Update on the “Long March” of John Carter and the Gods of Hollywood

Michael Sellers Other Stuff

Well here it is — new cover art by Eamon O’Donoghue who took my basic idea and made it a lot better. Thanks, Eamon. (Visit www.eamonart.com!)

This is the update page for John Carter and the Gods of Hollywood. Check here for progress reports on the status of the book.

As of August 30, we are in the home stretch:

  • New Cover Art by Eamon O’Donoghue (www.eamonart.com) is finished.
  • The book is being reviewed and fact checked by some of the major personages who are involved in the story.
  • Dr. Stan Galloway has provided a detailed review of the formatting as well as the content, making sure that all the technical aspects of it conform to MLA standards and helping on a number of levels.
  • Several key players in the field are reading it and providing notes/reactions.

I’m expecting to reach the finish line of all the fixes and improvements over the Labor Day Weekend and all then be ordering a new round of proof copies/advance reading copies which we should have by September 9.  If all goes well with that, publication by mid-September seems like where we will end up, unless there is an unexpected development from some quarter.

 


10 comments

  • It’s very cool to see something with this level of collaboration take shape. Thank you for keeping us in the loop and listening to our thoughts. This process must be a rarity, or at least feels like one! It’s a real privilege for the rest of us to have been invited along for the journey, even in our small ways, in comparison to the actual writing of the book. And we still have the finished product to look forward to!

  • All your hard work and attention to details looks to be gelling perfectly. I like this a lot and really do want a copy.

  • I can italicized ‘John Carter if you like’ but did the Star Wars scrolling have itallics in? I don’t think so but I could be wrong.
    Please email me if you want me to do it.

  • Argh! I liked it better in blue with the star field above and the red carpet below! And it made the John Carter image stand out more from the background. Anyway, I’ll buy it all the same, so… 🙂

  • Roland….I know, I know — but I don’t think this all-caps font has an italics option and even if it did, wouldn’t it look kind of strange? I agree that to be consistent and conform with MLA, a movie title is supposed to be italicized. I’m stressing a little over that because I’ve cleaned up every other MLA transgression and conformed to proper formats…….

    One other thing, though …. I quote from all kinds of media outlets throughout the book, and almost NONE of them italicize movie titles. It’s a situation where MLA Style Manual is completely at odds with common practice in media. But this s a book, and a semi scholarly one at that, so …….probablly need to get it to conform.

    Eamon — if you’re out there, do you have any ideas about that? It really is a shame to get all the movie titles in the book properly italicized but then have it different on the cover. Maybe we could conjure up some kind of quasi-italics for this all caps

  • Michael. Looking good! Just a couple notes: the scrolling subtitle on the front – I don’t think the JOHN CARTER should be in quotation marks. It should be in italics like the rest of the titles in the back cover text. Speaking of the back cover, the repeat of the small version of your book title at the top right is unnecessary and adds clutter to an otherwise fine layout. And a small quibble: the end of the first line of paragraph four – move that orphan “A” down to the next line with the rest of “Princess of Mars” thank you very much.
    It’s looking better all the time! Really coming together. Hooray!!

  • Thanks Bob … Eamon did some real magic with it. …….

    I will be able to make a firm commitment about the availability date after this weekend. One of the really exciting things that has happened is that some pretty senior and accomplished writers and editors have stepped up and are helping with it (some named above, some not yet ‘name-able’) and I want to respect their process because they are really helping it get to the next level. It’s an unusual combination of journalism and analysis that, while written in pretty much the same style I use here, has an obligation to be credible as a scholarly work with 260 footnotes that are all needed to buttress the “this is the truth” aspect. In other words, I worked very hard to avoid having to say “trust me, this is the truth” — I found sources that could be quoted and footnoted. But this “scholarly” quality (wrapped in pop culture clothing) means that it has to be impeccable in terms of a lot of tiny little formatting things that go beyond the usual “typo patrol”….so I’ve invested some time in that. But more importantly, I’ve got some real editorial support to help me get the telling of it right and I’m trying to keep that aspect moving forward without creating a crazed rush for the readers who have been gracious enough to invest their time in it.

    Anyway…mid September is the short answer and a firm date will be forthcoming.

    As to where to buy — I’ll let you know. There will be physical books that can be purchase here and will be signed copies; physical books that can be purchase through Amazon directly; and eBooks through Amazon (and possibly here, not sure how that will work)……..It will alo be available through other resources too as we go along, some physical bookstores, some other eBook mechanisms, but those are the main ones.

  • I hope that is a final cover, because I like that one alot. You actually had perfection with those elements when the tile was a little larger and the picture a little smaller.

    But, the most important thing was corrected, the blurring JOHNCARTERANDTHEGODSOFHOLLYWOOD effect when all the title letters were the same size. Much better this way.

    When will this be available to purchase ? and Which format rewards you with the most money back to you personally ? (For all your hard work.)

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