Greeting Loyal Airmen, today's Flight Log is another late entry.  The reason it is being compiled early this morning is because last evening the Air Chief finished his latest Brother Bones short story.

Since creating the Undead Avenger of the fictional city Cape Noire, this character has taken us on a really wild ride through every possible media imaginable from comics like the one-shot pictured about with stunning art by John Poacek.  Bones would also appear in an 8 pg strip in ALL STAR PULP COMICS # 2 as drawn by Joe Arnold.  Joe and the Air Chief are hoping to do another 8 pager for the third issue now in the works.

Brother Bones has even appeared in audio thanks to the good people at Dynamic Ram Audio with four wonderful short stories taken from the first book collection and superbly read by Mark Kalita.  Note, the remaining stories in that collection will be released soon as audio files, again read by Mark but from another company this time.  Stay tuned for further announcements.

The Undead Avenger has even teamed up with other popular pulp heroes like the Pulptress above in a story called The Butcher's Festival which appeared in her book from Pro Se Productions.  It, and several other Brother Bones adventures that were featured in Pro Se books will be reprinted, along with the new tales, in the next Brother Bones collection.  Again, stay tuned Loyal Airmen.

And last year we Bones chronicled by other talented writers such Roman Leary who penned the first ever full length Brother Bones novel, SIX DAYS OF THE DRAGON.  Barry Reese, a well known new pulp author who had the cast of Brother Bones appear in one of his newest Lazarus Gray tales. That story will be featured in volume five of that series soon to be released from Pro Se Productions.  Trust the Air Chief, you are going to love it.

We haven't even mentioned the wonderful action figure done up by Marshal Collectibles or the fact that we are in talks with a role-playing company interested in doing a Brother Bones game.  Now that would be something to see.  We'll keep our fingers crossed this happens and keep you posted along the way.

And so last night, as we stated above, we wrapped up the newest Bones adventure; a really gruesome, gritty tale and will be part of the new Brother Bones collection which we hope to have out relatively soon.  Most of our Airship 27 contain at least 60,000 words.  At present the new collection has just topped 55,000.  Meaning, the Air Chief needs to get busy and done one more short to get the package completed.

As we said, its been a wild ride and where it will lead, we have no idea.  Really.  The writer's muse, especially when it comes to Undead Avenger, is a fickle thing and we never know where it will lead next.  But none of this would ever have been possible without all your support, Loyal Airmen.  For that we will be eternally grateful.  Hang in there, we've a hunch this ride is just getting into high gear.

Ron Over & Out!

Greeting Loyal Airmen, our apologies for this late posting.  As many of you know, the Air Chief is a co-host on the comic orientated weekly podcast, ZONE 4.  We record the show on Thursday and then it is posted at the Comic Related website Friday evening.  Well, we had a late hour recording yesterday, which made it impossible for us to get this week's Flight Log written early.  ZONE 4 last week posted its 250th episode and there are tons of changes in the works for the program coming in 2014.  If you've never listened to it before, why not give it try this week.  We have a blast doing it.

As of the 1st of Jan all our older Airship 27 Productions pulp titles were no longer being published by Cornerstone Book Publishers and all rights to these books reverted to the creators.  At which point we are now in the process of putting together new Airship 27 Editions.  One of Art Director Rob Davis' primary goals is to get ALL 76 of our books up at Amazon's Kindle.  Last year saw a very sharp rise in our digital sales and as more and more of our fans get used to downloading their favorite books on these e-readers, we fully expect these kinds of sales to continue to climb.  To that end, Rob kicked off the past week by putting four of our older titles on Kindle. These included the historic DAMBALLA by Charles Saunders, which debut the very first ever black 1930s avenger hero.  Also arriving on Kindle was Don Gates debut of his Challenger Storm character in Isle of Blood with art by Pulp Factor Award winner Michale Kaluta.  Also added to the Kindle roster were MYSTERY MEN (& Women) volumes 1 & 2.  All Loyal Airmen can keep abreast of which old titles are being posted to Kindle by simply visiting our website on a regular basis. Simply click on the dirigible logo to the left of this Flight Log.  Note, all titles from 2013 on have been done via Amazon and so are on Kindle as is our now regular publishing routine.

As all you Loyal Airmen know, Airship 27 Productions has published brand new Sherlock Holmes adventures via our Consulting Detective series for several years now and these are amongst our most popular titles.  Over the course of that time, several of you have asked why the Air Chief has never written a Holmes tale and the honest answer is, we have never felt confident enough to do so.  Writing a traditional Conan Doyle story means mimicking the voice of Dr. Watson in telling the story. Believe us, that is no easy task and one of the reasons we appreciate the talented writers we've worked with who can do this literary trick.  Ergo, we have pretty much resigned ourselves to the fact that we would most likely never write a Sherlock Holmes story.

Well, as ever, the adage of “never say never” seems to have nailed us square.  Yesterday the Air Chief received a wonderful invitation to contribute to a new Sherlock Holmes anthology being produced by an Australian writer/editor.  The thing is, this collection will feature alternate world versions of Holmes and the connecting thread is that his sidekick will NOT be Dr. Watson.  In the editor's note was a list of other noted writers who have signed on to this project and some of the historical and fictional characters they have partnered the Great Detective with.  We were really ….really impressed with the list and just like that a very tiny kernel of an idea began to grow in our mind in regards to one particular “doctor” we've always been fascinated with.  So we suggested our concept to this Australian editor and he thought it was solid and encouraged us to go ahead and write it.  Will we?  The deadline is some time in April.  We're currently putting the finishing touches on a new Brother Bones tale and then there's crime anthology Terrence McCauley is edited that we've yet to address.  For the past twenty four hours we've waffled back and forth as to commit or…not?

What do you think?  All comments are most welcome.  As ever thanks for stopping by.
Ron – Over & Out!

Greetings Loyal Airmen, last week we took a long look back at 2013.  Well, that year is history now and as the new year begins, we set our sights forwards as to what we can expect in the coming months. Airship 27 Productions will once again be making appearances at the Windy City Pulp & Paper Show again this year.  Above is a photo of Art Director Rob Davis and the Air Chief after got set up at last year's show. Note, the people promoting the show are once again supporting the New Pulp Community and yours truly and Tommy Hancock will be setting up all kinds of events to celebrate New Pulp.  So keep tuned to this Flight Log and other postings on Facebook.  Of course our second big pulp show is Pulp Fest, this year at the end of July and once again in Columbus, Ohio.  We truly hope to see lots of our Loyal Airmen at these two shows.  Of course, separately, Rob and the Air Chief will also be appearing at various comic cons etc. throughout the year.

As the Air Chief looks ahead to the next twelve months, we can't help but get exited as we have quite a few things coming out.  Pulp-wise we'll have a story in the new OPERATOR 5 anthology from Moonstone Books which is scheduled for a March release.  We also a full-lenght G8 & His Battle Aces novel for Moonstone but a release date has yet to be set.  Then of course we'll be doing new black and white comic book series THE SPIDER – DOMINO LADY for them with art by Michael Dorman and letters by Brant Fowler.  We've seen half the first issue and it blew us away.

Of course Moonstone isn't the only publisher that we'll have work appearing in.  Van Plexico's WHITE ROCKET BOOKS is doing PRIDE OF THE MOHICANS, an anthology featuring the characters from James Fenimore Cooper's classic LAST OF THE MOHICANS and the Air Chief has a fast pace, outdoor adventure yarn in this collection.   We also have an Athena Voltaire flying adventure coming soon from SEQUENTIAL PULPS, based on creator Steve Bryant's popular pulp character.  And over the Christmas holidays the Air Chief finished a new story called THE WIND-UP KID intended for Russ Anderson's third volume of HOW THE WEST WAS WEIRD for PULP WORK PRESS.  As you can see, the Air Chief has lots and lots of cool stuff coming in 2014.

So what about Airship 27 Productions you asked?  Well never fear, we have some truly amazing anthologies and novels headed your way in 2014.  Amongst these are our second Captain Action book, HEARTS OF THE RISING SUN by Jim Beard, its a sequel to RIDDLE OF THE GLOWING MEN (above) and you won't want to miss it.  We've got tons of great new anthologies as well featuring such classic pulp heroes as THE GREEN GHOST, THE PURPLE SCAR and DOMINO LADY to name a few.

Last year we released our second SINBAD – THE NEW VOYAGES anthology (see above) and while we are hard at work on a third such collection, before that sees print we will be publishing our first full length Sinbad novel (SINBAD & THE WARRIORS OF FOREVER) written by C.B. Harvey and its a classic fantasy adventure that will blow you away.  Again just a small sampling of the books we have coming your way.

And books won't be our only offerings in 2014.  We've three new Brother Bones short audio presentations on the way (like the one above) to include the popular GORILLA DREAMS.  Like the first four we produced, these will also be ready by the super talented Mark Kalita.  Our second Captain Hazzard audio book, CITADEL OF FEAR is also in production and should soon be available in another month or so.
Like we said, there's no keeping the old Airship 27 down.  It is going to be a truly awesome year with lots of fun projects and products.  So stay tuned.

And now we end this first Flight Log of 2014 with some OUTSTANDING NEWS.  A few months ago we reported that Marvel Studios was considering developing a television series around Agent Peggy Carter from the CAPTAIN AMERICA movie we loved so much.  Well it has just been announced that this concept has been given the green light due to overwhelming fan response and there IS going to be a Peggy Carter series which will detail how she and others created SHIELD in the years after World War II.
The Air Chief is thrilled beyond words about this news.  We love the current AGENTS OF SHIELDS and this new show is going to be the perfect companion to it. Thank you Marvel Studios for listening to your fans.

And with that we end our first Flight Log of the new year.  Talk about exciting times, oh yeah!
Ron Over & Out!

                  
Greeting Loyal Airmen, well Christmas is behind us and we pray all of you had a wonderful time with friends and family as this Holy time should be spent.  We had some concern as our mother, Gabrielle Fortier, 89 years young, took a bad fall at the Senior Facility where she lives back in New Hampshire and the day before Christmas underwent surgery to put steel pins in her writs and a titanium pin in her fractured hip. Thank God she came through surgery well but now comes the hard part, the physical therapy to regain her mobility. It is going to be a painful but necessary process and we humbly ask your prayers on her behalf.  It seems 2013 was indeed a year of ups and downs, losses and victories.  Realizing this would be our last Flight Log of this memorable year, we decided to take a short look back at some of our own highlights and share them with you.

Airship 27 Productions kicked off its most productive year ever with the release of our fourth SHERLOCK HOLMES – Consulting Detective book.  Always a huge fan favorite, this series would book-end 2013 as our last title released only a few short weeks ago was the fifth volume in this series. In between those two titles, were 15 other pulp anthologies and novels and one 1 children's book (our first ever) for a grand total of 18 Airship 27 titles in one year.  Not bad for a two man operation.  We want to publicly thank our partner and art director, Rob Davis, whose tireless efforts and creative design work make all this possible.  It was a hell of a ride; both physical and creative.

Early in the year, Rob and the Air Chief were invited to Norman, Oklahoma, to be guest of the Oklahoma Fiction Writers Conference, an organization consisting of almost 800 writers.  It was a first time experience for us and there we gave two 90 minute presentations on HOW TO WRITE A GRAPHIC NOVEL.  We used our own DAUGHTER OF DRACULA book as the main feature of our power-point presentation with yours truly discussing the basics of script writing and Rob explaining how a professional graphic artist adapts such a script.  To help get these points across, we also sold copies of both the graphic novel and my script for it (seen above).  It was such an amazing, fun trip for both of us. Sadly, the very area of Oklahoma we were in was hit by those awful tornadoes only two weeks later.

Spring had finally arrived and being diehard Red Sox fans, Valerie and the Air Chief were thrilled to see baseball start up again with a new team.  After the Sox dismal last place showing in 2012, we weren't getting our hopes up too much.  This would clearly be a rebuilding year as all baseball fans believed.  So we started watching the games and keeping our fingers crossed.  Then came the Patriot's Day Boston Marathon bombing which kill and crippled so many innocent, good people as perpetrated by two insane brothers. both avowed Muslim terrorists.  Thanks to the fine efforts of Boston law enforcement, they were captured within days of the incident. It was another reminder that evil does exist in the world and there are fanatics that hate our democracy and freedoms, enough to want to destroy them any way they can. What these zealots don't take into account is the internal and spiritual fortitude of the American people and soon the people of Boston were loudly proclaiming a new motto that would echo all over the country throughout the summer – BOSTON STRONG!

Shortly after all this we were winging our way back to New England to attend the high school graduation of our granddaughter Chelsea.  We were all so proud of her.  This fall she began her college career in Wheelock, a Boston College and is loving it.  Upon getting back to Colorado from this whirlwind visit back east, the Air Chief somehow threw out his lower back and for several weeks was dealing with a very familiar pain. Still we kept up with our own stretching and daily walking routine and got things back to normal finally. In fact just in time before Rob and the Air Chief were to fly to Chicago for the Windy City Pulp & Paper Convention.

We were particularly excited about the fact that for the first time ever we would have a premium to offer all our Loyal Airmen who come out and support us at these conventions; the all cloth Airship 27 patch. We would gave one away freely to anyone who bought two of our books, or they could simply buy a patch for the low fee of $3.  We are happy to report the patches were a huge hit, both at Windy City and later at Pulp Fest.

One of the big highlights of the Windy City convention is the presentations of the Pulp Factory Awards given out Friday night to recognize in the best in New Pulp fiction and artwork from the previous year's publications.  Having won the PF Award for Best Pulp Short Story the previous year, we were stunned to do it again this year for our tale THE GHOUL, which appeared in the Pro Se Productions book MONSTER ACES as created and edited by Jim Beard.  Above is the happy Air Chief with his second PF Award along side the Managing Editor of Pro Se, our good friend Tommy Hancock.  It truly was a remarkable time and show.  So many of our colleagues and fans were in attendances and lots of great memories were made.

Then, no sooner do we fly home from the con, then the Air Chief and Valerie packed up once again and this time headed down to Denver to be guests at the second annual Denver Comic Comic. The year prior, the con's debut had brought in nearly 26,000 fans.  Most of us thought we'd see them expand to the 30,000 mark. Ha, we were so far off the mark it was ridiculous.  In the end the final tally was closer to 48,000 fans who turned out during those four days. It was crazy and we had so much fun. There were so many cosplayers like the group pictured above. And once again the Air Chief made lots of great new fans. We can only imagine what next year's show will be like.  Ha.

Then a short week later, barely having recovered from the DCC, the Air Chief and pro-artist, Felipe Echevarria were driving up to nearby Cheyenne Wyoming to put on a two day workshop in Comics and Graphic Novel storytelling.  See what we mean about a Traveling Year?  Above is the flier for that event and we had ten students take the workshop.  This was the first time the Air Chief had ever done anything like this at a college venue and we very much hope to do a lot more of these in the future.

Summer seemed to fly by in the blink of an eye.  Suddenly we were into the last week of July and it was once again time to for Rob and the Air Chief to wing our way to Columbus, Ohio, and Pulp Fest.  As we mentioned before, we had the new patch premiums on hand and Rob had just managed to put together the multi-disc audio set for our book – CAPTAIN HAZZARD – PYTHON MEN OF THE LOST CITY as read by Joe Stofko and produced by Dynamic Ram Studios. It is on four six disc and last six hours long. You can also purchase it on line as a download from the popular site www.Adidble.com – Rob had assembled five sets and we sold four of them at the show.  The audio book is doing extremely well and as we write these words, Joe is now recording the second of our Captain Hazzard adventures, CITADEL OF FEAR.

Another truly fun gathering of friends and fans.  While at Pulp Fest we released the 11th issue of our comic series, MR. JIGSAW – Man of a Thousand Parts.

Unfortunately the Air Chief didn't realize until he'd flown back home that the book had two pages printed out of order.  Never mind the story itself was a time travel and those mixed up pages made the story incomprehensible.  We had to go back to the printers, scrap the original files and redo the entire book.  Happily with weeks the clean edition was out and available to our legion of Jiggy fans.  And we are happy to report that issue # 12 should be out early in 2014.

With summer quickly fading into our rear-view mirror, one of our major family events occurred when our grandson Alex went and passed his driver's test and obtained his driver's license.  We couldn't be more proud of him.  Now he's working every chance to earn enough to eventually buy his own car. We so admire his determination.

Of course Fall brought with it the end of the regular baseball season and lo and behold, the Red Sox had won their division!!  Going from last to first place in just one season.  And all of us knew the BOSTON STRONG theme was what was inspiring this team of talented ball players to achieve the impossible.  October arrived and our battling Sox beat the Tamp Bay Rays to seal the Division Championship. Then they took on the powerful Detroit Tigers and again managed to find a way to come out on top as American League Champs.  Finally it was time to face the National League Champs, the St.Louis Cardinals in the 2013 World Series.  The Red Sox and Cardinals slugged it out, each team laying it all out on the field but in the end, on a glorious night in Fenway Park, the bearded Red Sox beat the Cardinals in a Game 6 and won the series.  The Red Sox were the World Champs and Boston was stronger than ever.  If this wasn't a real life metaphor of good and right triumphing over evil, the Air Chief doesn't know what is.  We had to wipe away a few stray tears watching these guys hold up that trophy.  AMAZING!!!

On Nov 5th, the Air Chief turned 67 years old.  A week later, Dark Horse comics released a magnificent reprinted edition of  TERMINATOR – BURNING EARTH, a min-series we'd done over twenty five years ago at the start of our career with artist Alex Ross.  Here we are at a local comic shop along with our pal and protege, Todd Jones who holds up his copy.  It was icing on the cake for us that had been this wild and crazy year.  Oh, there were tons of other things we'll never forget about 2013, there were some great books, movies and TV series that entertained us greatly.  After all, life is to be live and we like to think we've finally gotten that down pat.

This was but a small glimpse and we hope your own experiences were filled with mostly happy ones too. And we thank you for stopping by every week, supporting us and wish you and yours a truly FANTASTIC & HAPPY NEW YEAR.  Be safe and we'll see you back here in seven.

Ron – Over & Out!

Greeting Loyal Airmen, sorry this week's Flight Log was a bit delayed in getting up.  What with Christmas only days away, the Air Chief is hustling to get things ready etc.  A hectic, but fun time of the year to be sure.

Last week we announced the release of Airship 27 Productions fifth volume of our best selling series, SHERLOCK HOLMES – Consulting Detective. One of the writers in that collection was one of our regulars, Canadian Andrew Salmon. Back in 2009 Andrew submitted a Sherlock Holmes tale for volume one.  It was his first Sherlock Holmes story and won him the Pulp Factory Award for Best Pulp Short Story of 2009.  Since then, Andrew has written a new Holmes and Watson adventure for each consecutive volume of the series and in the process made a reputation for himself as one of the premier Sherlock Holmes writers working today.  Enough so that the good people at Fightcard press approached him earlier in the year to see if he would be up to the challenge of writing a Fightcard book starring the Great Detective.  Andrew accepted that challenge and wrote a brilliant tale called SHERLOCK HOLMES – WORK CAPITOL that was recently released.  In it Holmes delves into the world of London's illegal bare-knuckles fighting.  The book is superb, meticulously researched and written.  In a review the Air Chief posted on-line recently, we dared to called Andrew's best Holmes fiction to date.  If you are a Sherlock Holmes fan, please, head on over to Amazon where it is available in both hard copy and on Kindle.  You'll be glad you did.

One of the things this time of year seems to always bring with it are long-ago memories of other Christmas times when we were young.  People often asks us if there were any particular gifts we remember fondly and our answer is always the same.  Growing up in the late 40s and into the 50s, one of our heroes was the King of the Cowboys, Roy Rogers.  Roy had a half hour show on television and we never missed it.  Around 1956, at the ripe old age of ten, we recall television ads for a Roy Rogers Double R Bar Ranch set that came with the ranch, cattle, horses and figures of Roy on his horse Trigger, his wife Dale Evans on her Buttermilk, Bullet their German Shepherd dog, and there was even foreman comedian Pat Brady with his jeep NelleBelle.  We went crazy over that set and we pestered Mom and Dad non-stop about that truly awesome set of figures.  We were never a rich family, both our parents worked and money was always in short supply, so Christmas wishes were always a fifty-fifty thing.  But that year, we fondly remember waking up, around 6 a.m., Christmas morning and rushing down the stairs to the living room where we found waiting for us, all laid out under the Christmas tree none other than the entire Roy Rogers Doube R Bar Ranch Set.

Dad had carefully taken out every single piece from the box and arranged the entire diorama out beautifully.  To this day, fifty-seven years later, the Air Chief has never forgotten the joyful euphoria that overwhelmed us as we dropped to the floor and reverently held each of those pieces in our hands.  It truly was the most wonderful Christmas the little Air Chief had ever had.

For the Air Chief and his entire family, Christmas is also a Holy Time where we take time to pray and thank our beloved savior, Jesus Christ, for this miracle of friends and family he has filled our lives with.  We pray that all His blessing will shower down on your families on this special of times and that Santa will truly make this for all of you…THE BEST CHRISTMAS EVER!!!

Ron – Over & Out!

Greeting Loyal Airmen, well here we announcing our 18th and final Airship 27 Production title of 2013.  Last year, Rob Davis and the Air Chief together produced a record setting 16 titles.  We were thrilled with that number and thought this year we might just scale things back a little bit.  Do keep in mind we are strictly a two man operation primarily and Rob still works a full time “day” job while assembling all our books at night after he gets home.

Anyway, 2013 rolled in and out of the blue writer Michael Vance joined the team as our official Marketing Manager and we were thrilled to have him aboard.  We began putting out titles, novels and anthologies and even our first ever children's book – BARRY BASKERVILLE SOLVES A CASE by Richard Kellogg with art by Gary Kato.  So here we are, the start of December and we have just published our 18th title!  No one is more surprised about this then Rob and the Air Chief.  And rest assured we know fully well none of this would have been possible save for the supremely talented, and loyal, writers and artist who deliver such amazing work for us constantly.

And so our newest title is –  SHERLOCK HOLMES – Consulting Detective Vol 5!!  It features four new classic Homes and Watson tales as written by Chuck Miller, Aaron Smith, Andrew Salmon and I.A. Watson, every one of them a mystery gem.  Rob provides twelve gorgeous interior illustrations and the cover (above) is by the truly gifted Mike Fyles.  These Sherlock Holmes anthologies have been amongst our best selling titles since we started publishing them and fans keep asking us for more, which we are only too happy to provide them with.  As ever this is now on sale at Amazon but as a hard copy and on their Kindle e-reader.  We hope you'll give it a look-see.

On the comic front the Air Chief is still having a blast working with artist Michael Dorman on our new SPIDER-DOMINO LADY series for Moonstone Comics.  This past week we recruited our good friend Brant Fowler, one of our co-host on the weekly Zone 4 internet podcast show, to be the book's letterer and we couldn't be happier.  Brant's one of the finest comic book letterer's in the business.  The Air Chief finished the second script and has turned it in while Michael is almost half-way through drawing the pages for the first issue.  Stay tuned, we'll keep you posted as it moves along.

And there you have it for this week, Loyal Airmen, in the midst of the Holiday Season, we still keep pounding away at what we love best.  We hope all of you are enjoying the season and staying warm.
Till next week, take care,

Ron – Over & Out!

Greeting Loyal Airmen, it looks like winter had finally hit the country in a big way. We here in Colorado had our first real snowstorm of the year this past week, snow from the west and cold from Canada landed right on top of us living us with a carpet of white and sub-zero temps the past few days. Now this front is moving east and we hope all our Loyal Airmen living on the coast bundle up good.

Earlier this week the good people at Warner Brothers Studios announced that Wonder Woman, DC Comics famous Amazonian warrior character created back in the 1940s, would make an appearance in the new Superman vs Batman movie now in pre-production.  This is considered a sequel to the somewhat successful film released earlier this year with Henry Cavill in the role of Superman.  Now over a month ago it was announced the new movie, due in 2015, would feature Batman making this the very first time in live films that DC's two iconic heroes would meet.  Ben Affleck was later announced to play Batman; no comment.  The Air Chief was more than willing to reserve judgment until the film came out.  But then rumors began circulating that Wonder Woman might make an appearance also.  Now our thought here is, isn't this starting to crowd the picture?  Consider the entire returning cast of supporting players from MAN OF STEEL to include Diane Lane and Amy Adams are all coming back.  Now they want to ad yet another hero character meaning another origin story will have to be whipped up before the action can get going.  How long is this movie going to be.

Then a few days ago WB announced their choice to plane the famous female super hero, Gal Godat, a little known Israeli actor who appeared in the Fast & Furious movies.  Then the pictures of her surfaced the Air Chief had one of the biggest laughs he's had all year.  A tall, skinny, anorexic model is going to play the battling amazon?  In what world are these people living?  Certainly not ours.

From the time she first burst onto the pages of DC comic, Wonder Woman has always been portrayed as statuesque, voluptuous, strong and dynamic.  Which of those adjuectives suits Ms. Godat?  We look at pictures of her and want to sit her down and give her a good meal.  And please, do not give us that argument that she has several years to train and bulk up.  On what frame?  And is she going to get breast enlargement.  Sorry if we sound sexist here, but the truth is Wonder Woman is well endowed and has LOTS of “wonderful” curves in all the right places.  Ms. Godat is all bones and angles.  Oh, you say, well, its about her ability to act.  Really?  Well listen up people, Meryl Streep can act but that doesn't mean she should be cast to play Wonder Woman.  This whole casting is a joke and proof once again that when it comes to big budget comic book based movies, Marvel whips DC every single time.  Sigh.

On a much happier note, work continues on the new SPIDER – DOMINO LADY comic book series the Air Chief is writing for Moonstone Comics with artist Michael Dorman providing the fantastic artwork. Above is a sneak-peak as his interpretation of the classic pulp avenger, the Spider.  Believe Loyal Airmen, the Air Chief is wound-for-sound about this project.  More as it develops.

                                   
Like wise we are very, VERY excited about the early pages done by Colorado artist, Kevin A Johnson on our new BLACK LION graphic novel project.  See sample above.  Kevin's a gifted artist and is doing such a great job bringing our script to visual life.

And there you have it, Loyal Airmen, for yet another week. Again, stay well, warm and in this season of giving, go out and do something nice for someone.  Surprise somebody with an unexpected hug or kiss. They'll feel happier and so will you.

Ron – Over & Out!

Greeting Loyal Airmen and a sincere thanks for your stopping by here on the day after Thanksgiving, er as it has been distastefully called in our materially obsessed world, Black Friday.  But before ranting on that particular tag, which always leaves a bad taste in the Air Chief's mouth, let's remunerate about our wonderful Thanksgiving.

This is one of those special days when we focus out attention on the real things that do matter in our lives, our family and friends.  After all it is the people in your life that actual enrich it and make it worthwhile, not the cars, the multiple iPads, or other such foolish toys we use today to dull our senses.  People, real people.
Here at Hangar 27 we were thinking about each and every one of you and how there would be no Airship 27 Productions without you. That's not just a throw away phrase, it's the truth.  We could produce all the books in the world but without you to buy them, read and enjoy them, what would be the point?  Zip. Nada. So believe me from the bottom of my heart with the Air Chief says THANK YOU.

Valerie wasted no time yesterday locking down the kitchen and starting work on this year's turkey dinner.  All too quickly the house was filled with such insane wonderful smells, everyone's stomach were soon anticipating another sumptuous meal.  Meanwhile son Alan and daughter-in-law Nicole were on the road to pick up our one guest, Matt.  He's a soldier and our granddaughter's boyfriend.  He was scheduled to have duty and at the last minute was told he didn't have to report in for the entire day.  Which left him alone and no way to get home.  When Alan learned this, he smiled, grabbed the car keys and headed for the door.  No one in our circle gets left alone on Thanksgiving.  Cora, our granddaughter works in a bakery at a local supermarket and had no idea that when she got home yesterday, Matt would be here waiting for her.

Having been politely thrown out of  the kitchen for “being in the way,” the Air Chief retreated to another room to while away few hours with a movie.  From our vast DVD collection, we opted for THE PERFECT GAME, a sports film released in 2008 that tells the true story of the Mexican Little League from the poor town of Monterey that won the Little League Championship in 1957 and the young boy who threw the only no-hitter (a perfect game) in the history of that series.  This is a story of faith, hard work and determination, of the ultimate underdogs proving any dream can come true if you want it with all your heart and soul.  The Air Chief loves positive spots movie, they inspire us to be better people and this is one of the best.  It was an excellent choice to get us in  the right Thanksgiving spirit.

Towards the second half of the movie, we set it on pause, as Valerie took a break from cooking and together we made a few phone calls back east; the first to our mother in New Hampshire.  Gabrielle Fortier is now a spry 89 and doing just fine.  She is a resident at a wonderful senior home and had just come back to her room after enjoying a huge turkey dinner.  Mom is a joy and was as ever happy to hear from us.  God did bless us with such an amazing family, that phone call meant the world to all of us.

Finally the afternoon wore on, Alan and Nicole returned with Matt, Cora ended her work shift and grandson Alex appeared from his own room ready to chow down.  Our dinner was simply fantastic as Valerie once again outdid herself.  All of us left the table a few pounds heavier.  Ha.  We aren't kidding.

That was our Thanksgiving.  Later in the evening, unable to complete avoid the Black Friday temptations, Valerie and the kids headed out to see if it were possible to find some early Christmas gifts, leaving the Air Chief to hold down the fort.  They are too familiar with our thoughts on post-Thanksgiving shopping and we were more than happy to simply kick back, have a cup of coffee and find yet a second movie to wrap up the day.  This one we found on cable.

WORDS is a recent release about a struggling young writer played by Bradley Cooper who by accident finds a fifty year old lost manuscript with no name on it.  Touched by what he reads, he becomes haunted by the book because he realizes it is far superior than anything he himself could ever write.  Thus he falls to temptation and plagiarizes the book, selling to a publisher as his own.  When the novel becomes an overnight success, his entire life changes for he believe is the better.  But of course it is all based on a lie and those have a way of eventually being exposed.  Cooper's denouement happens when an old man, deftly played by Jeremy Irons, confronts him one day in the park and reveals himself as the true author of the manuscript.

WORDS captivated us completely as being a writer, the Air Chief understands the value, the power and ultimately the beauty of words.  Over a lifetime we've written lots of them in one form or another, be it comics scripts, articles, short stories or a few novels here and there.  We write because the ability to do so is a gift from God and not to use would be a sin.  Yet, at the same time, we are constantly aware of our limitations and the cold hard truths that our talents only reach a certain level.  We've no illusions we will ever be Stephen King or John Grisham on many of those amazing writers we admire and are in awe of.  And yet we do plod on, even with our own meager skills hoping always that with each new story we do in fact get just a little better than the last time.  It's all any creative soul can aspire to and leave the rest to God. 

Which is why, on this Thanksgiving, we were moved by this brief self-reflection and once again reminded how much we do have and should never ever take for granted.  We pray all of you had a great day and wish you all a truly great holiday season ahead.

Thanks ever,
Ron – Over & Out!

Greetings Loyal Airmen, on a frigid Colorado morning.  We've finally gotten our first snowfall of the year and this morning temps fell way-way below freezing.  Ouch.  Work at Hangar 27 continues at a frantic rate so that we can shout down operations for Thanksgiving coming up next week and all enjoy this holiday of gratitude.  But before that, we have a really awesome announcement this week.

Several years ago the Air Chief had an idea for a new comic book based on the exploits of former Navy Seal Jamal Lyon, codename BLACK LION.  We discussed it with artist amigo Brian Level and he was kind enough to do up sketches of the character, including the one above.  Unfortunately Brian just couldn't commit to do the actual graphic novel having other commitments.  So our search began to find the right artist to bring this character to graphic life.

                 
                                     SGT KEVIN A. JOHNSON & THE AIR CHIEF

As you'll recall from our entry of a few week's back, the Air Chief has the recent pleasure of meeting a former Army Sgt. with 20 years of service to his country, Kevin A. Johnson.  Kevin is now attending art college in Denver and during that momentous meeting, Kevin showed us his portfolio of comics work he had done many, many years ago.  We were blown away with his level of talent and brought up the subject of BLACK LION.   Kevin signed on immediately and in now in the process of drawing the first chapter.

             
After he did up a pencil sketch of the character, we enlisted super inker Mark Stegbauer to join the team and letterer extraordinary, Warren Montgomery.  This morning Kevin sent along the thumbnails for the first three pages and the Air Chief couldn't be more excited.

The plan is to produce the book and post it as a webstrip at the popular COMIC RELATED website on a weekly basis until completed.  Then we will be self-publishing the entire graphic novel.  Stay tuned, this is a project near and dear to the Air Chief.

And that wraps up this week's Flight Log, Loyal Airmen.  We want to take this opportunity to thank eavh and everyone one of you stopping by every week and your loyal support of our endeavors.  All of you are special to us here at Hangar 27.  God bless and HAPPY THANKSGIVING.

Ron – Over & Out!

Greetings Loyal Airmen,  this past week has been one amazing roller coaster ride for the Air Chief, in mostly good ways with one major speed bump along the way.  We've tons of good stuff to share with you, so let's get with it.

Last weekend we were guest at the first ever Rocky Mountain Con in Denver and we had a blast.  Met so many wonderful fans and some colleagues for the very first time.  One, artist Kevin Johnson, painted our second SINBAD The New Voyages anthology and meeting him was a blast. Enough so that we've cooked up a very special comic book project we are going to be working on. More as that develops. As ever there were so many costume players on hand, including the Ghostbusters above who stopped by my table. The dude on the far right is my pal Alex Eggleston.

Now remember that bump in the road we talked about earlier?  Well a few days after con we were working in the office on another pulp title when our 15 years old computer up and died on us. The big fear of any production outfit like ours.  Happily the hard-drive survived, maintaining all our files both text and photos.  We had to be shut down for a few days while we bought a new PC and had the data transferred but now all is well, we're up and running again on a much faster and more efficient machine.

If you'll recall, a few months ago we announced that Dark Horse Comics would soon be releasing a brand new edition of our old TERMINATOR BURNING EARTH mini-series for the defunct Now Comics. Well that beautiful book collected as a graphic novel hit the comic shelves this past week and we are thrilled. It features the first ever comic works of super-start Alex Ross.  Above is my good buddy, fellow writer, Todd Jones and the Air Chief, at the local comic shop here in Fort Collins showing off a copy of the book.  Word I'm getting is they are flying off the shelves, so make sure you grab one before they are all gone.  So many of our fans have told us over the years how much they wanted this book.  Now is your chance.
 
                         

At the start of the week Airship 27 Productions released our newest pulp title, the first ever Brother Bones full length novel, SIX DAYS OF THE DRAGON, and no, we didn't write it.  This is a character we created almost a decade ago and he's appeared in a half-dozen short stories that we published in a collection which won over many pulp fans.  Among them was writer Roman Leary who over the years became one of the characters biggest fans. Enough so that he proposed this idea of writing a Brother Bones novel for us. After reading his detailed plot, the Air Chief was thrilled by the story and gave him the green light to proceed.  Award winning artist Rob Moran signed on to do the book's 9 black and white interior illustrations and the amazing cover seen above, which was colored by artist Shannon Hall. The book is quickly becoming the best selling Airship 27 Productions title ever released.  It is now available at Amazon both as a hard copy and in Kindle.  We hope you'll check it out.  Roman tells an awesome pulp tale you don't want to miss.

And our final news of the week is that we've been recruited by Moonstone books out of Chicago to write a brand new black and white pulp comic book series.  It is called THE SPIDER – DOMINO LADY and teams these two classic pulp heroes.  The book will be 22 pages and appear bi-monthly.  Our run begins with issue # 3 which should be out early next year.  The artist is twenty year veteran, Michael Dorman who extremely talented and having a blast working our our first script which we turned in a week ago. Stay tuned Loyal Airmen, as we'll let you know more as the official release date becomes available to us.  We've written prose stories of both these great characters but this is the very first time we'll get to do comic adventures and we couldn't be more thrilled.

And there you have it Loyal Airmen, a ton of cool stuff as we work our way towards Thanksgiving.  Thanks for stopping by as ever and hopefully one of these days we'll be guest at a con near you.

Ron – Over & Out!