Waren Ellis 's - Crooked Little Vein

[ultramandingo]

BAD SIGNAL - WAREN ELLIS

Apparently I'm in ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY, on
the Hot 100 list of creative people arbitrarily chosen by
the drunks and perverts on staff at America's best-loved
magazine about stuff.

Someone described my position on the list as "behind
JK Rowling."

Some frequently asked questions
on CROOKED LITTLE VEIN:

* I'm not in charge of shipping. I
don't know when CLV will reach your
country. I don't know when Amazon
will send it to you. I'm getting a
stupid number of questions on these
topics. Listen: I'm Not The Publisher.

* This is Not Comics: this book is
not released on a Wednesday cycle.
There is no "late." If a local supplier
is telling you they don't get the
book until August, well, that's when
they're getting the book, and it's
nothing to do with me.

* The cover is from a political
cartoon by Benjamin Franklin. It
has nothing to do with any band,
any poster, or Skrulls.

* There is no book tour. I can't
afford to do one, and the publisher
apparently wasn't interested, as
the subject was never broached.
So, no, I will not be appearing in
Legstump, Indiana in support of
the novel.

* As of an hour or two ago, CLV's
Amazon ranking was #465.

You don't get a real sense of how
weird some comics fans are until
you put a prose book in front of
them. You have no idea how many
of them emailed to DEMAND to
know why the book was late because
their local bookseller didn't have
the July 24 publication date listed.
One guy wanted to know how many
pages long it was before he bought
it, in case it wasn't good value.

And the number of people who've
told me I've "sold out" by getting
listed in EW... I almost hate to tell
them it's the second time. Funny
stuff.
---
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sent from pub, street or road

[divinebrown]

I am beyond excited for this. I'm looking forward to seeing how Ellis works in prose form. I expect the best from Fell and Desolation Jones expanded into several hundred pages of sheer awesomeness.

[ultramandingo]

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

I got a copy of CROOKED LITTLE
VEIN today. The printed, complete,
finished object. It's a little black
book, which is perfect. Lovely
little thing it is. Turned it around
in my hands for a while.

People keep asking me if I'm leaving
comics. I tell you: today, it's very
tempting.


---
Sent via mobile device
sent from pub, street or road

[DWEarhart]

IF he left comics, I'd still follow his work. He's already involved with his second prose novel - I forgot how far along, as far as written and book deals, but whatever happens, I'll read just about whatever he writes.

[ultramandingo]

"At the start of this dark, demented fiction debut from Ellis, the creator of DC Comics' Transmetropolitan and The Authority, the U.S. president's heroin-addicted chief of staff hires 25-year-old Lower East Side PI Mike McGill to find the other Constitution. This is a secret document privately authored by several of the Founders detailing the real intent of their design for American society, which a debauched vice-president Nixon lost in the '50s. With half a mill in black ops money, Mike hires cute tattooed Trix Holmes to be his guide to America's deviant underworld, whence the 50-year-old cold trail begins. In their search for the missing document, reputedly bound in the skin of the extraterrestrial entity that plagued Benjamin Franklin's ass over six nights in Paris, the pair make some wild pit stops in Columbus, Ohio; San Antonio, Tex.; Vegas; and, finally, L.A. The home of the free and the land of the brave has rarely looked so creepy in this snappily paced homage to William Burroughs's Naked Lunch."

........sounds like a lost deslation jones script - plus you can read the first chapter at evil amazon!

[Expletive Deleted]

sounds like a lost deslation jones scriptIf the spoilers I saw on the V are accurate . . . those of us already familiar with his comics work aren't going to see all that much in the way of new ideas.

[ultramandingo]

......... im sold - "secret rat knowledge" !!!!!!

"Chapter One - I opened my eyes to see the rat taking a piss in my coffee mug. It was a huge brown bastard; had a body like a turd with legs and beady black eyes full of secret rat knowledge. Making a smug huffing sound, it threw itself from the table to the floor, and scuttled back into the hole in the wall where it had spent the last three months planning new ways to screw me around............"


ps. what the hell is your avitar from?

[Expletive Deleted]

ps. what the hell is your avitar from?The latest Great Lakes Avengers one-shot. It's Penance's pet cat, P-Cat the Penitent Puss.

[Roquefort Raider]

The latest Great Lakes Avengers one-shot. It's Penance's pet cat, P-Cat the Penitent Puss.

That's hilarious!!!

[DWEarhart]

I could have finished this thing in one day. the dialect treads along so willingly.

As far as ideas go, no, it's nothing new, and throughout the whole thing Warren Ellis does not try to pretend that you are reading anything besides Warren Ellis. But, there are moments when the characters take over, and you start to see the human aspect to the whole idea of this story. Maybe it was by accident, maybe not, but I loved it.

Too many radical ideas in every chapter, but I'll wait to see if that's a good or bad thing when his next prose work comes out. It's already being produced - you can't stop it.

[radunga]

IF he left comics, I'd still follow his work. He's already involved with his second prose novel - I forgot how far along, as far as written and book deals, but whatever happens, I'll read just about whatever he writes.

As long as he finishs planetary... I think he can´t do any better than that in comics.

[DWEarhart]

The script for the final Planetary has been done for three or four weeks. Cassaday just needs to finish up the pencils.

[z0mbie_aut0pil0t]

The book was amazing. I couldn't put it down. Go check it out.

[berk]

I read the first few lines in the bookstore the other day and was very tempted to pick it up, but I'm gonna try to stick to my original plan and wait for the ppb. Does look good, though. Now to avoid the spoilers until the ppb comes out.

[Paul McEnery]

I had a good time with it. It was like shagging that woman you like at the bar, the one who takes you home every now and again, and you go along willingly, even though you know there'll be that Crying Game moment when the clothes come off, because by now it's happened a dozen times or so, and you've remembered to bring the lube.

And yes, there is nothing remotely Chicago about the narrator. Who's not quite as unreliable as Warren perhaps thinks he is (or is that as Mike McGill thinks he is?).

And yes, this reads like the third book in the trilogy between Fell and DJ. Which is why each of them feels a little bit like thin gruel. And each of them leaves you scratching to remember where you first saw that story IRL on the intarwub.

[ultramandingo]

........crap! im still waiting for mine . stupid amazon .i added robert evans " kid stays in the picture " audio cd to get free shiping . wonder wich one is creepy-er

[DWEarhart]

Ellis talking about his next novel - Listener. From badsignal:


In between, of course, writing all these fucking comics, and writing LISTENER, Novel #2. Which I'm currently pulling apart in my head. William Morrow were angling for alonger novel, but I'd originally intended to continue working in thestripped-back style of CROOKED LITTLE VEIN. With some perspective, finally, on CLV, I'm going back and opening up the first 14000 words of LISTENER, writing longer and letting the thing take some time.

[ultramandingo]

bad signal
WARREN ELLIS

If you happen to stay in the Drake
Hotel in Toronto during the month
of September, you will be presented
with a copy of CROOKED LITTLE
VEIN. All month. Anyone who checks
in. Whether you want it or not.
And, when you retire to your room,
you will find on your phone there
a recorded message. From me.
Talking about CROOKED LITTLE
VEIN.

How bizarre is that?

Of all the promotional stunts I've
been involved with, this one is by
far the oddest.

* * * * *

[KenK]

I just finished reading the book, and I thought it was great for the most part. For comic readers, yes, if you're familiar with Desolation Jones, this is pretty much the first arc of DJ in prose form. Then you've got the Chief of Staff who couldn't be more like Dirk Anger from Nextwave.

[Paul McEnery]

It's just occured to me that CLV is like a greatest hits album. The fans pick it up for the couple of obscure b-sides, but it's meant for the greater public who aren't so familiar with the material.