Greeting Loyal Airmen, it seems this is one of those weeks were we have lots and lots of things to talk about. So let's not waste another minute and get right to the fun stuff.

Our thirteenth Airship 27 Productions' book of the year is – SHERLOCK HOLMES : CONSULTING DETECTIVE Vol Six.  Now if you'll recall last week's Flight Log, we teased with a peek at a small piece of Pat Carabjal's cover painting.  So here it is in all its beauty.  The book contains five brand new Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson mysteries as written by Michael Black (he contributed two shorts), Alan J. Porter, Greg Hatcher and I.A. Watson.  This series has been our biggest seller and with this line up, we fully expect this new entry will be just as successful.  The book is on-sale at Amazon.com in hard copy and soon on Kindle.  Note, you can go in any Barnes & Nobles brick and mortar store and order a copy as well.  We hope you'll give it your support, Sherlock Holmes fans.

Speaking of classic heroes from literature, the Three Musketeers, as created by French writer Alexander Dumas are back in a brand new, rollicking, fun, action adventure television series from BBC AMERICA. Episode one aired last Sunday night and both the Air Chief and Valerie enjoyed it immensely and can't wait to see more.  We are told from friends in the UK, that the series over there is now in season two and equally as popular there.  Pictured above, left to right are the characters Portos, Dartagnan, Artos and Aremis.  The King's Musketeers.  The Air Chief has always loved these great swashbuckling heroes and is truly delighted with this new TV show.

Having grown up in the 1960s, both the Air Chief and Valerie had been aware of the hit Broadway musical,  JERSEY BOYS, based on the life of singer Frankie Valli and his group, THE FOUR SEASONS. Talk about the soundtrack to one's life, we grew up listening to their great songs on the radio.  And from reviews we found since its debut, the musical was/is a huge success.  Which is why we were thrilled to discover it had been turned into a movie directed by Clint Eastwood.  It was released last week and a few days ago we finally managed to get to a local cinema and see it.  As expected, the majority of the audience were seniors like ourselves and couldn't help but sing (quietly) along with the actors and the film moved along.  JERSEY BOYS is pure entertainment with a great human story about friendship and loyalty and the music catapulted us both back in time.  For nearly two and a half hours, we felt like teens again.  Coming out of the theater, we were laughing and smiling happily.  If you need to kick back and truly enjoy a marvelous movie, you can't do any better than JERSEY BOYS.

And speaking of movies, one of the most eagerly awaited film projects among pulp fans is the new DOC SAVAGE movie that is going to be written and directed by Shane Black.  Black is best known as the guy who re-booted Robert Downey Junior's career with a little mystery flick called KISS, KISS, BANG, BANG (is you haven't seen it, go find it now, you'll be glad you did) and recently wrote and directed IRON MAN 3 for Marvel Studios.  The thing is, Black has been a big pulp fan most of his life and he has been really eager to bring The Man of Bronze back to the big screen.  Most pulp fans know there was a big budget Doc Savage movie made in the 70s with Ron Ely in the role of the near super-human Doc. Unfortunately this was the time of the “camp” craze ala Adam West's silly Batman TV show and the writers opted to “camp up” Doc.  The result was a box-office bomb.  Gee, we wonder why?  So now, all these years later, Hollywood is going to try to do it again…only this time with the selection of Black as the creative vision behind the project, fans fully expect him to play it straight.  Sadly progress on the project has been moving at a snail's pace.  Then this past week it was reported that Black had met with actor Chris Hemsworth (yeah, the guy who plays Thor in the Marvel movies) to discuss his playing Doc Savage.  And you better believe that really stirred up tons excitement across the internet.

As for the Air Chief, we think Hemsworth is a great choice to play Doc.  He's handsome, tall and rugged…easily filling the visual requirements. And thanks to his experiences in the Thor series and Ron Howard's recent flick, RUSH, we know the guy can act.  Still, we find it difficult to get too overly excited because the same article that reported this news also made it quite clear that the studio behind the movie is in no hurry to get it done…and Black is committed to several other movies before he can even consider pre-production for a Doc Savage epic.  So, as much as we applaud the idea of Hemsworth playing Clark Savage Jr. it is way too soon to start applauding.  Should the studio hold off on actively moving ahead on the movie, years could go by and then Hemsworth might not be available due to a conflict of other commitments.  Sorry to be a pessimist here, that's not our nature.  The Air Chief wants to see this move as much as the next pulp fan…but again, this is way..way too soon to start cheering yet.

Ron (Over & Out)

Greeting Loyal Airmen, it is good to be back after last week's abbreviated Flight Log.  We truly hope all you Loyal Airmen who are also dads had a great Father's Day last Sunday. Ours was wonderful ever thanks to our great kids, Scott, Michelle, Kevin, Alan & Heather…and our super six grand kids, Kristi, Chelsea, Cora, Alex, Taryn & Logan.  We are so blessed with such an awesome family.

We were also delighted to hear that our colleagues who attended last weekend's Denver Comic Con has a fantastic time.  Good or them. Who knows, maybe next year the Air Chief will get another invite.  That would be nice.  Though the older we get, the more those big cons are a whole lot of effort too.  For those of you Loyal Airmen interested, the Air Chief will be attending two more shows this year; Pulp Fest in Columbus, Ohio in early August (7th to 10th) and be a guest at the second annual Rocky Mountain Comic Con in Denver during Halloween Week.  We'll be telling you lots more about both of these appearances as they draw nearer.

Earlier this past week, Airship 27 Productions THE MASKED RIDER – Tales of the Wild West Vol II. Its our twelfth book of the year and features the classic pulp cowboy hero in three new adventures by Erwin K.Roberts, Bill Craig and Roman Leary.  It features the above gorgeous cover by Andy Fish with twelve black and white interior illos by Tom Rubalcava.  The book is now on sale at Amazon in both hard copy and digitally on Kindle.  We hope you westerns fans will saddle up and pick up a copy.

Meanwhile Airship 27 Productions super talented Art Director, Rob Davis, is busy assembling our next title which will be volume six in our best selling series, SHERLOCK HOLMES – CONSULTING DETECTIVE.  Rob also does the interior illustrations for all our Sherlock Holmes books, whereas to paint the cover for this new volume, we recruited Pat Carabjal.  Pat, if you'll recall, did the stunning cover to our recent BROTHER BONES – TAPESTRY OF BLOOD.  As Pat is very good friends with actress/model Irene Huber of Brazil, he often puts her in many projects and this new Holmes cover will be no exception.  He is presenting her as Holmes' only ever female rival, Irene Adler.  Above is the initial black and white drawing of Ms. Huber as Ms. Adler…i.e. one real-life Irene portraying an fictional Irene.
Ha.  With fingers crossed will be releasing the book shortly and able to show the finished cover which is just incredible to behold.

And as we are speaking of beautiful Femme Fatales, that's as good a place as nay to segue into our next topic; Ms.Gina Carano.  A former mixed martial-arts fighter and regular on the TV series American Gladiator, Ms. Carano launched her movie career last year starring in the wall-to-wall actioner, HAYWIRE.  It was one of the Air Chief's favorite films of the year and made us a devoted Carano fan instantly.   She next appeared on a guest spot in the canceled sci-fi series, ALMOST HUMAN playing a killer robot.  Look out Terminator.  Again, she was fantastic.  Then she had a small supporting role in FAST & FURIOUS SIX, which we have yet to see.  But along the way, she found time to star in another actioner filmes on location in Puerto Rico called IN THE BLOOD.

We had seen the trailers for this film at the theaters months ago and we thrilled to learn she had a new movie coming out. So you can imagine our surprise when, while shopping at a local retail store last week we came upon a DVD copy of IN THE BLOOD?  What the hell, we thought?  Had we missed its release? Truth is, there was no release and for whatever idiotic reasoning, Fox opted to release it directly to home video. This kind of thing happens often in Hollywood and general indicates the studio doesn't have a whole lot of faith in the finished product. In this case, whoever it was that made that call is a blooming idiot.  Directed by John Stockwell, IN THE BLOOD is a punch-in-the-face mystery thriller that works supremely well as both a action vehicle for Gina and tells a really twisty, original story.  In other words there is an actual mystery at the core of this fast paced flick.  The Air Chief has said all along that Gina Carano is the new Queen of Action Movies and her potential to become a huge star is just beginning to prove itself.  It's about time someone in Hollywood woke up and took notice.

And finally we are delighted to show off this truly awesome sketch of our character, Brother Bones – The Undead Avenger.  It was rendered by our pal, T.Glenn Bane.  Glenn runs the gaming company that is currently putting together a Brother Bones role-playing-module which they hope to have out by the start of next year. We just were not aware of Glenn's artistic talents until seeing a few pieces he posted on Facebook.  Which then led to our suggesting he do a pin-up of Brother Bones.  And this is what he whipped up in a matter of days.  We absolutely love it.

And there you go, Loyal Airmen, for this third week of June 2014.  We hope all of you are having a great summer and we'll see you back here next week.  Until then, be good to yourself and others.  It's the little things that make the world better.

Ron – Over & Out!

Greetings Loyal Airmen.  Due to a personal family loss, we're taking the week off.  We trust you'll understand.  At the same time, the third Annual Denver Comic Con is now underway.  No, we won't be there but wish all our colleagues in attendance a great weekend.  If you are fan and live in the area, do get down to Denver.  The show is awesome.

See you back here in seven.

Ron – Over & Out.

Greeting Loyal Airmen, today's Flight Log will be short.  It really doesn't need a whole lot of words.  We just need to never forget this date in history.  On June 6, 1944, half the world was under the heel of monster whose dreams of global conquest seemed unstoppable.  Untold millions upon millions of people had been killed or enslaved throughout Europe and Asia.  This was clearly the darkest night in human history.

Then, on that morning, thousands of boats crossed the English Channel in the greatest invasion ever launched by free men.  From them emerged Americans, Englishmen, Canadians and their allies from other nations, all united with one goal, to storm those beaches of Normandy and liberate their fellow men from the grip of tyranny: to save the world.

Back in America, their Commander in Chief, President Franklin D. Roosevelt went on the radio and said this of them, as so many died on those sands, “They fight not for the lust of combat.  They fight to end conquest.  They fight to liberate…”

And so they did.  Today we remember “the greatest generation” and their sacrifices with grateful hearts.

And the lesson they taught us with their sacrifices.  Home, country, loved ones.  What would you fight and die for today?  The Air Chief's answer is and always will be …all of the above.

Ron – Over & Out!

Greetings Loyal Airmen, well summer is now rolling along, schools are closing all around us and kids are excited to be out swimming, camping, hiking, biking and the million of other things that are so much fun about this season.

Oh, and we've got as yet one more graduation, this time of our granddaughter Cora, seen above with Valerie and the Air Chief.  Cora graduated last weekend from Rocky Mountain High School right here in Fort Collins and we could not me more proud of her.  Next Fall she'll enroll in the Front Range Community College.  Look out world, here comes Cora Marie!!!

Last week we announced the release of our latest pulp title, BROTHER BONES – TAPESTRY OF BLOOD.  For you E-readers, the title is now also available on Kindle from Amazon.  As you'll recall, the gorgeous cover (seen above) by Pat Carabjal features the Undead Avenger along with a very sexy vampire, the latest addition to the Bones' cast, SISTER BLOOD.  Well earlier in the week Pat posted a picture of the young model who posed for him as he was designing the cover.

                    
And here she is, Ms Irene Huber, standing in front of a print of the finished cover.  She and Pat are good friends and he has used her often in his work.  In fact he is now hard at work on a new Sherlock Holmes cover for Airship 27 Productions on which the notorious Irene Adler will appear.  And sure enough, as poetic as can be, one live Irene will model for a fictitious Irene.  We've seen preliminary sketches and they look fantastic.

Speaking of preliminary art, Pat often does up several different compositions to show his publishers.  He did the same thing for the Brother Bones book and we thought you Loyal Airmen would enjoy seeing the one we passed on.  It is still a gorgeous piece of artwork and deserves to be seen and appreciated.

And there you have it for this week, Loyal Airmen, as ever, thanks for stopping by.

Ron – Over & Out!

Greeting Loyal Airmen, we are so happy to be back home at Hangar 27 after a whirlwind, hit & run trip back East last weekend to attended our granddaughter's graduation from the University of New Hampshire. Go Wildcats!  On a day that started with a heavy downpour, the clouds parted and the sun appeared only minutes before the 3,000 students that made up the class of 2014 marched out onto the field in front of the Whitmore Stadium.

Among those proud and happy students was Ms. Kristi Valori Leclerc, accepting her Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology.  Here's a great shot of her taken only moments after the ceremonies concluded.  Note, the gentlemen behind her left shoulder with the tan baseball cap is her extremely proud father, our son-in-law Chris Leclerc.  Kristi was an exceptional student while at UNH and graduated with multiple honors and achievements.  In the Fall she will enter the Masters program at the University of Georgia and we've no doubt she is going to excel there as well.

If you'll not the location of her tassel, you can tell this photo above of Kristi with her oh-so-proud grandparents, was taken the night before graduation during the Honors Convocation.  As our very first grandchild, Kristi has always had a special place in our hearts and Valerie and the Air Chief couldn't be happier for this wonderful, beautiful, amazingly wonderful young person she has become.  That she is going to do great things with her life, we've absolutely no doubts whatsoever.  And so to Kristi and all the college grads of 2014, we say, CONGRATULATIONS!!!

Of course just because the Air Chief is out of the Hangar doesn't mean operations at Airship 27 HQ came to halt. No way.  While we were away enjoying out time with family, Art Director, Rob Davis, was busy getting out not one, but two new Airship 27 titles – GREEN LAMA – MYSTIC WARRIOR.  It contains four stories by Peter Miller, Kevin Noel Olson, Nick Ahlhelm and Robert Craig with interior illustrations by Neil Foster and a cover by Isaac Nascilla.  The book is now on sale at Amazon in both hard copy and on their Kindle. 

And the second just released to day was in the Air Chief's newest collection of Brother Bones stories…BROTHER BONES – TAPESTRY OF BLOOD.  It features five tales of the Undead Avenger as spot illustrated by Rob Davis with a stunning cover by Pat Carbajal.  We think you'll like.  And it too is available now at Amazon.com in hard copy and shortly in Kindle.  This one was two years in the making and is the third title in the series.

Meanwhile one of the books now in production that we are extremely excited about is the new SHERLOCK HOLMES – CONSULTING DETECTIVE, VOL VI.  It will contain five brand new Sherlock Holmes mysteries.  At present Rob is busy doing interior illustrations while super artist/painter Pat Carbajal has begun work on the cover.  Above is a peek at one portion of it featuring the irascible Dr.Watson.  Trust me, Loyal Airmen, when you see the final painting, you'll be delighted.

And there you have it for this week as we get all ready to celebrate Memorial Day and the unofficial start of the summer season in the good old USA.  Please, as ever, do pause at least once during this holiday weekend to remember all the men and women who have served in our military forces throughout the history of our great country.  Freedom has never been free, it is constantly paid for by the sacrifices of all our veterans; those who came home and those who did not.  May God bless them all and continute to bless the United States of America.

Ron Over & Out!

OFF TO NEW HAMPSHIRE –  As Valerie and the Air Chief are in New Hampshire this weekend attending their granddaughter's graduation from the University of New Hampshire, there just wasn't enough time to put together a new Flight Log this week.  Sorry about that, Loyal Airmen.  We will be back next Friday for sure.  Till then, take care,
Ron – Over & out

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Greeting Loyal Airmen, once again the Air Chief had the fun of being a guest at Gryphon's Games & Comics here in Fort Collins, CO for Free Comic Book Day last Saturday.  Sherman & Liana Sanders, the owners of the shop always do it up big and local comic fans have a blast.

Here's a shot of the Air Chief, one of six comic local comic creators who were guests at the shop.  We are told over 1,400 people attended…no surprise there as the line from the front entrance through the shop never let up since the second they opened the doors.  A huge thanks to the Shermans and especially all our great Fort Collins comic fans.  Can't imagine what next year will be like.  Ha.

Recently one of our regular Airship 27 pulp writers, Aaron Smith of New Jersey, took a vacation to New Orleans with his lovely wife.  It is a city they had bought longed to see and enjoyed their short visit immensely.  During their stay, they visited several old and historical cemeteries in the city and it was while there they came upon this tombstone marker for a Captain Michel Fortier.  Upon closer inspection they discovered a newer plaque which also seem to promote this American patriot with my family name.

On this one he is Colonel Michel Fortier.  The Air Chief has always been fascinated by ancestry and this came as a really pleasant surprise.  What with today's internet and our abilities to search the world for historical data, you can believe in the weeks and months ahead, the Air Chief will be surging the web to see what we can discover about the Colonel, his life and his devotion to our country.  Stay tuned, hopefully there will be lots more to come.

                                
And speaking of things to come, hopefully our next Flight Log will display the cover to our newest Airship 27 Productions pulp title – BROTHER BONES – TAPESTRY OF BLOOD.  Our Undead Avenger, pictured above by artist Rob Davis, returns in a brand new collection of gruesome action stories by yours truly.  This book was a real labor of love as we love writing this characters.  So stay tuned.

And next week the Air Chief and Valerie fly back to New Hapshire to attend our granddaughter, Kristi LeClerc's graduation from the University of New Hampshire.  We are so proud of her and truly looking forward to this trip back home.  Expect the Flight Log to be posted a few days early.  Till then stay safe and happy.

Ron – Over & Out!
                                  

Greetings Loyal Airmen, we are back safe and sound from last weekend's amazing Windy City Pulp & Paper Con.  The show as was a huge blast and the Air Chief and his art director, Rob Davis truly had a great time getting together with so many of you Loyal Airmen and lots of our fellow pulp colleagues.

And here's the Air Chief and Rob once again manning our two tables filled with all kinds of pulp and comic goodies.  Sadly, by some snafu, Rob forgot to pack our glorious Airship 27 banner which we always have standing tall behind our tables.  It was missed, but didn't stop us or our Loyal Airmen who stopped by from having a great time.  A real tip of the Pulp Fedora goes out to the show's two promoters, Doug Ellis and John Gunnison.  Again they outdid themselves.

Of course the entire reason for this show are the pulps and they were on display for all to see, as this fan is discovering in front of this WALL OF PULPS.  From the old, to the reprints to the New Pulp, if it was Pulp Related, it was at Windy City.  Oh, yeah.  Pulp collectors were in heaven.

For the second year in the row the con featured NEW PULP SUNDAY.  A block of five hours set aside on the last day of the show for five panels dealing with New Pulp Fiction.  Participating were 18 writers, editors, artists and publishers, all part of the New Pulp Movement.  The Air Chief had the fun of moderating the first of these and on our panel we had, from left to right, Tommy Hancock, David White, Rick Lai and Chris Bell. If you ever plan on attending the Windy City show in the future, to make it point to stick around for New Pulp Sunday, you'll be glad you did.
             
                               
             

And for the fifth year in the row the Air Chief had the honor of announcing the winners of the Pulp Factory Awards given to the best in New Pulp Fiction and Art published the previous.  Helping us with this delightful chore were Rob Davis and Tommy Hancock. This years four Quill & Gears trophies went to….

BEST PULP NOVEL –  Will Murray fro DOC SAVAGE – SKULL ISLAND from Altus Press.
BEST PULP SHORT STORY – Andrew Salmon for THE LIMEHOUSE WEREWOLF from Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective Vol 4 from Airship 27 Productions.
BEST PULP COVER – Rob Moran for BROTHERS BONES – SIX DAYS OF THE DRAGON from Airship 27 Productions.
BEST INTERIOR ILLUSTRATIONS – Sean Ali for PRO SE PRESENTS # 19 – Pro Se Productions.

Our congratulations on these winners and all those nominated in this year's award program.

And finally, aside from the fun of the panels, the awards, the auctions etc.etc.etc. the biggest reason the Air Chief attends this show is to meet our Loyal Airmen, none more loyal and supportive than Mr. John Bodnar seen above with the Air Chief.  John is a wonderful human being and despite some truly serious health issues that have plagued him for years, he still manages to smile and carry on.  We are so grateful for his continued support and happy to call him a true friend.  God bless, John and thanks always.

And there you go, all you other Loyal Airmen.  That's it for our Windy City Con report.  One day maybe we'll post a picture of you with the Air Chief.  Until then, take care and thanks for stopping by.

Ron – Over & Out!

Well Loyal Airmen, its that time again when the Air Chief packs up Airship 27 for his flight to Chicago and the annual Windy City Pulp & Paper Con.  Believe me, as ever we are truly excited for this show once again.  We, and our Airship 27 Productions partner, Rob Davis have tons of new pulp novels and anthologies to display at our tables for all those loyal pulp fans attending.  We'll also have four of our terrific writers stopping by out tables to sign copies of their books.  Chris Bell, David C.Smith and Gene Moyers will be on hand Saturday and Jim Beard will stop by on Sunday morning.  Looks to be a great weekend, hope to see many of you there.  That's why this Flight Log is a day early.

Speaking of fun shows, the Air Chief has a blast last Saturday at the FoCo Comics & Gaming Festival, Fort Collins first ever comic show.  So many fans came out to show, it was a packed house and we had a blast.  The Air Chief also got to unveil his new con banner for the very first time.  Here framing it with us, is Colorado school teacher, Diane Odbert, a good friend, avid comic reader and truly wonderful teacher.  The Air Chief did a presentation at her school a few weeks back and when we mentioned the comic show, Diane promised to come over and we were so glad she did.  So congrads to the college students of CSU here in town for putting on one hell of a great comic event.

Last year, one our colleagues, writer/editor Van Allen Plexico announced he was going to put together an anthology featuring the characters from James Fenimore Cooper's classic LAST OF THE MOHICANS; an American adventure classic.  It has always been one of the Air Chief's favorites.  So we immediately signed on and wrote a story called RED BLIZZARD.  Earlier this week, Van released the finished book via his imprint White Rocket Books.  Alongside my tale are three others by Jim Beard, Frank Schildiner and I.A. Watson, all truly superb writers.  The cover was done by my dear friend, Denver based Laura Givens who truly outdid herself.  The book is now on sale at Amazon.com in both hard copy and on their Kindle for E-Readers.  Writing this particular story was, for the Air Chief, a dream come true.  We hope you'll check it out.  We are told Van is going to have copies at Windy City, where he too will be in attendance.

And there you have this early Flight Log, Loyal Airmen.  Thanks as ever for stopping by.  Next week we hope to report on the Pulp Con and the fun we had while there. Take care,
Ron – Over & Out!

Greetings Loyal Airmen, we are going to have some artistic fun with you this week.  A few days ago we released our latest Airship 27 Productions title and we thought it would be fun to take you back on how this amazing cover was put together and the two remarkable artists responsible for it.

Our story begins sometime last year when the Air Chief was approached by writers Derrick Ferguson and Joshua Reynolds.  Both of have done lots of great work for Airship 27 Productions in the past so you know, when they offer up an idea, the Air Chief is all ears.  This time around they had this idea of writing a full length pulp novel in which a young Dillon, the black hero created by Derrick (one of the most popular new pulp heroes out there today) would seek out a 70 yrs old Jim Anthony; Super Detective to be his teacher in all things dealing with adventure.  They were going to call the book THE VRIL AGENDA and after we read the loose plot outline, we sign on immediately.  The Air Chief right at the offset this would turn out to be a very special projects.

To that end, we thought it would be wise to announce the book's arrival way-way ahead of time.  Something we rarely ever do.  But the Air Chief wanted to get pulp fans excited about what was coming their way and so we enlisted the aid of our pal, and Airship 27 Art Director Rob Davis to do up a special preview poster announcing the book.  Whereas in the previous Jim Anthony books we've published here at Airship 27, we've always imagine him looking like the late body-builder-turned-actor, Steve Reeves. As for Dillon, he always had us imagining football-star-turned actor Jim Brown. So we suggested to Rob that he do up an image to showcase these two heroes in that fashion.  Above is the resulting, super wonderful poster Rob did up.  Of course he, on his own initiative added zeppelin, the skull and Nazis swastika, all recognizable pulpish icons.  Soon as Rob was done, we plastered this all over the internet and on every pulp website we could think of.  It served its purposes, as it instantly stirred lots of excitement amongst pulp fans everywhere.  Meanwhile Derrick and Joshua set about writing the book and within six months of this poster being released, they had delivered the manuscript.

As soon as the Air Chief finished reading/editing the manuscript, we handed it back to Rob as he was going to be doing the nine interior illustrations that would grace the final book.  While Rob started part of the process, it was time for us to find just the right cover artist.  We had long been fans of artist Adam Shaw who, in the past few years, had some remarkable covers for other New Pulp companies. Covers that truly impressed us and we had always harbored a wish that someday we would be able to recruit to do a cover for Airship 27.  Having so enjoyed the experience of reading THE VRIL AGENDA, the Air Chief decided it was time to give Adam a call.  We dropped him a letter explaining the book's plot etc, how excited we were  about the project and then inquired if he would be at all interested in doing the cover for us.  Several days later Adam replied affirmatively.  His schedule was pretty full up, but if we didn't mind waiting a few more months, he would agree to signing on.  Well, that decision was a no-brainer and we told him we had no real deadline.  At this point Adam asked if we'd produced any kind of art at all or if we had any definitive concepts for what the cover should be.  The Air Chief immediately sent him the poster Rob had put together and Adam liked it a great deal.  Enough so that he opted to make it his composition and a week later send us his own pencil roughs of that image done in his style.  Both Rob and the Air Chief were thrilled and he was given the green light to proceed.

Now a few more months go by and then we get a letter from Adam saying he has begun work on the cover painting for THE VRIL AGENDA.  The above image was the next piece we received.  It was superb and everything we had hoped for.  The only suggestion the Air Chief had was to lighten the color of Jim Anthony's hair, reminding Adam that in this picture he is 70, though fit, his hair should be mostly all silver color.  Adam agreed and informed he still had a few more elements he wanted to add to the painting to include the swastika on the zeppelin.  By now Rob and the Air Chief were really excited.

And so another week goes by and voila, Adam turns in the completed cover, considerably lighter than the previous version, with all the detailing in place.   The Air Chief was thrilled beyond words.  This is simply one magnificent pulp image.  But upon reflection, we realized Adam, by using up all the available space he could within the confines of the image, had inadvertently created a real problem for us.  How on earth could we add the title, our logos, the author's names and anything else to sell the book…without covering up way too much of a truly gorgeous piece of artwork.  The old Air Chief was really scratching his head on this one and relayed his concerns to Rob, not believing there was any way to wrap this up with all that added stuff and not in some way diminish the impact of the overall image.  Of course the Air Chief should have had more faith in Mr. Davis.  Honestly, since becoming our partner in this pulp venture, Rob has become one of the most talented book designers in the business.  We should have know he'd figure out a way to make Adam's picture soar….at the same turning into an actual book cover.

Rob's ingenious solution was to add a orange/brown border that would match Adam's palette of colors, with ample space at the top for the book's title.  From that point on, it was just a matter of adding the other elements so as to not cover the primary heroes or their background.  He cleverly used the same font he had whipped up for the original poster way back when, and a thinner, more art deco type for the character's names and the bottom tag line.  When the Air Chief saw the final, completed cover, he about jumped out of his chair to yell…WAHOOOO!!!   Since releasing the book, earlier this past week, we have received nothing but enthusiastic praise for this cover, which truly credits two amazing artists, Adam Shaw and Rob Davis, work in sync to produce something so damn beautiful.

And of course, the book IS now on sale at available at Amazon in both hard-copy and on Kindle.  It is a fantastic read, one of the best we've ever published.  We hope you'll give it look-see.

And that wraps up this week's Flight Log, Loyal Airmen, we hope you've enjoyed this peek behind the curtain on how great artwork evolves.  Thanks ever for stopping by and until next week, take care,

Ron – Over & Out!