News

Geekomancy in Audio!

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1 month ago
by Michael R. Underwood in ,

Huzzah! w00t! At long last!

Geekomancy is now available as an audiobook! 

Narrated by Julia Farhat, you can now beam all the jokes, all the genre emulation, and all the action straight into your ear-holes.

This is a particular pleasure for me, since I spent three years with audiobooks as my primary form of reading, since I spent most of my time as a book rep driving around the Midwest, and reading while operating a motor vehicle is both illegal and difficult.

The Celebromancy audiobook will likely come out very close to the ebook release in July, but that will ultimately be up to Audible, who are producing the audio editions.

If you aren’t already an Audible member, you can get a free audiobook by signing up for a trial membership.

Becoming an Angry Robot

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9 months ago
by Michael R. Underwood in ,

The announcement is finally here! Starting Monday, I will be taking up a post as the North American Sales & Marketing Manager for Angry Robot Books.

Official press release here - http://angryrobotbooks.com/2012/08/a-warm-welcome-to-our-shiny-new-bot-mike-underwood/

I’ll be doing the job from Indiana for several weeks, then moving to NYC to work out of the US Osprey office. I lived in Brooklyn as a kid, and have visited several times a year with my sales rep job, and I’m excited to be back in the Big Apple, but not nearly as excited as I am to focus all my energy and experience with one publishing house, serving as a brand champion for Angry Robot, Strange Chemistry (the upcoming YA imprint), and Exhibit A (a Crime/Mystery imprint coming Spring 2013).

I first heard of Angry Robot a few years back, when my dad told me about a new SF/F house that Random House was distributing in the states. I immediately loved the cover design, the clear sense of humor in the cover copy and design, and the whacky range of titles they published from the beginning.

These will be a busy few weeks — but don’t worry, Geekomancy readers, I’m still hard at work on the sequel, and will keep plugging along as fast and as best I can.

Geekomancy mention in Sword & Laser

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10 months ago
by Michael R. Underwood in , ,

Geekomancy makes a guest appearance on the fabulous Sword & Laser video show, during the Calendar segment of episode 7.

Linkage! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHW8kzc1dmg&feature=g-all-u

If you don’t want to watch the whole episode (you should watch it anyway), you can see the novel at 15:45.

And now back to the happy author dance.

Geekomancy Bookstore Events

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11 months ago
by Michael R. Underwood in ,

I’m very happy to have three bookstore events scheduled so far, where I’ll be doing readings, signings, trivia contests, and more.

“But Mike, this is an eBook? How will you sign copies for people?” you might ask. I know I did. But I think I’ve got a pretty good solution cooked up. My tablet lets me take snapshots of pictures and then draw on them with a stylus, so I can create images of the Geekomancy cover, sign them to readers, and then send them by email. It’s not quite the same as a signed paper book, but I think it’s pretty cool. I have also made up book plates (aka business cards), which I can sign with a sharpie. I will also sign other things, as requested (character sheets, RPG books, T-Shirts, etc.) because hey, why not?

The Official Book Launch Party will be on Saturday July 21st, at my friendly local Barnes & Noble Booksellers in Bloomington, IN. I’m very happy that the Bloomington B&N is hosting the launch party, since I used to work at the store, and my time as a barista and bookseller was the start of my career in publishing. I’ll be doing a reading, signing (see above), and hosting a geek trivia contest and a Geeky T-Shirt contest.

I’m also very honored that a couple of my independent bookstore friends will be hosting me for events during my traveling season for work this summer.

 

Here’s the current list of events!

 

July 13th, 7:00 PM at CoffeeTree Books in Morehead, KY. Postponed for now. Stay tuned for details.

July 17th, 7:00 PM at McLean and Eakin Booksellers in Petoskey, MI.

July 21st, 6:00 PM at Barnes & Noble Booksellers in Bloomington, IN. Facebook page for the event is here.

First Blurb for Geekomancy

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11 months ago
by Michael R. Underwood in , , ,

Today, I got the first blurb for Geekomancy! And it’s a doozy, if I do say so myself.

“If Buffy hooked up with Doctor Who while on board the Serenity, this book would be their lovechild. In other words, GEEKOMANCY is full of epic win.”
- Marie Lu, author of the Legend trilogy
This is me doing my happy author dance. Those who have seen the ‘There Will Be Flail’ video will have a good idea of what said dance looks like.
We’ll be able to use this quote on the cover, at the various websites, etc. Cover blurbs are a great way to give a snapshot of what is worth getting excited about in a novel, and they help draw in the audiences for established/popular authors to build buzz. We’ve got a few other leads out for blurbs, and I hope the novel connects with some of the other folks reading as well.

‘A New Generation of Rep Groups’ at PW

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1 year ago
by Michael R. Underwood in , ,

I’m quoted in a story at Publisher’s Weekly — talking about being a second-generation bookseller (I’m at the end of the story).  It’s interesting for me to see what quotes and topics were chosen out of an hour-long interview.  It was a fun process, and of course my grand ambitions are to be quoted there many times in my life, including more as a writer.

http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/bookselling/article/47745-a-new-generation-of-rep-groups-.html

 

I haven’t seen the print version yet, so I’ll keep an eye out for that during my travels this week.

I’m Still Alive, I Swear

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2 years ago
by Michael R. Underwood in

I haven’t been blogging much, despite an abundance of bloggable media in the last few months. More of my free time has been alloted to creating geek culture rather than just consuming it.

I started submitting query letters for my New Weird Superheroes novel

    Shield & Crocus

this summer, and recently started a new novel, which is currently known as

    Codename: Metaphysical Fencing Academy

.

In the meantime, I’ve sold my short story “Kachikachi Yama” to the Escape Pod fiction podcast. Once the story goes live, I will link it directly.

For now, watch

    The Event

and make sure you see

    The Social Network

.

Dollhouse Renewed: Fox Spared Whedonites’ Wrath

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4 years ago
by Michael R. Underwood in

Variety.com and i09.com are reporting that FOX has renewed Whedon’s Dollhouse for a second season (information points at another 13-episode season order, and staying on the Friday timeslot).

This means that Whedon’s declaration about swearing off television in exchange for doing internet-based work will probably wait for a little while longer, though Joss has been known to have more than a few projects at any one time.

Execs apparently enjoyed the last couple of episodes (as I did), and were convinced by strong DVR/TiVo numbers and the unaired “Epitaph One” as proof that the show could run on a smaller budget.

No word on Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, its Friday night mate. While Dollhouse can run on a smaller budget, Terminator requires CGI/elaborate makeup cyborgs, and may not fare as well, despite/because of its willingness to break format/formula and experiment with structure.

On the Horizon — Mid-season

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4 years ago
by Michael R. Underwood in , ,

Here are three speculative and/or genre-inclined shows coming up soon in TV-land. Dollhouse, Castle, and Kings.

Dollhouse

Joss Whedon’s anticipated new tv drama, starring Eliza “Faith” Dushku as Echo, one of a number of ‘Dolls’ — people who have had their memories wiped, live in an idyllic but infantile ‘Dollhouse’ facility, and who, when they become ‘Active,’ are implanted with memories and skills to serve as whatever the Dollhouse’s clients want them to be. This will allow Whedon and the show to explore Dushku’s range as a leading lady, explore the theme of memory vs. spirit/soul, exploitation, human experimentation/human trafficing, etc. The show also stars Tamoh “Helo” Penikett as James Ballard, the FBI agent who investigates the urban legend of the Dollhouse. Dollhouse has been troubled by production delays, disagreements about creative direction, and other issues, but it is on track for at least a nine-episode initial order.

Dollhouse premiers February 13th on Fox.

Castle
Richard Castle (Nathan Fillion, of Firefly and Dr. Horrible fame) is a famous best-selling mystery novelist who is tapped by the NYPD as a consultant when a copycat killer starts committing murders in the same manner as Castle’s books. This creates what seems to be a very promising meta-genre component for the series, since we’ll have Castle interpreting everything through the filter of a crime/mystery writer, and provides a variation on the ‘expert consultant protected by bad-ass detective/agent’ dynamic of shows like Fringe, The Mentalist, Numb3rs, Bones, etc.

Stana Katic (Heroes, 24, Quantum of Solace) plays Castle’s detective handler/inspiration for the protagonist for a new series of books. The show is likely to make good use of Fillion’s range, injecting comedy (From the video preview — “Did you see that? That was so cool!”) and romance (Castle asking the detective out, and her brushing him off while acknowledging the chemistry) into what seems to default to a prime-time hour-long crime procedural drama.

Castlepremiers March 9th on ABC.

Kings
An alternate-present America re-telling of the story of King David, Kings gives us David Shepherd (Christopher Egan) rescuing the son of King Silas (Ian McShane), ruler of Shiloh, a city in the Kingdom of Gilboa, David is welcomed into the court and turned into a hero of the people, wrapped up in politics and power. NBC’s promotion has highlighted the alternate-history aspects of the world, focusing on the monarchic nature of the Kingdom of Gilboa (Shiloh, the center of the story, appears similar/evocative of a New York City or the like).

UNN Breaking News

This show appears to be high-production value, since there will not have to be much in the way of SF special effects, focusing on costuming, graphic and set design to highlight the subtle but fundamental differences between our world and that of Kings. The story of King David should provide enough material for several seasons, depending on how close of a re-telling is planned and how quickly the story is to unfold. Early responses to the pilot script paint it as “bold, bizzare, fun”.

Kings premiers March 19th on NBC.

Ever Wanted to Fly on a Zeppelin?

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4 years ago
by Michael R. Underwood in ,

Now you’ll have a chance, if you have $800 to spare on top of getting to the Bay Area.

http://www.boingboing.net/2008/10/08/historic-halloween-s.html

I have several friends who should be scrambling to hold up banks to assemble the funds.

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