Join Me at Odyssey Con!

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In just about a month–the weekend of April 10—12–I’m slated to be a guest of honor at one of the finest science-fiction conventions in the Midwest: Odyssey Con. As Odyssey Con takes place less than an hour from my house, I’ve been there many times, probably more than I’ve been to any other SF show. This makes me a cheap date for the con, and I’m also pulling double duty as both a gaming and literary guest of honor. New York Times—bestselling authors Heather Brewer and Jonathan Maberry will join me there as my fellow guests, bringing that heavy-duty literary power with them, so it’s sure to be a fantastic blast.

Unlike with some of the bigger shows, you have plenty of time and space to talk with the guests and enjoy the panels. They even have a full-size gaming track that taps the lode of gaming pros in the area, so you can get your game on there too.

So if you’re around, please come on out and say hi. Talk books, play games, and have some fun. I hope to see you there!

Gen Con Industry Insider Applications Open

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If you’re a tabletop gaming professional and would like to a featured presenter for the Industry Insider track at Gen Con–hands down, my favorite event of the year–applications for that are now open. You need to register with Gen Con to even be able to read that page, though, so let me hit the high points Gen Con shared in its latest newsletter, which includes a quote from me.

Do you have interesting perspectives and diverse opinions on the game industry? Are you a game designer, author, entrepreneur, art director, or professional in the industry? Then, you may be a great addition to the Industry Insider program. Submissions are now open at this link (sign-in required). Requests will be accepted until April 2, 2015.

“If you’re a gaming professional with something to say, the Industry Insider program is a great showcase where you can share what you know with the people most eager to learn. Plus, you get to sit on panels with some of the smartest and most accomplished people in the history of gaming and maybe learn something from them yourself. Join the fun!”

– Matt Forbeck, bestselling author, game designer, and Industry Insider Advisory Program Panel Member.

Featured Presenters must attend Gen Con, submit topics for consideration, speak on those topics, and have the time to participate in 3-5 seminars/panel. As a Featured Presenter, you would be entitled to a complimentary 4-Day badge, a featured bio on gencon.com and in the yearly Program Book, access to the VIG Lounge, and more!

You might notice that the people who take part in the Industry Insider track used to be called guests of honor and are now referred to as featured presenters. That’s not accidental. It’s a more accurate term for the kind of duties and privileges that come with the position, and it should help prevent a lot of the confusion over the program that happened in the past.

The committee came up with a whole FAQ about this. You can download it from their site, but I have the Industry Insider FAQ PDF right here for you too.

Applying is fairly easy, although the competition for the available slots is fierce. If you get in, you’re only obligated to show up and chat about things you know and love for a grand total of 3 to 5 hours during the show, alongside many other industry greats.

It’s a wonderful gig, and I’ve been a part of it ever since Gen Con moved to Indianapolis back in 2003. If you’re a gaming pro, come join me. Either way, I hope to see you at the show!

The Battle Against Ultron Is Here!

91mNM-FMyrLMarvel Avengers: Battle Against Ultron is slated to hit shelves today. This is a book for young readers I wrote for DK, the same people behind the bestselling Marvel Encyclopedia, and it features Marvel’s greatest superhero team and their history of conflict with one of their most tenacious and dangerous foes: the murderous robot Ultron.

Battle Against Ultron comes in both softcover and hardcover formats. The softcover retails for $5.99, while the hardcover runs $16.99. Both are 128 full-color pages.

I wrote the book for kids starting to read on their own. My editor at DK, Sadie Smith, hired literacy experts to keep the grammar, vocabulary and content right in line with that.

The DK graphic design team–led by Robert Perry–did a beautiful job with this book, making use of some of Marvel’s greatest artwork. See below for some sample pages. If you have any kids around who are intrigued by the upcoming Avengers: Age of Ultron film, this book should be perfect for them–whether they’re old enough to see the movie or not.

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Halo: New Blood Is Here!

HNB_CoverToday, you can finally get your hands on my latest novel: Halo: New Blood! This is an original novel set in the universe of Microsoft’s bestselling series of Halo video games. It serves as a sequel to the blockbuster Halo 3: ODST, and it follows the career of Gunnery Sergeant Eddie Buck, who was voiced in the game by Nathan Fillion (of Firefly, Castle, and many other awesome things).

The book is exclusively available in electronics formats, including both ebook and audiobook editions. Scott Brick, a legend in the voiceover business, narrates the audiobook, which contains every word I wrote, plus maybe a few more. He’s lent his voice to dozens of fantastic novels, including Dune, The Bourne Identity, and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep (the basis for one of my favorite films, Blade Runner), and I’m thrilled to be able to listen to his work on my book too.

As I’ve said before, huge thanks go out to Ed Schlesinger at Simon & Schuster and to the entire team at 343 Industries, especially Jeremy Patenaude and Tiffany O’Brien. They helped me out every step of the way, not only pointing out pitfalls I’d stumbled across or outright created but actually offering up solid and workable solutions as well. I could not have asked for a more passionate group of people to work with.

I had an absolute blast living in Buck’s head while I wrote this. It’s told from his first-person point of view, and I worked hard to get down his voice and patter. The research involved playing games and watching videos, though, so don’t cry a drop for me.

If you have half as much fun reading it as I did writing it, you’re in for a treat. I can’t wait for you to dig into it–and today your chance is here.

Enjoy!

Halo: New Blood Audiobook Coming Too

halo-new-blood-9781442389434_hrNext Monday’s going to be wild. I have two books coming out, each related to massively popular universes: Avengers: The Battle Against Ultron and Halo: New Blood. Oddly, the formats for these run the gamut.

Battle for Ultron – which is based on the Avengers comics and meant for young readers, five and up – will be available only in print, but in both hardcover and softcover editions. New Blood, on the other hand, will only be available in electronic format. Simon & Schuster announced the ebook a while back, but they quietly slipped in an audiobook version too while no one was looking.

The audiobook is narrated by Scott Brick, who’s a legend in the voiceover business. He’s provided the narration for dozens of fantastic novels, including Dune, The Bourne Identity, Patriot Games, Mystic River, The Martian Chronicles, Moneyball, The Firm, How to Survive a Sharknado, Metatropolis, The Heist, A Princess of Mars, and even Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. In short, the man reads great books well.

The audiobook will be available through iTunes, Audible/Amazon, and all the rest of the usual suspects.

So this Monday, get ready to listen up, tap your screen, or flip through actual pages and join me for a couple of very different books, each fun in their own wonderful ways.

The Avengers: Battle Against Ultron Debuts Monday

Avengers Battle Against UltronAs it turns out, I have not one book coming out on Monday, but two. The first, of course, is my Halo novel, New Blood. The second is Marvel: The Avengers: Battle Against Ultron, which features this snazzy cover here.

Battle Against Ultron is part of the DK Reads series of books, meant for young readers just getting started on their own. It’s designed for kids ages five and up, and it features entries about each of the main Avengers, their headquarters, their gear and powers, and one of their greatest foes, the murderous robot Ultron.

It’s 128 pages, and you can find it both in an inexpensive softcover or a much more durable hardcover.

I had a great time working with Sadie Smith and the rest of the team at DK on this one, and I can’t wait to give a copy to my youngest nephews, Luke and Matteo. If you have any kids around who are intrigued by the upcoming Avengers: Age of Ultron film, this book would be perfect for them too–whether they’re old enough to see the movie or not.

I Wrote a Halo Novel

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Today, 343 Industries finally announced that I wrote a novel for Halo, the bestselling series of science-fiction video games they develop for the company’s owner, Microsoft. Over at Halo Waypoint, Jeff Easterling (a.k.a. GrimBrother One) interviewed me about the book for their Canon Fodder blog. Go check that out, and then come back so I can add a little bit to it.

I first ran into Halo back in the year 2000, before the game had even been announced. I was down in Chicago, interviewing at Bungie (the game’s original developer) for a writing gig on a different game, and Bob Settles there showed me the demo for this new project they had in the works and watched my jaw drop. I didn’t get the gig (it went to my pal John Scott Tynes instead), but I’ve been keeping up with Halo ever since. I’ve bought every generation of Xbox and played every one of the Halo games, and I’ve had the pleasure of replaying them with my kids too.

The first thing I did when I discovered that Simon & Schuster had gotten the rights for new Halo novels, I contacted Ed Schlesinger there right away. Ed had been my editor for the Guild Wars novel I cowrote with Jeff Grubb (Ghosts of Ascalon), and he told me he was writing me a note about the Halo books at the same moment my email arrived in his inbox. He put me on the shortlist of authors he assembled for 343, and soon after I had an interview with some of the people at 343 to see if I was the right person for the job.

After crossing my fingers hard enough to put dents in them for a week or two, I got an offer to write a brand-new novel set in the Halo universe. I pitched a number of different ideas, and we quickly focused on a new story starring the heroes from Halo 3: ODST: Gunnery Sergeant Edward Buck and his team of Orbital Drop Shock Troopers.

ODST sticks out a bit from most of the Halo games in that it’s spun out in a nonlinear format (lots of flashbacks), has a noirish feel to it, and centers around a number of mysteries that unfold as you play. It also features the voices of a number of well-known actors, including Nathan Fillion and Tricia Helfer. (Nathan voices Buck, and I had his voice running around in my head for months!) It’s one of my favorites in the entire series.

Halo: New Blood is a digital-first short novel, which means:

  • It’s ebook only to start.
  • It clocks in somewhere around 60,000 words.
  • It can get to you fast.

The book is slated for release on March 2, 2015, not even six weeks from now. This is a clip from the cover art by Isaac Hannaford, who worked on Halo 3: ODST, as well as Halo: Reach and Halo 3, and led the concept team for Bungie’s follow-up universe, Destiny.

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I’ve been sitting on my hands and biting my tongue about this news since last spring, and it feels fantastic to finally have it out there so I can finally talk a bit about it.

I want to offer huge thanks to Ed Schlesinger at Simon & Schuster and to the entire team at 343 Industries, especially Jeremy Patenaude and Tiffany O’Brien, who helped me out every step of the way. I could not have asked for a better, more enthusiastic, or more passionate group of people to work with.

For me, this is a dream job. I had a fantastic time writing this book, and I cannot wait for you all to read it.

Join Me at Capricon!

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I’m going to be the Author Guest of Honor at Capricon 35, in Wheeling, Illinois, over Valentine’s Day weekend, February 12—15, just about a month from now. I had a great time at the show when I went a couple years ago, and I expect it to be even better this time around.

Steve Jackson had been scheduled to be the Gaming Guest of Honor, but he’s had to cancel. Fortunately, bestselling author Margaret Weis is stepping in to take his place.

The irony here is that I’m better known for my games than Margaret is, and vice versa when it comes to novels. You might not know that Margaret has also published all sorts of roleplaying games, including the newest Firefly game, and the Leverage and Marvel Heroic Roleplaying games, both of which I chipped in on. So she certainly has plenty of cred on both side of that divide.

My friends John Anealio and Patrick Hester of the Functional Nerds podcast and also often the Hugo-winning SFSignal will also be Guests of Honor. (I actually wrote the lyrics to John’s song “Angry Robot,” which he created for my pals at Angry Robot Books.) By no coincidence, they just interviewed Margaret, and they should have an episode with me up soon as well.

Artist John Bivens, musician Alexander James Adams, and fan Elizabeth “Dr. Evil” Huffman round out the Guest of Honor list. (I don’t know any of them yet, but I’m sure I will by the end of the show.) In addition, I’m looking forward to seeing fellow writers like Lester Smith, Mary Robinette Kowal, Mary Anne Mohanraj, Jody Lynn Nye, Eric Flint, and Gene Wolfe.

The latest draft of the full schedule has been posted. My schedule currently looks like this:

Thursday, 2/12

5:00—6:30 pm: Training the Game Master: Tips and Tricks For Running a Great Game
While Capricon is not a gaming-specific convention, gaming is a big part of the convention, and many of our members enjoy gaming outside the con. Tabletop role playing games in particular are tricky. Depending on the game master, they can be remarkable or repugnant. Our experts share their techniques on how to run a good tabletop RPG. Neal Litherland, Dr. Michael Unger, Margaret Weis, and me. 

6:30—8:00 pm: Fandom in Popular Culture
From books such as Bimbos of the Death Star, Cat at a Kiwi Con, and Matt Forbeck’s trilogy of Dangerous Games novels to television shows such as Big Bang Theory and Community, fandom has been shown in many lights in popular culture. Where is it wrong and where is it painfully right? Andrea Hawkins-Kamper, Valli Hoski, Toni Lichtenstein Bogolub, Mary Anne Mohanraj, Greg Press, and me. 

8:00—9:30 pm: Opening Ceremonies
Welcome to Capricon 35: What Does R & R Mean to You? Join us as we kick off this year’s event and get some idea of what to expect and to meet our Guests of Honor (GoHs) and the people who make it all possible. Alexander James Adams, John Anealio, John Bivens, Patrick Hester, Elizabeth Huffman, John “Shadowcat” Ickes, Terrence Miltner, Margaret Weis, and me. 

Friday, 2/13

2:30—4 pm: Bringing a Game to Life
From the drawing board to the playing board, how does game design work? What are the differences when designing different types of games, such as board games or video games? Our game design experts share their experiences and answer your questions. Brian Babendererde, Marinda Darnell, Margaret Weis, and me. 

5:30—7 pm: Crafting a Story
How does one take an idea and turn it into a story? How do authors create these convoluted worlds with lots of characters and multiple story arcs, and more importantly, keep track of it all and make it a coherent whole? Richard Chwedyk, Rebecca L. Ciardullo, Phyllis Eisenstein, Mary Robinette Kowal, Gene Wolfe, and me. 

Saturday, 2/14

10:30—11 am: Reading

11:30 am—3:00 pm: D6xD6 RPG: Shotguns & Sorcery with GoH Matt Forbeck
Join our Guest of Honor, Matt Forbeck, in the Gaming Room for a round of D6xD6 RPG: Shotguns & Sorcery, run by the game’s creator, Lester Smith. Deathwind: A cyclonic storm is raging the city, laying waste especially to the ramshackle buildings of Goblintown. While the city’s upper reaches protect their businesses and estates, our heroes must venture into the lower circles, to investigate reports of undead loose in the streets. (Players get a special d6xd6.com promo die!) 2—6 players.

3:45—4:30 pm: Autographing: Matt Forbeck & Jody Lynn Nye

So we should have a rollicking good time. Join us if you can!

 

 

 

The Shotguns & Sorcery RPG Kickstarter Is Over!

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The Kickstarter drive that Outland Entertainment has been running to fund a tabletop roleplaying game based on my Shotguns & Sorcery stories ended tonight, and what a finish! In the end, it wound up raising $64,545 from 1,211 backers. Thanks to each and every one of you who helped out with it, whether through backing or spreading the word or both! This wouldn’t have happened without you.

The team at Outland did a fantastic job with the drive. Jeremy Mohler (whose art graces the cover above) led the way, and Susana Grilo was tireless with her marketing support. Ed Lavallee created an amazing cover, and William Ward pitched in with priceless advice about the entire project.

Big thanks also go out to the entire team at Monte Cook Games: Shanna Germain, Bruce Cordell, Charles Ryan, Tammie Ryan, and of course Monte himself. They did far more than just license their Cypher System to Outland. They plugged the project hard every step of the way.

Thanks also to Rob Schwalb, who I’m finally going to be creating a game with. I can’t wait to make this happen, and I’m grateful to everyone involved for all the support.

Now, it’s time to go make the greatest game we can!

 

 

The S&S Kickstarter Ends Tomorrow

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As you may know, I licensed my Shotguns & Sorcery setting to the fine folks at Outland Entertainment earlier in the year so they could make a tabletop roleplaying game out of it. That’s a mockup of the cover up there, and it’s damn snazzy. The artwork is by Outland’s CEO Jeremy Mohler, and graphic designer Ed Lavallee dressed it all up to look fantastic.

Outland got to work quick and licensed the Cypher Games system from Monte Cook Games, which appeared in the bestselling games Numenera and The Strange. They also lined up my pal Rob Schwalb to handle the game design duties, leaving me to concentrate on writing the background material instead. It’s a dream team.

Outland launched a Kickstarter to help produce the game back in November, and it comes to an end at 9 PM CST tomorrow, January 1, 2015. The Kickstarter reached its initial funding goal in under a week, and since then the backers have unlocked eight stretch goals. So far, that brings us to 40 pages of full-color art, a rules conversion for Pathfinder, a Players Guide, a Monster Folio, a stack of printable character cards, an introductory adventure, and a short comic included in the rulebook.

As I write this, the Kickstarter has lined up almost 900 backers and over $47,000 to help make the game a reality. If you backed it already, you have my thanks. I’m going to do the best I can to help Outland produce a fantastic game for you, and I hope you love every bit of it.

If you’ve put off backing the drive until now, well, time’s running short. Don’t miss out.

Either way, though, thanks to you for whatever support you’re been able to lend. You’ve helped make a challenging year end on a fantastic note. Here’s to an even better 2015!