On the Book Front

Things are proceeding well with the bindery, the mailing lists, and the US fullfillment center. There is still plenty of infrastructural work to do, but we’re gradually excising the parts of the process that don’t work well enough and replacing them with things that do.

ITEM: Autarch, among many other things an Arktoons creator, has launched its new Kickstarter campaign for ASCENDANT: PLATINUM EDITION. A revised second edition of the RPG featuring traditional superheroes who are attractive, straight, and even occasionally right-of-center, if you can imagine such a thing.

ITEM: Today is the last day to subscribe to CASTALIA LIBRARY and receive THE ARTS OF WAR as part of your subscription. Please note that a catchup payment will be required as this is the second month of the two-part subscription. The next book in the subscription series, #21, will be announced tomorrow to the subscribers, via the appropriate mailing list to the non-subscribers, and on the Darkstream. We’ve created the new mailing list to ensure externally-verifiable perfect compliance with the GDPR and eliminate the risk of malicious unfounded abuse complaints, as the mailing service provider can now see and confirm that every single individual on the list proactively signed up for it via their own server.

ITEM: Chuck Dixon is flying on Midnight’s War: Night Streets. And the art is spectacular. New heights, my friends, is what Arkhaven is reaching.

ITEM: Speaking of The Legend, the first in the CHUCK DIXON’S CONAN series, THE SIEGE OF THE BLACK CITADEL, is now available in paperback from Castalia House. An excerpt is below. The second in the series, CARAVAN OF THE DAMNED, is already complete and will be published later this year.

I’ll have more to say about the bindery on tonight’s Darkstream.

Continue reading “On the Book Front”

No Truth, No Taste

The (((CBS producers))) thought the Charlie Brown Christmas was too slow, too religious, and didn’t like the music. The truth turned out to be the precise opposite, of course.

“Isn’t there anyone who knows what Christmas is all about?” an exasperated Charlie Brown exclaims. “Sure, Charlie Brown,” Linus reassures him, “I can tell you what Christmas is all about.” And then Linus famously recites Luke 2.8-14, part of the biblical Christmas story.

It’s just seven verses. Read by the innocent voice of real child (rather than an adult voice actor), it’s the highlight of the show for many people.

And yet those seven verses almost got the whole thing canceled.

When Charles Schultz, the creator of the Peanuts comic strip, was first approached about doing a Charlie Brown Christmas special, he included the Scripture reading in his pitch. One of his producers was instantly hesitant, but Schultz insisted.

“If we can talk about what I feel is the true meaning of Christmas, based on my Midwest background,” the producer later recalled Schultz saying, “it would really be worth doing.” Notice how Schultz had to speak of the Christian faith euphemistically as coming from his “Midwest background.” The producer explained that Schultz was adamant that the Scripture be included, “If we hadn’t gone that way, we wouldn’t have done the show.”

And yet, when the CBS producers saw the first cut of the show, they were really worried. “We thought we had ruined Charlie Brown,” one producer said. Along with thinking it was too slow and not liking the music (they didn’t like the music!), they thought it was too religious.

These are the inversionists who subsequently decided that America wanted every single television show to be set in New York City and Los Angeles, and killed off the most popular shows on TV. Don’t ever mistake what is reported to be “popular” and “successful” as actually being what people want.

Now they’re going to try to convince everyone that no one ever liked Dilbert, one of the three greatest cartoons ever drawn.

UPDATE: Scott Adams reports on the efforts to erase him.

My publisher for non-Dilbert books has canceled my upcoming book and the entire backlist. Still no disagreement about my point of view. My book agent canceled me too.

Build your own platforms and keep the wicked out of them. If you don’t, they won’t hesitate to eject you, your faith, your nation, and everything that is good, beautiful, true, or functional.

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Darker than the Dark Lord

Scott Adams actually accomplished something I never achieved in two separate national syndications: he was cancelled by Universal Press Syndicate.

Dilbert has been cancelled from all newspapers, websites, calendars, and books because I gave some advice everyone agreed with. (My syndication partner canceled me.) Dilbert (and more) will only be available on the subscription site.

— Scott Adams

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Sunday Arktoons

A MIND PROGRAMMED Episode 12: Deformed By An Evil Star

THE WISE OF HEART Episode 11: The Defense Argument

VEGFOLK FABLES Episode 198: Adorable and Horrible

INVASION ’55 Episode 33: Eruption

BEN GARRISON CLASSICS Episode 84: Crooked House of Clinton

PAPER DOLL VERONIKA Episode 49: The Thieves of Thief Mountain

FULL OF EYES Episode 25: Anguish to Joy

CLASSIC BIBLE TALES Episode 85: Hosanna!

CHATEAU GRIEF Episode 209: Sneakers