Quick Anecdote
Real quick, promise: When I was in high school, my family took a loooong, 16-hour car ride to visit relatives in the far northern upper index finger of Michigan. In order to survive such a claustrophobic experience, I turned to my local comic shop for help, turning its shelves upside down in search of epic reading material, ideally something that I'd never read before. Being a massive geek, there wasn't much I hadn't read. I had to SEARCH.
Lo and behold, I found a 3-Graphic Novel collection called ARMAGEDDONQUEST by one RONALD RUSSELL ROACH. Three 300-page GN's that comprised an entire biblical horror-fantasy-mystery journey in highly enticing black-and-white. I wasn't much of an indy/b&w reader at the time (I was in high school - I wanted capes!), but the subject mater seemed sweet, sweet genre fodder, and the art in AQ was charming as all get out. I had no idea what it was, but I went for it.
Best. Reading. Experience. Of. My. Life.
I could not put it down. I had to break a few times because the writing was DENSE, but I couldn't actually take it out of my hands, even then. Older readers/retailers will recognize the name of SIRIUS PUBLISHING, who released those 3 GN's way back when. Apparently Sirius publisher, Robb Horan, had the same reaction to ARMAGEDDONQUEST that I did. You can read Robb's 1997 reaction HERE (scroll down to the blog area).
Since publication in 1997, however, this comix gem has been long forgotten and lost to the annals of quirktastic publishing history. Until now.
The creator, Ronald Russell Roach, lives way the heck out in Copenhagen, Denmark, and after a dozen years of mentioning AQ every time "Your Favorite Comics" subject was brought up at parties and receiving nothing but blank stares in return, I decided to do something about my AQ-aloneness and I got up the guts to send off an email to Ron through his personal website, which he thankfully still maintained. He answered, and I pitched him the idea of bringing AQ back to modern readers via two methods:
For the #2 up there, we chose Ka-Blam for the best prices and, frankly, best quality print editions around insofar as POD is concerned. ARMAGEDDONQUEST BOOK ONE: TAZIO was released just a few months back, in August 2009, and we're releasing the whole 20-Book series as 52-page single issues, on a MONTHLY basis, until March 2011.
When ICBW hits, BOOKS 1-5 will all be out, and all of them are ready for ordering right this very minute! These books are 52 pages each and only $3.99 cover price, which beats the heck out of any 52-page mainstream comic price.
Let's Make a Deal
Any Retailer that would like to receive free books as a sampler, simply contact me at davebaxter [at] sonofhowell [dot] com and tell me you're interested. No strings attached, I'll ship off a copy of whatever books are ready as a free sampler for you. Right now that's Books 1-3. I hope to rush 4 and 5 to be print-ready by early November so I can send y'all the whole 5-book shebang.
These books should be available via Ka-Blam's direct-to-retailers COMICSMONKEY.COM, however, if CM isn't up and running in time for ICBW, retailers can order the books through me using the email address above, rather than directly through the IndyPlanet.com site, for the discount rate of $2.99 per issue. Any retailer that orders 30 or more issues, of any assortment, will get free shipping to their store, anywhere in the US.
Order must be placed by Thanksgiving to ensure they arrive by December 30th. Though, hell, feel free to order up until the big 12/30 deadline, I'll ship out the books soon as I can, one way or the other.
I would also be remiss not to mention that these Ka-Blam editions of AQ conatain BRAND NEW illustrated prose stories and comics written by Roach himself. Yup, the main dude is contributing brand new exclusive material to these edition of AQ! I know I'm in love :)
For all the online samples you could ever hope for, check out the webcomic site at www.armageddonquest.com
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