The website for DEPTH OF DECEPTION (A Titanic Murder Mystery Thriller) is on-line. Stay tuned for up-dates as we draw near to the April 2, 2012 publication.
http://www.depthofdeception.com/
Depth of Deception can now be purchased at an introductory rate of $0.99 from Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007O3IKTY as well as in other e-book formats from Smashwords at https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144531.
Friday, 24 February 2012
Monday, 12 December 2011
A Night to Remember
On March 31, 1909 the hull of one of the largest passenger ships in the world was started at Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast, Ireland. Exactly two years later, on March 31, 1912 the final fittings were completed, readying her to set sail the following week. It was the pride of the shipbuilding area. But, just before midnight on April 14, 1912 the floating luxurious palace known as the RMS Titanic struck an iceberg and less than a few hours later sank into the North Atlantic Ocean taking over 1,500 people with her. Not only was this the greatest maritime disaster ever seen at that time, but it was a blow to man's arrogance when they boasted that 'not even God could sink her.' This upcoming year, 2012, will mark the centennial anniversary of that tragic but historic event.
On March 31, 2012 (note the significant date), in the exact spot where RMS Titanic was first built, the TITANIC BELFAST®, the world's largest Titanic attraction, opens to the public. This awesome new building is the same height as the Titanic's hull. It includes nine interpretive and interactive galleries displaying the sights, sounds, smells and stories of Titanic and the people who built her. There is also a 1,000-seat banqueting suite to be used for special events, conferences and/or weddings where guests can sample the same meals as were served aboard the Titanic. Tickets go on sale today. http://www.titanicbelfast.com
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| Titanic Belfast® |
I can't help but think it would be a cool venue to have a book launch for The Depth of Deception, my Titanic murder-mystery thriller novel.
That floating city continues to fascinate us, doesn't it? Recently, drawings used at the Titanic inquest in 1912 were sold at an auction. One drawing of the entire cross section of the ship sold for 220,000 pounds ($363,000 USD).
In related news, the cigar box, with the White Star Ship logo, that was owned by Captain Edward John Smith (Titanic's captain) was sold for £25,000 ($39,000 USD).
Besides the Titanic Belfast, there are many other upcoming events marking that fateful night. Director James Cameron (Avatar) will be re-releasing his multi-Oscar winning 1997 film TITANIC, which will now be presented in 3D, on April 6, 2012. (A week before the centennial anniversary of the sinking of the RMS Titanic.)
There will also be two Titanic memorial cruises on April 10, 2012: one departing New York harbor and another from South Hampton, England. Both of the cruises will have descendants of Titanic passengers, historians, and enthusiasts aboard. Together they will gather to pay their respects at a special Memorial Service at the exact place and time where the RMS Titanic sank 100 years ago. http://www.titanicmemorialcruise.co.uk/
There will also be two Titanic memorial cruises on April 10, 2012: one departing New York harbor and another from South Hampton, England. Both of the cruises will have descendants of Titanic passengers, historians, and enthusiasts aboard. Together they will gather to pay their respects at a special Memorial Service at the exact place and time where the RMS Titanic sank 100 years ago. http://www.titanicmemorialcruise.co.uk/
You can find Titanic exhibits all over the world, which have been touring over the last few years. http://www.titanictix.com/ There is also a memorial and exhibit to be held in Halifax, Canada where many of the recovered bodies were buried. http://www.titanic100.ca/ For coin collectors there is even a Titanic Centennial commerative coin: http://www.titanicheritagetrust.org.uk/2012-shop-medallions.htm
In an earlier blog, entitled 'Judging a book by its cover' (http://alexander-galant.blogspot.com/2011/07/judging-book-by-its-cover.html) I mentioned another unique Titanic collector's item for sale. An original copy of Futility (pictured here) which tells of a fictional ship, Titan which also struck an iceberg on a cold April night and sank in the North Atlantic. The interesting part was that this novella was published in 1898, 14 years BEFORE the Titanic set sail. (If you are interested in purchasing this extremely rare edition, please contact Michael Baber of Bicentennial Bookshop.)
This novel is an important clue in my above mentioned historical-thriller, Depth of Deception. Coming soon - April 2012.
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| Illustration by Carmen Gillespie |
My novel Depth of Deception (A Titanic Murder Mystery) can now be purchased at an introductory rate of $0.99 from Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007O3IKTY as well as in other e-book formats from Smashwords at https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144531.
Sunday, 30 October 2011
A Bloody Unique Book Launch Event
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| For Bram Stoker's 1897 dramatic reading |
On the morning of May 18, 1897 Bram Stoker staged a dramatic reading of his soon-to-be-published vampire novel. Since it still wasn’t certain which title the publisher was going to use, Bram entitled his reading, Dracula or the Un-Dead. Bram Stoker preferred The Un-Dead but the publisher wasn't so keen on the word 'dead' in the title. Bram hastily prepared the script for his dramatic reading using proof copies of the novel's text. He altered the text for the stage and made changes that would meet Lord Chamberlain’s requirements. As the royal censor, Lord Chamberlain could order an offending word, line or scene stricken from a script, or could even ban a play completely by refusing to license it for performance. The dramatic reading script did not have time for a polish or edit and using 15 actors from the Henry Irving company, Bram Stoker staged a one-time performance that lasted over four hours. Eight days later, the novel Dracula was published. Though not a commercial success in Bram Stoker's lifetime it has become the highest selling fiction novel in the world and has never been out of print.
Over the years I have directed various ‘Dracula’ projects including a Dracula short with Mickey Rooney narrating as Van Helsing and in 1997, the centennial year of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, I re-adapted and re-staged a (shorter) dramatic reading in the style that Bram had done 100 years earlier, using actors in costumes and this time adding live music for underscoring. For publicity I spread a rumour that Bram Stoker had re-staged his reading of Dracula here in Toronto while managing Henry Irving's North American tour. There is no evidence that Bram had ever staged a second reading of Dracula.
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| The Cast of 1997 dramatic reading of Dracula |
Years went by and I found myself working on Dracula the Un-Dead, the official sequel to Bram Stoker's novel.
Penguin Canada wanted to have a big event for the book launch here in Toronto, and wanted to do some sort of dramatic reading. Dacre Stoker (great-grandnephew of Bram) suggested they get a hold of me since I had recreated Bram's in 1997. When I met with the publicist from Penguin, she told me that they had heard a rumour that Bram had re-staged his public dramatic reading in Toronto and that's how they got the idea. Oh... the irony...
I suggested using the Bathurst Street Theatre in Toronto. Since it had been built in 1888 as a church, it had the right ambiance for the new gothic story. The one night performance would take place just before Halloween on October 28, 2009.
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| Bathurst Street Theatre, Toronto |
We wanted to make this a spectacular event for a modern audience. Having learned from my previous reading that the audience had trouble feeling for the death of a character when they could still see the actress drinking bottled water right in front of them on the stage (as is normally done in dramatic readings), I decided we were going to have entrances and exits. Using my experience of mixing projections with live productions we used a new effect called a Fogscreen, which literally created a curtain of fog using ionized water particles to project onto. The result was amazing. Even when projecting a newspaper headline it could be clearly read on the fog. Actors were able to enter through the fog with minimal image displacement and without getting their costumes wet either.
The period costumes were provided by award-winning costume designer Alex Amini, whom I've worked with many times on several of my stage and film productions. Eighteen incredible actors were used to bring Dracula The Un-Dead to life, some had been involved with my 1997 Dracula reading (ie. Carmen Gillespie, who played Mina Harker in both and like her character in Un-Dead, had not aged in that time). The whole performance was underscored by haunting live music composed by Kieren MacMillan. Dacre Stoker and Ian Holt were there in person and acted as narrators.
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| Countess Elizabeth Bathory (Elaine O'Neal) entering through her portrait, painted 300 years earlier. (projected onto the Fogscreen) |
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| The 2009 cast of the dramatic reading of Dracula the Un-Dead. |
The result was a magical night. We had only sold 18 advance tickets but on the night of the performance approximately 500 eager people showed up. The performance ended on a cliffhanger moment with a 'To be continued... in the novel' projected, which resulted in a huge line-up to buy copies to have them signed. All in all a very successful evening. Our full house became the largest book signing and sales event for Dracula the Un-Dead's publicity tour.
Click here to see 1-minute video from the reading showcasing the Fogscreen:
To view photo stills from that night visit:-------
My novel Depth of Deception (A Titanic Murder Mystery) can now be purchased at an introductory rate of $0.99 from Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007O3IKTY as well as print and other e-book formats from http://www.depthofdeception.com
Friday, 14 October 2011
Guess where?
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This photo was taken circa 1900. At the time this photo was taken this intersection was known as Longacre Square. It became Times Square in April 8, 1904, when it was renamed by Mayor George McClellan Jr at the urging of Adolph Ochs, owner of the New York Times. (We are looking southward - that building in the background is where the ball is now dropped every New Year's Eve.)
The Cadillac Hotel (seen in the above photo) was on the northeast corner of Broadway and 43rd Street. Built in the 1880's, it was originally known as the Barrett House and became the Cadillac Hotel in 1898. It was renamed in 1914, then torn down in the 1940's. Today an office tower stands in its place.
The New York Theater on the left was originally called Hammerstein's Olympia - The Music Hall which opened in 1895. The Ziegfield Follies performed here for five years and many other famous musicals ran here as well. Another historical note worth mentioning: the Biograph Company's first Mutoscope "peepshow flickers" (early risqué movies) were premiered here in 1899 which set off the 'moving pictures' craze. In 1915 the New York Theater was taken over by Lowe's as a movie-vaudeville house. The theater was demolished in 1935. Now there is a three-level Toys 'R Us store.
This photo was one of many old pictures that I used for historical research while I was writing The Depth of Deception (A Titanic Murder Mystery Thriller). I find it personally interesting to stand in the place where that photographer stood, and observe what has remained the same and what has changed. The fun of historical research!
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| Photo by Alexander Galant - 2010 |
Update: My novel Depth of Deception (A Titanic Murder Mystery) can now be purchased in Kindle & paperback from Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007O3IKTY as well as in other e-book formats from http://www.depthofdeception.com/buy-the-book.html
Friday, 7 October 2011
What would you do if you won the lottery?
There is a lottery for $50Million. There is another one here in Ontario for $100,000 a year for life, which is more than most people make in a year.
My wife asked me, "What would you do with your time if you won the lottery and no longer had to worry about earning money?"
The first thing that came to mind was to travel to England to do some additional research for my next novel. So if I were to win the lottery, I would still want to write. I would still be a storyteller... with less stress.
What would you do with your time if you won the lottery?
My wife asked me, "What would you do with your time if you won the lottery and no longer had to worry about earning money?"
The first thing that came to mind was to travel to England to do some additional research for my next novel. So if I were to win the lottery, I would still want to write. I would still be a storyteller... with less stress.
What would you do with your time if you won the lottery?
Friday, 2 September 2011
Write a novel in three days?
It's Labour Day weekend, and I'm reminded of another Labour Day weekend from 2006. While most of my friends were outdoors enjoying the last days of summer, I was inside figuratively chained to my computer taking part in the 3-Day Novel Writing Contest.
The contest itself first began in 1977 and has continued every year over the Labour Day weekend. There is an honour system of rules. No one is watching you to see that you don't start before midnight but after so many years, they can tell when someone has cheated and not kept within the 72 hours. In the end, the writers are not necessarily competing against each other (even though there are three top prizes) but rather the competition is with themselves. Just the insane thought: Can I write a whole novel in three days?
Although you are not allowed to do any writing of the actual manuscript ahead of time, you are allowed to come up with a story and even an outline. As I wrote in an earlier blog entry:
(http://alexander-galant.blogspot.com/2011/07/inspiration.html), that the inspiration for my novel, The Depth of Deception, came from a tabloid headline I had seen 16 years earlier. So I put together a rough outline with all the plot points I wanted to cover and the ending. That was key. I've never been able to write a screenplay or story unless I had the ending first and knew where I was going.
Day One - At the stroke of midnight I began typing. My wife was completely supportive and was looking after our one-year-old daughter while I embarked on this crazy venture. Since I was normally the cook in the family, my wife purchased a weekend stock of frozen dinners and easy to make lunches and made sure that I ate. After many years of working together in theatre she knew I would forsake eating to get the job done. I had also e-mailed all my friends and colleagues and told them what I was doing and to not bother, call or e-mail me for the duration of the long weekend.
Using the my outline as a guide, I felt I was off to a good start. I didn't get as far as I had hoped but the main characters were becoming well defined.
Day Two - From my years of going to school during the day, theatre in the evening and working the graveyard shift at a variety store, I learned that I could survive with short 20-minute power naps. I employed this technique to survive this weekend (it was easier when I was eighteen). Still the 20-minute naps would give me a few hours of focused writing time. The contest's website stated that this is usually the time that "the outline may be discarded". This was not the case with me. I was right on track. Every once in a while my wife would check that I was still breathing and bring food.
Day Three - One nap was longer than I had intended and I was now behind. I was typing furiously, very glad I took that typing class in high school. (You can't do something like this with the hunt-and-peck-typing-system.) As I was writing I was becoming increasingly aware that everything was moving too... conveniently. On the screen it was clear who the antagonist was and their comeuppance was foreshadowed too soon. Suddenly there was a surprise twist. It was such a surprise that I didn't see it coming until my fingers stopped typing and I read what I had just written. I had killed off a major character. I didn't intend for that to happen. They were supposed to be triumphant at the end. I looked at the screen again. They were dead. Of course, the easiest thing to do would be to backspace and delete that last sentence. But I couldn't. I stared at it. It made sense. It was essential. It threw doubt onto who was good and who was bad. I looked at my one-page outline and crumpled it up. It no longer applied.
I got up and went to the living room and calmly told my wife, "I just killed off a major character."
"What?" she blinked. She asked me a couple of other questions and I think I answered but I can't be sure. I looked at the clock on the wall. It was past seven o'clock in the evening. I had less than five hours left to complete the novel.
"I have to take a walk," I said to her. "I have to figure out what's going to happen next."
I didn't go too far. I could feel the effects of sleep deprivation on my body and did not trust myself crossing the street. So I walked around the block... many times. I recall talking out loud to myself, sometimes as the characters, figuring out the dialogue and the consequences of what had happened in my novel. I'm sure to any passerby, I looked insane talking to myself with no newfangled Bluetooth, hands-free cell phone in sight.
After a short while, I returned to my computer and typed away as fast as I could. By this point, spelling, grammar, character development, and even scene description become immaterial. The main driving goal was to be finished writing by midnight.
I finally reached the end of the novel. I looked at the clock, there were 13 minutes left to go. I hit 'save' so that it would be date-stamped with the actual time, proving that I had completed it in the allotted time. I woke up my wife so she could witness the momentous occasion and sign the form as a witness that I obeyed the rules. About one minute after midnight I was in my own bed and sound asleep.
The next day, I sent in my manuscript with the title, The Unthinkable - playing on the ironic nickname of the Titanic being "unsinkable". It was 77 pages long and contained a total 17,487 words. It was full of spelling mistakes and errors. My tenses were inconsistent. Still, I was very pleased with myself for having completed a manuscript in three days.
A few weeks later I met a handful of other 3-day Novel Contestants from the Toronto area at a pub for drinks. We were all asked to bring our first chapter to read to each other's work. It was very interesting to see the different genres that were tackled in this contest. When I read my chapter, it intrigued them. They wanted to know was going to happen and suggested I pursue getting it fleshed out to a point where it would be published.
One other writers took a poll and asked how many of us were procrastinators. We all put up our hands. She concluded that this was the appeal of the 3-Day Novel Contest. It was to conquer the procrastinator inside of us and prove to ourselves that we can do it.
I don't know if it applies to all writers but it certainly worked for me. It worked again in the fall of 2010 when my agent at Writers House, echoed the opinion that Unthinkable should be fleshed out into a full length novel. Since 2012 will be the centennial anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic and James Cameron is re-releasing his blockbuster movie in 3D, my thriller novel connected to the Titanic would be very marketable. She challenged me to expand it from 25,000 words (I had made corrections and added details before showing it to her) to over 60,000. Though she said she'd prefer over 80,000.
I picked up the gauntlet and worked towards an agreed deadline. Six months later I sent her the re-titled, 381 page novel with 90,351 words. My agent read it over the memorial-day long weekend and loved it. She said the pace and the suspense made it the perfect book to read at a cottage or beach.
(The book will be published April 2, 2012 - http://depthofdeception.weebly.com/)
So, to answer my original question: Can I write a novel in three days? Yes. It may not be perfect but it was proof of what I can accomplish when I put my mind to it.
To anyone else wanting to challenge themselves in writing a novel in three days, I highly recommend the experience. For more information on the 3-Day Novel Contest visit: http://www.3daynovel.com
----
My novel Depth of Deception (A Titanic Murder Mystery) can now be purchased at an introductory rate of $0.99 from Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007O3IKTY as well as in other e-book formats from Smashwords at https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144531.
The contest itself first began in 1977 and has continued every year over the Labour Day weekend. There is an honour system of rules. No one is watching you to see that you don't start before midnight but after so many years, they can tell when someone has cheated and not kept within the 72 hours. In the end, the writers are not necessarily competing against each other (even though there are three top prizes) but rather the competition is with themselves. Just the insane thought: Can I write a whole novel in three days?
Although you are not allowed to do any writing of the actual manuscript ahead of time, you are allowed to come up with a story and even an outline. As I wrote in an earlier blog entry:
(http://alexander-galant.blogspot.com/2011/07/inspiration.html), that the inspiration for my novel, The Depth of Deception, came from a tabloid headline I had seen 16 years earlier. So I put together a rough outline with all the plot points I wanted to cover and the ending. That was key. I've never been able to write a screenplay or story unless I had the ending first and knew where I was going.
Day One - At the stroke of midnight I began typing. My wife was completely supportive and was looking after our one-year-old daughter while I embarked on this crazy venture. Since I was normally the cook in the family, my wife purchased a weekend stock of frozen dinners and easy to make lunches and made sure that I ate. After many years of working together in theatre she knew I would forsake eating to get the job done. I had also e-mailed all my friends and colleagues and told them what I was doing and to not bother, call or e-mail me for the duration of the long weekend.
Using the my outline as a guide, I felt I was off to a good start. I didn't get as far as I had hoped but the main characters were becoming well defined.
Day Two - From my years of going to school during the day, theatre in the evening and working the graveyard shift at a variety store, I learned that I could survive with short 20-minute power naps. I employed this technique to survive this weekend (it was easier when I was eighteen). Still the 20-minute naps would give me a few hours of focused writing time. The contest's website stated that this is usually the time that "the outline may be discarded". This was not the case with me. I was right on track. Every once in a while my wife would check that I was still breathing and bring food.
Day Three - One nap was longer than I had intended and I was now behind. I was typing furiously, very glad I took that typing class in high school. (You can't do something like this with the hunt-and-peck-typing-system.) As I was writing I was becoming increasingly aware that everything was moving too... conveniently. On the screen it was clear who the antagonist was and their comeuppance was foreshadowed too soon. Suddenly there was a surprise twist. It was such a surprise that I didn't see it coming until my fingers stopped typing and I read what I had just written. I had killed off a major character. I didn't intend for that to happen. They were supposed to be triumphant at the end. I looked at the screen again. They were dead. Of course, the easiest thing to do would be to backspace and delete that last sentence. But I couldn't. I stared at it. It made sense. It was essential. It threw doubt onto who was good and who was bad. I looked at my one-page outline and crumpled it up. It no longer applied.
I got up and went to the living room and calmly told my wife, "I just killed off a major character."
"What?" she blinked. She asked me a couple of other questions and I think I answered but I can't be sure. I looked at the clock on the wall. It was past seven o'clock in the evening. I had less than five hours left to complete the novel.
"I have to take a walk," I said to her. "I have to figure out what's going to happen next."
I didn't go too far. I could feel the effects of sleep deprivation on my body and did not trust myself crossing the street. So I walked around the block... many times. I recall talking out loud to myself, sometimes as the characters, figuring out the dialogue and the consequences of what had happened in my novel. I'm sure to any passerby, I looked insane talking to myself with no newfangled Bluetooth, hands-free cell phone in sight.
After a short while, I returned to my computer and typed away as fast as I could. By this point, spelling, grammar, character development, and even scene description become immaterial. The main driving goal was to be finished writing by midnight.
I finally reached the end of the novel. I looked at the clock, there were 13 minutes left to go. I hit 'save' so that it would be date-stamped with the actual time, proving that I had completed it in the allotted time. I woke up my wife so she could witness the momentous occasion and sign the form as a witness that I obeyed the rules. About one minute after midnight I was in my own bed and sound asleep.
The next day, I sent in my manuscript with the title, The Unthinkable - playing on the ironic nickname of the Titanic being "unsinkable". It was 77 pages long and contained a total 17,487 words. It was full of spelling mistakes and errors. My tenses were inconsistent. Still, I was very pleased with myself for having completed a manuscript in three days.
A few weeks later I met a handful of other 3-day Novel Contestants from the Toronto area at a pub for drinks. We were all asked to bring our first chapter to read to each other's work. It was very interesting to see the different genres that were tackled in this contest. When I read my chapter, it intrigued them. They wanted to know was going to happen and suggested I pursue getting it fleshed out to a point where it would be published.
One other writers took a poll and asked how many of us were procrastinators. We all put up our hands. She concluded that this was the appeal of the 3-Day Novel Contest. It was to conquer the procrastinator inside of us and prove to ourselves that we can do it.
I don't know if it applies to all writers but it certainly worked for me. It worked again in the fall of 2010 when my agent at Writers House, echoed the opinion that Unthinkable should be fleshed out into a full length novel. Since 2012 will be the centennial anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic and James Cameron is re-releasing his blockbuster movie in 3D, my thriller novel connected to the Titanic would be very marketable. She challenged me to expand it from 25,000 words (I had made corrections and added details before showing it to her) to over 60,000. Though she said she'd prefer over 80,000.
I picked up the gauntlet and worked towards an agreed deadline. Six months later I sent her the re-titled, 381 page novel with 90,351 words. My agent read it over the memorial-day long weekend and loved it. She said the pace and the suspense made it the perfect book to read at a cottage or beach.
(The book will be published April 2, 2012 - http://depthofdeception.weebly.com/)
So, to answer my original question: Can I write a novel in three days? Yes. It may not be perfect but it was proof of what I can accomplish when I put my mind to it.
To anyone else wanting to challenge themselves in writing a novel in three days, I highly recommend the experience. For more information on the 3-Day Novel Contest visit: http://www.3daynovel.com
----
My novel Depth of Deception (A Titanic Murder Mystery) can now be purchased at an introductory rate of $0.99 from Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007O3IKTY as well as in other e-book formats from Smashwords at https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/144531.
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| Illustration by Jonathan Adams - 3DayNovel.com |
Review for my Star Wars spoof
A favorable review of my short film, Star Wars: Blasted Behavior, for the screening at DragonCon in Atlanta tomorrow.
http://www.zombiecatproductions.com/?p=5739
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