Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} Howling Mad by Peter David INTERVIEW. Lilja: For those of us that aren't that familiar with the world of comics, can you tell me a little about you and what you have done before? Peter David: Well, here's my bio: Peter David is a prolific author whose career, and continued popularity, spans nearly two decades. He's worked in every conceivable media: Television, film, books (fiction, non-fiction and audio), short stories, and comic books, and acquired followings in all of them. In the literary field, Peter has had over seventy novels published, including numerous appearances on the New York Times Bestsellers List. His novels include Sir Apropos of Nothing (A "fast, fun, heroic fantasy satire" Publishers Weekly), Knight Life , Howling Mad , and the Psi-Man adventure series. He is the co-creator and author of the bestselling Star Trek: New Frontier series for Pocket Books, and has also written such Trek novels as Q-Squared , The Siege , Q-in-Law , Vendetta , I , Q (with John deLancie), A Rock and a Hard Place and Imzad i. He produced the three Babylon 5 Centauri Prime novels, and has also had his short fiction published in such collections as Shock Rock , Shock Rock II , and Otherwere , as well as Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine and the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction . Peter's comic book resume includes an award-winning twelve-year run on The Incredible Hulk , and he has also worked on such varied and popular titles as X-Factor , Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man , Fallen Angel , Supergirl , Young Justice , Soulsearchers and Company , Aquaman , Spider-Man , Spider-Man 2099 , Star Trek , Wolverine , The Phantom , Sachs & Violens , and many others. He has also written comic book related novels, such as The Hulk: What Savage Beast , and co-edited The Ultimate Hulk short story collection. Furthermore, his opinion column But I Digress has been running in the industry trade newspaper The Comic Buyer's Guide for over a decade, and in that time has been the paper's consistently most popular feature and was also collected into a trade paperback edition. Peter is the co-creator, with popular science fiction icon Bill Mumy (of Lost in Space and Babylon 5 fame) of the Cable Ace Award-nominated science fiction series Space Cases , which ran for two seasons on Nickelodeon. He has written several scripts for the Hugo Award winning TV series Babylon 5 , and the sequel series, Crusade . He has also written several films for Full Moon Entertainment and co-produced two of them, including two installments in the popular Trancers series as well as the science fiction western spoof Oblivion , which won the Gold Award at the 1994 Houston International Film Festival for best Theatrical Feature Film, Fantasy/Horror category. Peter's awards and citations include: the Haxtur Award 1996 (Spain), Best Comic script; OZCon 1995 award (Australia), Favorite International Writer; Comic Buyers Guide 1995 Fan Awards, Favorite writer; Wizard Fan Award Winner 1993; Golden Duck Award for Young Adult Series ( Starfleet Academy ), 1994; UK Comic Art Award, 1993; Will Eisner Comic Industry Award, 1993. He lives in New York with his wife, Kathleen, and his four children, Shana, Gwen, Ariel, and Caroline. Lilja: How did you get involved with The Dark Tower comic? Peter David: They asked me. I'm sorry, I wish I had a sexier answer than that, but that's the simple truth: One day my phone rang, it was Joe Quesada, he asked if I was interested in the gig, and I said absolutely. Lilja: Tell me how it works. Is it correct that you get a manuscript from Robin Furth and take that and combine it with Jae Lee's illustrations? Peter David: Robin did an initial scene by scene breakdown that describes in general terms what happens in each scene. Jae then took that breakdown and told the story visually. I then come in and write the script, producing the original narrative captions and the dialogue (both new and material taken directly from the books). Lilja: Does it ever happen that you get material from Robin that you have to ask her to change for any reason? Peter David: There's been a good deal of back and forth between myself, Robin and Jae, particularly as the project has gone on and we've become more comfortable with the idea of batting stuff around and making it the best it can be. Lilja: Have you ever asked Jae to change the illustrations to fit the text better? Peter David: Jae has been so obsessed with doing revisions unasked, honing the material until it's just right, that there hasn't been too much I've had to do. If I do encounter scenes where I feel the art isn't quite clear, I just make it clear in the dialogue and captions. I think maybe there was one occasion where I said, "I think this really needs to be redrawn," and it was. Lilja: How did you prepare for this task? Were you familiar with The Dark Tower books before this or did you have to read up to do this? Peter David: I'd read up to Wizard and Glass . When I got the gig, I went back, reread them, and then went on to the rest of the series. Technically I didn't need to read past Wizard and Glass , but I'm glad I did. If I'm writing the comic, I can't be less informed about it than the fans. Plus it was very helpful; I picked up the narrative style I use largely from the dialect style in Wolves of the Calla , for instance. Lilja: Were you nervous about taking over from King with the text for The Dark Tower ? After all, this is his masterpiece. Peter David: Terrified. I actually didn't relax about it until I came face to face with him at the New York Comicon. He'd been saying in e-mails that he liked what I was doing, but I needed to ask him in person. He put his hands on my face like it was a benediction and said, "You're doing a fantastic job." Probably a high point of my career, if not my life. Lilja: There is a lot of descriptive text in the first issue. Is that kind of text easier or harder to do compare to dialogue? Peter David: No different. The thing is, we're trying to cover a lot of ground, and I knew we'd need SOME sort of captioning to bridge the gaps. I just felt that giving the captions a narrative style of their own, as if some unseen person is telling Roland's history, would add some personality to the series as well as give you even more of a sense of what Mid-World is like. Lilja: These first issues are pretty much a direct adaptation of King's book and I guess you get a lot of guidance from the books. But how about when it comes to new material, do you expect that to be much harder? Peter David: No. Easier, actually. For starters, I don't have to page through already-existing books to find the exact dialogue. But it's been incredibly useful because working with Steve's dialogue as a safety net makes it that much easier to develop the sense of how everyone should talk. That way when I'm "flying solo," as it were, I'll have an easier time of it. Lilja: I understand that King has the last word on everything. Has he asked you to change anything so far and if so, can you tell me what? Peter David: He's done some fine tuning here and there. I've found some of his changes fascinating. For instance, whenever I took dialogue from the books, I didn't change a word. Edited for length here and there, but kept the wording exact. And in a couple of places, Steve actually changed the dialogue. He rewrote his own words. So I figured, well, if Steve can change the already-printed dialogue, then so can I where necessary. Lilja: How far in advance do you get the scripts from Robin? Did you do all seven issues at the same time of did you finish one issue before moving on to the next? Peter David: I'm working off the artwork, actually. I've got Robin's outlines for all thirty issues of the entire series. I've gotten the artwork through issue 6 and scripted all that. Lilja: I take it that you are in for all the issues, first to last, right? Peter David: If they want me, sure. At the moment I'm only definitely in through issue 7. But I'll stay around for the long haul if they want. Howling Mad by Peter David. Sometimes, the rapidity with which some books vanish into out-of-print limbo can annoy you beyond belief. And sometimes, it just makes you howling mad. Sadly, Howling Mad is one of those books which disappeared from the realms of ready availibility. Fortunately for us, Ace Books was smart enough to re-issue it in 1999, 10 years after it's original publication. That's a good thing, because Peter David (perhaps better known for his work in the comics field) has one of the keenest wits on the bookshelves today. Howling Mad is a new take on an old story. A werewolf is on the prowl, an innocent is attacked and bitten but not killed and, when the next full moon rolls around . well, you know the story. But in this case, the victim of the werewolf's bite is not a human -- it's a wolf. And when the next moon rises, there's a new man in town. David's description of the sensations a wolf becoming a man would experience is uncannily realistic -- assuming, of course, that David has never undergone such a transformation himself. Even as the visual changes take place -- bones stretch and snap into strange new shapes, the long snout shrinks, the tail vanishes, legs fill out and bend in new angles, fur falls off in clumps, revealing bare pink skin -- David gives a rundown of more disconcerting changes: the sharp senses of scent and hearing are muffled to insignificance, even as the wolf's black-and-white world expands into vivid technicolor. So what is a tall, well-built (and, by the by, completely naked) man to do when he's found in the Canadian wilderness in the vicinity of a spate of recent attacks? Well, he might be forgiven for reacting in feral fashion -- and, of course, he ends up locked away in a padded cell. No one seems to know where he disappeared to come morning, but the wolf that's there in his place is soon sent off to a small New York City zoo. And there, the wolf encounters Darlene, an animal rights activist with bad taste in men. The newly named Josh's adaptation to human society is delightful to watch. (As are Darlene's efforts to explain why she has a wolf in her apartment for most of the ensuing month.) Witness, for instance, Josh's first introduction to alcohol: He stared at the glass and swirled the liquid around. "You mean it's supposed to taste like that?" "Why? How does anybody consume it? Why would anybody?" "Because we like it. It relaxes you." "I was relaxed. Now I'm tense. And the taste. " She shrugged, leaning back in the chair. "You get used to it." "Why would anyone want to get used to it?" "We get used to all kinds of things. The sharp taste of alcohol, the bitter taste and caffeine shakes from coffee, the smoke and yellow teeth and coughing from cigarettes. We're real good at getting used to everything we have to suffer with in order to have a good time." Besides Josh and Darlene, David has peopled his story with some great supporting characters. Take, for instance, Duncan, a hard-luck vampire living homeless in Manhattan. Then there's the elderly, feisty, shotgun-toting Mrs. Michaelson, who doesn't take kindly to strange shenanigans in her apartment building. Byron Keller, a disenchanted American, gets the story rolling but his part, while striking a sympathetic chord with many Americans in his circumstances, is rather short. And then there's ol' Doc Parsons. I was fortunate enough to stumble upon Howling Mad while browsing a used bookstore in Toronto. (Canadians, it seems, have a much better book selection than we literacy-starved neighbors to the south.) I urge you to grab this one while you can. However, if publishers once again deem it good and proper to deny themselves the cover price on this one, I urge you to seek it out through other means -- if you like to laugh, it's worth the search. List Format. (A quick-reference version of some of this information, that you can keep open while browsing the List, is available; if your browser supports JavaScript, you can also access the quick-reference version by using the "List Format" links at the top of many pages.) At first, the List may look a bit imposing, with odd codes all over the place. But once you know the secret of what those little codes means, everything will fall into place. An entry on the List looks like this: David, Peter [AL] [BL] Howling Mad [BBT] About a wolf who gets bitten by a werewolf and turns human 3 nights a month. -3 Rating: 3 Result: LY Significance: + Description: 0 Saturation: 0. Fantasy; lycanthropy (in reverse). -11 A quite good (and different) lycanthropy story, and a rather funny look at our own culture as a bonus. -Ph Lycanthropy. -154. So, what does all of that mean? Let's break it down: David, Peter [AL] [BL] This first line gives the author of the book, Peter David. It also has two links that will lead you to more information about this author; the [AL] points to a list of Peter David's books, and the [BL] points to a page of reviews of some of his books. Different entries will have different links, with different two-letter codes to tell you what's on the other side. What do all those codes mean? Hold that thought; we'll get to it eventually. Howling Mad [BBT] The people listed before the first slash gave the book a "+" rating, meaning that someone interested in transformations should definitely seek out this book. (So two people--"11", Joe Huber, and "Ph", myself--thought that Howling Mad fell into this category.) The people listed between the slashes gave the book a "0" rating, meaning that the book is about average as far as transformation goes. (So two people--"3", Gavin Steyn and "154", William Osborn--thought that Howling Mad was about average.) The people listed after the slashes gave the book a "-" rating, meaning that the book uses transformation only incidentally, and it's probably not worth seeking out if you're only interested in the transformation. (So nobody thought that Howling Mad was this way.) : This book heavily involves transformation. : This book is about average, transformation-wise. : The transformations in this book are pretty incidental; it's probably not worth looking for if the transformations are all you're interested in. : There's some question as to whether this book belongs on the List at all; or there's critical information missing about the book. (If you know the missing information, please let me know!) Please take note that these ratings deal only with the question of "Does this book involve transformation heavily?" They don't deal with the question of "Is this book enjoyable to read?" we'll get to that question in a moment. The [BBT] to the right is a link to the Bookstore Browser, to let you search various online bookstores for this book, by title and author. Again, you'll find all sorts of different types of links as you go through the List, with different codes telling you what the links lead to; we'll get to those codes before long, I promise. This next line has the publication info for a particular edition of the book--the publisher (Ace), the publication year (1989), the ISBN (0441346634), and the price ($3.50). Please notice that much of this information comes from my own collection (and the collections of other contributors), so the publication info given may well not be for the most recent edition. The [BB] is another Bookstore Browser link, this one doing a search by ISBN (for this particular edition) rather than for title. About a wolf who gets bitten by a werewolf and turns human 3 nights a month. -3 Rating: 3 Result: LY Significance: + Description: 0 Saturation: 0. Fantasy; lycanthropy (in reverse). -11 A quite good (and different) lycanthropy story, and a rather funny look at our own culture as a bonus. -Ph Lycanthropy. -154. Here we have the meat of the entry--the specific comments people have made about the book. The contributor of each comment is listed by number; for exaple, the first comment ("About a wolf who gets bitten by a werewolf. ") was made by Gavin Steyn, #3. Well, that clears everything up, right? Have fun with the List! What the heck does "Rating: 3 Result: LY Significance: + Description: 0 Saturation: 0" mean? An excellent question. Let's find out. :-) Entry Format. Rating : "Okay, forget about this transformation stuff. Is this book enjoyable to read?" 5: An absolute must-read 4: Worth reading multiple times 3: Worth a read 2: Possible read, if it looks interesting 1: Not recommended at all. NR: Not read. (In other words, the contributor knows that the book involves transformations, but hasn't read it completely.) AM: Advanced medical technology AS: Advanced science AX: Transformation of humans by aliens CM: Current medical technology DT: Travel between dimensions EC: Result of evolutionary change EM: Evolutionary genetic manipulation GM: Genetic manipulation MA: Magic (cast upon those transformed) MC: Magic (caster transformed) NA: Natural ability NT: Nanotechnology RE: Reincarnation SY: Symbiosis VI: Virus VR: Virtual Reality OT: Other (described in the entry comments) Sometimes, more than one of these codes may be listed; for example, "Cause: MA/DT" means that both magic and dimensional travel are involved. And "Cause: MA?" means that magic may be involved, but it's not certain. AN: Animal characteristics (someone turning partly or completely into an animal) AP: Astral projection AR: Age regression (becoming younger) AT: Artificial telepathy BC: Bodies of several people combined into one single body BM: Body metamorphosis BT: Brain transplant BX: Body completely transformed EA: Evolutionary ability GC: Gender changes HG: Hermaphroditic gender changes IN: Transformation from/to inanimate object LY: Lycanthropy MD: Decrease in mental power MP: Increase in mental power MR: Mental recordings MT: Mind Transfer MU: Mind transfer--participant(s) unwilling MX: Minor body transformations PE: Personality changes RM: Racial metamorphosis RP: Reverse possession SC: Shape changers SP: Spiritual possession ST: Soul transfer TD: Telepathic disguise TT: Mind transfer forward/back in time VA: Vampiric ability ZC: Size change OT: Other (described in the entry comments) +: Very important; the book is all about the transformations, or revolves around them. 0: Somewhat important; the transformations are critical to the story, but not the focus. -: Unimportant; any transformations are incidental to the story. X: Not rated +: The transformations are described very well. 0: The transformations are described reasonably well. -: "Poof! He was a wolf." +: There are transformations everywhere. 0: "Average"--probably a few transformations. -: Only one transformation. (Or perhaps even none at all--for example, a character may have been transformed before the events of the book even start, and the book deals with the results of that transformation.) So, that explains the List.. but the mystery of "What do those two-letter codes mean?" is still unanswered. If your answer to that mystery is "Who cares? I'll figure it out as I go!", then I admire your initiative; stop wasting your time here and start reading the List, silly! But for the more cautious souls among you, who want to know everything they can before they leap into the unknown, read on for just a bit more. Link Codes. [AL]: Author List. The ftp archive at sflovers.rutgers.edu has a collection of lists of works by particular authors (in the /pub/sf- lovers/bibliographies/authorlists directory); this link will take you to the list of works by the author you're reading about. [BB]: Bookstore Browser link by ISBN. This link will take you to a separate browser screen, which will let you browse various online bookstores' information on information on the book (such as its availability, and reviews written by other customers). If you're interested, it will also allow you to order the book. This link does a search for the book by its ISBN number; that's faster, and more reliable (since it's not as vulnerable to typos in the author or title), but it means that you'll only see that particular edition of the book--you won't see other editions that may have come out. Following one of these links does not obligate you to buy anything! If one of these links doesn't seem to lead anywhere, please see the Q&A page for more info. [BBT]: Bookstore Browser link by title. This works the same way as the [BB] links, but does a search by title (and possibly by author, depending on the store) instead of by ISBN. This will show you every edition of the book that the store has, not just the ones I know about. But it's slower, and a bit less reliable. Following one of these links does not obligate you to buy anything! [Bo]: Cross-reference to Book list. You'll find this if you're reading the Stories section of the list, and the author in question has also written transformation-related books; this link will take you to the author's entry in the Books section of the list. [BR]: Book review. This will take you to a review of the book you're reading about. [DZ]: Dani Zweig's Belated Reviews. Dani Zweig has written a very large, very well-written set of reviews about various SF authors and books; this will take you to the review of the book or author you're reading about. [FT]: Full Text. In a few rare cases, the full text of a book or story may be available on line; for example, Project Gutenberg electronically archives some books that are in the public domain. In these cases, following this link will let you see and download the book or story being talked about. [FT$]: Full Text--Commercial. "Virtual publishing" companies are starting to appear-- companies that publish books and stories over the Internet. With some of them, you have to pay in advance; with others, you read it, and then pay if you like it. (Or they may give you the start of the story, but sell you the ending. ) This link will direct you to stories published this way. ( It will not lead you to a location that commits you to spend money, nor will it display anything you're supposed to pay for if you like . For that reason, you may have to follow a few more links after this one to get to the actual story.) [GS]: Good Stuff. Things that didn't fall neatly into any of the other categories, but which seemed interesting enough to include anyway. [HP]: Home Page. An author's home page, which may contain more info about the author's works. [RR]: Raymond's Review. Eric S. Raymond wrote another very large, very well-written set of reviews about various SF authors and books. This will take you to his review of whatever the heck it is you're reading about. [SS]: Cross-reference to Short Story list. The opposite of the [Bo] link; if you're reading the Books section of the list, this will take you to the author's entry in the Stories section. [??]: Watch this space. This one isn't really a link; it means that I haven't checked for other useful web sites covering this title/author yet. I hope that this explanation makes the List more useful for you. If you still have questions, please let me know. Howling Mad — Peter David. WHO'S ARIAID OF JOSHUA WOLF? We all know what happens when a man is bitten by a werewolf: Every full moon, he turns into a wolf. Of course. But what happens when a wolf is bitten by a werewolf? And what if this wolf is snatched up by unsuspecting zookeepers and dragged off to the urban wilderness of New York City? And -- most intriguing of all -- what happens when the full moon rises over his cage? Well, New Yorkers have seen their share of lunatics. But are they ready for a wild and weird man-wolf named Joshua who's never heard of fast food, cable TV, or that many-splendored thing called "dating"? Howling Mad. Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. I’ve been trying to track this book down for a while now, and finally found a copy on a bookswap site. I read it in an hour. I was not impressed. The plot concept was what had initially peaked my interested: Werewolf bites wolf. what happens? Hey, that sounds cool. I like werewolves. And I love fantasy. And I’ve enjoyed a few of David’s other books. Pish. It was only a tiny two-hundred page novel, and author spent way to much time beating into my head that wolves aren’t human and don’t think in concepts, like, words. Clumsily beating in, I might add. I might be grading this a little harshly. it was originally published in 1989, and maybe that sort of stuff needed to be stressed in that decade, but even if so, it did not age well. It starts off with this clunky framing technique evolving a writer who is supposedly telling the reader this tale, who opens the story setting and then never appears again. Then there was the obligatory female love interest for the newly-turned werehuman, which was so predictable as to defy belief. (Instant attraction on the part of the woman at first glimpse of inhuman man with bulging corded arms, leading her to try to domesticate him to city living, leading him to ponder between staying with her or tracking down his wolf-mate, leading me to mutter respectively, “But that’s so. cliché.” “No, that’s a stupid idea.” and “Go back to the bitch in the woods!”) Plus, in addition to the evil rampaging werewolf, there was also an evil vampire involved. And the entire plot was ultimately caused by an old gypsy curse. I honestly can’t decide if the story could have been improved by developing it more, or if it was a mercy that the book was so brief. I recommend it only to serious fans of the werewolf subgenre and of Peter David. ( )