Is this the end of my GNS Collecting?

The postie brought these two books to my hands today, the first having to travel the width of the Atlantic to reach my greedy fingers:

I have been after these editions for over a year, as they are by far my favourite editions of Guy N Smith's Satan's Snowdrop and Bats out of Hell. 

 

 I don't think there are many more GNS books out there that I am actively seeking now. Could this be the end of my collection? We'll see.

Guy N Smith Zine Cover Reveal

Wednesday, 10 April, 2024

I have a nice writing routine in the caravan, which has allowed me to make very good progress with my GNS zine/book. Unfortunately, this routine will come to an end this coming Friday, as the weekend will be taken up with my 24-hour writing marathon. I hope this will result in a full first draft of my 9th horror novel, Familiar. The two prime characters of this story are a teenage girl and a toad! Then, on Monday, I will be returning to the office after my mix of sick leave and, latterly, Annual Leave. God only knows what this will do to my schedule, though I am confidant of completing my Guy N Smith book within the 100-day project deadline. But, on the plus side of returning to the grind of working for 'The Man'... Well, I get to keep my job. So, it's full steam ahead with my creative work this week. One of the things I worked on today was the cover design of the GNS zine - I hope you like it.

And, if you want to spoil the magic of how I created the above werewolf image, scroll down below:

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GNS 9/11

 

5/100

Thursday, 04 April, 2024

Guy N Smith project 5/100. Just sown these babies with the mission of getting them to flower and to get some decent pics of them before the 100-day deadline hits.

4/100

Wednesday, 03 April, 2024

It was another quiet day with just me and the pwscat. The writing for my GNS zine is going well, and ideas are unfolding fast. 

I have also decided on the project that will replace the second edition of Avalon (postponed after May's visit to Glastonbury needed to be cancelled due to our housefire). More on this soon...

Day 3/100

 Tuesday, 02 April, 2024

A really bad hayfever day, spent on my tod in the caravan as my wife returned to work this morning and my son has been working for a good couple of weeks now. I say on my tod, but I did have this little one's company. Though she was't too pleased with my constant sneeze and gave me a good old grumble everytime I sneezed.

As I will be publishing a previously unpublished short story by Guy N Smith in my tribute book to him, I designed a cover pic for the piece. The story concerns a dog who guides his owner through a treacherous swanp. I am quite pleased with the result:

Day 2/100 and a Laundry-time Meander

Monday, 01 April,  2024

Day 2 of my Guy N Smith 100-day-project. Working on the introduction of the Guy N Smith zine under the watchful eye of fudjcat. 

Whilst staying at the caravan site, we doing our clothes washing in the landrette, the cycle lasting 30 minutes. With that in mind, we took a quick drive to the local pond on Cefn Bryn, Broadpool, catching the sunset there perfectly:

Returning to the campsite with a good 10 minutes to spare; we parked the car up outside the laundrette and crossed the road to photograph the sheep that were gathered near the roadside gate:

The sheep were very inquisitive and friendly and even allowed me to take a short video of them:

The Entrance to Llanrhidian Holiday Park

The evening light really has been kind to us since we have been staying in Llanrhidian, as as we left the laundrette with our washing, we were even rewarded with a huge rainbow over our caravan:

Day 1/100

Sunday, 31 March, 2024

Day 1 of my 100-day-project to produce a tribute to my favourite author, Guy N Smith. Before the first day comes to close, I want to have completed typing up Guy's hand-written story, Toby's Way, which will literally be the centrepiece of my one-off GNS zine... 

 And with my work on the GNS project competed for the day, I sat outside the caravan to do a little work on my next novel, Cold Comfort.

Never mind working on my writing,
I should start work on losing that belly

A New 100-Day-Project

 Saturday, 30 March, 2024

It was one of my better days yesterday. It started with me vising the marsh to get some shots of the high tide, continued with us almost completing the removal of all our things from the upstairs and attic of our charred house, and, after an evening's drive back to the caravan beneath the most fantastic of skies (see yesterday's post if you want to see it for yourself,) we watched continued watching the brilliant 3 Body Problem on Netflix! And in between all that, I finally picked up the courage to ask Tara, the daughter of my favourite author, if she would let me publish one of her Dad's unique manuscripts I have in my collection in my forthcoming tribute book to him. I cannot describe the elated feeling I got when she gave me her blessing 🙂 I am turning this venture into a '100-Day-Project', and the clock starts tomorrow. Time to plan...

In the afternoon, I finally took some pics of these trees by the Swansea dump I've been frequenting for the past few weeks.

We drove along the marsh road on the way back to the caravan and I stopped off briefly to take a short video of the small church there with it modern tweeting Swift boxes:

A beautiful evening ended the day, reminding us to always make the best of bad situation:

The Doors of Hell Have Opened

 Monday, 25 March, 2024

I hope this little beast of a book will be published in a week or so. The Cover design is done and dusted (see above), and the formatting of the novel for publishing is now also completed. I've just got to do a quick page-by-page check on the final typeset work, and then it will be ready...

What's next? I hope I hear you ask? Well, it's finally time for me to sort out that Guy N Smith zine I have been promising for so long. After that, I'm not too sure. I had planned on producing a second issue of Avalon, but with the cancellation of our Glaston visit for the May Day celebrations, I am going to put that on hold for a year. Reissuing/reworking my Hand in Gove book may be an option as this theme seems to have grown in popularity recently, but I'm not too certain yet. And my fourth Gower book, Tidal Gower, will still probably conclude my publications this year. 

Of course, while all the above is going on, I will be writing my ninth horror novel, Familiar, and ideas for it are already coming thick and fast.

Until my next post, keep happy :)

My Updated Guy N Smith Collection

 Wednesday, 06 March, 2024

GNS Reading Graveyard Rendezvous with One of His Creations

Monday, 04 

Models for a fotoshoot for my upcoming GNS zine:

Winter's End (2024) Update

Friday, 01 March, 2024

It is Spring at last! That was one harsh winter, wasn't it? Anyway, we are through it now, and it is time to look forward to better things...

Healthwise, I am hoping for a fantastic season ahead. My new meds, seen as a wonder drug by my consultant, have proved as good as promised and I officially return to my day job next Thursday.

Over the past winter, I have managed to progress my Cold Comfort novel and it is just a matter of formatting the thing now prior to its publication, which still has its official release date of March 31 intact - although this may stretch into April if anything gets in my way of progress it this month.

Progress of my Guy N Smith book is also going well, with all my Lego photography completed (I still don't know what to do with all the GNS Lego dioramas I've created over the past few months). I have one field trip lined up before completing this particular book. This was originally going to involve a visit to Hopwas Wood, the scene of The Sucking Pit and numerous other GNS tales, with Knighton being a reserve alternative should the weather prove too wet for woodland walking. With the continuing uncertainty surrounding the location of the bomb crater in Hopwas Wood (whose rain-filled depths inspired The Sucking Pit), I have decided to delay this visit for another day (and probably another year). Instead, I have now decided that my field trip will be to Shell Bay, the location of GNS' classic Night of the Crabs. This change of location came as a relief to my wife and son, who will accompany me on this field trip, as there is far more to occupy my family's time on the coast of North Wales than a meander through a single woodland. Knighton remains in reserve if the weather forecast proves too gloomy for beach camping at the time. The GNS book is still scheduled for a close of June 2024 release.

Prior to the above field trip, the three of us (and hopefully my daughter if she can find the time) have another trip planned, this time to Glastonbury so I can take photographs for Issue 2 of Glastonbury guidebooks, Avalon. This should be my third publication of 2024, scheduled for the end of September.

After that, I will be working on my fourth Gower guidebook - Tidal Gower. 

After that, my prospective 9th novel, about a girl's unusual friendship with a toad - Familiar - should lead me nicely into 2025...

Here's hoping the nice weather brings good times for myself, my family and all my friends, readers and site visitors. Have a love Spring :)

Mega Book Haul

Wednesday, 28 March, 2024

Mega haul received today. All books ranged between £4.75 and £8.99 with free postage. Good to see there's still bargains out there in 2024!

Oh, and this little fellow:

Word on the street, well in the FB GNS forums, is that some of these books are extremely rare, so the bargain I had is all the sweeter!

Cold Comfort Blues (Part 2) - Sorted

Monday, February 26, 2024 

Wow. My lovely daughter asked me to trawl through the attic for old pics of her with her old Pokemon toys. As I will do literally anything she wants, I obliged lol. And my reward? As I reached the end of over a 100 pages of old print outs of 20 year old digital pics, I came upon all the missing pages of my Cold Comfort novel, lost for over 20 years. Game on! And just as I was having fun working on my Guy N Smith zine lol.

 

Cold Comfort Blues (Part 1)

It's not looking good for Cold Comfort meeting it's March 31 deadline. My DVD reader seems to think all my old Data CDs are blank. Which they aren't as I accessed then in the past. I will try them in another drive but I'm not feeling too hopeful at finding those missing two chapters. And, to be honest, I'm not in the mood for rewriting 10,000 words of content I last read 26 years ago. Yet. And so, I'm moving on with my GNS project early... Click pic to see it properly as fb insists on cutting a large section of the image off its preview.

GNS - Trucker/Thirst Redesigns

Saturday, February 24, 2024

Saturday, February 24, 2024

Took me 3 attempts to get this one to my liking - a fusion of two Guy N Smith Books The Trucker & Thirst.

Original version, before realising that a truck carrying deadly weedkiller would more likely be a tanker

Tanker redesign, but I wanted the tanker to sink further into the water - note the glimpse of weedkiller spilling from the rear of the tanker

3rd version, using less bricks, and a deeper build, allowing to view beneath the water surface

Underwater view of the crashed tanker. The weedkiller is more apparent now. Just need to add more spillage to the underwater scene now...

Lego GNS Update

Friday,  February 23, 2024

Working on another section of my expanding Guy N Smith Lego diorama. When complete, this will sit atop my GNS book, zine & manuscript bookcase. The trouble is, I keep finding ways of improving and adding to it...

Guy N Smith - Crabs Omnibus

I don't think I've mentioned this addition to my Guy N Smith archive yet. It's probably the highlight of my collection too - the handwritten Manuscript, typescript and final printed book of Crabs Omnibus, all signed by the author.