The bad news: it doesn’t have the full-color plates I intended the project to have; it is, for now, a novel instead of an illustrated novel. The good news: there are interested parties (well, actually, there’ve always been interested parties), so we might see 1999 Illustrated sometime next year. The better news: barring some unforeseen screwup, on September 29th, this long-delayed project is finally going to see the light of day.
What is it? In short strokes: The Priestverse. Earth-P. My Watchmen (with all due respect to the amazing Mr. Moore). The film Crash with superheroes. Click here for details.
The first thing I’d like to say is that I’m looking forward to reading ‘1999’, although I’m slightly disappointed that it isn’t in an illustrated format, for now.
The second thing that I would like to see is that when I click on your link it doesn’t work. 🙁
Trev: which link? They all seem to be working from my end. Help! Thanks –cjp
What is it? In short strokes: The Priestverse. Earth-P. My Watchmen (with all due respect to the amazing Mr. Moore). The film Crash with superheroes. Click here for details.
The link you provided above doesn’t work for me. I’m on Firefox, if that helps. What I get is a black screen with some words that are enlarged with some missing.
If I click on the screen it takes me to another that plays music and tells me I can skip intro, doing so will take me to the proper ‘1999’ screen. I hope this all makes sense.
Trev: the link is working perfectly. 🙂 What you are seeing is a presentation slideshow. Possibilities: (a) you are on a mobile device. Rotate your screen to landscape. (b) you have “zoomed” your mobile or PC browser screen way up, reset zoom to 100% (c) you are viewing this on a desktop portrait display (which I use for writing); re-size your browser window and reset zoom to 100%. Or skip the presentation altogether–click the black screen and where you see Skip Intro, click that 🙂 The presentation is responsive to the height (not the width) of your browser window. Hope that helps.
It’s because I’m on desktop. It works fine once I’ve clicked the black screen and skipped the intro. Cheer, cjp. 🙂
Preordered, spread the link around to friends. 🙂
Well, that sounds like…pretty much exactly what I said I wanted in the comments section on the previous post.
Priest, how’d you know my birthday was coming up?
Thad wrote:
” I can think of a lot of great books that took existing characters and filed the serial numbers off…”
LOL! That’s a great metaphor 🙂
I’m not arrogant enough to suggest all of the characters in “1999” are completely original, but none are intentionally derivative. I tend to think everything’s been done before. The real selling point of most any art or music these days is process: how this particular group of creative people do this familiar thing.
Part of my motivation for posting “1999” even w/out the intended illustrations is this: the longer it sits on my hard drive, the more stories in various media are published, and ideas that were (at least more) original in 2007 may now come across to an audience as my following or ripping off someone else’s idea. At least, by having a publication date, I can say, “No, actually, I thought of that back in 2015 (actually, 2007).”
Unlike Watchmen, “1999” isn’t a satirical deconstruction of the genre, it *is*the genre; a comic book without the pictures, operating within traditional Marvel-esque superhero norms. It attempts to make no statement beyond, “I Really Do Love Superhero Comic Books.” It breaks no new ground and doesn’t pretend to be high art or even groundbreaking in any sense.
It is also the first thing I’ve published to my Kindle store that exists within the genre I am best known for. Comic book fans may not necessarily want to read a procedural crime drama; they want capes. “1999” has capes. Well, okay, one guy wears a cape. And he’s really, really bad.
“1999” is just comics I could never actually do at a comics publisher because no publisher could guarantee all 36 episodes would see print. I’ve only been given the writing gig for a huge crossover event once (Acclaim Comics’ “Solar: Hell On Earth”), so I decided to write my own 🙂 Past that it’s Frank Miller-Roger Stern-Chris Claremont with a healthy dose of Mark Waid-isms inspired by his professorial teaching during our work together on Impact Comics at DC. I hope it’s a fun ride.
Ironically, if the work finds even a small audience, that actually would encourage a publisher to go look for a bigger one. The original concept was to launch a monthly comic out of the “Pulp” prose series, thus providing the equivalent of thirty issues of foundational continuity before issue #1 ships.
The nice thing about books (versus comic books) is books are forever. They don’t have to earn back their investment the first week or even the first year of their existence; you get as many bites at the apple as you want. No publisher goes, “Well, he’s sold 500 copies out of the back of his pickup, we don’t want those other ten thousand readers.”
Jim
So happy you decided to release this BTW. I hope it gets huge reviews and, with a bit of luck, this new showcase of your talent dealing with the genre you’re famous for -deservedly- serves as a cornerstone and a support point to put more things in motion. Fingers crossed.
P.S.- I’m really busy with more covers for Tom, but I’ll email you -again- as soon as I can spare a moment to do so. Keep up the good work and the wheels spinning.
I’m really excited by this! As charming as it is to think of Priest writing SPIDER-WOMAN, what I really want is Priest to create something of his own. I don’t think of prose as a second-best option to comics; I think prose is clearly where Priest shines brightest. Of course, Priest has a talent for superheroes as well, and superheroes in prose strike me as the best showcase for his gifts and brilliance. Illustrations, while interesting, are unnecessary for me to enjoy a good story.
Kindle copies are shipping to mobile devices now. Not showing as eligible to review yet, though.
http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/Rants/093015.html is this month’s review column from me, including 1999 ep 1-4.
I just started reading this yesterday. I’m part way through Episode 2.
And HOLY CARP I am loving the heck out of this…! 😀 😀 😀
Don: HOLY CRAP! Thanks so much!
By the way – are there plans to (at some point) issue a Complete 1999? Perhaps in a physical edition? Maybe it’s not a comic, but we do in fact have a prose section in our store, and I’d love to carry it!
(Totally understand if the economics don’t allow for that, of course. This new publishing world offers many more opportunities, but still has limitations!)
I don’t think we’ll see the novel collected until there is a print version of some sort, preferably with illustrations as originally conceived. I am, with the help of some buddies, looking to find a partner or publisher for the project, and there’s an unrelated deal in the works which may provide an opportunity for “1999.” Meanwhile, I’ve already completed Book One of the “1999” sequel, “1999: Red & Black,” which I wanted to post in March but I’ve been too busy to work on the remainder of the manuscript and would hate to post Book One and then radio silence for six months. Reminds me of those hit HBO or AMC series where they get you hooked and then there’s like nine months of bickering and haggling over salaries (i.e. screwing the audience) between seasons. I’d rather not do that. Thanks for the kind words.