IAMTW

Tied In Ties Up Another Rave

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Novelist James Reasoner has given TIED IN a rave. He says, in part:

For someone like me, who’s very interested in the history of popular fiction, the highlight of TIED IN is David Spencer’s “American TV Tie-ins from the 50s Through the Early 70s”, which is almost a book in itself. It’s a fascinating historical discussion of how the TV tie-in novel originated and evolved over the years and touches on many of the books I was buying and reading when they were new. This article really brought back a lot of good memories for me. Along similar lines, also of great interest to me were fine articles by Paul Kupperberg about comic book and comic strip tie-in novels (I read a bunch of those, too) and Robert Greenberger about the connection between pulp magazines and tie-ins.


TIED IN is available as an e-book right now, with a print edition coming out soon. Either way, I don’t think you can go wrong. It’s informative, entertaining, and a must-have if you have any interest in tie-in fiction. Highly recommended.

Thanks, Jim!

Scribe Award Winners Announced

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P7230119  The International Association of Media-Tie-in Writers presented the fourth annual "Scribe" awards, honoring such notable franchises as CSI, Criminal Minds, The X-Files, Star Trek, Stargate, Star Wars, and Dr. Who. Nominees on hand include Alina Adams (As the World Turns), Max Allan Collins (G.I. Joe), Keith R. A. DeCandido (Star Trek), William Rabkin (Psych) Stacia Deutsch (Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs), Jeff Mariotte (CSI), Nathan Long (Warhammer), and Dayton Ward (Star Trek). The event was hosted by moderator Collins and aw
ards presenter Lee Goldberg (Monk).

Following are the nominated works. Winners are highlighted in bold.

BEST NOVEL (GENERAL FICTION) 

As The World Turns: The Man From Oakdale by "Henry Coleman" & Alina Adams
CSI: Brass In Pocket by Jeff Mariotte
Psych: A Mind Is A Terrible Thing To Read by William Rabkin

BEST ORIGINAL NOVEL (SPECULATIVE FICTION) 

Star Trek Vanguard: Open Secrets by Dayton Ward
Star Trek: A Singular Destiny by Keith R.A. Decandido
Warhammer: Shamanslayer—A Gotrek and Felix Novel by Nathan Long
Terminator Salvation: Cold War by Greg Cox (Tie)
Enemies & Allies by Kevin J. Anderson (Tie)

BEST ADAPTATION (GENERAL & SPECULATIVE) 

Countdown by Greg Cox
GI Joe: Rise Of The Cobra by Max Allan Collins
The Tudors: Thy Will Be Done by Elizabeth Massie

BEST YOUNG ADULT (ORIGINAL & ADAPTED) 

Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs by Stacia Deutsch And Rhody Cohon
Bandslam: The Novel by Aaron Rosenberg 
Thunderbirds: Deadly Danger by Joan Marie Verba 

GRANDMASTER: WILLIAM JOHNSTON

(pictured: William Rabkin  & Max Allan Collins)

TIED IN – The Book

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The International Association of Media Tie-In Writers is pleased to announce the publication of TIED IN: The Business, History and Craft of Media Tie-In Writing, edited by Lee Goldberg.

Tie-in novels are books based on pre-existing media properties — like TV shows, movies and games — and they regularly top the national bestseller lists. But as popular as tie-ins books and novelizations are among readers, few people know how the books are written or the rich history behind the hugely successful and enduring genre.

This 75,000 word book is a ground-breaking collection of lively, informative, and provocative essays and interviews by some of the best-selling, and most acclaimed, writers in the tie-in business, offering an inside glimpse into what they do and how they do it.
Contributors include Alina Adams, Jeff Ayers, Donald Bain, Burl Barer, Raymond Benson, Max Allan Collins, Greg Cox, William C. Dietz, Tod Goldberg, Robert Greenberger, Nancy Holder, Paul Kupperberg, Jeff Mariotte, Elizabeth Massie, William Rabkin, Aaron Rosenberg, David Spencer, and Brandie Tarvin.

Our hope is that our organization, through efforts like this book, can enlighten readers about who we are and what we do, as well as explore the diversity of our work and the rich history behind it.  


TIED IN is currently available in an e-edition on Amazon and Smashwords (and soon on the iBookstore and Barnes & Noble). A trade paperback edition will be published later next month.


A Novel Promotion for Tie-Ins

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My publisher, Penguin-Putnam, has found an unusual way of promoting their tie-ins…

Congrats to Penguin TV Tie-In Emmy Nominations!

We wanted to congratulate all the nominees for the 62nd Primetime Emmy Awards!

Here are the list of nominees from Penguin TV tie-ins:

 

The Pacific
Outstanding Art Direction For A Miniseries Or Movie
Outstanding Casting For A Miniseries, Movie Or A Special
Outstanding Cinematography For A Miniseries Or Movie (Part 5 and 9)
Outstanding Costumes For A Miniseries, Movie Or A Special (Part 3)
Outstanding Directing For A Miniseries, Movie Or A Dramatic Special (Part 8 and 9)
Outstanding Single-Camera Picture Editing For A Miniseries Or A Movie (Part 5, 9, 8)
Outstanding Main Title Design
Outstanding Makeup For A Miniseries Or A Movie (Non-Prosthetic)
Outstanding Prosthetic Makeup For A Series, Miniseries, Movie Or A Special
Outstanding Music Composition For A Miniseries, Movie Or A Special (Original Dramatic Score)
Outstanding Miniseries
Outstanding Sound Editing For A Miniseries, Movie Or A Special (Part 5)
Outstanding Sound Mixing For A Miniseries Or A Movie (Part 2, 5, 8, and 9)
Outstanding Special Visual Effects For A Miniseries, Movie Or A Special (Part 1 and 5)
Outstanding Writing for a Miniseries,
Movie or a Dramatic Special (Part 8 and 10)

True Blood
Outstanding Art Direction For A Single-Camera Series
Outstanding Casting For A Drama Series
Outstanding Prosthetic Makeup For A Series, Miniseries, Movie Or A Special
Outstanding Drama Series
Outstanding Sound Editing For A Series

Monk
Outstanding Original Music And Lyrics
Outstanding Lead Actor In A Comedy Series

Burn Notice
Outstanding Supporting Actress In A Drama Series

Psych
Outstanding Music Composition For A Series (Original Dramatic Score)

Return to Cranford
Outstanding Art Direction For A Miniseries Or Movie

Kudos to Penguin for a) taking pride in their tie-ins and b) trying to get some extra attention for them.

2010 Scribe Award Finalists Announced

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The International Association of Media Tie-In Writers is pleased to announce the finalists for the fourth annual Scribe Awards, which honors excellence in the field of media tie-in writing for books published in 2009.  The winners will be announced at a ceremony to be held at Comic-Con International July 22-25 in San Diego.

2010 SCRIBE AWARD FINALISTS

666-4  BEST NOVEL (GENERAL FICTION)

AS THE WORLD TURNS: THE MAN FROM OAKDALE by “Henry Coleman” & Alina Adams

CSI: BRASS IN POCKET by Jeff Mariotte

PSYCH: A MIND IS A TERRIBLE THING TO READ by William Rabkin

BEST NOVEL (SPECULATIVE FICTION)

STAR TREK VANGUARD: OPEN SECRETS by Dayton Ward

STAR TREK: A SINGULAR DESTINY by Keith R.A. DeCandido

WARHAMMER: SHAMANSLAYER—A GOTREK AND FELIX NOVEL by Nathan Long

TERMINATOR SALVATION: COLD WAR by Greg Cox

ENEMIES & ALLIES by Kevin J. Anderson

BEST ADAPTATION (GENERAL & SPECULATIVE)

COUNTDOWN by Greg Cox

GI JOE: RISE OF THE COBRA by Max Allan Collins

THE TUDORS: THY WILL BE DONE by Elizabeth Massie

BEST YOUNG ADULT (ORIGINAL & ADAPTED)357-7  

CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS by Stacia Deutsch and Rhody Cohon

BANDSLAM: THE NOVEL by Aaron Rosenberg

THUNDERBIRDS: DEADLY DANGER by Joan Marie Verba

GRANDMASTER: WILLIAM JOHNSTON


Call of the Mild

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9780451228765 William Rabkin's  hilarious CALL OF THE MILD, his latest original PSYCH novel,  is now out at bookstores everywhere. Here's the skinny:

Shawn Spencer has convinced everyone he's psychic.

Now, he's either going to clean up-or be found out…

Shawn Spencer has always hated the wilderness-by which he means anything outside the delivery radius of his favorite pizza place. But Psych has been hired to solve a baffling case of industrial espionage, and the only way to catch the spy is to join their client's bonding retreat-a grueling seven day backpacking mountain trek.

But when one of the campers turns up with a bullet in the head, Shawn and Gus soon realize that sheer cliffs, rampaging bears, and freeze- dried pineapple aren't the greatest threats they face…

How can you resist? Go out and buy it now.

William Johnston Named Tie-In Grandmaster for 2010

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IAMTW’s GRAND MASTER SCRIBE AWARD,
THE FAUST, GOES TO THE GENRE’S MOST
PROLIFIC PRACTITIONER,
WILLIAM JOHNSTON

 The International Association of Media Tie-In Writers is
bestowing The Faust, its Grand Master Award for excellence, to author William
Johnston, the writer of over a hundred tie-in novels and the most prolific
practitioner of the craft, it was announced today by organization co-founders
Max Allan Collins and Lee Goldberg.  

William Johnston 2008  Johnston was born in Lincoln, Illinois, in 1924.  He joined the Navy in 1942 and served in the
Pacific.  He worked as a disc jockey,
advertising executive, magazine editor, and PR man before his writing career
took off in 1960 with The Marriage Cage, a comic mystery that earned him
a Best First Novel Edgar Award nomination from the Mystery Writers of America. He
followed that book with a slew of pulp titles for Monarch Books, ranging from
light comedy (The Power of Positive Loving) to medical romance (the Doctor
Starr trilogy) to soft-core erotica (Save Her for Loving, Teen Age Tramp,
Girls on the Wing). 

Johnston’s medical novels dovetailed with his first tie-in
assignments — original novels based on the TV series The Nurses, Doctor
Kildare and Ben Casey. Those books, published between 1962 and 1964,
were so successful that his next original medical romance, Two Loves Has
Nurse Powell, was presented as “From the author of Ben Casey.” 

In 1965, Johnston wrote an original novel based on the TV
comedy Get Smart. The book was a huge success, leading to nine more
novels over the show’s five-season history and making him the “go-to” guy for
sitcom-based tie-ins. He wrote books based on Captain Nice, Room 222,
Happy Days, Welcome Back Kotter, The Flying Nun, The Brady
Bunch, Nanny and the Professor, The Munsters, Gilligan’s Island, Bewitched,
The Monkees and F-Troop, among
others.

 But his TV tie-in work extended far beyond sitcom
adaptations. He wrote books based on Ironside,  Dick Tracy, The Young Rebels, The
Iron Horse, Then Came Bronson,
and Rod Serling’s The New People, to name a few. He even adapted the cartoon characters Magilla
Gorilla and Snagglepuss into books for children.   

Johnston also penned many novelizations, including the
pilots for the 1930s-era private eye series Banyon and the high school
drama Sons and Daughters. His feature film novelizations include Klute,
The Swinger, Echoes of a Summer, The New Interns, The Priest’s Wife, Lt. Robin
Crusoe USN  and his final tie-in project, Gore Vidal’s
Caligula (under the pseudonym  “William
Howard”). 2055-1  

After
retiring from fiction writing, he opened his own bar, which he operated for
many years. He currently resides in San Jose, California. 

The International Association of
Media Tie-in Writers (www.iamtw.org) is
dedicated to enhancing the professional and public image of tie-in writers,
educating people about the craft and business of tie-in writing, and to
providing a forum for tie-in writers to share information, support one another,
and discuss issues relating to their field. 

The Faust, the IAMTW’s Grandmaster Award, is named in
honor of Frederick Faust (also known as Max Brand) and is given annually. The
award recognizes a writer for their extensive and exceptional work in the
tie-in field. Past honorees have been Donald Bain, Alan Dean Foster, and Keith
R.A. DeCandido.

The Rigors of Writing Tie-ins

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Over at Jeff Vandermeer's blog, authors Dan Abnett and Mark Charan Newton discuss the challenges of writing tie-ins vs non-franchise fiction. Here's an excerpt:

Mark Charan Newton: You see it frequently these days – a literary fiction star such as Jonathan Lethem wanting to write a comic strip for Omega the Unknown, or Jodi Piccoult writing a Wonder Woman series. There’s a sense of reverence and pedigree involved. It has cool factor. But those authors are writing for a franchise that is not creator-owned. It’s not their world; the characters are often not their own. But let’s go the other way. For an author to write tie-in fiction – that is, fiction connected to a franchise or character, that isn’t technically owned by the author – it is still treated as a gaucherie by the majority of genre fans. The books suffer by not getting proper review coverage, and sometimes they are not even considered as ‘real’ works. Why do you think tie-in fiction is treated as the second-class citizen of the genre world?

 […]Dan Abnett: There are any number of contributing factors, and many of them are inevitably contradictory. Let’s start with a basic assumption: if you write as a hired gun, you must be in it for the dosh. You don’t really care what you’re writing. Therefore (obviously), you’re just crapping it out, words per square inch. In other words, tie-in fiction MUST by the very nature of its manufacture, be poor, disposable and second-rate.
It’s possible that an awful lot of people think this. They may not even mean to think it. There’s also a possibility (actually, a very high probability) that an awful lot of people in what I’m happy to refer to as “my line of work” believe that’s what other people think.
I think it’s worth getting this out of the way right at the start: writers of tie-in fiction may, sometimes, involuntarily, feel slightly guilty. They may be, involuntarily defensive. They know what the perception can be, and it contaminates them slightly. Tie-in writers can be their own worst enemies.

[…]Mark: It’s interesting you mention the money as a perceived incentive, and you’re quite right. But I suppose without naming names, there have been writers who have been strapped for cash and wanted to do tie-in fiction because they thought it was easy money. Hang around at a convention bar and you’ll hear those stories. So, as an aside – you’ve written both original fiction and tie-in fiction, so which do you find is easier?

 Dan: I actually think it’s harder to write for franchises in many ways, as you’re constantly checking (or you damn well should be!) that you’re remaining true to the source, in terms of detail, fluff, character and style. It’s quite demanding to be so engaged, so ‘on’, permanently policing your actions within the boundaries of someone else’s property. In your own work, you only have to check with yourself about where the edges are. This labour is OF COURSE counter-balanced by the creative efforts involved in original invention – let me just say that before anyone has an indignant spasm.

Benson on Bond

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Rbb  My friend Raymond Benson talks to Buzznews about what it was like to pick up where Ian Fleming & John Gardner left off as author of the Bond novels from 1997-2002. Here's an excerpt:

How did you go about laying the groundwork for your incarnation of James Bond?

Raymond: I was told by IFP (Ian Fleming Publications) that I could "use or ignore" anything that the other continuation authors (Amis, Pearson, Gardner) had done. I didn't contradict anything Gardner did, I just changed a few things back, like the whole "Captain"/"Commander" thing and the gun Bond uses.[…]Basically, the Bond continuation novels should not be taken as an extension of the series that was before it…. they are separate series by individual authors… the only thing we really need to be faithful to is Fleming’s universe. After all, if we were REALLY being a continuation, then Bond would be in his 90s by now.

When you did the novelizations for the movies Tomorrow Never Dies, The World Is Not Enough and Die Another Day … What did you have to do to fit the stories into the reality and you'd already spun? 


Raymond: With the first one, "Tomorrow Never Dies", I tried to fit it in with the continuity after "Zero Minus Ten," my first Bond novel, and mentioned that 007 had been to Hong Kong etc…. but then after that I realized it wasn't worth the trouble. EON didn't care about the novelizations fitting in with my original books, and neither did IFP . They were treated like separate entities, just tie-ins to the respective movies, which is what they were. I don't consider the three novelizations part of my "oeuvre", so to speak.

Scribe Award Ceremony Announced

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Third annual presentation of the International Association of Media-Tie-in Writers (IAMTW) "Scribe" Awards, honoring excellence in tie-in writing in such notable franchises as CSI, Criminal Minds, The X-Files, Star Trek, Stargate, Star Wars and Dr. Who, will be held on FRIDAY JULY 24 3-4:30 pm at Comic-Con in San Diego in Room 4. The ceremony will be followed by a panel discussion with the nominees, including James Rollins (Indiana Jones), Matt Forbeck (Mutant Chronicles), Bob Greenberger (Hellboy), Keith R. A. DeCandido (Farscape), Stacia Deutsch (Dark Knight), Nathan Long (Warhammer), and Tod Goldberg (Burn Notice). With moderators Lee Goldberg (Monk) and Max Allan Collins (GI JOE).