

Everyone always asks if I think zombies are like resurrected people, just not in the "right" way, but it occurred to me today that in some ways, they're more like the way Hindus believe we will be reincarnated as something/someone else, because in the Hindu idea, you come back, and your present existence has an influence on your next incarnation, but you don't really remember your former existence(s). If zombies wander around, but don't quite remember being human, and don't remember basic things like how to talk, or basic rules like you're not supposed to eat other people, then that sounds kind of similar to reincarnation. Just saying.

Review Down Under!

A review of GOTLD from a very prestigious journal that comes to us from Oz - The Bible and Critical Theory 3.2 (2007) 34.1-3. Most of it summarizes my analysis, with some tags as to where I'm being "liberal" and where I'm being "neo-orthodox," but the last paragraph is the nice one:

"I found myself wondering as I read Paffenroth why the divine grace did not arrive. Perhaps, it does not arrive because Paffenroth does not believe in it, although I think that highly unlikely. Perhaps, grace does not arrive because Paffenroth plans another book. More likely, grace does not arrive because it does not befit zombie movies (see, e.g., 160n52, 162n24) and because Paffenroth genuinely loves zombie movies. That love is the book’s saving grace, for it allows Paffenroth’s work to avoid being a heavy-handed tract and to avoid the blatant apologetic that interprets a piece of secular art as revealing a problem to which the Christian message provides the answer."

Me, love zombie movies? You think? Nice how he puts it though, that loving zombie movies keeps me from being "blatant" and "heavy-handed." In fact, that may be the one of the few times that zombie movies have been associated with subltety.

Best Chaptah - EVAH

Let's see if the readers agree. Gentlemen? I'll give you a minute.

Well, at the least, it broke the log jam, so now I can get to writing them one after another.

Eleven Weeks

That D2L has been between 2,000th and 12,000th sales rank on Amazon. Currently at 4,474th right now.

Class B

Drove down to meet the fine lads and lasses of ClassB in the Garden State. Now there are some young people who know their horror, both in print and on screen. Sorry I didn't have a better response to the "favorite contemporary authors" - I just am so used to thinking of people dead for hundreds, if not thousands, of years, I always struggle for what's going on in the current field. But I thought you all were really up on stuff and loads of fun. Apparently they're going to put something on YouTube (I hope edited, as they were filming for hours) and I'll put up the link when they do.

Chapter One

Finally got started on the sequel to D2L. Just a couple paragraphs. Halting at first, then the ideas started to link and flow. I'm excited.

The Silver!

Gospel of the Living Dead took home the Silver Medal in the Popular Culture category in Foreword Magazine's Book of the Year Award!

Guitar Hero

My new distraction. I haven't gotten any good at it yet, but it's definitely the kind of thing I could see spending a lot of time on. Before this, none of Charlie's PS2 games have interested me in the least.

HorrorWatch Review

The fine people at HorrorWatch posted a review of GOTLD:

http://www.horrorwatch.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=1443

Glad to see someone points out that I treat Romero the way a literature professor would treat Shakespeare, because it's true. (And contrasts such examination with breathless fanboy accumulation of trivia and behind-the-scenes gossip.) If you're a craftsman and you work hard on something, you deserve and welcome that kind of scrutiny.

Zombies in the News

They're everywhere:

http://www.macleans.ca/article.jsp?content=20070604_106056_106056

Sound familiar? I confess it did give me more appreciation for 28 Weeks Later.

Hope for the Future of America

Clearly, if - like the fine lads of Class-B - America's youth had such good literary taste (never mind willingly reading unassigned books on their own!), as well as the ability to articulate what's good or not-so-good about what they read, then the future of our country would be bright:

http://www.class-b.net/bookreviews/view.php?action=view&id=21

That's what no child left behind should be about, never mind some stinkin' standardized test! Look at them: they don't just say "Wow, great!" they can say why some characters are more compelling than others. That's some subtlety my college freshmen would do well to emulate.

And I'd never thought of it before, but these instantaneous reviews are really helpful to an author. I now am picking up on what people want in the sequel: more Milton, not such uniformly bad villains, but still plenty of splatter, and lots of that pure, zombie goodness. Check.