12/13/05

• On June 2, the Kansas City Star reported that the use of Boy's Life in a local high school was being challenged by a local parent. The December 7, 2005, issue included this update on the story:

  The Blue Valley School District will keep another disputed novel in its curriculum—at least for now.

  A district committee reviewed the book Boy's Life by Robert McCammon and voted 10-1 Tuesday to retain the novel in communication arts classes.

  The committee was made up of district staff, parents and students, who were all required to read the book and decide whether it fit district criteria for selecting novels.

  The complainant plans to appeal the decision to the Board of Education.

  You can read the entire article by clicking here (registration required).

11/25/05

• The Bibliography and Book Cover Gallery have been updated to include the signed, limited editions of Horror: 100 Best Books and Dark Dreamers. Also added a scan of the Dark Dreamers trade paperback edition to the Cover Gallery.

11/19/05

• Thanks to Lynda Patterson, a photo of Lynda with Robert McCammon from the Samford University Library signing in October has been added to the Signing Photos page.

11/15/05

• The new book Horror: Another 100 Best Books, edited by Stephen Jones and Kim Newman, includes an essay by author Yvonne Navarro about Robert McCammon's 1981 vampire epic, They Thirst. Click here for the complete table of contents for Horror: Another 100 Best Books.

11/10/05

• The 10/17/05 update below covered the use of a coffin by Italian publisher Gargoyle Books to promote the first Italian translation of They Thirst, entitled Hanno Sete. Guerriglia Marketing, the company behind the campaign, has posted a short video (Windows Media format) of the event that can be downloaded from here.

  And here's the interesting web site for Cofanifunebri, the Italian company that provided the coffin.

11/08/05

• Thanks to Ed Yarb, the cover for the hardcover edition of Best New Horror 3, featuring Robert McCammon's short story "The Miracle Mile," has been added to the Book Cover Gallery.

11/03/05

• Michael Nehs of Frontsight Productions has posted a brief Sanctuary update. Sanctuary is the planned film version of Robert McCammon's novella "Blue World." For more information, see the Sanctuary Movie News page.

• German resident Torsten Scheib reports that the German edition of Boy's Life, titled Unschuld und Unheil, is the book of the month (November 2005) at the German book site www.BookOla.de! The site is an off-shoot of the award-winning site www.stephen-king.de, and the bookcircle on the site is currently reading the book. You can find the German-language discussion forum for the book by clicking here.

10/20/05

• In 1991, British publisher Severn House published a hardcover edition of the anthology Stalkers, edited by Ed Gorman and Martin Greenberg and containing Robert McCammon's short story "Lizardman". The cover for this edition has been added to the Book Cover Gallery.
  

10/18/05

• Russian publisher ACT has reprinted another edition of Mystery Walk. The cover for this new edition has been added to the Book Cover Gallery.
  

10/17/05

• Book Promoted With Coffin (AdRants)
  To promote the first Italian edition of Robert McCammon's book, They Thirst, a coffin full of books was carried through the streets of downtown Rome. A street team, which carried the coffin on their shoulders, offered everyone a coupon of sorts for a free coffin in case they found themselves facing death by vampire. The stunt was created by guerrigliamarketing.it for Gargoyle Books and induced smiles, curiosity and various odd religious rituals among onlookers. See more images of the promotion HERE.

• Thanks to Dave Willoughby, a scan from the 2005 River City Publishing Catalog has been added to the Speaks the Nightbird Cover Gallery.

10/11/05

• Troy Palmer has contributed two new illustrations he created that were inspired by Usher's Passing and Mystery Walk. You can view Troy's art in the Fan Artwork Gallery. Thanks, Troy!

09/22/05

• Added a link to Simon & Schuster's official page for Robert McCammon to the Links page.

09/20/05

• A scan of the cover of Vampires: The Greatest Stories, edited by Martin H. Greenberg, has been added to the Book Cover Gallery. This book includes a reprint of Robert McCammon's short story "The Miracle Mile," which originally appeared in Under the Fang.

09/12/05

• A new photo of Robert McCammon has been added to the Portrait page. Thanks to the McCammons for the photo!

09/09/05

• Thanks to David E., a photo of the uncorrected proof for the Dark Harvest collection Night Visions 4 has been added to the Cover Gallery. This particular copy was signed by McCammon, Dean Koontz, Edward Bryant, and Clive Barker.

• Rainstorm Entertainment is currently developing a movie based on Robert McCammon's short story "Night Calls the Green Falcon." I have created a page devoted to The Green Falcon, and I'm trying to get more information about the project. Stay tuned!
  

08/31/05

• Troy Palmer has contributed a new illustration he created that was inspired by The Night Boat. You can view Troy's art in the Fan Artwork Gallery. Thanks, Troy!

08/03/05

• Frank Darabont sent me an update on the status of his adaptation of Robert McCammon's 1990 novel, MINE:

  "I came close to getting MINE into production this year, but it was a near-miss. For those who may not know, getting a movie greenlit for production is like having the planets align—countless factors all have to come together at the right moment for anything to happen. I remain committed to making MINE, and am currently in a search for the actresses to play the lead roles of Laura and Mary. I'm hoping to get the movie before the cameras at some point in 2006, although it might be later that year rather than earlier. That's because circumstance and opportunity (the planets aligning) might dictate that I direct my adaptation of Stephen King's great horror novella, The Mist, first. If so, I will likely start shooting The Mist this coming December, '05."

  --Frank Darabont, 08/03/05

08/01/05

• Michael Nehs, the producer for Sanctuary, the planned movie adaptation of "Blue World", posted a status update to the McCammon message board today.

  The full email update from Frontsight Productions is also available. An archive of their email updates will be maintained on the Sanctuary information page on this site.

07/31/05

• Robert McCammon continues to work on his upcoming novel, The Queen of Bedlam. He expects to complete it before the end of the year.

• There are some more possible movie/TV projects based on McCammon works in development. None of them are far enough along to be named, but any official news will be posted here when it's available.

• Boy's Life has been reprinted in Japan in a 2-volume edition. The covers have been added to the Book Cover Gallery.
  

• Russian publisher ACT is still reprinting new editions of some of McCammon's books. The covers for these new editions of Baal and The Night Boat have been added to the Book Cover Gallery.
  

• Thanks to Dan, covers for the hardcover editions of How to Write Tales of Horror, Fantasy, and Science Fiction and The New Twilight Zone, both featuring contributions by Robert McCammon, have been added to the Book Cover Gallery.

07/08/05

• Frontsight Productions sent a new teaser poster for Sanctuary.

07/06/05

• Michael Nehs, the producer for Sanctuary, the planned movie adaptation of "Blue World", posted a status update to the McCammon message board today.

06/29/05

• On June 2, the Kansas City Star reported that the use of Boy's Life in a local high school was being challenged by a local parent. Today's issue reports that committees at Blue Valley High School voted to keep Boy's Life in the curriculum, along with Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison and the short story "Rape Fantasies" by Margaret Atwood. From the article:

  Each committee of parents, students and staff members read the materials, heard comments from complainants and teachers, and read professional reviews.

  The complainants may appeal the decisions to the district level.

06/27/05

• Thanks to Matthew Craig, the cover for the 1991 UK Severn House edition of the anthology Post Mortem has been added to the Cover Gallery. Robert McCammon's short story "Haunted World" appeared in this anthology, which was originally published in the U.S. in 1989.

06/23/05

• Italian publisher Gargoyle Books is publishing Hanno Sete, an Italian translation of Robert McCammon's They Thirst. The book will hit bookstore shelves in October 2005. Thanks to Paolo, we have the cover art for this new edition; click on the image below to view a larger version.
  

  Gargoyle Books is also publishing Italian translations of the Deep in the Darkness, by Michael Laimo, and Riverwatch, by Joe Nassise. I've read both of those recently and recommend them both.

06/13/05

• Robert Weinberg reviews Swan Song on About.com

06/03/05

• The Kansas City Star reports that usage of Robert McCammon's Boy's Life in Blue Valley North High School has been challenged by a local resident. No mention is made of why the book has been challenged, but this isn't the first time Boy's Life has been challenged or banned in schools. You can read the article by clicking here (registration is required).

  Update: after searching the web, I found a page called The Blue Valley F-List, which lists books to which some parents have objected. It's apparently the presence of the "f-word" that lands a book on their list.... Here's a page that documents the offensive parts of the books, according to the Blue Valley parents who run the web site. Finally, here's a link to their Boy's Life page (actually, the warning page that leads to the actual page) which contains quotes from the book that are, of course, taken out of context.

• The Bibliography page has been updated to include Robert McCammon's afterword for As Timeless As Infinity: The Complete Twilight Zone Scripts of Rod Serling, Volume 2. The cover for the book has also been added to the Cover Gallery.

05/25/05

• Clint Leduc has contributed another illustration, this one inspired by The Night Boat. You can view Clint's art in the Fan Artwork Gallery. Thanks, Clint! If anyone else would like to contribute artwork to the site, just drop me a line!

05/03/05

• Back in November 2002, Smoky Mountain News published a great review of Speaks the Nightbird. A link has been added to the Speaks the Nightbird page.

• Adam Lipkin has written a new article about werewolf novels that includes mention of The Wolf's Hour for BookSlut.com.

• The University of Tulsa's newspaper ran this review of The Wolf's Hour back in February 2001.

04/24/05

• Thanks to the talents of Dave Ballard, there are two new McCammon computer wallpaper images now available for download. The images are based on the artwork for the U.S. hardcover and U.K. paperback editions of Mystery Walk. Each image is available in a dark version and a "ghosted" version. You can find them on the Downloads page, or you can click the images below.

• There are two new reviews of McCammon books on different websites:
  • Robert Weinberg reviews They Thirst on About.com

  • Craig reviews Speaks the Nightbird on Craig's Book Club

04/18/05

• The following scans have been added to the Book Cover Gallery:
  • Gone South audio adaptation (front)
  • Gone South audio adaptation (rear)
  • Stalkers audio adaptation
  • Night Visions 8 hardcover
  • Night Visions 8 hardcover uncorrected proofs

04/12/05

• A new page devoted to Sanctuary, the movie version of "Blue World", has been added to the site.

03/28/05

• The web site for Frontsight Productions, the company producing a movie based on Robert McCammon's novella "Blue World", is now online with information about the movie, which has a working title of Sanctuary.

  For more on the movie, visit the Frontsight Productions website, and read the "Blue World Movie Information" thread on the Message Board.

03/16/05

• Troy Palmer has contributed an illustration inspired by Swan Song. You can view Troy's art in the Fan Artwork Gallery. Thanks, Troy!

03/05/05

• Several new themes have been added to the RobertMcCammon.com Message Board, allowing you to choose different colors and layouts for the board.

03/03/05

• Russian publisher ACT has published another new paperback two-in-one edition of Blue World / Usher's Passing. The cover has been added to the Cover Gallery.

02/25/05

• The 2004 Hungarian translation of MINE included a new preface by Robert McCammon, written specifically for that edition. The preface has been added to the MINE page.

• I don't know how many copies were in each printing, but both paperback volumes of Speaks the Nightbird are now in their third printings from Pocket Books.

02/13/05

• New interview now online!

  Robert McCammon wanted to provide an update to visitors of this web site, and I suggested we do a new interview for the site. On January 27, 2005, Robert McCammon and I talked about the new book he's writing, called The Queen of Bedlam, and his current plans for the future. Click here to read the new interview, which has also been added to the Interview Archive.

• Scans of the Dark Harvest lettered limited edition of Swan Song have been added to The Book Cover Gallery. Also, the non-U.S. edition covers can now be viewed grouped by country. See The Book Cover Gallery for the view-by-country links.

01/31/05

• To tide you over until I've had time to transcribe last week's interview with Robert McCammon, I've added another old interview to the Interview Archive. This interview is entitled "In the Light: An Interview with Robert McCammon," and was conducted by Steve Spignesi for a book about Stephen King. Thanks to Steve for permission to reproduce the interview here.

• R.I.P. Philip DeGuere.

  Mark Evanier reports that writer-director-producer Philip DeGuere died from cancer last week. Among other shows, DeGuere worked on the 1985 revival of Twilight Zone, and wrote the teleplay for the TZ adaptation of McCammon's "Nightcrawlers".

01/29/05

• Russian publisher ACT has published two new paperback two-in-one editions of Baal / Mystery Walk and Bethany's Sin / The Night Boat. The covers have been added to the Cover Gallery.

01/28/05

• Coming soon: a new interview with Robert McCammon, wherein we discuss his new book and his plans for the future!

• Clint Leduc has contributed an illustration inspired by The Wolf's Hour. You can view Clint's art in the Fan Artwork Gallery. Clint said he'll be sending in more illustrations in the coming months. Thanks, Clint! If anyone else would like to contribute artwork to the site, just drop me a line!

01/26/05

• The message board system has been replaced with a much more modern system. The new board allows you to create your own login accounts, so that your posting name, email address, etc., are remembered automatically, along with the ability to send private messages, create polls, and lots more. There are also separate forums available now for off-topic discussions, etc. The Flea Market Board is now a separate forum in the main message board.

  Unfortunately, I have been not been able to find a good way to migrate the the old message board posts to the new system, so we're starting from scratch. However, the old message board posts will be made available again for archival purposes in the next few days.

  Click here to visit the new, improved message board!

  If you encounter any problems, please send mail to Webmaster, or post in the appropriate forum on the board. Thanks! I hope you like the new board.

01/25/05

• Michael Nehs of Frontsight Productions has announced that an independent theatrical film version of Robert McCammon's novella "Blue World" is currently in pre-production. The working title of the film is "Sanctuary". Click here to read Michael's post on the Message Board for more information.