I received the final invoice from the printer for THE SHADOW FILES, the bulk of the money due was for shipping costs from China to Los Angeles. Because of the idiot in charge of making decisions for our country thanks to his moronic voters, the cost of shipping has gone up over $400 from the last time I paid to have SONIC DAYS shipped over here. Even though it’s taken a bigger bite out of my wallet than I expected, as before when I was dealing with the Chumpster’s tariffs, I didn’t pass the along increased costs onto the customers. I held the line and delivered to everyone exactly what they ordered without any bait’n’switch.
I’m still waiting to hear when the books begin their journey to the Port of Los Angeles, and as usual, I’ll get back with the details. By the way, the video above doesn’t give a clue to the surprises and extras featured in the book. And I look forward to everyone’s comments once they’re able to examine the book at greater length.
In the meantime, I was interviewed by the guys putting out the SONIC WEEKLY podcast which you may want to check out. While the focus was on my native Buffalo, NY roots, due to the fact I produced over 2/3 of my Sonic work while living in Buffalo – specifically, the towns of Kenmore and North Tonawanda – there was just no way we could avoid talking about Sonic and related topics.
Currently, I’ve been going full speed ahead working on pages for THE LARA-SU CHRONICLES: SHATTERED TOMORROWS graphic novel, which is scheduled for release Christmas season 2026. At the same time, work on THE LARA-SU APP is progressing with an eye (finally) on a late summer release. Initially, the app will be available in the iOS format through the Apple app store. I hope to have a Droid version out sometime soon after that.
On another note, I’ve been receiving plenty of emails telling me how great the books I’ve published are, but I’d appreciate if everyone spread the word to anyone and everyone with similar interests. Being able to publish the books is one thing, but I’d like to be able to pay everyone at a better rate than I currently am. For that to happen, I need to sell more copies.
I’ve yet to distribute to comic book stores and other outlets precisely because for the most part I’ve been a one-man band and I don’t have a staff to assist me. While it’s true I have Patrick working on the app, Ethan handling recoloring and translators transcribing my script into other languages to allow for the app to reach a greater audience, those are specific tasks, and truth be told, even they aren’t getting paid what they really deserve. And I haven’t even mentioned recruiting new talent to take on penciling, inking and coloring, something I would love to do, but isn’t feasible at this time.
So I need everyone to get the word out how the books are presenting the best version of these stories and encourage people to check them out. It’s much appreciated.
Finally, I’m still working on getting out to more conventions and will post those dates and locations once they’re confirmed. Thanks for reading and take care.