So it is read an e-book week or something. And so for today only, until Midnight EST, I make the following offer:

Anyone who emails me [adampknave @ gmail(dot)com] between now and midnight and asks for it, will get the PDF of the entire Strange Angel book. For frees, yo.

What is Strange Angel, you ask?

Susie Sparrow’s life has turned upside down. She’s merged with Ferapont, who says he is an angel, and has dedicated her life to ridding the world of demon possessed people. Unfortunately she is also in High School. Trying to schedule fights around school, hanging out with friends and dinner with the parents might be too much for one girl with large flaming wings to handle. But don’t tell her that. This volume collects all three volumes of the hit novella series as well as the original short story that started it all. As an added bonus it also contains a never before seen end story, exclusive to this volume!

“Strange Angel is fun, scary, gory, action packed, and surprisingly touching… This book is highly recommended for any fans of Buffy or just good, fun, dramatic horror and fantasy.” — D.J. Kirkbride, author of SOULLESS

“Knave’s intense vision is packed with occult thrills. His brutal meditations on the struggle between good and evil create a fast-paced narrative bristling with gothic horror appeal. This dark action series is bound to be popular with fans of the recent surge in horror film.” –John Edward Lawson, author of LAST BURN IN HELL

“And even though I have repeated this time and time again, Knave is one of my favorite writers. His style is intimate and provocative, quietly humorous and always intelligent. He has this amazing ability to make you question everything you believe in, while passing you a beer and telling you a dirty joke. And never was it showcased more then in this series. That’s right, people, Knave has fucking arrived!” -Kelly “Bloodymary” Perry, Horror-Web.com

“If you’ve been missing some Buffy, but want to read something with a unique twist, the Strange Angel series of novellas by Adam P. Knave is a great joyride.” – Adrienne Jones, author of BRINE

So once again it is simple. Email me [adampknave @ gmail(dot)com] and ask for the book and get a shiny PDF in the mail. I’d offer it in other formats if I had it in other formats, but, uhm, I don’t. So this is what I can. Still! Free book! Today only!

Hey guys, the offer is closed. Sorry! But you can, of course, still buy the book at Amazon.

Little Lego guys, with traditional green army men bases, and a jeep and a stretcher! How cute are they? It’s 11 bucks for the set (click here to purchase) and there is a limit of 5 sets per person.

Man I love this so much. So much!

Spider-Man!
Spider-Man!
Prays just like a spider can!
Leans against the Wailing Wall!
Glad he sticks, he won’t fall!
LOOK OUT, GOYIM!
Here prays the Spider-Man!

So anyway, yeah. There’s a guy dressed like Spider-Man, praying at the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem. Who knows. Israellycool points out that there is a good chance this photo was taken on Purim, given the holiday’s customs of masks and costumes.

Then again… who knows!

I will say that Stan Lee’s “Face front, true believer!” line was never so apt.

To that end I wanna introduce you to one of those people. I should do this more often, I know. But I get busy and forgetful and end up failing. Still! I will do this one.

Attila Adorjany is an artist. You can find him at 600 pound gorilla where he blogs and does comics and draws and…

He does live draws you can tune in and watch! He does all this stuff and recently he even asked for some help. Here’s an amazing artist who wants your help getting out there. He earns the chance with every piece he draws. It’s awesome to watch.

Anyway, you can go here to read his talk about asking for help.

He also does commissions. Are they dirt cheap? Of course not. Are they worth it? I’m saving some pennies up now, man.

So seriously, go check him out, read his stuff, look at his art and become a fan. Because, hey, awesome is awesome, right?

To: adampknave
From: [name removed in case of Cthulhu]
Subject: Long fucktime uajagoz

Dear fuck you asshole,

Uofej nyetiferyh unyid iityoveu I have the privilege to request your assistance to transfer the sum of $47,500,000.00 (forty seven million, five hundred thousand United States dollars) into your accounts. Ieheb uajogozoo ojor iboreu yoas umynagojo.

Yqiseloz naepy. We are now ready to transfer the fund overseas and that is where you come in. It is important to inform you that as civil servants, we are forbidden to operate a foreign account; that is why we require your assistance. Loujypeyx vyhoyi ydoz uuck you! Shit fuck peaqejo uvuzue feliyazile yjima yqaeopoha ivapuet ylyusuzofe aratucyt ziqealoocu.

Cock pussy bastard iijyuh oside yuosy ytupyfe aryn apav relyojaz aniwyh. The transfer is risk free on both sides. Bastard shit licker. Alternatively we will furnish you with the text of what to type into your letter-headed paper, qukopueah izor akodosylu qatoyuke along with a breakdown explaining, comprehensively motherfucker what we require of you. The business will take us thirty (30) working days to accomplish.

Please reply shit urgently.

I don’t mean I had some foggy loose dream-story that didn’t work out. I mean I will wake up with exacting, detailed stories or associated items, that work and are a bunch of fun. I tend to then, quickly, call D.J. Kirkbride and tell him, because so far, for reasons I don’t know, they’ve also been comic related.

The first pass of one of our stories was sleep written like that. I woke up about 4am and knew I had to get this shit down. That it might suck in the morning, but something was just right about it. So I got up and jotted down detail after detail and suddenly had most of a beat pass for a script. So I mailed it to D.J. and then went back to bed.

When he got back to me with it, having fleshed it out and all, I had forgotten I had written it.

A few weeks ago D.J. and I discussed working up a cover idea for a pitch we’re knee deep in. And we both agreed to think about it and I went to bed and then I woke up, about 2ish, and called him in a hurry. I could see the cover, exactly. He wasn’t there so I left a half-asleep, rambly to all fuck message for him, describing the cover in detail. That cover has been done and we all love it.

Last night I went to bed a bit early due to just sheer exhaustion. And then I woke up. A pitch idea was in my head. Not fully, but the bones were there. Something D.J. and I can shape into a full pitch. But I just woke up with it and grabbed the phone.

I do wonder if D.J. has started to dread having his phone ring past 1am EST. Because it means that, once he sees it’s me, he has to know he is in for half-asleep, excited, rambling. He still answers the phone, so I guess it isn’t too bad, but he is also braver than I am.

Really though, it kinda annoys me. I love getting good, solid ideas out of my brain. I truly do. And I know how lucky I am. But I also kinda want to be awake more often when it happens. Prose ideas come to me when I’m awake. Comic ideas are about 60/40 awake/asleep and slipping. There is part of me that just doesn’t like the idea that comic ideas happen when I’m not looking.

On the other hand it would mean that I could justify naps are working, right? Hmmm… maybe there’s something to this, after all.

Put simply: He’s the best of us. Stripping away everything else, at his deepest core, Superman represents the humanity, the heart, that can change the world. He’s what we could be if only we never backed down. If we did what we knew was right, listened and were willing to change our minds, and generally acted from the heart after carefully and honestly weighing options, even if we disagreed with them.

Now, you can say Superman is a Moses story (it was never Jesus, honest, though yes in the movies and such they have tried to switch it to a Jesus analogy) what with the baby being sent down the river (the galaxy) by his parents and so on. Sure. But really, Superman hits a different angle I don’t see discussed as often. He represents what we could be as adults.

Most comic readers were kids, remember. Many of them on the cusp of adulthood. And Superman is one of the ultimate adults. He represents the power of adulthood, in obvious ways, with his super-abilities. But even more so in his actions. For him, growing up, taking on the responsibility of adulthood is not something to be done lightly. It is a responsibility that never goes away. You have to protect the world, your fellow man and you have to care.

He’s the best of us, and worst of all he knows it. It makes him sad. Because, of course, Superman wants us all to be at his level. He feels the lack, that we can’t share with him the power and joy that come from being so heart-driven, so compassionate and strong.

Which is why, really, he has to be not-human. By making superman an alien you can have your cake and eat it too. He can be the best of us, that shining example for everyone but as the ultimate outsider he is also not tied to any one place or mindset. It allows for a more universal adoption of the character. Now that isn’t always necessary, nor is it always the best way to get there. But in this case it works. Because you want a Superman who is cut off, making due, the best he can be and yet even then he will never fully be 100% human, not in his own head. He can’t be. He is the last of his kind. No matter how much he is accepted, he can’t forget, himself.

And once you can see him in the light of being the best of us you start to understand his villains. Luthor, for example, hates Superman. He hates him more than anything. But he doesn’t hate him because superman is the most powerful thing, or that his power reduces ordinary humans to uselessness in comparison. No, Luthor hates him because he can’t feel the same level of compassion, and he is so smart he understands his flaw and sees how it stops him. So he redirects and takes that self-hatred, that knowing flaw, out on an external force that, he also knows, will always forgive him and understand him. They’re tied, those two.

Braniac is another easy villain that has come back into prominence in the last decade. As a robot, he has, classically, no feelings. Making him Superman’s true opposite. The power without the compassion. The force without love guiding it. Also, he’s a robot. Robots are cool.

Superman is everything we could be, if we felt deep enough and trusted in ourselves and one another enough. He can save you with a kind word as well as stopping bullets. You can do the same, he tells us. You can all do the same.

Recommended reading: Here is a short list of graphic novels that represent great Superman stories:

All Star Superman, Vol. 1 and All Star Superman, Vol. 2 by Grant Morrison and Frank Quietly.

DC: The New Frontier by Darwyn Cooke

Superman: Birthright by Mark Waid and Leninil Yu

Previously on Core Concepts: The Start!