Mark Leslie is a writer, editor and bookseller who lives in Southern Ontario. In 2005, Mark joined the blogging bandwagon and started posting random thoughts and musings on writing, bookselling and being a father.
Today is the release day for the latest full length novel in the Canadian Werewolf series.
It all started back in 2006 when I attempted to turn the short story "This Time Around" into a novel called A Canadian Werewolf in New York. It took me almost ten years to finish writing the book, which was originally published in 2016.
But in the summer of 2020, after spending a few years working on the characters and considering the other adventures that Michael Andrews, the main character and werewolf in the story, might get into, I decided to invest in the Canadian Werewolf brand as a series with new covers.
In August 2020 I launched Stowe Away an approximately 20,000 word novella adventure.
And, on Feb 23, 2021, Fear and Longing in Los Angeles, the second novel in the series.
Fear and Longing in Los Angeles takes Michael Andrews to Hollywood where he is working as a script consultant on the set of one of his books that is being turned into a movie.
He is using the trip as a chance to clear his head and get away from his frustrating love-life. The only woman he has ever loved, Gail, has made it clear that there's no chance of ever returning to the previous relationship. That, at best, they would only be friends.
When in LA, Michael encounters a mysterious woman he is compelled to get to know, and she turns out to be the perfect distraction for him. But while he's there, he also encounters some a nefarious hate group cult that is growing and threatening innocent people. And the woman he is getting involved with seems to have ties to that group.
Perhaps because it's about a man with enhanced strength and senses (a la the character of Wolverine) on a cross-country road trip with a young girl who is he trying to protect; but with some of the misadventures, detours, and slight humor of the John Hughes classic.
Stowe Away (Book 1.5) is a novella length story that takes place about one year after the events in A Canadian Werewolf in New York (Book 1), and about another year before the events in Fear and Longing in Los Angeles (Book 2), which is releasing in Feb 2021.
Michael Andrews is an Alpha Wolf and Beta Human trying to live a normal life in the Big Apple while living with the side-effects of being a werewolf. During the right phase of the moon, he turns into a grey wolf, with no control, or memory of the experience from his human brain.
In the novel, Michael is desperate to get to Stowe, Vermont, to be there for his best friend, Gail. Without a driver's license or a passport, he is unable to rent a car or fly there, so he boards a train. Only, there are a couple of challenges in his way:
The train arrives about half an hour after sunset, and it's "that time of the month" for this werewolf
There is a young woman being stalked by a human predator and Michael being Michael, is obligated to ensure her safety and escape from harm
The book (and the previous titles in the series) is part of a re-branding, and is available in Print (Hardcover and Trade Paperback), eBook, and Audiobook simultaneously. The audiobooks are read by Scott Overton.
Stowe Away and the other books in the series, are available to order through most online bookstores, through your favorite local bookstore, as well as via your local library.
As a writer, I have, lately, been recognizing the value of recycling, or re-using, old material into newer forms.
Come to think of it, perhaps I have regularly taken that approach. I'm only just starting to recognize it now.
"I, Death," a 1000 word short story I wrote in the mid 1980s in my second year of high school was re-imagined into a serialized horror story in blog format in 2006. That same story was slightly revised and rolled out again in 2012, and then it was later adapted into a novel that came out in 2014.
A ghost story that I made up to scare students when I was teaching drama as part of a summer program at Carleton University (Prospero's Ghost) was re-adapted over the years to be set within the context of almost every new bookstore I worked at between 1992 and 2008, to entertain and frighten fellow bookstore employees. That story then got re-envisioned to take place at McMaster University when Kimberly Foottit and I co-authored "Prospero's Ghost" to be included in the anthology Campus Chills, which was released in 2009.
And yesterday, for May the Fourth, 2020. I released a silly parody video called Spud Wars: A New Hopelessness.
I spent a few hours on Sunday May 3rd working on the parody, which basically stars me playing every role, with not much in terms of costumes, makeup, or even acting ability, a Darth Tater Mr. Potato Head, and our dog, Maya. I then added in a few visual effects.
It is, of course, silly, and self-reflective, and produced with virtually no budget and a hastily written outline.
Of course, the parody video was based on the Spud Wars series rolled out on this blog, originally in 2006, and then re-vised and re-edited/crafted in 2011.
That original Spud Wars series was a text and photo based serialized story inspired by a a simple photo I'd taken of myself unmasking Darth Tater.
The original storyline, of course, actually had somewhat of a plot, which involves Darth Tater wanting to get revenge because I ate his father (as a plate of French Fries the night before) - he attacks, I am knocked out. The story continues in The Carb-Eater Strikes Back where I seek help from the wise old Yoda-figure mentor, Mister Bunny. He advises me to "use the forks" which I do to defeat the spud. The story continues in Return of the Spud-Eyewhere Darth also seeks help from the same old master, who advises that he clone himself.
At that point, the story devolves in terms of storyline and trying to parallel the original Star Wars movies, because the next chapter is Darth Comes Knocking - and then trying to adapt cloning into it (in recognition of the Star Wars prequel movies), with titles like Darth's Revenge Part I and Part II, followed by Mark's Last Stand where I am defeated by the clone army of Taters.
I then, of course, adapted a picture of Alexander man-handling my camera when he was about 18 months old . . .
The story continues with Alex Attacks and then more episodes, including images of Alexander fighting a bunch of the Tater clones in The Final Standoff, then coming to a truce and playing video games (because all this violence makes them want to play video games) in All This Violence.
It was supposed to end there, but I'm a sucker for cliffhanger endings, and so had someone creeping up on them at the end of that one, and the story ends with Spud Wars: The Conclusion and Spud Wars: Epilogue.
It was a fun 12 part serialized story.
Of course, writing a parody script to a few images and shooting an entire sequence of these things are two different things. Alexander most certainly wouldn't participate in it with me, and he's no longer 18 months old. He is 15. Most of the additional Star Wars Mr. Potato Head figures are in Liz's office at the school, so I only had the one Darth Tater in my office at home to use. Not to mention, I had less than 24 hours from conception of the movie trailer parody to wanting to release it on May the Fourth, Star Wars Day.
That is why the recent adaptation is so different than the original scrip.
The lesson, of course, is a concrete example of why the movie version and the original text-based version are so different.
No wait, the lesson is that re-adapting and re-imagining an idea can take many different forms and formats, over the years. It's all part of the creative process of being a storyteller.
Well that's neat. I started writing this thinking there would be a lesson about re-using and re-cycling ideas into different forms and I also ended up exploring one of the many reasons why a movie adaptation of a book, or comic can't possibly be the same thing, that it has to become it's own unique entity, it's own unique experience.
When I was recording a recent episode of the Stark Reflections on Writing & Publishing podcast, I began reflecting on the various ways that an author can leverage FREE in order to build their author platform.
Below are those points, quickly summarized.
1) To Get Readers Hooked on a New Series
Offering the first book in a series free can bring a large funnel of new readers to your books. And, for authors who perhaps don't have more than a few books in that series, sometimes offering a free short story that is linked to that series is a great way to get people to try out your characters and their unique world/setting.
