News From The Dead Zone #62

Breaking News from the Dead Zone

Lisey’s Story won the Bram Stoker Award in the novel category at the HWA Banquet in Toronto last weekend.

Today is release day for Gunslinger Born #3. Here is a preview of the issue, and reviews from Comic Book Resources, Pop Culture Shock, and Lilja’s Library. Also check out this video from Marvel pertaining to the release of issue 1.

Frank Darabont and his crew set people on fire on Day 18 of filming of The Mist. See the Webisode here (Quicktime .mov, 6 MB). Quint from Ain’t it Cool News spent three more days on the set after our visit. His reports are here: Day 2.1, Day 2.2, Day 2.3.

Here is a nice long review of the Special Edition DVD of Christine. Speaking of our favorite haunted car, Disturbia co-writer Christopher Landon may be involved in a remake of the movie. “[Christine] has been all over the place,” he told Coming Soon. Apparently this was going to be a SciFi original or a movie for NBC. “If it happens or not we’ll see, but when I came in what I wanted to do was really go back to the book, the source material. I’m a fan of the Carpenter version, it is fun. But the book was much more of a possession story than it was just a killer car. That’s what made the book so great is that what was so terrifying was that it wasn’t just about an inanimate object running around and killing people, it was a boy who was sorta being taken over by the former owner of the car – and there was something more terrifying about that. Also, I just love the dynamics of the characters and so forth. Right now it’s way too soon say anything else about it. We’re so in the thick of deal-making, I don’t want to blow anything else!”

The paperback edition of Blaze will be released on December 26, 2007. The cover art for the hardcover, due out in June, appears here. Yes, that’s a red mitten you see underneath the E in the title.

A while back I mentioned that Michael Marshall (Smith) would be adapting a King story for a UK TV series. At World Horror in Toronto last weekend he said that the story is “Mrs. Todd’s Shortcut.”

News From The Dead Zone #61

Breaking News from the Dead Zone

Rich Chizmar and I got to visit the set of The Mist in Shreveport, Louisiana on Thursday and Friday last week. I posted a lengthy “travelogue” of the trip on my Live Journal. While I was in Shreveport, this article was published in the local newspaper: A bad day at the market’ is fun for creators of The Mist I’m writing a set visit report for Rue Morgue magazine, which will probably be in their next issue. Set videographer Constantine Nasr put together a video blog (a webisode) from day 10 of filming that premiered at Ain’t It Cool News and later appeared at Jo-Blo.

I was interviewed recently for this article about the Dark Tower in the LSU Reveille. It seemed apropos that I was in Louisiana when it appeared. Also apropos that I took exit 19 from the highway to get to The Mist set every morning.

Amazon has a page up for The Science of Stephen King: From Carrie to Cell, The Terrifying Truth Behind the Horror Masters Fiction by Lois H. Gresh and Robert Weinberg, due out from Wiley at the end of August. I had a chance to read this book in manuscript a few weeks ago, and my lengthy blurb is available on the Amazon page, along with comments from Peter Straub, Stephen Spignesi and F. Paul Wilson.

Postscripts 10 should be shipping soon, with the new King story “Graduation Afternoon.” I strongly recommend that you skip King’s introductory paragraph until after you read the story itself, because it reveals an image that is best left undiscovered until you get to that part of the story.

King is the editor for the new edition of The Best American Short Stories, an anthology that is organized by a well-known guest editor each year. King said he picked 20 stories to be featured in the 2007 edition, which will be out in October, after reading more than 400. King also said the book will contain a list of 100 short stories that weren’t chosen for the collection but made the “honor roll.” He wrote in the introduction to the collection: “There isn’t a single one … that didn’t delight me, that didn’t make me want to crow ‘Oh man, you gotta read this!’ to someone. I knew it would be that way. That’s why I took the job. Talent does more than come out; it bursts out, again and again, doing exuberant cartwheels while the band plays ‘Stars and Stripes Forever.'”

The Gunslinger’s Guidebook, a concordance for the Marvel graphic novel series, has been pushed back to August. Co-author Anthony Flamini posted this on the Marvel DT board: “Yeah, The Gunslinger’s Guidebook was originally envisioned as a handbook focusing on Roland’s Hambry adventure and everything that occurred prior to that. But as Robin Furth and I discussed things in greater detail, we decided that we also wanted to feature profiles on the all-new Mid-World characters who would be debuting for the first time in the comic adaptation following the Hambry story arc . . . characters such as the ferocious General Grissom (of the blue-faced barbarians). So that’s the primary reason for the book’s delay — but you’ll be getting a superior product packed with much more original content! The wait will be worth it!”

The first issue of The Gunslinger Born has been reprinted with a new Quesada cover. I don’t know how frequently this happens in comic-dom. Issue 3 will be released next Wednesday.

Eli Roth told SCI FI WIRE that King endorsed his version of Cell. “My first question when I adapted it was can I deviate from the book?” Roth said. “It’s Stephen King. Am I going to piss off Stephen King? He was mad at Stanley Kubrick, I don’t want him mad at me. And, finally, Stephen King was like, ‘Do whatever you want.'” Roth warned that he would be making changes to the story. “I love the opening [scene],” Roth said. “But I also want to keep, … not necessarily that same chaotic tone, but I want to keep the tension of the opening 40 pages of the book going throughout the whole film and introduce other elements. Because I think the book, for me, where it loses tension is where suddenly you don’t feel like the phone crazies are trying to kill them. … I find that it’s finding other ways to make it so you still feel the tension that any second you could get killed [and] carrying that throughout the whole film.” He hopes to get King to do a cameo. “There’s always room. That’s the good thing about Cell. Because it’s like crazy people running around trying to [kill you] It’s like everybody gets a cameo.” He hopes to shoot the movie in his native Boston, where the book is set.

News From The Dead Zone #60

Breaking News from the Dead Zone

Quint from Ain’t it Cool News reports from the set of The Mist. Day 1, Day 2, Day 3 & Day 4 (with photos). Frank Darabont will provide fans with news about The Mist at the next West Coast edition of FANGORIA’s Weekend of Horrors convention, May 18-20, 2007 at Burbank’s Marriott Airport Hilton.

Here’s a very brief interview with King in the NY Post. Quint’s interview is much longer.

In an interview with Michael Marshall (author of The Straw Men and The Intruders, which I’m currently reading) I found this line: “At the moment, I’m about to start a television adaptation of a Stephen King short story.” After a little detective work, I turned up the name of the story he’s adapting, but I’m not allowed to say anything about it yet since the deal isn’t signed. Stay tuned!

JJ Abrams had this to say to Wired News in a recent interview in response to a question about him directing The Dark Tower: “This is something that we are just now talking about with Stephen, so it’s too early for me to say that we’re even officially doing it yet just because the thing is in the early stages of discussion. I love what the The Dark Tower is. Damon Lindelof is obsessed (with it). We met Stephen, who was just the greatest, and hit it off. What’s exciting to me about it is that it is a very edgy epic. You could . . . say it’s his Tolkien Ring series, but I feel like it has a potential of being a lot more. I think that sense of that great hero, that sort of Western, iconic, almost spaghetti-Western-type hero in this landscape is just an amazing—it feels iconic to me.”

Moviehole.net reports that Dimension is gearing up to remake Children of the Corn. Not a sequel, a remake, with Saw III director Lynn Bousman attached.

Here’s an article about the artists involved with Gunslinger Born: Illustrators make `Tower’ stand out. Issue two came out this week, in case you missed it.

In a recent interview with Movies Online, Lorenzo di Bonaventura admitted that they haven’t yet shot the ending for 1408. “It was a really interesting idea because the idea of doing a real time movie in a hotel – one man in a one-bedroom suite for 80 minutes of real time. We didn’t know how you’d come out of that. Like do you need bigger or do you need smaller? What do you need? Or do you feel like he should die or do you feel like he should live? What do you feel? And so we wrote like 15 different endings because Stephen King’s short story doesn’t really have an ending. It just sort of ends and it’s not a cinematic ending. I’ll say it that way. So that’s the last piece of the puzzle, but it’s really fascinating to have done a movie all in a room and we all went sort of crazy.”

Here is the publisher’s description of Blaze, posted at Amazon/UK: “At 6’7″and just under 300 lbs, Clay Blaisdell is one big mother, but his capers were just small-time until he met George Rackley. George introduced him to a hundred cons and one big idea: kidnapping the child of rich parents. The Gerards are filthy rich, and the last twig on the family tree could be worth millions. There’s only one problem: by the time the deal goes down, the brains of the partnership is dead. Or is he? Now Blaze is running into the teeth of a howling storm and the cops are closing in. He’s got a baby as a hostage, and the crime of the century just turned into a race against time in the white hell of the Maine woods.”

The March selection of a signed book through The Haven Foundation will be Dreamcatcher (hardcover). The price will be $60 plus shipping. The books will go on sale beginning at 12 noon Eastern Standard Time on March 12th. They have a total of 25 copies available and will be offering them in small lots at random times throughout the day so that they will not sell out within the first 2 minutes of going on-sale as they did in January. The April selection will be Black House (hardcover) signed by both Stephen and Peter Straub for $80 plus shipping.

News From The Dead Zone #59

Breaking News from the Dead Zone

February 27, 2007: Stephen King confirmed at New York Comic Con last weekend that he had granted the option to make a Dark Tower movie to J.J. Abrams and Damon Lindeloff (LOST) for $19.

King also addressed the persistent rumor that he might go back and rewrite the rest of the Dark Tower books, as he did with The Gunslinger. “Yes, that’s correct. It’s a first draft. It was written over a long period of time, and I look at it as a work that’s still in progress. That’s why I re-did the first book. The vision that I had of what was going on got clearer as it went along. So, for instance, I looked back at the first book and I said to myself ‘there’s a lot of things I can do with this now, now that I know how everything turns out in the end.’ I’m a really instinctual writer—I don’t work with an outline. I did have an outline of some of The Dark Tower stuff way back when, when I started, when I was stoned, and I lost it. I didn’t have a clue, and I couldn’t remember what was going on, and I had that poem by Robert Browning to draw on, to start, so I knew certain elements that I wanted to be in it, that were in the poem. So, when I got done, and I looked at it, I said This Horn of Eld should be there at the front. That’s what you when you rewrite a book. I’ve got a book now called Duma Key, and there’s a woman who has some bracelets and the bracelets are important, but they’re not there until the end of the book. What I’m saying is, I know now some things I could do. The Dark Tower is one book, and I’d like go back and fix it up. Who knows—I might end up novelizing their comic book.”

He also suggested that The Stand would make a good project for a comic book adaptation. Here are some reports about the panel, including some with photos:

Eric Roth also stated that Cell would be his next movie project after Hostel II. Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski (Ed Wood and 1408) are working on the script. “By the time I finish Hostel Part II the script should be ready. I really want to read it.”

Lilja has a nice photo courtesy of Frank Darabont from The Mist set at his web site.

Don’t forget that issue 2 of The Gunslinger Born will be out on March 7th. Each of the first five issues will be released on the first Wednesday in the month. No word yet on the release schedule for the July issue, since the first Wednesday is July 4th.

Thanks to King’s praise of Meg Gardiner, both on his website and in Entertainment Weekly, there’s been a run on her books at second hand outlets and her agent told Publishers Lunch that publishers are lining up to make book deals with her in the U.S., where she is currently unpublished.

Here are more details about Blaze, which is now up for preorder at Cemetery Dance:

Blaze: A Posthumous Novel
By Richard Bachman
Foreword by Stephen King

List Price: $23.00
Hardcover, 256 pages
ISBN-10: 1-4165-5484-X
ISBN-13: 978-1-4165-5484-4

Here’s a short “interview” with King as part of a series where celebrities talk about credit cards.

News From The Dead Zone #58

Breaking News from the Dead Zone

Lilja reports that Scribner will publish the next Richard Bachman novel, Blaze, on June 12.

Everyone got excited last week when Hollywood Reporter announced that King was in talks with J.J. Abrams to bring the Dark Tower to the screen. Abrams is well known for his work on LOST, and he and King have formed sort of a mutual admiration society. However, it must be emphasized that this is very, very, very preliminary, and nothing might ever come of it. Keep in mind how long a movie based on The Talisman was in discussion before it showed any promise of becoming reality.

I finally had a chance to read through the Marvel Spotlight on the Dark Tower series. It has a two-page letter from King and interviews with Robin Furth, Jae Lee, Richard Isanove and Peter David. The Road to the Dark Tower even gets a couple of mentions, including in Peter David’s interview. Peter David wrote on his website about his experience at the midnight signing at Times Square, and took part in a TV interview at WCSH (Portland, ME) that was up on the web site last time I checked. The same page had an archival interview with Tabitha King if you scroll down to the bottom.

Newsarama released the conventional cover for issue #4 of Gunslinger Born. They also got the David Finch variant artwork for issue 2. See right and click on the images for larger views.

Two new Entertainment Weekly columns: The Secret Gardiner and A Modern Fairy Tale.

Dennis Hopper is in negotiations to star in Dolan’s Cadillac, a movie that was in preproduction a few years ago with Kevin Bacon and Sylvester Stallone attached to it. Then there were rumors of Freddie Prinze, Jr. The report said that production would begin in a couple of months. We’ll see.

The February selection of a signed book through The Haven Foundation will be Hearts in Atlantis (hardcover).  The price will be $60 plus shipping.  The books will go on sale beginning at 12 noon Eastern Time on February 23rd.  Haven has a total of 25 copies available and will be offering them in small lots at random times throughout the day so that they will not sell out within the first 2 minutes of going on-sale as they did in January.  The March selection will be Dreamcatcher (hardcover), also at $60 plus shipping, and the April selection will be Black House (hardcover) signed by both Stephen and Peter Straub for $80 plus shipping. NOTE: Anyone who has purchased a signed Stephen King book through The Haven Foundation will not be eligible to purchase another signed copy. There is a one signed book per household lifetime limit in order to give as many people as possible the opportunity to get a signed book.

Award news from this past weekend: Stephen King’s Desperation won The Art Directors Guild’s Excellence in Production Design Award for best TV movie or mini-series. John Stokes (TNT’s Nightmares and Dreamscapes: From the Stories of Stephen King) won for television movie/miniseries/pilot at the 21st Annual American Society of Cinematographers’ Outstanding Achievement Awards.

News From The Dead Zone #57

Breaking News from the Dead Zone

Jae Lee’s original drawings from Gunslinger Born are available for sale here.

Here are a few reports about the midnight openings at various comic stores across the country to launch the graphic novel.

In Entertainment Weekly, King had this to say: ”There are some that are an interesting hybrid between the superhero comics and the novels that I read as an adult.” And while many would like to see The Dark Tower on the big screen, King is wary. To a degree. ”If Peter Jackson came along and said, ‘I made up with New Line and they want to spend billions of dollars on this,’ I’d say sure, knock yourself out.” In other words, fans, don’t look for that movie anytime soon.

If you’re in the Portland, ME area, Peter David will be signing Gunlsinger Born at Casablanca Comics on Friday, February 9th from 3-6 PM. WCSH (Portland channel 6) will have an interview with Peter tonight at 7 p.m. local time.

There’s also a new entry at the Marvel Blog and Quint reviews #1 at AICN.

Lilja has an excellent in-depth interview with Frank Darabont at Lilja’s Library.

News From The Dead Zone #56

Breaking News from the Dead Zone

The Gunslinger Born is almost here! Marvel announced today that due to the tremendous popularity of the variant cover program, each issue of The Gunslinger Born will feature a sketch cover, as chosen by Jae Lee, and an all-new variant cover by one of the top artists in the industry. Issue #2 will feature a variant cover by David Finch (New Avengers, Moon Knight) and a sketch cover by Jae Lee (shown here). Stay tuned to Marvel.com for more on who the other variant cover artists will be. Jae Lee takes the T.M.I. quiz.

“We have more than exceeded our initial forecast numbers. With the first issue looking to surpass 200,000 units in sales, this is by far the biggest selling non-super hero comic event in recent memory,” said Dan Buckley, president and publisher of Marvel Entertainment. At present, newsstands, including Barnes & Noble and Borders, can’t carry the comic. Foreign translated version deals are being worked through..

“These comics aren’t junk food; they’re more like delicacies,” King said. “Sushi for the mind, if you like. You have to teach yourself how to read ‘adult comics,’ which are actually comic/novel hybrids. and even then you have to give yourself to the experience, which means accepting the idea that you’ll need to work a bit as you do with any good novel. This is, in a sense, an ‘origin’ story, and interesting in its own right These are not just retellings of books that have already been written. The books serve as a launching pad—and a resource center, I suppose—but the flight is into brand new territory. People curious about the Crimson King will find things to interest them here. And give them some nightmares, I hope. They—Marvel, and especially Robin Furth, who worked with me on the later [“Tower”] books, keeping the proliferating details straight—broke out a simple story line that might be called Teenage Gunslingers and How They Grew,” King said. “The basis was Wizard and Glass, the only novel in the series that comes close to being a stand-alone. I modified their outline, and have had a chance to tinker with the dialogue and narration of each issue before it gets graven in stone. I don’t tell anyone what or how to draw, though. I know my limitations.”

Advanced reviews:

Lilja reports these new additions to the cast of The Mist: Frances Sternhagen (Misery, The Golden Years), Alexa Davalos, Sam Witwer, Bill Sadler (The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile), Jeff DeMunn (The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile, Storm of the Century) and Brian Libby (The Woman in the Room).

A press release about a new film company from Fangoria mentions that Brian Witten, under his Witten Pictures banner, is producing a feature based on The Breathing Method.

News From The Dead Zone #55

Breaking News from the Dead Zone

Andre Braugher and Laurie Holden have joined Thomas Jane in Frank Darabont’s production of The Mist. Holden, the female lead, plays Amanda, who is “on the good side of the aisle,” and Braugher is Brent Norton, the attorney who lives next door to Tomas Jane’s David Drayton and has “more of an adversarial relationship” with Drayton. Holden previously starred in Darabont’s movie The Majestic. Shooting is scheduled to begin in mid- to late February in Shreveport, La. for a tentative November release.

Here’s a nice long interview with Glenn: Drawn to horror.

To commemorate the launch of the Marvel Dark Tower series, almost 150 comic book retailers across the country will begin selling the issue at the stroke of midnight. A list of participating stores can be found at here. Fans who flock to Midtown Comics in Manhattan will see a couple of special guests: Peter David, who writes the dialogue for the series, and Jae Lee, the book’s artist. The store will open for one hour.

In advance of the big release, Silver Bullet Comics’ podcast guru Tim Beeman introduces a Marvel conference call featuring Robin Furth. The conference call is hosted by Jim McCann, Marvel’s Assistant Manager of Sales Communication. Click the podcast image at this link to be taken directly to the conference call. Furth discusses her extensive experience as King’s personal research assistant and how writing A Complete Concordance prepared her for the writing of this series. Furth details the challenges of telling Roland Deschain’s back story.

Here is the trailer for 1408, which premieres in July and a positive review from an advanced screening. CHUD and Total Film have short articles about the movie, and Lilja has an interview with the director, Mikael Håfström. The movie will preview at Fangoria’s Weekend Of Horrors in Chicago the weekend of Feb 23rd.

HBO Video, through Warner Home Video, will release Creepshow III on May 15th. Neither King nor George Romero were involved in this production, which features five new inter-connected tales of horror: “Alice,” “Rachel the Call Girl,” “Professor Dayton,” “The Haunted Dog” and “The Radio.” The DVD arrives unrated with an anamorphic widescreen transfer and Dolby Digital 2.0 audio. Extras will include behind-the-scenes interviews with directors Ana Clavell & James Glenn Dudelson and make-up artist Greg McDougall. Retail is $19.98.

News From The Dead Zone #54

Breaking News from the Dead Zone

Ehren Kruger talks about The Talisman miniseries with the folks at Coming Soon. “The core structure of the feature was always that of the novel, but there was just no way we could include a lot of what’s in the novel, so now we’re able to go back and cherry-pick the best sequences and plotlines and subplots of the novel again.”

New York Comic Con announced that it will launch an audio and video podcast available free to the general public. The podcast episodes, which will begin almost immediately after New York Comic Con (February 23-25) concludes, will feature interviews, anime clips, previews from TV shows and films and highlights from panel discussions at the show. The podcasts are expected to be released for several months following the convention and will remain available throughout the year. King, who will be at the con on February 24th, will be among the guests of honor featured in interview podcasts. Read the rest of the press release.

Marvel held a press conference yesterday to discuss The Dark Tower: Gunslinger Born #1, released next month. Sitting at the head of the audio table was Robin Furth, chief story architect of the hotly anticipated comic adaptation and long time associate of Stephen King. Also in attendance were Marvel editors Ralph Macchio, Nicole Boos, John Barber, as well as Jim McCann, Marvel’s Assistant Manager of Sales Communication. Read more about what was said at the press conference.

A couple of other Marvel-related intervews: Part II of interview with Peter David and Entering the Dark Tower IV- Robin Furth interview. The Gunslinger Born is featured on the front cover of the January 24th issue of Marvel’s Daily Bugle magazine. The issue is available for 25¢ at most comic book stores.

News From The Dead Zone #53

Breaking News from the Dead Zone

Dimension announced that 1408 has been pushed back to July 13th. Here’s an article about The Mist, which starts filming in Shreveport, LA in just over a month from now.

This week in Entertainment Weekly, King spends an hour flipping around the TV dial. Television Impaired.

SKFakes is running another competition this year. To register, send your name and email address to [email protected]. The entry fee is £10 ($17). Over half a dozen books, all signed by King, are among the list of confirmed prizes to date. More details about the nature of the competition will be announced closer to the starting date, April 1st.

News From The Dead Zone #52

Breaking News from the Dead Zone

Lilja reports that Scribner will publish Duma Key in January 2008. In the third and final section of his interview, King talks about Ghost Brothers of Darkland County, books in cellphones and limited editions.

In addition to the graphic story we’ve been expecting, issue 1 of Gunslinger Born will contain a map of New Canaan, a preview of issue #2 and an exclusive prose short story by Robin Furth telling the tale of Roland and his friends as they learn how their worlds came into being—all accompanied with spot-illustrations by Jim Calafiore and June Chung. The 48-page issue is all content—no outside advertising.

A note regarding the signed books being offered at the Haven Foundation storefront: there is a one-per-household limit for signed books. If you bought a copy of The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon or Secret Windows, you are not eligible to purchase any future signed offerings. This policy ensures that signed books will be available to more people. This restriction does not apply to the unsigned books the charity is also offering.

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Breaking News from the Dead Zone

Parts I and II of Lilja’s interview with Stephen King are online at Lilja’s Library. Part I covers such topics as Fan sites, Blaze and The Haven Foundation. In Part II, King talks about Duma Key, Jack Sawyer and The Gingerbread Girl. Part III appears tomorrow.

In March, Marvel will publish Gunslinger’s Guidebook, which appears to be a concordance type book for the Dark Tower graphic novel series. “May luck rise to meet you, sai. Dark days have befallen the once powerful Affiliation. As the Good Man’s revolutionaries continue their assault on the civilizations of the Inner Baronies, young Gunslinger Roland Deschain of Gilead and his loyal ka-tet embark eastward on an undercover mission to the distant Outer Barony of Mejis on behalf of the Affiliation. The Gunslinger Guidebook serves as your essential guide for Gilead to Mejis and all points in between – featuring profiles on the Big Coffin Hunters, Sheemie Ruiz, and Rhea of the Coos.” Click the cover image for a larger version.

Nicole Boose has a new entry in her Marvel blog, The Error That Almost Was. Issue 1 of the series is at the printers.

Peter David and Jae Lee will sign The Gunslinger Born #1 at Midtown Comics at midnight on February 6th at Times Square.

News From The Dead Zone #50

Breaking News from the Dead Zone

The Haven Foundation will be offering a very limited supply of signed books by Stephen King each month. The January selection is Secret Window. This was published as an exclusive Book-of-the-Month Club anthology of hard-to-find non-fiction pieces, little-known interviews, short stories, and articles, with an Introduction by Peter Straub. It was intended as a companion to On Writing. Copies will go on sale at 12 PM on Monday, January 15th (eastern time zone) and will be on an ‘as supplies last’ basis. They may be purchased at the Haven Foundation store. Unsigned hardcover copies of other King titles will also be available for purchase at the original cover price plus shipping. Many of these are now out-of-print in the hardcover edition. New titles will be added as they become available, so check back often for current inventory.

Through The Signed Page, Richard Isanove, the colorist of The Gunslinger Born, will be signing copies of the comic book for those who can’t meet him at New York Comic Con in February. Here’s a new interview with scripter Peter David and cover art from issue 3 and an interview with Jae Lee.

Stay tuned for an in depth interview with King at Lilja’s Library. He reported yesterday, “Abiut an hour ago I hung up the phone after doing a 45 minute long phone interview with King himself. Yes, you heard correct. Hearing ‘Hello Hans? Steve King…’ when I answered the phone was probably one of the weirdest (in a very good way) things I have ever experienced.”

You can buy the original cover art or prints of Edward Miller’s cover art for the PS Publishing edition of The Colorado Kid here.

Dorman T. Shindler reviewed Secretary of Dreams in the St. Louis Dispatch. He called it “a Twilight Zone-like anthology featuring illustrated works by Stephen King that are reminiscent of the EC horror comics the author professes to love. The tales gathered here—featuring hordes of invading zombies, a haunted truck and a ‘storm’ of frogs—are well-suited to the treatment. And Glen[n] Chabourne’s pen and ink, nightmarish, illustrations (featuring lots of skeletal detail, rotting skin and deranged stares) is the perfect accompaniment. The difference here is that none of King’s words is edited, so the illustrations enhance rather than replace the prose. That makes for near perfection when it comes to King’s 1981 World Fantasy-winning story, ‘The Reach,’ a story Joyce Carol Oates once termed elegantly composed.” Here’s the transcript of Glenn Chadbourne’s recent chat.

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Breaking News from the Dead Zone

January 4, 2007: Happy New Year! Welcome back to News from the Dead Zone. This should be an exciting year, with the possibility of two new novels, at least two films, the graphic novel series and who knows what else? You’ll know what else—if you keep checking out this page.

The Marvel web site has lots of new goodies to promote the Dark Tower graphic novel series, which will be out in just over a month from now. On the main DT page you can download a cool screensaver and wallpapers and watch a trailer for the series. On the blog page, Nicole Boose presents a first look at some of the extra material that will be included with the first issue: a map of New Canaan based on a sketch provided by Robin Furth. The previous blog entry is here.

Here’s an interview with Dark Tower comic scripter Peter David

A group called Dead Issue has a song called The Last Gunslinger inspired by Roland on their MySpace page. I haven’t listened to it yet, but I thought I would pass this along.

Filming of The Mist is slated to commence filming February 20 for a tentative November 21 release.

Rebecca Gibney says King called (director) Mikael Salomon after seeing The End of the Whole Mess to tell him it was one of the best adaptations of any of his works that he’d ever seen.

Pan’s Labyrinth director Guillermo del Toro told SCI FI Wire that he hand-carried a copy of his movie to King’s Maine to screen it for him personally. King later named it his favorite film of 2006. “Even now, when you say it, I get chills,” del Toro said in an interview this week in Beverly Hills, Calif. “I do. I mean, … Stephen King has been a huge influence.” del Toro, “like a Muslim going to Mecca,” hand-toted two enormous film cans containing a print of his movie through three airports from Los Angeles to Bangor. “And then I arrived to a theater that, technically, was very hard for me to go, ‘Oh, this is the optimal screening,'” del Toro said. “And yet, to this day, it remains the best screening of my entire life. Because I was sitting next to Stephen King, and he was squirming during the impalement sequence, and I was like, ‘It doesn’t get better than this.'” The FX people who did Pan’s Labyrinth will be doing The Mist, by the way.

Subterranean Press announced recently that they should receive their slipcases for the new edition of The Green Mile within a few weeks, at which time the marathon shipping operation will commence.

I started a new book review site called Onyx Reviews, where I’ve posted a bunch of my book reviews and a couple of interviews. The Owen King interview appeared previously online but the Tabitha King interview appears here for the first time.

News From The Dead Zone #48

Breaking News from the Dead Zone

If you subscribe to the newsletter from Stephen King’s official web site, you received a notice late last week concerning a chance to buy a signed copy of The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon or John Irving’s Until I Found You from a special store set up at The Haven Foundation website. Though the King books aren’t first editions, $40 for a signed hardcover with unequivocal provenance is a great deal in today’s market. The approximately 200 copies sold out very fast, but subscribe to the newsletter or check the Haven web site for future offers throughout the winter. Haven is the replacement for the Wavedancer Foundation, an organization designed to support people in the book and publishing industry who have little or no financial cushion in the event of a sudden catastrophic accident. All proceeds from the sale of these books goes to Haven.

Both Stephen King and Robin Furth will be attending New York Comic Con at the end of February. King will be a Guest of Honor and will appear with Furth on a special panel hosted by Joe Quesada, Editor In Chief of Marvel Entertainment, Inc. on Saturday, February 24. Marvel is beginning a full-court press to support the Dark Tower comic series. One of the series associate editors has established a Dark Tower Blog at the Marvel web site. There’s also an article in today’s USA Today (Dark Tower looms in graphic form) and the newspaper’s website has the e-mail Q&A that gave rise to the article. Both links have sample artwork from the first issue.

CaféFX Plus (Pan’s Labyrinth, Eragon, Ghost Rider) will be doing special effects for Frank Darabont’s The Mist, starring Thomas Jane, who describes the script as “12 Angry Men with monsters.” The movie will be shooting in Shreveport, LA at the end of February for a couple of months.See the interview with Jane here. (Windows Media).

Here are King’s three top-ten lists for 2006: Books, Music, Movies.