Monthly Archives: April 2011

The Adventure of Parachuting Ninja

The Adventure of Parachuting Ninja

When my sister was in town a few weeks ago, we went to Wilmington and found ourselves with a pile of tickets from an afternoon at the boardwalk arcade. For our prize, we chose the parachuting ninja.

Awesomeness personified, am I right? And thus, I present to you the adventures of the Parachuting Ninja, a story told in photographs.

The adventure begins deep in the forest of mint, as Parachuting Ninja makes his way through the woods.

Once past the treacherous herbal forest, he finds his next obstacle, the giant Zygo Cactus. It’s a prickly enemy for any Parachuting Ninja, no matter how highly trained.

Watch me read from Bother!

Hello there, fine blog readers! Last week, I did my first reading as part of Bull Spec’s Issue #5 launch. My short story, Bother, is featured on the cover, and I got the pimp spot of the evening–by which I mean, I read after 7 other fabulous speculative fiction writers and editors did their things that I wish I had recorded to share with you, too! I didn’t expect a recording at all, but that dastardly husband of mine pulled out his cell phone camera and . . . it wasn’t that bad! So I’m sharing it with you today, and I hope you enjoy hearing the first few pages of the story. If you do, pick up a copy of Bull Spec now! If you’re local, it’s at the Regulator and both Durham Barnes & Nobles this week and will be expanding to the locations listed below the video in the next few weeks. If you’re not, then order it here.

Becca Gomez Farrell at Quail Ridge Bookstore from ben farrell on Vimeo.

Tips for polishing up my reading presentation are very welcome. Hope you enjoyed it!

Locations where Bull Spec #5 is or soon will be available:

The Regulator Bookshop (Durham, 9th Street)
Sci-Fi Genre Comics & Games (Durham, 3215 Old Chapel Hill Rd between University Dr and MLK Blvd)
Quail Ridge Books & Music (Raleigh, 3522 Wade Ave at Ridge Rd)
Internationalist Books & Community Center (Chapel Hill, 405 W Franklin St)
Chapel Hill Comics (Chapel Hill, 316 W Franklin St)
Foundation’s Edge (Raleigh, 2526 Hillsborough St)
Storyteller’s Books (Wake Forest, 100 E. Roosevelt Ave)
Capitol Comics (Raleigh, 3027 Hillsborough St)
Flyleaf Books (Chapel Hill, 752 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd)
All Fun & Games (Apex, 958 US Highway 64)
Ultimate Comics (Durham: 9th St; Chapel Hill: Farrington Rd)
Barnes & Noble of Cary (760 SE Maynard, Cary Commons)
Barnes & Noble of Durham – The Streets at Southpoint (8030 Renaissance Parkway)
Barnes & Noble of Durham – New Hope Commons (5400 New Hope Commons)
All Booked Up (Apex, 104-B North Salem St)
Northgate Books (Durham: Northgate Mall)
North Carolina:
Barnes & Noble of Greenville, NC (3040 Evans Street)
New York:
Forbidden Planet NYC (NYC, NY)
Pennsylvania:
Golden Eagle Comics (Reading, PA)

Bull Spec #5 Launch and NC Speculative Fiction Night

My short story, Bother, is now available online! Bull Spec’s PDF version is up, a couple of days before the official publication of issue #5 on Friday, 4/15. You can find the full contents list and order a print or PDF version here. I may be biased, but I think you’ll want the print version because of this gorgeous cover.

The artwork is by Richard Case, a Hillsborough resident and comic book artist who’s done a lot of work for the DC label. He picked Bother to illustrate for the cover, and I love how it came out! I think it captures the feel of it quite well, and—it must be said—there be dragons! Okay, just one dragon, but it’s a beauty!

If you can’t wait to get a copy in your hands to read any of the fabulous fiction within its pages (including Absinthe Fish by M. David Blake, which just received a Recommended from Lois Tilton, the Locus Magazine short fiction reviewer!) then join us at Quail Ridge Books , 3522 Wade Avenue, Raleigh, on Friday night (4/15)! At 7:30, a bunch of North Carolinian speculative fiction authors and industry folks, including me, will be convening for readings, probable panel discussions, and more. Bull Spec #5 will be hot off the presses and available for purchase then. They will likely be an after party at Crowley’s also. . .

Let me know if you’re planning to go so I can say hello!

And Bull Spec’s publisher just referred me to his list of where you can find the magazine locally, and in a few other states, too, though they likely won’t be on the shelves until sometime next week.

The Regulator Bookshop (Durham, 9th Street)

Sci-Fi Genre Comics & Games (Durham, 3215 Old Chapel Hill Rd between University Dr and MLK Blvd)

Quail Ridge Books & Music (Raleigh, 3522 Wade Ave at Ridge Rd)

Internationalist Books & Community Center (Chapel Hill, 405 W Franklin St)

Chapel Hill Comics (Chapel Hill, 316 W Franklin St)

Foundation’s Edge (Raleigh, 2526 Hillsborough St)

Storyteller’s Books (Wake Forest, 100 E. Roosevelt Ave)

Capitol Comics (Raleigh, 3027 Hillsborough St)

Flyleaf Books (Chapel Hill, 752 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd)

All Fun & Games (Apex, 958 US Highway 64)

Ultimate Comics (Durham: 9th St; Chapel Hill: Farrington Rd)

Barnes & Noble of Cary (760 SE Maynard, Cary Commons)

Barnes & Noble of Durham – The Streets at Southpoint (8030 Renaissance Parkway)

Barnes & Noble of Durham – New Hope Commons (5400 New Hope Commons)

All Booked Up (Apex, 104-B North Salem St)

Northgate Books (Durham: Northgate Mall)

North Carolina:

Barnes & Noble of Greenville, NC (3040 Evans Street)

New York:

Forbidden Planet NYC (NYC, NY)

Pennsylvania:

Golden Eagle Comics (Reading, PA)

Stellarcon 2011 and High Point, NC

View over the tracks

I am way behind on all my travel posts, but I’m hoping to get that taken care of in the next few weeks. Here’s one on a trip the husband and I took to High Point, NC, for the 35th Stellarcon. “Now old enough to run for president!” was the unofficial slogan. This was my third speculative fiction convention, and Ben’s first.

What did I think? It was fun! Stellarcon convinced me to sign up in large part because I was amazed that such a small conference offered so much programming. As an author, I’m most drawn to the panels on writing-related aspects that I need more guidance on, but I also really enjoyed the fan-based panels, though I only attended two. One was on love for New Who and the other was a celebration of that glorious genre called B-movies.

A sci-fi/fantasy convention, you say? Where are the crazy pictures? Well, since you asked . . .

Klingon Karaoke!

Apparently, this is a Stellarcon tradition, with a Klingon and an Enterprise crewwoman hosting the event. I sang a little No Doubt—pretty badly since I didn’t remember the verses to Spiderwebs. Sigh. Other singers had more success.

An airship captain with a nice, deep voice.

The esteemed Klingon MC singing Somewhere Over the Rainbow.

Raven, the captain, and his girlfriend dancing along.

On Day 2, Ben and I went for a walk around High Point, as I’d never been there beyond stopping to take a picture there during the Giant Furniture Adventure. I was surprised by many of the awesome buildings High Point has that are definitely worthy of a shot or two.