Mills on the Moon(stone): Kolchak & The Avenger

Okay, so yesterday I posted a picture of my cat. Yes, it was a lame way to avoid missing another day of blogging... but what the hell. She's a cute cat.

Anyway…

My long-gestating Kolchak miniseries for Moonstone has just been announced by the publisher over on their forums. It's scheduled to debut in March of '08. The art by Tim Hamilton is incredible, and Dave Akins' covers are pretty awesome, too.

Here's the solicitation copy:

KOLCHAK TALES: NIGHT STALKER OF THE LIVING DEAD #1 (of 3)
32 pages, color, $3.99

Written by: Christopher Mills
Art by: Tim Hamilton

ZOMBIES! Everybody hates them. But that appears to be exactly what Carl Kolchak finds to be stalking among the cornstalks in the small heartland town of Georges Corner, Nebraska. The simple task of covering just another festival pageant takes a dark turn... as it so often does in Kolchak's world... when people start disappearing, and the dead start walking! Watch out... they bite!

Covers by Twilight Creation’s board game "Zombies" artist Dave Akins!

Also scheduled for March is Moonstone’s latest pulp fiction anthology, which also includes a new short story by yours truly:

THE AVENGER CHRONICLES

Written by: Ron Goulart, Max McCoy, Robert Randisi, etc.
Interior Art: Andy Bennett & Dave Aikins
Cover Art: Peter Caras, Dave Dorman, Doug Klauba
Edited by: Joe Gentile
336pgs, b/w, Squarebound, 6"x9", $17.95
10 digit: 1-933076-32-1
13 digit: 978-1-933076-32-4

The Avenger…All-New Stories for the Next Generation!

Moonstone Books is proud to present this original anthology featuring eighteen never before seen tales of The Avenger, the first new Justice, Inc. fiction in more than thirty years! The Avenger Chronicles includes incredible, action-packed stories by some of today’s best writers in comics and fiction including:

Max McCoy, Robert Randisi, Ron Goulart, Tom DeFalco, Joe Gentile, Robert Greenberger, Clay and Susan Griffiths, CJ Henderson, Howard Hopkins, Paul Kupperberg, Christopher Mills, Will Murray, Mel Odom, Gary Phillips, Martin Powell, James Reasoner, Richard Dean Starr, and Dan Wickline.

In addition to this impressive lineup, The Avenger Chronicles includes stunning cover artwork by one of the original Avenger paperback cover artists, Peter Caras (creator of more than 1,700 cover paintings, & a student of Norman Rockwell), and original interior illustrations by Andy Bennett (Vampire: The Masquerade) and Dave Aikins (Zombie, the Board Game).

Out of Tragedy, a Hero Is Reborn…

In the roaring heart of the crucible, steel is made. In the raging flame of personal tragedy, men are sometimes forged into something more than human.

Wealthy and successful at an early age, Richard Benson was preparing to enjoy a long and happy life with his family when crime took away his wife and young daughter.

Once he was just a man, but now he is a machine of vengeance dedicated to the extermination of all crime. A figure of ice and steel, but more pitiless than both, Benson has become a symbol to crooks and killers--a terrible, almost impersonal force, masking cold genius and a nearly supernatural power behind a face as white and still as a dead man’s mask. Only pale eyes, like ice in a polar dawn, hint at what awaits criminals when they invoke the rage of millionaire adventurer Richard Benson -- The Avenger!

Now, for the first time in over 30 years, the fearless/expressionless crime fighter; the man with the moldable face, the man with the shock white hair and the pale grey eyes, is back in action in a stunning collection of stories featuring all the action, adventure, and revenge Avenger fans have come to expect! From noir adventure and two-fisted action, to emotional tales of inner demons, join The Avenger for an E-ticket thrill ride!

*Book Trade version/Cover A: by Peter Caras

*Direct Market Version/Cover B: by Dave Dorman

*Ltd Ed. Hardcover: (limit of 300) original cover art (not pictured) of the entire Justice Inc crew by Doug Klauba AND ALSO includes an exclusive to this hardcover special Avenger story by Chinese/Indonesian Martial Arts (KunTao Silat) master Joe Judt!

1-933076-33-x
978-1-933076-33-1
$44.00

Keep an eye out for both of these in Previews, and be sure to pre-order them from your local comic shop so you can be certain of getting your copies!

Oh, and I've been told that the Werewolves: Dead Moon Rising anthology, from the same publisher, should be hitting store shelves any day now. I'll keep you posted.

Hey, Kids! Comics!

After Seventeen years toiling away in the comics industry, struggling to make my mark as a writer, it's beginning to look like 2008 might be my biggest year yet in the biz.

Yeah, I know we're not even halfway through 2007 yet, but making indy comics takes a long time. As it stands, though, I have a bunch of projects moving along that should be out next year.

Of course, there are more than a few projects I've been involved with that I thought would be out long ago that never made it to the stands. And some of the projects I have on tap for '08 were originally intended to be finished years ago. But I'm reasonably confident that most of the projects I'm listing here will be out and in comic shops before the end of '08. They're all well-along, production-wise, and have strongly committed, established publishers – publishers that I have confidence will actually still be around when the books are ready to go next year.

Here's what we're looking forward to in '08:

Femme Noir: The Dark City Diaries. Finally! The great folks at Ape Entertainment have picked up this long-gestating creator-owned 4-issue project, drawn by Joe Staton, based on our webcomic. Horacio Ottolini and Mark Stegbauer are slapping on the inks, while Melissa Kaercher colors.

Kolchak: Night Stalker of the Living Dead. A three-issue miniseries from Moonstone Books, based on the classic TV series. In this Tim Hamilton-drawn horror epic, I take the intrepid reporter/monster hunter and drop him down into the middle of a Dawn of the Dead/28 Days Later-styled zombie plague. Hey, everybody loves zombies, right? Covers by Dave Aikens.

Captain Midnight. Right now, this is a serialized back-up feature entitled "Assault on Midnight Mesa," made up of three 6-page installments, that I hope Moonstone will eventually collect as a one-shot. The artist is Rich Clark.

Perils on Planet X. I've just come to a verbal agreement (with contracts on the way) with a reputable publisher to bring to the market the long-in-the-works sci-fi swashbuckler illustrated by the talented Gene Gonzales. Three issues, color. Look for more details on this, soon.

And, finally, there's Gravedigger: Dangerous Prey, a new, hardboiled crime comics one-shot, pencilled by Rick Burchett and inked by Fred Harper. Of the projects on this list, it's the most tentative, but I'm hopeful that it will be out before the end of next year.

I also have a number of prose stories lined up for publication by Moonstone Books in '08, featuring characters like The Avenger, Captain Midnight and, possibly, The Spider again.

I'm the busiest I've been in years, and I'm having a blast working on these projects. Hopefully, they'll proceed without serious snags and make it to your local comics shop as planned. Keep your fingers crossed!

Richard Benson, The Avenger

In 1939, Street & Smith Publications, publishers of the legendary pulp magazine heroes Doc Savage and The Shadow, launched another crime-fighter onto the newstands and magazine racks of America. Allegedly written by Kenneth Robeson, the masterful scribe of Doc Savage's adventures (in fact, "Robeson" was a S&S "house" name), new hero Richard Benson, alias The Avenger, made his debut in a high-octane thriller entitled "Justice, Inc."

Never quite as popular as Savage or The Shadow, The Avenger nonetheless managed to secure a small cult following, and when the paperback reprints of Doc Savage became best-sellers in the 1970's, Warner Books reprinted the 24 Avenger adventures as well. Those sold so well that acclaimed sci-fi author Ron Goulart was commssioned to ghost write another dozen or so. There was even a very short-lived comic book from DC around that time, called Justice, Inc., after the character's debut story, drawn by the legendary Jack Kirby (the cover above is from that series, drawn by the equally-legendary Joe Kubert. Beautiful, isn't it?).

Richard Benson was a grim vigilante with a deathly gray, immobile, wax-like face, which he could reshape into various disguises simply through manipulation of his deft fingers. He had a few assistants (just like Doc and The Shadow), and carried a custom firearm he called "Mike" and a slim throwing knife named "Ike." The Avenger may not have been the most popular pulp hero, but damn, he was cool.

So what provoked this little informal history lesson? Just this: Moonstone Books, for whom I'm writing a Kolchak The Night Stalker comic book, and already wrote a Spider prose adventure, have landed the license to The Avenger and have asked me to contribute a short story to a new Avenger anthology. Reportedly, they've even persuaded the above-mentioned Ron Goulart to contribute a new story to the book. I also know that my pal Martin Powell – who previously contributed to The Spider, Kolchak and Phantom anthologies – is participating in this one, too. It should be a great book!

I always wanted to be a "pulp" writer – and now I am! And best of all, these are authorized, licensed projects, so I'm legitimately part of the characters' legacy. How cool is that?

More details when I can. Stay tuned!