Greetings loyal airmen.  I'll bet the last thing you ever expected me to tell you is NOT to buy one of my books.  But that is exactly what I'm saying in regards to something I discovered only yesterday afternoon.  A kind fan dropped me a nice letter saying he had just finished our new pulp GHOST SQUAD and hoped we would do more of these.  Then he went on to ask if I was aware of how much some of our older titles were selling for on-line at Amazon.com.  Eager to learn what he was talking about, I logged on and discovered someone was asking $258 for a copy of our second Captain Hazzard book, The Citadel of Fear.  Pictured above.  Wowser!  That's just nuts.  Then I found some enterprising book dealers were asking $262 for a copy of our first Hazzard pulp, Python Men of the Lost City!  So what exactly is going on here and why am I trying to raise a red flag warning you away from these sellers.  Let me explain in detail.

Airship 27 Prod. started publishing through Wild Cat Books and for a year and half they were the folks who put out all our books.  Then, as happens in life do, things changed and WCB opted not to continue its partnership with us.  It was a friendly parting of the ways and they agreed, as of Jan. 1st, 2008, to stop printing any more of our titles.  Which they honored.  So as the year went on, places like Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com continued selling what titles they had in their inventories.  As each stock was depleted and new orders kept coming in, these outfits would go back to the publisher to buy more copies.  Only in the case of these Airship 27 Prod. they were told by WCB that the books were no longer available.  Another way of saying, out of print.  Of course it was never our intention at Airship 27 to keep these books out of the hands of our loyal fans and soon as the new year kicked in, we had made a new deal with Cornerstone Book Publishers to become our new publisher.

Then came the balancing act of both producing brand new books, while at the same time working on reprinting the old books in new, deluxe editions.  As this past year rolled on, we made lots of progress along that reprint goal.  But of course there were still orders coming in at the book sellers' sites and they had to keep telling would be buyers that they no longer had the product.  Which is when other sellers (usually small book stores) who did have some copies realized the demand was much greater than the current supple and so in good economic fashion, they started jacking up the prices.  Which is what is now reflected at those sites.  The thing is we ARE going to reprint those books and when we do they will be sold at our usual low, retail prices.  The last thing we want is our fans having to shell out ridiculous amounts for these books.  Oh, sure, I do understand the nature of collectibles and am aware some people do place a higher value on first editions.  So, in a sense, every time we do a second edition reprint, it does raise the asking price of the older books.  We get that.  But I've never ever bought any book except to read it.  Not save it because it's a first edition. And keep in mind, when people pay these kinds of monies, not one cent ever goes back to the writers and artists who made the book. There's something very wrong about that too.  I would trust most of you loyal airmen feel the same way. 

Finally, should anyone ever walk up to me at a con and hand me one of these WCB editions and brag about “how” much they had to pay for it, look out!  Why?  Because if they can spend over a hundred dollars for a book we sold at $18, I promise you I am then going to charge them $30 for my autograph.  Count on it!  Ha.

The Red Sox are still alive!  Unbelievable as it seems, our beloved Sox beat the Anaheim Angels in the first round of play-offs, 3 games to 1 to move on to the American League Pennant Championship against the super strong Tampa Rays. The same Rays who won the division in the first place.  The Sox are banged up bad, with several of their key players out of the line up to include Mike Lowell at third base, and our star slugger, Dustin Pedroia (in photo) only had one decent hit in the Angels series.  Not what you'd call comforting.  But again, this October baseball where anything can, and usually does, happen.  Game one in Florida tonight.  GO SOX!!

When not watching baseball, your old Air Chief has been sampling some of the new fare on the boob-tube and I thought I'd share some of my new and old likes.  Cartoon network is now running the Star Wars Clone Wars series, which kicked off with the feature film this past summer (poster above).  I've caught several episodes and have to say they are a lot of fun.  The animation is great and the stories all pack a good 30 minute punch.  And if that wasn't enough, Cartoon Network has slotted a truly wonderful family action series THE SECRET SATURDAYS before it.  This one is so much like the old Jonny Quest series and is a rollicking good time.

On the more serious side, I've already mentioned how much I'm enjoying FRINGE and now LIFE is back.  The latter was the shortened cop drama about a detective who spends 11 years in prison for a crime he didn't commit and when released, is given his old job back.  Now he's out to find the real criminals and those in his own department who framed him.  It sounds deadly sober, but the twist is that while in prison, this fellow learned Zen philosophy and it helped him survive his ordeal.  Now he uses it to keep focused on his mission.  It's really a refreshing, different kind of cops and robbers show and I really like it a lot.   Enough good stuff to keep me occupied until LOST comes back at the start of next year.  Oh, yeah.

And finally, as you'll recall, I recently posted here that I was looking for new pulp writers to help with our ambitious plans for the future of Airship 27 Prod.  Well I am so happy to report we've had a huge response to that plea from some truly terrific young (and mature) would be pulp writers.  You'll soon be seeing their fantastic work in our titles. Thanks to one and all for answering the call.

And there you have it, loyal airmen.  Hope all of you have a great Columbus Day weekend and see you back at the hangar next week.  Ron – Over & Out.