Farewell, Stan Lee

CNN

He called us 'True Believers'. He exclaimed 'Excelsior!' like a magic word. A word felt in the bones of all who heard it. He lived to entertain and brighten the world for everyone. He should be proclaimed the Saint of Comic books. That's Stan Lee.

I still remember my very first comic book. It was Amazing Spider-man 184 titled 'White Dragon, Red Death!'. I was so hooked! Yes, I'm old. I grew up on the Adam West Batman series and the 1970's Spider-man and Hulk television shows. I took them all in with wide eyed wonder and they kept me out of my parents' hair. They inspired my creativity for all my life beyond.

Stan lived an amazing life and never slowed down once. Even though his last few years were laced with torment, his fans could count on his appearance until he was 95 years old. I wanted to include a quote, but there are so so many that I grabbed this LINK to some of the most awesome things the man ever said. Read them.

He was a humanitarian. He believed in kindness, tolerance, acceptance, and most of all love for your fellow human being. He demonstrated that behavior in everything he did. And in reality, he is immortal. He can never truly be gone for his creations live on in his stead.

I remember when people got together to make sure my son could meet Stan Lee in New Orleans. He still has the autographed photo put away up in the closet. It's a saved memory he can have for the rest of his life. I have an autographed copy of Drawing Comics the Marvel Way. It will never be for sale.

I think, if we could all adopt those practices of Stan Lee's life, the world could be an amazing place. I know the world was better just for having him in it.

So I've started up the mailing list

That's what all the gurus say to do. Get a mailing list going in order to get more people interested and latched on to your brand. Well, there is one phrase that definitely does not work in this business;

If you build it, they will come....

Not so fast. You have to go find them and while I've had some fellow authors croon to me about how easy it was for them.. I have had no such luck.

It's literally the ''superhero age" in movies and books even though comics have suffered. I can't think of a time my brand could possibly be more relevant.  But in a world that wants Spider-mans and Captain Americas how does an Indy brand get noticed?

Well, I'm still struggling to follow guru advice, but I can tell you it is practically never as cut and dried as presented. I'm saying this to you, fellow Indy creator because we live in a tough market. So what am I doing about it now?

Well, opting onto my mailing list (upper left corner of my blog page) will net you a free book. But it won't stop at that. I'm going to make sure my mailing list gives cool updates, more freebies, new artwork, and whatever else I can think of to stuff into that package until it bursts. I want every email you get on my list to feel like you're opening a birthday present. I want fun in your inbox.  Maybe some puzzles or coloring pages you can print out for the kids? Or totally keep them to yourself, I won't mind.

I'm changing the cover of Chaos Rising today. It may take a couple of days for that change to go live, but it will and I will make sure people know about it. Eventually all the covers will be changed. Yeah, you're getting to see that cover right here as the header to this blog post.

And soon I think I'm going to offer a chance to have yourself drawn as a superhero or fantasy character straight from a photo you send me. More details on that if we can get this off the ground.

That's what I'm doing about it now. My next steps are more writing and art of course. I have to keep creating and keep things moving. Direction has always been hard for me. I can wind up with too many projects on the plate but that's easy to do as a one man band.

So that's the update for now. Off to do more creating.