The Guardian and Total Sci-Fi Love Amortals

Amortals just received two more glowing reviews, one of which includes my favorite line from a review ever. First, though, Paul Simpson at Total Sci-Fi Online enjoyed the book and says:

Forbeck deftly deals with the philosophical implications of the society he’s functioning within while delivering a thrilling, chase-filled detective story with a surprising finale. VERDICT: 8/10 Highly enjoyable technothriller.

Wait for it. It gets even better. Over at The Guardian–yeah, that Guardian, one of the biggest newspapers in the UK–Eric Brown writes:

Amortals is Chandler by way of Blade Runner, with the pace of an express train. Great fun.

As a writer, I try not to think too much about reviews, but I read them all. Good or bad, I do my best not to take them to heart but to examine them with a cold eye to see what I can learn about my work from the reactions it engenders.

But this one just made my day. If I could have written my own review of Amortals, I would have wanted to come up with that exact line. Raymond Chandler is one of my favorite writers, and Blade Runner is one of my favorite films, and to have my work compared to either is an honor. The fact that this comes from my first review in a major paper–the second largest English-language newspaper on the web, behind only The New York Times–makes it that much sweeter.

Vote for Amortals for SF Book of the Year

The folks over at SFBook were kind enough to name Amortals their Book of the Month in November. This apparently put it in the running for their Book of the Year, an online contest that’s open to voting from the public.

Other books in the running include Pat Rothfuss’s The Name of the Wind, Mike Shevdon’s The Road to Bedlam (also published by Angry Robot), Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, Robert Jordan’s The Gathering Storm, Robert Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land, and Guy Adams’s The World House (yet another book from Angry Robot). This is a staggering list, and I’m flattered as can be just to have Amortals on it.

As audacious as it might be, I’m asking you to click on over to SFBooks and vote for Amortals. It only takes a second, and it’s fun and easy to do. Let’s see how high we can make that needle move! Thanks!

Amortals in SciFi Now

According to my publisher pals at Angry Robot, SciFi Now covered Amortals in its latest issue, calling it “A nightmarish vision of a future without death.” I’m guessing that the piece showed up in issue #48, although since I’m in the US and SciFi Now is a UK publication, I don’t have a copy at hand. However, the Angry Robots were kind enough to toss up a kind quote from the review:

Forbeck’s ability to create a world is undisputed. His Washington DC of two centuries hence is a gritty and dark place. A few of his observations… are really quite incisive, and his main protagonist, Dooley, is instantly likeable as the prototypical cyberpunk antihero.

Puppy Tweets

It’s been so long since I worked on this one that I almost forgot about it. Mattel has a new toy out for the holiday season called Puppy Tweets. It’s a tag that you attach to your dog’s collar, and it communicates with your computer via a USB dongle. Through that it contacts Twitter and sends out tweets related to your dog’s level of activity.

This is, of course, not an attempt to replicated the communications collar that Dug the dog used in the Pixar movie Up. It’s a toy, and most of the messages are goofy fun. I wrote a large chunk of them for Mattel, so if your dogs start tweeting at you soon, they may be using words I put into their mouths. (I’m brave that way. As in: doing so virtually and from a long way away.)

Worldbuilders 2010

Pat Rothfuss, author of the excellent The Name of the Wind, has set up Worldbuilders – his annual fundraising drive for Heifer International – once again. As an incentive for fans of genre fiction, Pat and dozens of other authors have donated all sorts of prizes that you can win for taking part in the drive. Every $10 you chip in nets you a chance at winning something cool, like an autographed copy of a great read. Plus Worldbuilders matches 50% of your donation, making your bucks go farther.

Alternatively, you can purchase things from Pat’s online store, all proceeds of which go to Heifer. Pat also auctions off all sorts of rare items like editorial criticisms, rare books, and more.

I just sent off an autographed copy of Guild Wars: Ghosts of Ascalon today, so it should go up into the book lottery soon. If you can chip in something too, please do. It’s a great cause, and it’s heartwarming to see so many authors and readers banding together to do some good in the real world.

New Amortals Reviews

A few new reviews for Amortals cropped up over the long holiday weekend. In the first, Eddy Webb of White Wolf/CCP fame enjoyed the book and contrasted it to Mike Stackpole‘s In Hero Years… I’m Dead, which I happen to be reading at the moment too. Eddy writes:

Matt is at the top of his game in creating a fun and engaging story. If you like action thrillers, this is a good book to pick up.

Over at Amazon.com, the Kindle edition has two reviews. The first is from Fantasy Literature, which gave the book four stars and calls it “One helluva sci-fi thriller.”

The second comes from Hunter Johnson, another gaming industry guy, who gives the book five stars and writes:

I thought I had figured out the Big Reveal by the end of chapter two. I was right and wrong – I had figured out one of the surprises, but it was only the first reveal – a lowly lackey far below the peak of this pyramid of reveals. Matt Forbeck’s “Amortals” takes off running, makes a few detours, and packs a lot of thoughtful socio-economic science fiction in around the action-movie-style murder mystery.

Help Jim Ward

During the second era of TSR – the one that started after Gary Gygax had been forced out of the company he’d founded – Jim Ward served as the vice president of the company. He’d been there almost since the very start, having written Gods, Demi-Gods & Heroes, one of the first D&D supplements. He later wrote Deities & Demigods, with Rob Kuntz.

Under Jim’s watch, the company published many great games, most notably Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd Edition. He was inducted into the Academy of Adventure Gaming Arts and Design Hall of Fame in 1989. His own best-known titles include Metamorphosis Alpha, the original Dragonball Z collectible card game, and the legendary Gamma World, which Wizards of the Coast just published in a new edition.

Jim’s been a freelance game designer and consultant for much of the time since he left TSR, except for a stint as the president of Fast Forward Entertainment. He’s made a good go of it, but the last few years have not been good to him, mostly because of his deteriorating health. For a long time, Jim and his local doctors couldn’t figure out what was going on, only that it was bad. Recently, though, he had some luck at the Mayo Clinic, where they diagnosed him with a neurological disorder for which they seem to have a treatment that should hopefully make his condition manageable if serious.

Of course, this has put a serious dent in Jim’s life. He and his wife have decent health insurance, but the co-pays are substantial. Also, he’s not been able to be nearly as productive as normal during this time, and freelancers only get paid when they work.

A group of Jim’s friends – led by Tim Kask, the founding editor of Dragon Magazine – have formed an fund for helping out Jim. It’s called Friends of Starship Warden, and it’s already up and running. If you can chip in a few bucks for a guy who helped form the tabletop gaming hobby and brought us all a lot of fun over the years, please do.

Join the InSpectres

The guys over at Reactor 88 Studios have set up a fund drive for the InSpectres film on IndieGoGo. Principal photography wrapped on the picture last month, but there’s a long way to go in post-production, showing the film around, etc., and that all eats money.

I co-wrote the screenplay for this with Jeff Dohm, and it’s a funny adventure film with some great actors and a fantastic crew. I also play a zombie in the opening reel, which may be worth the price of admission all by itself. Each level of contribution comes with a number of cool perks too. If you’re interested in investing anywhere from $10 on up to $5k, go ahead and check it out.