Lost And The Operational Theme Problem

Here's a really good article by Javier Grillo-Marxuach, one of the people responsible for the much-missed Lost TV show, that sheds a lot of light on why some television programs work while others clearly don't.  I'd never looked at it in quite this way before, but it makes perfect sense to me: the characters on the show all have to be directed along the same "operational theme" axis in order to propel the episodes forward in a consistent and compelling manner.  It's the sort of thing that's obvious once it's pointed out to you, but maybe not before that.  And it's also very much in line with the kind of thinking that I put into each of my novels, though I've now got new insights on the topic to consider.

Crazy Physics!

This news of scientists figuring out how to "trick the uncertainty principle" is pretty mind-blowing in its possible implications for the future of quantum science.  If it leads to the ability to extend quantum behaviour to non-quantum (macroscopic) objects, we could be talking teleportation or instantaneous communication over large (really, really large) distances, among other major breakthroughs.  Yikes!

The XBox One Fiasco

I own both an XBox 360 and a PS3, and I'd say I got my money's worth out of each of them, although the Sony device got used about ten times as much as Microsoft's console.  However, when the XBox One and PS4 were announced last year, it was pretty clear to me that I needn't waste any money on the new box coming out of the house Bill Gates built.  Bad decision after bad decision were revealed by Microsoft in the months leading up to November (when both new consoles arrived), and to be honest I never once wavered in my decision to give the XB1 a pass... not even when I found out that Titanfall, the long-awaited first release from the ex-Infinity Ward crew at Respawn Entertainment, would be exclusive to the XBox family of devices.  Hard to believe anything could sour me enough to pass up a highly-touted first person shooter, and yet there it was.

Today I saw an article on the topic that brought back all those memories and reinforced my decision.  My six-month-old PS4, on the other hand, gets used every week and has been a delight to own so far.

More Comments On Leap Of Faith

It's still rolling in:

"I LOVE IT!! It's honestly one of those books, I can't wait to relax and read, but I also don't want it to end, so I don't want to read it too fast."

and

"I really liked it! The ending shocked me!"

and

"I really enjoyed this book..particularly the main character and how she responds to the whirlwind of information coming her way...I like her personality and her history and ultimately very excited about her choices! The book is a fun ride to read... Like potato chips ..hard to stop at one chapter! Enjoyable and well constructed!"

not to mention this enthusiastic assessment:

"Leap of Faith is epic!!!  Your best novel yet!!!  Love it!!!"

Glad to see that most people are getting their money's worth...

Not That Anyone Asked Me But...

I think the Washington Redskins controversy is easily solved: rename the team to be the Washington Americans, keeping the logo the same.  The proud Native American depicted in the current team logo, decked out in full headdress, is the perfect icon for the new name.  Sure, some folks would continue to refer to the team by its old name for awhile, but fortunately that problem will solve itself as those intractable few inevitably die off.  Problem solved.  You're welcome.

Some Early Feedback On Leap Of Faith

I've only heard from a few people who've finished Leap of Faith in the first couple weeks of its release, but the feedback so far has been almost universally positive.  Here are a few samples:

"Well- I've finished it Matt and I'm misty eyed.... Thanks for a great read and you've wowed me. Can't wait to tell everyone! — feeling wonderful."

"I wanted to thank you again for your wonderful book.  As always, you have brought the characters to be very personal and real as if you could meet them on the street.  This makes them, for me, individuals that you can identify with and care about...  I read the book in 2 days.  Congratulations and keep up the good work.  Put me on the list for your next release."

And, in the spirit of brevity, there was this one:

"fantastic" (that's all there was, really... I didn't edit it down!)


Anyone else out there done the book and ready to tell me what they thought of it?

Kind Of A Big Deal

In a week that saw Leap of Faith achieve profitability just 12 days after its release, I would've been happy just reporting on that fact here.  But I actually have much bigger news to pass along...

I've been lucky enough to be selected as the first Emerging Artist by the website BOOM-QA.  If you click on that link, you'll see that they've posted lovely profiles of both Leap of Faith and its author.  Much to my delight, they also sent out press releases to a couple of the local news outlets here in London, which may lead to some further exposure for the book, if things go well.  This is exactly the sort of opportunity I was hoping for with the new book, as I think it has a huge amount of potential if I can get it into enough hands.  Please help me spread the word about Leap of Faith.  

A Five Bike-Ride Week!

Three round trips downtown (Mon, Fri & today), a lunchtime ride to Westmount Mall and back (Wed), and an hour-long spin class (Tue night) all add up to my busiest biking week since I retired back in 2008.  The best part?  I wasn't feeling all that tired as I pedaled the last few kilometres home today, mostly uphill and into the wind.  It's been years since I've tested myself like this, but it's nice to know that even at 51 I can still handle this much exercise over a six day period.

Wind Turbines Don't Kill Many Birds

The next time someone tries to warn you against building more wind turbines "because of all the birds they kill", just refer them to this article (and chart) and you'll be good to go.

Approaching Profitability On Leap Of Faith

Just eight days after its release, Leap of Faith is very close to being "in the black" in terms of making a profit!  I'm cautiously optimistic that we'll get there later this week, which would be one of the quickest starts I've ever had for one of my books.  Thanks to everyone out there who came to our Launch Party two Sundays ago and to everyone who's bought a copy of the book since then.  It really helps to have the money rolling in so quickly as that gives me something to play with as far as promoting Leap of Faith, such as my current plan to do a flyer blitz in our neighbourhood for it.

I've gotten a little bit of feedback on the book so far, all of it very good, but I expect to hear a lot more over the next few weeks.  Really looking forward to that!

Launching Leap Of Faith

Another book launch party has now come and gone!

We had a great turnout for Leap of Faith's kickoff this afternoon, hosting 31 people along with Vicki, Susan Garner, Emma and ye olde author himself.  As usual, I didn't get nearly enough time with each attendee as I'd have liked, but that just seems to be the nature of the beast.  Hopefully everyone understands that, and no one felt neglected.

Before most of the people arrived, Emma took this lovely photo of Vicki, Rich and I showing off my four novels.  Not a bad start to my body of work, I'd say!

If you couldn't make the party but want to get your hands on Leap of Faith, get a hold of me any time now and we'll set up an opportunity to make that happen.  Though the list of readers of the book is still quite small at the moment, every bit of feedback I've gotten so far has been very positive.  Leap of Faith definitely seems to be a winner, and that's all I could ever ask for.

Raising A Moral Child

Via Tammy, here's a great article about various studies done on the topic of how to raise a moral child. There are lots of gems in there, including experimental proof of the old adage, "Actions speak louder than words."  It really puts the boot to the notion that parents can successfully preach one type of behaviour to their kids without living by those same standards themselves.  You really do have to model the sort of principles and values you want your children to adopt, it turns out.

How We're Losing Our Ability To Read Deeply

I found this article on how our human brains are adapting to the cursory reading style of the Internet fascinating.  I've always been a skimmer when I want or need to be, something I picked up back in elementary school when I was part of a trial speed reading program.  I found I could, with practice, dramatically increase my reading speed while only suffering moderate reduction in comprehension of the material.  To me, this seemed like a useful skill, though not something I'd want to do all the time.  As an example, I decided to read Heart of Darkness a year or two ago on Vicki's Kindle because I'd always been interested in learning how it influenced Apocalypse Now, one of my favourite movies, and yet had never tried the book before.  Within a few pages of starting it, though, I realized it wasn't written in a style that I'd personally enjoy.  So I kicked into high-speed and blew through it in about half an hour, picking up most of the key points of the plot without spending any time absorbing the nuances or even most of the word choices.  In general, though, I'd never read a book that way as I want to lose myself in it and savour every bit of it.

Anyway, it sounds like more and more people are (perhaps unintentionally) adapting their reading style to a similar cursory approach, thanks to the Web.  Studies are finding that people miss out on many of the details or even quit reading partway through, especially if they're reading on a screen rather than a paper page, simply because their attention wanders or they get bored.  It's pretty frightening to think that's the way current and future generations are headed, considering how much learning and unadulterated fun can be found by reading, if you invest yourself into it.

Needless to say, I hope that Leap of Faith and all my other novels continue to capture readers' imaginations and keep the pages a-turning.

Big News: Colbert To Replace David Letterman On Late Show

As a one-time fan of David Letterman (back in his NBC days) and a big-time fan of Stephen Colbert and The Colbert Report, today's news that the latter funnyman is taking over the former's spot on The Late Show is both exciting and worrisome.  Colbert's on-screen persona as a staunch conservative buffoon is, presumably, not the one taking over the hosting role on CBS.  It'll be the real Stephen Colbert, I would imagine, sitting behind the desk, rather than the satirical character he first developed on The Daily Show.  If so, it's exciting to think that we'll get to know the real man, but sad to consider losing the great figure he spent so many years perfecting.  I guess we'll have to wait and see just how it all plays out, though.

Launch Of Leap Of Faith Now Less Than A Week Away!

Six days from right about now, we'll be hosting a party to get Leap of Faith off the launchpad and up into orbit.  I've already heard from a few early birds who've gotten their hands on copies of my fourth novel ahead of the party, and they're all telling me that they can't put the book down.  I think binge reading may end up being a "major problem" where this book's concerned, if the first readers are anything to go by.  But what a nice problem to have...

How Long And Cold Was The Winter?

Well, we just pulled the corner back on the pool cover, intending to drop the submergible pump in and lower the water level... only to discover there's several inches of solid ice on top of the water!  We've actually never seen that before.  As Vicki says, it's probably partially due to the fact that we didn't have much in the way of mid-winter thaws this year, as well as all the ridiculously cold temperatures we've hit over the past three or four months.

So it looks like we'll have to wait a while for that ice to melt before we can begin to deal with the excess water in the pool.  What a crazy winter... it just doesn't want to end!

X:Men: Days Of Future Past Trailer Blows My Mind

This... looks... amazing!



"Days of Future Past," from Uncanny X-Men # 141 & 142, remains one of the best X-Men stories ever, even 30+ years later.  And so to see it adapted into a major motion picture, directed by Bryan Singer and starring (among others) Ian McKellan, Patrick Steward, Jennifer Lawrence, Hugh Jackman, Michael Fassbender, Peter Dinklage, Ellen Page and Anna Paquin?  Sheer fanboy joy!

It comes out May 23rd, a mere 7 and a half weeks from now.  By then I'll probably have seen Captain America: The Winter Soldier twice (we've already got tickets for this weekend coming up), which should make the waiting a whole lot easier.  What a great start to the year in terms of superhero movies!  (And considering the storyline of my latest novel, I'd say 2014 may just be the Year of Time Travel!)

Alien: Isolation May Be Just The Game For Me

As this hands-on preview of the upcoming Alien: Isolation notes, it's been a tough last stretch for gamers who also happen to be Alien fans.  I had such high hopes for the return of Aliens Vs Predator a few years ago and yet it totally let me down.  And then Alien: Colonial Marines ended up making the merely-lackluster AVP look like gold, by comparison.

Now, though, there's an incredible amount of excitement around Alien: Isolation, with its focus on horror and survival instead of gunplay and mayhem.  In other words, it has much more in common with Ridley Scott's 1979 Alien than James Cameron's Aliens from 1986 (both of which I love, though I prefer the original over the sequel).  The description of it, linked to above, makes it sound like exactly the sort of game I'd enjoy playing in the dark, squirming in my seat as I try to stay alive.

Of course, I've been fooled before... after all, both AVP and A:CM had lots of hype before they came out, too.  Here's hoping this time it doesn't all turn to shit when the product actually arrives.

[Update moments later: Another article I just read on the game mentions that it's not due out until October 7.  That's a long six months from now!]

Your First Small Sample Of My New Book, Leap Of Faith

We're just over two weeks away from the Book Launch Party for Leap of Faith, so I thought now might be a good time to publish the first snippet from it, just to whet everyone's appetite.  This excerpt is taken from the first chapter:

“Hey, I totally forgot to tell you,” I say to Keri-Anne as we take our dinner dishes to the kitchen following a long discussion of last night’s Mad Men.  “I met a guy today who claimed to be a time traveler.” 

“He actually said he was a time traveler?” Keri-Anne replies, her eyes wide and a skeptical look on her face.

“That’s exactly what he said.  ‘I’m actually a time traveler.’  Very matter-of-fact, like he’d just told me he wrestles alligators for a living.”  As I load up the dishwasher, I add, “And then he smiled.”

“C’mon, Maggie,” she responds, squinting at me.  “A time traveler?”

“I swear,” I tell her.  “Those were his exact words.”

“So what did you do?”

“I laughed, like he was joking.  And then I pretended to study Sunnyside’s dessert menu until he left the place.”

“And he had just come up to you, right out of the blue, to tell you this?”

“No,” I reply with mock seriousness, “we had a whole little conversation before that.  He came over to my table while I was waiting for the bill for my lunch, and asked if I could help him find the ROM.  He had a folded up map of Toronto in his hands.”

“An actual paper map?” Keri-Anne asks, surprised.  “Holy!  Maybe he really was a time traveler.  From the 1950s, by the sounds of it.  Did you ask him if he’d heard of Google Maps?   Or cell phones, computers, or that newfangled Internet thing?”

“No,” I laugh, “I just showed him where we were on the map, and where the museum is, and then we talked about the best route for him to take to get there.  He said he was planning to walk, and I told him it wasn’t all that far so he shouldn’t have any problem.”

“And…?”

“And then he thanked me, and was about to leave when he dropped the time traveling bomb on my head,” I tell her, as I start the machine going and motion Keri-Anne toward the living room.  “Sure you don’t want a beer for a change?  Or a glass of wine?”

“No thanks, I’m good with water, same as always.”

I grab a Blue out of the fridge, refill her glass with tap water and follow her to the other room.  She’s taken her usual spot, stretched out on the sofa that she and Gramps used to watch the TV from.  I set her water on the coffee table within easy reach, and then plunk myself down across from her in the recliner and take a long pull on my beer.

After a moment she asks, “Did you at least find out his name?  Before he turned out to be crazy, I mean.”

“Oh, of course I did.  I found out all about him, don’t you know?  His full name is William Christopher McBrewster the third.  He’s a Capricorn who enjoys moonlit walks on the beach, reciting poetry in the nude and rescuing animals from scientific experimentation.  He learned how to time travel from a Tibetan monk who tragically died just seconds after passing his secret on.”

Keri-Anne giggles all the way through my little speech, and then asks, “And did he happen to have a tin foil hat on, by any chance?”

“Not that I noticed.  Seriously, he seemed like a normal enough guy up to that point.  Well-spoken.  Polite.  Pretty good conversationalist, actually.  Mid-30s looking with a slight paunch.  Collared shirt, expensive slacks, nice shoes.  Not exactly what you’d expect from some nut-job off his meds, wandering along Bloor Street.”

I push the recliner back about a quarter of the way and settle myself in.   I might as well get comfortable, as I imagine we’re both going to be here a while.

“Anyway,” I continue, “you know what I always say: the men I meet inevitably end up being married, gay or total psychos.  At least this guy self-classified in the first few minutes, which was pretty considerate of him, when you stop and think about it.”

“OK,” Keri-Anne says, as she sits up to take a sip of water, “but what if he hadn’t?  Self-classified with the time traveler comment, I mean.  Would you have been interested?”

“You mean, would I have said, ‘Well, as a matter of fact, I’m headed to the Royal Ontario Museum myself today.  What say we make an outing of it and stroll there together?’  Is that what you’re asking?”

Smiling, she replies, “I just wondered what you thought of him, that’s all.  You said he looked like he was in his mid-30s.  That’s OK, right?  I mean, that’s within your acceptable age range, isn’t it?”

I laugh.  “‘Acceptable age range.’  As if.  I keep telling you: I don’t have a big long list of qualifications, when it comes to guys.”

“I wonder if Mr. Time Traveler’s married?” she asks, in a whimsical voice.  “Do you think there’s a Mrs. Time Traveler out there, somewhere?”

“Ha.  I definitely don’t have a clue.  We only talked for a few minutes, like I told you.”

“Hmmm.  Was he wearing a wedding ring?  Not that guys don’t sometimes take theirs off when they’re out of the house.”

“Geez, Keri-Anne, who notices whether somebody’s wearing a wedding ring when you only spend, like, two minutes giving them directions?”

“I only asked because… Well, if he’s in his 30s and not married, what could that tell us about him?”

“He might be desperate, which could only have worked to my advantage.  Is that what you’re implying?”

She laughs and shakes her head.

“Don’t worry, I’m not about to leave all this behind,” I inform her, sweeping my right arm up to take in the surroundings I grew up in, “to go traipsing around through time, like some Doctor Who companion.  Besides,” I add, leaning forward to pick up the paperback that’s resting beside the recliner, “I’ve got a really good book right now, so why do I need a man?  He’d just screw up my life, especially if he was going to show up tonight to apologize for a fight we’re going to have next week.”

A Perfect Day In Toronto

On Monday of this week Vicki and I headed to Toronto for the day.  I had been asked to get a high resolution scan of my Watchmen page for inclusion in an upcoming over-sized hardcover book of Watchmen artwork being published by comic company IDW.  They periodically release "coffee table books" featuring original art that's of particular interest to fans, and Watchmen certainly qualifies in that category (it's often referred to as "the Citizen Kane of comic books").  The editor of the art book, Scott Dunbier, had put me in touch with Toronto comic artist J Bone, whose work I'd recently enjoyed in the Spirit/Rocketeer 4-issue miniseries from IDW, and who had a high-res scanner that I could use.  Since we were going to Toronto to get that done, we invited Tammy and Ryan to meet us for dinner later in the day, and just like that: we had a day-trip planned!

I wasn't sure what to expect when we got to the artist's apartment, as I'd never met him before or even read an interview with him.  Any concerns we had, though, were completely wiped away in the first few minutes of the visit.  J greeted us at the door with a huge smile and made us feel completely at home.  His apartment was amazing: walls of bookshelves filled with graphic novels, art books, movie DVDs, and action figures of all kinds.  In other words, our kind of place!  Before long, J and I were geeking out on various comic and movie topics, and then he and Vicki realized they had classic Sci Fi books in common, and off they went in that direction.  J turned out to be one of the nicest and friendliest comic pros we've ever met, and we've met a lot in Chicago and elsewhere over the years.

More than an hour after we got there, we all remembered we were supposed to be scanning some artwork, and so we got busy with that.  Then it was more chatting and swapping stories, and before we knew it, we'd taken up two hours of J's time and Tammy & Ryan were waiting for us at the nearby restaurant.  Oops...  It'd been way too much fun and neither of us wanted to leave, but we had other fun to get to and J had artwork to finish for a deadline.  Vicki thought to grab a photo before we took off, though:

And we didn't leave empty-handed, as J very kindly gave me the first 3 issues of his current Image series with James Robinson, The Saviors.  I've since read and enjoyed them very much, and will be picking up all of the future issues at the store as they come out.  Yay: yet another creator-owned Image title for me to happily support!

We capped the day off with a wonderful dinner at a pizza place Tammy recommended, getting to spend a couple of hours with two of our favourite people.  Lots more excellent, non-stop conversation ensued about work, movies, TV shows and whatever else came to mind.

And then we braved a couple of white-outs on the 403 and 401 before making it back here safely, much to Vicki's relief (I was the one driving and yet my knuckles weren't white).

Definitely one of our best days, thanks to J, Tammy & Ryan!