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The Forts series has found a new home!

More than likely you’re silently saying to yourself, “Oh that’s too bad. It must not have sold well. That poor, poor man.”

Let me assure you, that’s not the case – far from it in fact. The choice to continue the series with someone else was actually mine and mine alone. I never signed a contract for the series as a whole and after my experience with the first book there was no way that was going to happen. It wouldn’t have been the right choice.

I don’t see any reason to go into the details of the “breakup” (for now), but I will say that Forts is moving to greener, less frustrating, and far more professional pastures.

So what does this all mean to you?

Well, it means that the copy of “Fathers and Sons” you no doubt have sitting in a place of prominence on your bookshelf – or next to the crapper, either way. That copy of Forts will very soon be an out of print collectors edition!

That’s right, I said collectors edition and I meant it!

Will you be able to sell it on ebay to pay the rent? Eh, I wouldn’t count on that.

Will you be able to trade it for a pack of gum and maybe a Butterfinger bar? Yep, I think you might be able to pull that off.

Still, your copy is special now. It’s unique. If you sent it to me to get autographed it’s even more unique. You own it, some other people own it, but no one else is ever going to own it – ever. That’s pretty cool, no?

For those of you that haven’t got your hands on a copy yet, a second edition print version of the book will be arriving with a brand new cover before you know it. (Probably within the next few months in fact.) Along with the print version, the book will FINALLY make its way to e-readers everywhere! (This is long overdue.)

Oh, all those editing flubs the original publisher left in – you know, the ones that caused the sentence “This could have been a fantastic book if it had a good editor” to appear in nearly every review. Thankfully those are going to be fixed up for the second edition.

For those of you waiting patiently for “Liars and Thieves,” right around the time the second edition arrives book two is going to hit the shelves! It’s a heck of a lot later than was originally planned, but I’m hoping it’ll be worth the wait.

The nonsense of the past is in the past and hopefully that’s where it’s going to stay. Writing has officially picked up again on the final book in the series and I’m probably only 40,000 words or so from finishing it up.

Forts has a new home, and this is a good thing.

Scratch that and revise: Forts has a new home, and it’s a giggity-great thing.

It’s better than a steaming hot pizza and a tub of ice cream served to you by Rosario Dawson in a French maid’s outfit.

Okay, maybe it’s not that good…

It’s still pretty fantastic though.

Steven

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By Edward Zelinsky

Like most Connecticut residents, I watched with a mixture of fascination and horror the trial of Steven J. Hayes. Hayes is one of two defendants accused of the particularly gruesome home invasion murders in July, 2007 in suburban Cheshire, Connecticut. Hayes has been found guilty; the jury has sentenced Hayes to receive the death penalty.

Like everyone who followed this trial, I have both admired and sympathized with Dr. William Petit, Jr. whose wife and two daughters were brutalized and killed by Hayes. Unsurprisingly, Dr. Petit wanted the death penalty in this case as would I had I been in Dr. Petit‘s position. So compelling have been the facts exposed at Hayes’ trial that many normally outspoken opponents of the death penalty have remained silent as the jury assigned that penalty to Hayes for his truly evil crimes.

During the Hayes trial, I also spent much time thinking about Ricardo Beamon. Mr. Beamon too was killed in July, 2007 in Connecticut. Mr. Beamon had led a troubled inner-city life which he had turned around by founding, in the words of the New Haven Register, a “high-end urban clothing” store. Mr. Beamon, who left a two year old daughter, was killed in a robbery. In a plea agreement, Mr. Beamon’s murderer agreed to a twenty year prison sentence. Mr. Beamon’s murder has occasioned relatively little public attention.

Undoubtedly, distinctions can be drawn between these two cases. However, the similarities are great as well. Both the members of the Petit family and Mr. Beamon are gone, leaving their respective loved ones to grieve for their undeserved losses.

In this context, I have been thinking as well of my nephew Brandon who was killed last summer by a negligent car driver. I am angry about the loss inflicted on us. If I could, I would like to take matters into my own hands. Instead, he will receive a prison sentence and then resume his life. Our loss is no less because the individual who killed Brandon acted negligently, rather than intentionally.

Under these circumstances, I cannot say that we inflict the ultimate penalty of death in a principled fashion.

One other family member has influenced me as I mull these issues, my late uncle, Justice Seymour F. Simon of the Illinois Supreme Court. Seymour was a consistent dissenter in his court’s death penalty cases. The legal basis for his dissent was, at one level, quite technical, namely, that the Illinois death penalty statute permits excessive prosecutorial discretion and violates the separation-of-powers provision of the Illinois state constitution.

However, Seymour came to be a profound critic of capital punishment. Seymour did not oppose the death penalty out of a soft-minded sympathy for those who commit horrible crimes. Rather, sitting atop a large state judicial system, he became convinced that we inflict the death penalty in an unprincipled manner.

I suspect that, when she grows up, Ms. Beamon will agree.

I can’t oppose the death penalty in all cases. Capital punishment was appropriate at Nuremberg. The Israelis were right to hang Adolf Eichmann. If we catch Osama bin Laden, I would favor, in Abe Lincoln’s famous phrase, hanging him like Haman “upon the gallows of [his] own building.”

But short of these cases,

Well, it took me only a week to fail on my promise to get a new sketch up every friday.

Yep, I kinda suck.

Maybe this will make you feel a bit better.

I've recently decided to do something I've always wanted to do, but for whatever reason always backed out of - a webcomic.

I've loved comics as a medium since I was a kid and I've always thought doing a webcomic on a regular basis might be fun. That being said, I don't have a ton of extra time and I didn't want to get something started and never see it through.

I'm not saying there's no chance of that happening this time out, but I've chosen sort of an easy-breezy style of art and I'm going to give it my best.

I want to get a few pages ahead of the game before I start posting stuff, so I'm looking at getting up and running by the end of next month - hopefully. I'll have mo information as I get closer.

In the meantime, here's a little something to wet your whistle.

Steve

I'm going to make an effort to update the blog more, and because of that I'm promising at least one sketch a week - every Friday!

Excited!?

You shouldn't be.

If history is any indication, the chances of me following through on this promise aren't that great.

Steve

The publisher of the Forts series, CANONBRIDGE LLC is working alongside the SOLDIERS' ANGELS charity and has reduced the cost of the book in hopes that you'll purchase, donate, and get it in the hands of the soldiers overseas. This is not only for Forts, but some of their other titles as well.

If you're interested, click the words CANONBRIDGE LLC for more details.

See how easy I made that for you?

Go me!

Steven

I'm bringing back the "100 blah, blah fill in the blank" thing I did for "Fathers and Sons" as we slowly approach the release of "Liars and Thieves."

I've been hard at work on the sequel to the first Cousin Albert book lately (among about a thousand other things).

The above is a an unfinished page. Unfinished means not done - so I don't want any comments from the peanut galley.

It's an elephant with a bruise on her butt.

Quality stuff.

Steve

Nope, Forts isn't gong to be made into a movie anytime soon. Sure, it would be nice, but it isn't very likely.

Damn Hollywood fatcats!

With the help of a little extra time though, google images, and my handy photoshop skills, I put together a poster anyway.



I'd pay seven bucks for that.

Steven

I polished off the cover for Albert at the Zoo early last week, and I'm pretty pleased with the results. It's a nice looking cover. I think it relates to the first book well.

Steve

Along with the ten-thousand other things I'm currently working on is the sequel to Paul Wood's "Cousin Albert" Series. Not only is Albert taking a trip to the zoo this time out, but he's doing it in full color. That's right, no more black and white interiors, this time it's color all the way.

While I haven't seen the full manuscript yet, I have gotten started on the cover. I'm pretty pleased with the overall design - think it'll be a quality piece when completed.

Hopefully it will...

Otherwise, as an eight year old might say, I'm in deep doo-doo.

On another note, it's only about four months or so until book 2 in the "Forts" series comes out. I'm excited. A part of me thinks it'll be the one people remember the most. It really is the "Empire Strikes Back" of the series It's a bit darker, the ending will leave you wanting more, and once it gets rolling it doesn't stop.

Then there's Krystoph...

You're going to like Krystoph.

Here's a quick update on the piece I'm doing for my brothers impending twins. I spent much of last week in the hospital, so progress has slowed considerably.

Feeling much better though - thanks for asking.

Overall I like how the piece is coming along. There's a lot of work to do though, and they are due to pop out sometime in August.

I need to get my keyster moving.

Steve

I wasn't able to dedicate as much time putting pencil to paper as I would have liked on this years drawing day, but I did get a few sketches completed.



The first is of Me, Sayid from Lost and Liza Minnelli as a dangerous trio of rebels roaming a post apocalyptic wasteland in search of the scarcest resource of all - our humanity. It's all very deep and meaningful.



The second is a sketch of a Beaker plush doll in my office. Why Beaker? Why not?

Steve

I've finally put the kibosh on the cover of book 2 due out before the end of the year.



The overall tone of the book is a little darker, and I think the cover matches. If you liked anything about book one, the sequel is going to make you go bonkers.

You can hold me to that.

On another note, the profiles page of the Forts site has been updated to include four new characters. Two of them you'll be familiar with from "Fathers and Sons," the other two you'll meet in "Liars and Thieves."

Consider it the first preview.

CLICK HERE TO READ

Steven