A couple of weeks ago, I posted a series of interviews with the authors of the first five Apocalypse Weird books. As part of those interviews, I asked each author to tell me something about the Apocalypse Weird project that people might not know. Here’s what I learned.

• Texocalypse Now (originally Digger) was the original book project that developed into the whole Apocalypse Weird world, and it was originally conceived as a video game.  [Courtesy of Michael Bunker]
• Amazon through their 47North imprint originally passed on what became the Apocalypse Weird project because it was too big of a concept.  [Courtesy of Michael Bunker]
• Tim Grahl came up with name of the parent company, Wonderment, after reading a history of Marvel Comics. We wanted Wonderment to become the Marvel Comics digital publishing. [Courtesy of Nick Cole]
• The stable of Apocalypse Weird writers is not an exclusive club. We want anyone and everyone to come in and write in this world. Hence, the formation of the Apocalypse Weird: Survivors Facebook group. You can invent your own Apocalypse and Boss, or you can write in someone else’s (there’s a Rules document posted for the group). All fanfic will be published on a site by Wonderment, and the best-quality, most-popular fanfic will be looked at by Wonderment for a possible contract to write an Apocalypse Weird novel. So come on in and join us! The Apocalypse is fine! [Courtesy of Chris Pourteau]
• All magnetic roads lead to Mount Asgard on Baffin Island, the Deccan Traps in India, Parhump, Nevada and the year 1974. [Courtesy of Jennifer Ellis]

And finally, this great story from E. E. Giorgi on the origin of her book, Immunity.

“Well, my anecdote is that when Michael Bunker asked me to be part of AW I said, “Yes, absolutely,” without having the faintest idea what my story was going to be about. I read the Red King and loved Nick’s writing but there was no way I could get myself to write about zombies. And then Michael told me about his “autoimmune flu,” a concept that had me instantly intrigued. How can a flu virus be “autoimmune”? It would have to be both a flu virus and yet be part of our body. Turns out, we do have viruses embedded in our DNA, they are called endogenous retroviruses. I looked them up and learned that they are mostly expressed in the brain and they have been associated with neurological disorders like schizophrenia. The next day I wrote an email to Chris Pourteau to tell him that I had “scientifically” proven zombies. And that’s how Immunity started.”

If you haven’t read the original Q&A posts yet, here they are:

• Michael Bunker on Texocalypse Now
• Nick Cole on The Dark Knight (the sequel to The Red King)
• Chris Pourteau on The Serenity Strain
• Immunity by E.E. Giorgi
• Jennifer Ellis on Reversal

And of course, you should absolutely go and buy the books, they should be available from your favourite online retailer.

 

And the latest Apocalypse Weird book, Hoodoopocalypse by Kim Wells is out today.

Don’t forget, you can get a FREE copy of my short story, Only Friends by subscribing to my newsletter.

[Six Things I Learned About the Apocalypse by Philip Harris first appeared on Solitary Mindset on 9th March 2015]