This is about my journey to get my graphic novel Dusk published.Dusk is about a woman named Eve who was brainwashed into service by a powerful vampire for her knowledge of occult magics. Saved by the ever stoic vampire, Ash, Eve now struggles to pry herself away from her former life and cope with a dangerous addiction. The book is 104 pages long in black and white.

When I first started out making comics, I did it more as a hobby and less with a career in mind. So with that in mind I thought the internet would be the perfect tool to produce a comic. Printing is free, distribution is free and you have access to a potentially unlimited audience.

So as I went along putting long form comics (single completed stories) on a webpage a coworker of mine, Brian Kurtz, pointed out a webcomic that his brother did called PVPonline. The basic setup of PVPonline was the more traditional newspaper comic strips where a joke was told with a recurring cast in about 4 panels.

As I looked around the internet, I begin to notice more and more than most webcomics were of the same 4 panel humor format. At first I was annoyed that webcomics had settled more on the comic strip model than the comic book, but then it became clear why. Webcomic strips can be read in quick short bursts when someone has a little free time at say school or work. Also there’s more instant gratification because it’s humor.

That said, the internet is now more open to various formats and styles of webcomics as the field as grown. But since I was trying this back in the late 90s early 2000s I decided I should try to peruse doing comics in print.

At first I tried writing assignments posted by artists and creators at various comic book forums, most of them not going anywhere for a variety of different reasons. I found it to be a good learning experience because I got practice doing scripts for different genres, for different art styles and for different comic formats.

One day, I came across an announcement that a small British publisher, Warpton, was looking for pitches from writers. So I sent a couple of rough ideas to the publisher and we talked them over until he settled on Dusk, my vampire story I had been publishing for awhile. I actually had originally plotted a long story arc for Dusk’s first story, but since Warpton was looking to do self contained one shots, I had to start from scratch.

After several script rewrites, for bare minimalistic stories to ones overflowing with flashbacks, the publisher finally decided on a script. He offered to find an artist team, but I wanted to go out and find my own. So I went to this great website for comic creators, called Digitalwebbing.com, and started posting for an artist. That’s how I found artist Maki Naro. He liked the story enough to help out by lending his penciling skills. From there I gathered up the inker and letterer.

As I waited for Warpton to get the other one shots lined up so they could get it all scheduled properly, I wanted to strike while the iron was hot and got Maki to do another comic story while we were waiting for the first one to get to print.

Unfortunately, Dusk was the only one shot comic that came out from Warpton at that time. Besides working as a publisher, the owner was also opening a comic book shop and having a new baby, so since it was a small operation all the other one shots couldn’t be printed and Dusk had a limited run in a few shops in England.

With no publisher, I took my 60 odd pages of comic and went looking for another publisher. I had plenty of promising conversations with several editors but there was always something that didn’t mesh right, be it from their publishing schedule, to preferred genres, to contract negations (or lack thereof). Finally I came across Ambrosia, a publisher with a very different plan than Warpton.

Ambrosia had found that small, around 100-120 pages, and affordable graphic novels could be fairly successful. What they would do is fully serialize the comic online and then sell it via PDF and stores. The agreement was that since I had 60 pages already, Ambrosia would serialize those 60 pages and during that time I’d get another 60 pages finished for a complete book.

By this time, Maki had gone onto other things, so I went to look for another artist through various comic boards once again. I found one that not only had amazing art but could also ink their own stuff. So that just means I needed to get the letterer back on the team.

Well, the main artist was moving locations from home and college and all the artwork, so I was back to square one. Ambrosia was more than nice enough to push back my schedule while I looked for another artist. So I did find another artist but then Ambrosia had to go on hiatus because of personal issues. Now I had an artist and not a publisher.

Yet again I’m talking to various publishers and having productive conversations but nothing is really coming working. During this, some creators were giving advice and talk of self publishing came up several times. As looked into this I found that print on demand had come along way and it was quite feasible to not only print a book on a budget but also distribute it as well.

After many years of various starts and stops, I find myself talking online about my book that is available at most online and offline retailers.

After 25 years, “The Cellar,” Richard Laymon’s first novel in his Beast House series, finally made it’s way into paperback via Lesiure Books last fall. Those of you who, like me (up until this weekend) have never read a Laymon book, or “The Cellar,” may find this a good starting point to jump in at.

“The Cellar” focuses on a tourist attraction in a small California town called, you guessed it, “The Beast House”. TBH has a very lurid history, full of murders and sexual depravity, that has tourists flocking to hear the story of the legendary Beast and the murders it supposedly committed. The main characters of the story, Donna and her twelve-year-old daughter Sandy, get mixed up with the house when they try to run away from Donna’s ex-husband/Sandy’s father, Roy. Roy was incarcerated for raping Sandy when she was six. Donna takes Sandy and hits the road, going anywhere as far north as she can to put distance between Roy and her daughter.

On the way she has a car accident and ends up having to stay the night in a small town where the Beast House is located. Meanwhile, Roy is going on a rampage of carnage, rape, torture and arson to find out where his family has gone. Staying at the same motel as Donna and Sandy is the only known survivor of an attack by the Beast, Larry Maywood Usher, and an ethical killer (he only takes jobs to get rid of those who have it coming) for hire named Judgment “Jud” Rucker, who has been hired by Usher to dispatch the beast.

This is not a book as much as it is a cerebral carnival ride. There are no heavy insights to the human condition here, no social commentary, just a straight-up entertaining read. Laymon wants to take you on a trip through the mysteries of the Beast House and he does it in good fashion. No words are wasted, and there is no verbal muscle flexing or showing off here. It starts off visceral and keeps on going.

Then there are the characters. They are all vividly painted. I felt they came across as real people with real feelings. The characters’ dialogue comes across as real and takes us inside the character’s minds. There is a special relationship that evolves between Sandy and Larry that in almost any other author’s hands would have been over done. This is where Laymon shines.

The relationships between the characters are simple, yet seem fresh, not because of narration but because of the way they act and react to each other. Laymon doesn’t go pages and pages on end describing what each character thinks. He understands that the reader has the ability to think and reason out why characters are the way they are and why they do the things they do. He keeps the action constantly moving forward, and the mystery of the Beast House always before the reader, baiting us into reading more.

“The Cellar” isn’t anymore than what it sets out to be, which is a macrabe, good old-fashioned haunted horror house thrill ride; short, sweet, and to the point. It’s a light read that doesn’t feel too light, combining the sensibilities of gaslight horror films with the scholock of 70′s and 80′s horror. It’s violent, disturbing (you will HATE Roy), sleazy, entertaining, pulpy fun. I have not read any of the other books in the Beast House series or the other works of Richard Laymon, but after this I plan to do both.

[Editor's Note:] “You see nobody believes me when I say HorrorYearbook.com is a place for everybody to have their voice heard. We welcome our readers and fans of horror movies opinions. So I offer you one of our Message Board members, unedited (because I’m lazy), review of ‘Chaos’. Enjoy!”

Is this the most brutal movie ever made? The most blantant rip-off ever? A modern day horror masterpiece? I hope to examine these claims in what I would like to call THE MOST BRUTAL MOVIE REVIEW EVER.

I am sure the majority of readers reading know about this film by now. I’m not going to go into anything other than the film itself for the first part of this review. For those of you who don’t know, this is a new rape/revenge movie done by David “The Demon” DeFalco, which he self-proclaims as “the most brutal movie ever”. I must admit that “Chaos” is a very fucked up movie, but certainly not the most brutal ever. Of course, if DeFalco called it “A Very Brutal Movie” it wouldn’t have the same ring to it. The movie starts with a text crawl informing us that “Chaos” is a “cautionary tale” based on “true events”. On the commentary track for the film we learn that the cautionary tale bit was an afterthought put on because the film was so “brutal” that people could learn from it. While people can learn from it, I don’t think they need to be told not to go off with strangers they don’t know at parties or anything of the such. That is taught in school curriculums as well as by (hopefully at least) caring parents.

The film then starts off as we see a lady on the road trying to hitch a ride. A couple of streotypical backwoods horny hicks try to abduct and rape her. However, they are stopped by a couple of do gooders (actually the villians of the film) who proceed to use obviously fake kicks and punches to beat them and then trash their car with a baseball bat. Watching this, you would think you are going to watch something hokey, cheap, and fake looking. Since this is the prelude to the film, it makes you think the rest of the film will follow the same tone, and level of acting. However, that is suprisingly not the case. From here on in, we are introduced to the two victims, Emily and Angelica, who are going to a rave despite protests from Emily’s inter-racial parents.
They go to the woods, and are early for the rave. It’s like 4 in the afternoon, and most raves take place at night, so they decide to kill the time by going to score some extacy pills. The baddies, we find out, have another co-hort Swan (Chaos’s son) at the rave to score some chicks. This character is played by Sylvester (Demolition Man) Stallone’s son, Sage Stallone. He is not as in shape as his father. He talks to the girls into coming back with him to the cabin where the baddies are hiding saying that is where he has some ectacy located. The girls, being dumb, decide to go with him instead of telling him to go get the drugs and bring them back. At the cabin, this is where the film goes down into depravity, which is it’s ultimate aim. From here on in, the girls are abducted, beaten, raped, and killed. Emily’s over-protective parents get scared that they haven’t heard from their daughter by 6 o’clock, and they try to call her. Emily doesn’t answer because she fell down a hill into a pile of leaves and got knocked out. So off the parents trot to the rave to find them. They are able somehow to stumble upon the dead body of Angelica. The parents go home to call the police and unforutnately for them, the killers come over to their house as well seeking a ride into town. The parents figure out they are the killers of their child and plan revenge. The killers, however, decide that the parents are up to something, and so we have the most “brutal” showdown in cinema history, baby. Well, not really. Actually this is probably the worst part of the movie. There is a chainsaw brought out by Pops to cut up Chaos and family. The parents have the bad guys down, and the dad is getting ready to send Chaos back to Hell, but the police bust in, and shoot Emily’s father in the head. Then the mom shoots the cop who shoot her husband, then Chaos shoots the other cop and then the mom. It’s a very funny and unbelievable scene. Far-fetched and campy, and set-up simply to let Chaos win. See, it’s symbolic! His name is “Chaos”, and he represents “chaos”!!!! It’s GENIUS!!!!

Ok, now to get to the brutality. There is no real gore in the film, it’s rather the emotional abuse of Emily and Angelica that makes the film so “brutal”. It’s to the credit of both the actresses who play them that they carry it off well. Most actresses wouldn’t be able or willing to go as far as they do. No matter your opinion of the film or those behind it, you will (as long as you aren’t a psycho yourself) feel sorry for them. They are put through alot. The worst scene is when one of the girls is sodomized by a knife in a scene that goes on for far too long.

The bad guys are good in their roles. Kevin Gage as Chaos is a very intimidating person. He’s an alpha-male psychopath, very strong and powerful. I would like to see him in an action flick sometime as a anti-hero, as I believe he could really kick alot of ass. Here though, I don’t think he is totally believable as a serial killer. He’s no David Hess. He is, however, competent in the role.

This movie feels like an old-school 80s horror flick, and if it wasn’t for the mention of cellphones or one of the characters saying the year is 2002, you might think that it’s from a bygone era of things like Silent Night, Deadly Night. It has that downbeat sleazy feel to it. You could see Britian putting this on the Video Nasty list.

SEND TO MOBILE PHONE   

The Demon

Unfortunately, all good points of this film are going to be ignored by most due to the antics of director David DeFalco telling people that he is a demon and challenging critics and fans to fight him. He’s like a cross between a shock-rocker and pro-wrestler, but at least we have confidence that the majority of both those groups know they are putting on an act. With DeFalco though, that isn’t the case, as juding from the extras on the DVD. In one of the most bizzare extras on a DVD ever, we have him cutting a wrestling promo inside the L.A. County Corners office. I don’t know why he felt this would be a good idea. The feature starts off with the camera following behind a shirtless DeFalco as he opens the doors to the crypt, while sporting the most brutal rat-tail ever. Dave then goes off on a tirade of how he is ” The Demon” and how this is the first time a filmmaker has been interviewed in a coronoers office. Well, of course it is Dave. Most directors want to be taken seriously. There is a reason that filmmakers don’t go around getting interviewed in coroners offices and it’s because they have the common sense to know it’s not a good idea. If you have read Vern’s review at Ain’t It Cool News, then you know all about this.

The Demon continues his promo informing us that this is “his reality”. That there are “homicides, suicides, and auto-accidents”, and that we are entering “the demon’s playground”. Now I didn’t realize this, but apparently nobody in the world dies from natural causes anymore, so to make a film where people have fun and live good lives is ridiculous because it’s fake. The only reality is that we are all going to one day be raped and murdered, and therefore “Chaos” is a very important film because The Demon made it and not only is it the first step in the “sucession of evil”, but it’s the first step in the “progression of evil”. This might be a pretty interesting feature if the demon had not been in it, as it shows the daily grind of a coroner. He tells us on average the L.A. Coroner’s Office has 10,000 bodies a year. “10,000 bodies a year, baby!”, The Demon explains happily. Evidently he thinks that 10,000 people dying a year has something to do with him making “Chaos”. We learn that none of this is about showing the L.A. Coroner’s office at all about midway through when The Demon and the coroner shake hands. This whole thing is a sick self-promotion for The Demon’s next movie in the progreession and sucession of evil in which the coroner, Cormier, tells us that he has a theory that people who do too much methamphetamine open up the doors for demons to come and possess their soul, which gives this reviewer the impression that for DeFalco it will be an autobiographical film.

The commentary track is interesting. You get to learn that star David Gage is indicted for drug charges and one of the producers murdered his wife. DeFalco thinks that’s cool because it shows how evil and brutal his film is. They are very self-congratulatory about all this “brutality” and very careful to not mention “Last House on the Left”. They do say that the murders of the girls are based on some serial killer guy, which goes to show that they can’t even make up orginal deaths. They go on to say that the serial killer has since been executed, which is sad, because he would probably sue them for plagerism.

Chaos is not a remake; to be a remake it would have to be acknowledged for what it is by the people behind it. Without “Last House on the Left”, there would be no “Chaos”. So in a roundabout way you can blame the superior film for it’s unofficial knock-off. Also, remakes generally add something new or put a new twist on things. “Chaos” doesn’t do either. What it does do is get the tone right. You want a hard edged horror film? “Chaos” delivers. Whether or not you can get past the controversy regarding DeFalco’s antics and his denial of it being the bastardization of “Last House on the Left” will go a long ways as to how you will take to the film. It’s nothing more than what it sets out to be, but it’s not as grandiose as DeFalco proclaims. It’s a disturbing and fucked up film in the basest way possible. It’s up front and vulgar, pulling no punches. There is nothing more than that there though. Seriously the whole message is “this is some fucked up shit”. “Chaos” is not a horribly made film nor horribly acted. It’s just very immature and twenty years too late. At least it’s only 70 minutes long.

2 out of 5

Tell Us What YOU Think on the Message Board