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Animals to Cuddle

In-Fur-Nation - Sun 12 Nov 2017 - 02:40

As we’ve noted, if you’re talking about Furry Fandom the word “cute” is never far away. And if you’re talking about cute, plush animals are probably going to come up too. Well at the L.A. Comic Con we came across an artist called Bellzi, who specializes in cute plush animals. In literally dozens of designs in fact. “Anything and Everything Cute” their web site says, and they live up to that ideal!

image c. 2017 by Bellzi

Categories: News

FC-284 Fake Mews - We discuss an upcoming movie release where Fayroe participated in suit as an extra, unbox some gifts from fans and read the news.

FurCast - Sat 11 Nov 2017 - 23:59

We discuss an upcoming movie release where Fayroe participated in suit as an extra, unbox some gifts from fans and read the news.

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FC-284 Fake Mews - We discuss an upcoming movie release where Fayroe participated in suit as an extra, unbox some gifts from fans and read the news.

Categories: Podcasts

FC-284 Fake Mews - We discuss an upcoming movie release where Fayroe participated in suit as an extra, unbox some gifts from fans and read the news.

FurCast - Sat 11 Nov 2017 - 23:59

We discuss an upcoming movie release where Fayroe participated in suit as an extra, unbox some gifts from fans and read the news.

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FC-284 Fake Mews - We discuss an upcoming movie release where Fayroe participated in suit as an extra, unbox some gifts from fans and read the news.

Categories: Podcasts

[Live] Fake Mews

FurCast - Sat 11 Nov 2017 - 23:59

We discuss an upcoming movie release where Fayroe participated in suit as an extra, unbox some gifts from fans and read the news.

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[Live] Fake Mews

Categories: Podcasts

Rabbit, Take Me Home!

In-Fur-Nation - Sat 11 Nov 2017 - 02:59

An interesting project we stumbled across at the LA. Comic Con, with the deceptively simple title of Bun. Brought to us by the writing and illustration team of Brian Silveira and Lisa Nguyen, Bun is a graphic novel fantasy/horror series the couple created and published themselves. Their web page describes it like this: “A boy. A girl. An unspeakable evil. A rabbit.” An interview in a local newspaper gave us a bit more description: Bun is “…an intricate tale that follows a young boy and his pet rabbit, the titular Bun. The book picks up after the boy, Milo, loses his mother to cancer. In the wake of her death, his father retreats into alcoholism and depression, essentially making the boy an orphan, alone and struggling with his grief. Milo suddenly disappears, transported to another world where his rabbit Bun serves as the only bridge back home.” The first and second installments of this black & white series are available now.

image c. 2017 by Silveira/Nguyen

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Categories: News

Kiba’s Furpocalypse 2017

Furry.Today - Fri 10 Nov 2017 - 13:34

For #FursuitFriday we have Furpocalypse.
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The Star Justice Series, by Michael-Scott Earle – Book Review by Fred Patten

Dogpatch Press - Fri 10 Nov 2017 - 10:00

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

The Star Justice series

Eye of the Tiger: A Paranormal Space Opera Adventure, by Michael-Scott Earle
Seattle, WA, CreateSpace, April 2017, trade paperback, $15.99 (439 pages), Kindle $2.99.

Space Witch: A Paranormal Space Opera Adventure, by Michael-Scott Earle
Seattle, WA, CreateSpace, May 2017, trade paperback, $15.99 (424 pages), Kindle $2.99.

Zeta Hack: A Paranormal Space Opera Adventure, by Michael-Scott Earle
Seattle, WA, CreateSpace, June 2017, trade paperback, $16.99 (605 pages), Kindle $2.99.

Binary Pair: A Paranormal Space Opera Adventure, by Michael-Scott Earle
Seattle, WA, CreateSpace, July 2017, trade paperback, $16.99 (568 pages), Kindle $4.99.

Burning Bright: A Paranormal Space Opera Adventure, by Michael-Scott Earle
Seattle, WA, CreateSpace, August 2017, trade paperback, $16.99 (519 pages), Kindle $4.99.

These books should be readable quickly. The pages are in LARGE type. At an estimate, they contain only half or less of the wordage of most books; so I would guess that the 439 pages of Eye of the Tiger would be only about 220 pages in most books.

The five Star Justice novels are space opera s-f, not anthro animal fiction, but the main protagonist is a bioengineered seven-foot-tall were-tiger super-warrior. Amazon’s blurb is, “Star Justice is less military space opera and more of a ‘band of misfits in space’. Think Serenity, Farscape, Guardians of the Galaxy, Mass Effect, Cowboy Bebop, and Outlaw Star. If you liked those stories, you’ll love Star Justice.” That’s an American futuristic movie and a TV series, a Marvel superhero comic book (and the movies based on it), a video game, and two Japanese anime TV series. Guardians of the Galaxy and Outlaw Star have anthro animal characters among their “band of misfits in space”, and Cowboy Bebop has Ein, the corgi data dog. Readers certainly know what they’re getting into.

The setting is over 3,000 years in the future. Humanity has settled the galaxy. Civilization ranges from urbanized planets mostly controlled by megacorporations, to frontier worlds. The megacorporations engage in warlike rivalry with each other. Each of the five novels has a different setting – Mad Scientists’ lair, Western, urban crime – but each is in its own way a “wretched hive of scum and villainy” (Star Wars™) that the heroes have to escape.

Eye of the Tiger begins with one corporation’s airplane approaching its target. The plane carries a command staff about to launch into a mission with 31 enslaved prisoners. The prisoners are all criminals bioengineered to become tiger-men super-soldiers. One of them, “Adam”, so named because he is the first experimental super-soldier to survive the process, is the narrator. He hates his sadistic controllers.

“‘Adam, Adam, Adam,’ he [a scientist-controller] sighed. ‘Oh sorry, I mean Subject Two. This is your thirty-first sortie. I just can’t seem to kill you. Whatever shall I do? Oh, I know. You have point. Shotgun, pistol, knife, and how about a smoke grenade? That should do you fine.’” (Eye of the Tiger, pgs. 9-10)

Adam is the leader of the 31 super-soldiers, all bioengineered to turn into tiger-man killers, controlled by explosive collars to blow their heads off if they disobey. The point man, the team leader, is invariably the first to be killed.

“My muscles began to enlarge. They twisted, thrashed, and tried to leap from my skeleton, but my skin kept them from escaping as agony poured through my blood. The pain of my transformation also brought a feeling of euphoria. Unlimited strength seemed to fill my arms, legs, and chest. It felt as if I could bend the shotgun into a 90-degree angle, but I kept my desires in check.

I’d need the gun if I planned to stay alive.

I didn’t see the fur, but I felt it explode from my skin and fill the remaining spaces between the armor. My jaw widened with my skull, ad my old teeth were forced out of my gums by six centimeter long fangs. I never had access to a mirror, but I knew what the other prisoners looked like when they changed their forms, and could guess what I looked like:

A walking tiger in black carbon plated military armor.” (pgs. 13-14)

The team’s mission is to parachute onto a heavily-defended enemy laboratory, fight their way inside, and steal “‘a biosample contained within the labs there. Once it has been retrieved, you will rendezvous back on the top of the roof where this aircraft will pull a fly-by pick up. Eliminate all resistance to your mission.’” (p. 12)

The “biosample” turns out to be a vampiric beautiful nude woman with glowing red eyes, floating in a liquid-filled transparent tube. The woman is telepathic and telekinetic. She calls mentally to Adam to free her, telekinetically removing the explosive collar from his neck.

They escape together amid lots of gunfights, explosions, gore, and thousands of innocent bystanders killed. Since “Adam” is a pseudonym because he was the first tiger-man, she adopts the name “Eve” because she’s similarly the first of her kind.

As soon as they are safe, Adam turns back to human:

“I had never maintained my half-tiger form for this long, and I felt my hunger gnaw through my stomach like a disease. The starvation made my anger spiral to a slight insanity, and I couldn’t help from growling every time I breathed in the stench of the sewer that covered us. The feline part of my soul wanted to clean myself up, but we didn’t have time for such activities, and that also made me angry.” (p. 75)

For most of The Eye of the Tiger, Adam is in human form, but it can be argued that he is always a tiger disguised as a human:

“The technology inside of me was new. The powers the experiments gave me made me superhuman. Even when I wasn’t in my half-tiger form, I was still many times faster, stronger, and more aware than [I had] been before my change. The world was alive with colors, scents, sounds, and raw emotion. I could sense all of it as it flew by me. It had taken a while for me to get used to myself after the final phase of their experiments. I was probably more animal than human. Unless one considered humans to be animals, then I was probably more tiger than man. More monster than thinking creature.

More hunter than prey.” (p. 149)

While they are temporarily relaxing in a cheap motel room, Adam ponders on what they have become and what they can do for the rest of their lives. (He doesn’t even know what planet his corporation has brought him to. Eve tells him they are on the primary world in the Trappist-1 system, forty light-years from the Sol system.) Eve proposes that they stay together:

“‘There are many like us,’ she said. The woman had been drying off her hair, but she seemed to be done, and she set the wet towel down on the couch next to her.

‘Like us?’

‘Some exactly like us. Some like us in the sense that they are being used as weapons. They are prisoners, and forced to fight in an endless battle between the mega corporations, governments, and militaries of our galaxy.’” (pgs. 98-99)

In a later firefight, while Adam is still in his human form, Z, a snarky super-computer hacker (incidentally a teenage beautiful blonde – that’s Adam and Z on the cover of Zeta Hack), asks:

“‘How are you still walking? You’ve got a fucking bloody hole the size of my palm on your back,’ she asked as she bent to grab one of the long guns.

‘I’m hard to kill.’” (p. 177)

Between the action scenes, Adam gets introspective about what has been done to him:

“Once my eyes had been brown with a few flecks of green in them. Now they were a strange goldish-yellow. The pupil was still round, but as I stared at myself [in a mirror], I willed my vision to begin to shift, and I saw the black circle in the middle of my iris begin to elongate. I shook my head and then rubbed the bridge of my nose before looking in the mirror again.

How long would I live?

Even if we didn’t get captured or shot full of holes trying to escape this planet, I’d been re-created and mutated with the DNA. Had they just used tigers? Or did they use other creatures as well? I didn’t know exactly what they did to me, but I didn’t imagine it had done any favors for my longevity. I might only have a few Earth months left. I didn’t recall them injecting me with drugs to keep me living, but that didn’t mean my body wouldn’t fray at the edges and come apart when the alien DNA battled against my human parts.” (pgs. 209-210)

Eve and Adam need to get off-planet and preferably out-system. Their plan, with Z’s help, is to compel the president of weapons design and manufacturing of the Elaka Nota Corporation (the megacorp that controls the world they are on, and that experimented on Eve) to take them to the megacorp’s private spaceport facility and steal a starship with warp drive. Z is reluctant to join them:

“‘Are you two just going to eat me after I help you? I don’t know what kind of crazy shit you both are into. That guy turned into a fucking walking tiger with big ass teeth. You have crazy red eyes and just admitted you are a vampire. How do I know you won’t just suck all the blood out of me and then feed me to your boyfriend when all this is over? You’re hot and all, but I’d like to keep my blood where it is, thanks.’” (pgs. 214-215)

Z does join them, fortunately since she gets the best lines:

“‘Yesterday I was figuring out how to spend all the money you were going to pay me. I was going to buy a cat. Ha. I really like them. I found this one with tiger stripes. I’ve always had a thing for the old Earth cats. Now I’m about to steal one of Elaka Nota’s hyperdrive ships with a man who is a giant walking tiger. This is the weirdest sex dream I’ve ever had.’” (p. 348)

They find, with maximum drama and violence, a strange starship at the Elaka Nota spaceport. They assume it’s an experimental model (with warpdrive, hyperdrive, and folding drive), but what it really is is revealed later. They escape to the nearest inhabited solar system, Gliese 876, in the ship that they name Persephone:

“‘Thank you! I’m going to engage the warpdrive. Partially because it sounds cool, and partially because I’m scared shitless of using the fold –’” (pg. 376)

Eye of the Tiger (cover by Alejandro Gonzalez Agudelo) includes almost nonstop graphic military action:

“My bullet entered him at the pelvis, ripped up through his stomach, under his ribcage, into his heart, through his lungs, and then exited at the top of his shoulder.” (p. 257)

And military humor:

“I moved back to the sewer hole, jumped down, set our gear bags over my shoulder, and then climbed back up to the alley.

‘Z, can you see?’

‘Oh sure, looks like black with darker spots of black on a burning black background of blackness.’” (p. 260)

Space Witch, Book 2 (cover also by Alejandro Gonzalez Agudelo), turns from futuristic mad scientists’ lair into a mostly space Western:

“‘What code did your starship’s computer give our little rock?’ the man asked as soon as he leaned on the railing of his balcony.

‘Gliese 876-C-ii,’ I said.

‘Ha! We like to call this place Greenpeace. You came to us in our dry season.’” (Space Witch, p. 49)

“It looked like a classic western type bar. One of those watering holes I recalled from the old movies with a pair of wooden double doors, dozens of dusty seats and sticky beer tables, a broken down jukebox in a corner, and inhabitants that looked like they had worked way too hard for way too many hours. There were about half a dozen men in the room, but only two of them looked up when Eve, Z, and I stepped into the tavern.” (p. 6)

But the characters stay true to space opera:

“The four men turned and set their hands on their laser pistols. I looked past them to study the woman closer. She wore a cowboy hat with a wide brim that hid her hair. The woman may have once been beautiful, but half of her face was made mostly of metal, and her left eye shone with a yellow laser glow. It was almost as if she wore a mask of polished steel shaped into the form of the rest of her face.

‘I’m not looking for trouble, Cynthia,’ John said as his hand rested on his pistol.” (p. 16)

Adam, Eve, and Z find themselves on Greenpeace in the midst of a range war between two powerful, corrupt ranchers, Wayne Sampson and Cynthia Jayhee, for control of the whole planet moon. Also, both are involved in helping a revolution on nearby (just 90,000 light-years away) Gliese 876-B-iv between its all-controlling, evil Alloprize Corporation and that world’s rebel fighters, the Children of Rah, the miners of its valuable rhodium, vital for starship engines. Both ranchers try to hire the trio to deliver food and medical supplies to Jatal Coorhar’s freedom fighters there. Somebody keeps trying to bushwhack Adam, Eve, and Z, and they don’t know which of the players is double-crossing them. Plus, they get their first eerie clues that the Persephone is something more than just an experimental starship:

“A shiver ran down my spine, and I turned to look across the launch platform. It felt as if someone were watching me again, but there was no one else here but me.

‘Persephone?’ I felt like an idiot for whispering the ship’s name, but Eve’s words were leaking into my beliefs. I was a weretiger, Eve was a vampire. None of these things should be possible, but here we were. Was our ship alive? I would have never believed it possible, but perhaps Elaka Nota had put an artificial intelligence on board.” (p. 127)

The last half of Space Witch takes place on Gliese 876-B-iv, where Adam, Eve, and Z help Jatal’s miners against the Alloprize Corp. Saying how it ends would be a spoiler.

Zeta Hack, Book 3 (cover by Boris Nikolic) sees Adam, Eve, and Z, on Persephone, arriving at the huge Queen’s Hat Station, a massive space station shaped like a giant Mexican sombrero, to sell a cargo of rhodium so they can buy food and hire a pilot, navigator, and other key crew – they’re exhausted from flying Persephone with only three people. They don’t expect any trouble at Queen’s Hat because its administration is militantly peaceful:

“‘Sounds good, Persephone. If you are looking to trade rhodium, there is no docking fee, but the harbor clerk will inspect your wares as soon as you exit onto our platform. We’ve got a no firearms policy in the station. If we catch a gun on you, we’ll throw you in prison for a few weeks. If you kill anyone on the station, we’ll throw you out the airlock. I’m forwarding you the bylaws attachment. There are more details of our policies in there.’” (Zeta Hack, p. 7)

But Zeta Hack’s theme is urban crime & warfare. They have hardly gotten into the space station when they are involved in a bank robbery with multiple deaths. Adam is forced to kill the robbers in self-defense. The station’s District B “Tight Uniform Bitch” police commissioner (a beautiful chain-smoking redhead) offers to let them go if Adam and Z will unofficially rid the district of its organized crime bosses within a week. Eve is held as a hostage. Otherwise all three will be spaced.

Suave gambling palaces, corrupt police, white slavery, bloody gang warfare, a killer android that masturbates, two million unsuspecting victims, unexpected allies, and an invading megacorp fleet. More is learned about Persephone and Eve:

“Then Eve discovered the scientists who controlled her experiments created other subjects. While less powerful than she, they showed more promise of becoming easier to manage weapons. It was important to Eve that we get a crew, no, a small army, and then hit back at Elaka Nota so the sisters she had met could be saved.” (p. 14)

Persephone is revealed to be, not an Elaka Nota experimental starship, but a mysterious starship of unknown origin discovered by the megacorp drifting empty in deep space.

Also, Adam’s and Z’s being forced to work closely together complicates their personal relationship:

“My feelings for the snarky hacker were growing stronger, but my love for Eve hadn’t faded. How could I have feelings for two women who were so different? What the hell was I going to do? What would I tell Eve?” (p. 345)

In Binary Pair, Book 4 (cover by ImGuss), a mysterious message sends Persephone, Adam, Eve, Z, and their two unusual new crewmates, engineers Paula and Kasta (that’s Paula and Kasta – or maybe Kasta and Paula – with Adam on the cover) to the other side of the galaxy and System Y-114a, a.k.a. Uraniel. They find an apparently pristine world full of abandoned cities with all their people in deep underground bunkers, thousands of raptor-like killer robots that attack all people on the surface every day at dawn and dusk, and a fleet of Lith Dae warships filled with space marines circling Uraniel.

Captain Renalta and Commander Tunar-Roz claim Uraniel is Lith Dae’s colony planet, and the robot drones are their technology gone wrong. They offer to hire the Persephone to help them correct the robots’ programming. Adam and the women learn that Lith Dae is trying to enslave Uraniel’s people, and plans to seize Persephone as soon as Adam & crew reprogram the drones. More importantly is why they were summoned to Uraniel:

“By the stars, Adam, the crust of this planet is filled with unearthed technology of an ancient and powerful race of humanoids. The wasps the people of Uraniel accidentally unleashed are just the tip of the iceberg. Lith Dae was able to recover a tiny portion of the technology, and they are using it to develop biological weapons they think will give them control over this part of the galaxy, maybe even the entire Milky Way.” (Binary Pair, p. 199)

Adam and the four women must outwit/defeat the entire Lith Dae fleet, and solve the problem of the ancient bird-drones to free Uraniel’s millions of true settlers. Binary Pair reveals Z’s real name.

Burning Bright, Book 5 (cover by Alejandro Gonzalez Agudelo again), begins:

“‘So, to summarize: there is a group of god-like vampire creatures that created the universe as some sort of galactic farm so that they can feed off of all life. Then they ate everything they could, planted new seeds of life in the universe, and went to sleep for a few billion years. Now they are waking up and are going to be hungry again?’” (Burning Bright, p. 7)

What more do you need to know?

A lot, because SURPRISE: Adam and his four women – yes, I know that’s a sexist phrase, but read this book and you’ll see how accurate it is – get immediately sidetracked on new adventures before they can begin to prepare a defense against the returning SAVOs (Superpowered Asshole Vampire Overlords). Burning Bright ends on a cliffhanger and a To Be Continued in Book 6, Prime Valkyrie. That’s a major spoiler, because as of this writing, Amazon is advertising Star Justice as a “5 Book Series”. But this is a review, and you deserve to know that you won’t get a clean conclusion from just these five books. They have been published one per month from April through August 2017, so presumably Book 6 will be out before this review is posted. (Postscript: It is; Book 6, Prime Valkyrie, in September.) (Postpostscript: So is Book 7, King Killer, out in October. Its blurb starts “Adam and his crew of beautiful women are together at last, but now they must circumnavigate the rite of passage that will most likely kill the weretiger captain.” It sounds like they’ve practically forgotten about the SAVOs that are coming to destroy the whole universe.)

I had better end this review here, or it will never get posted. Should you get into the series? Sure; for the first four books, at least. The Star Justice novels are space opera, not furry fiction, but Adam is a character who, when he is an anthro tiger, you will want to see in plenty of action. There is at least one scene of feral fury per book, not counting the times when Adam struggles with his tiger nature to keep from shifting. There are frankly more tiger scenes in the first books, because later on Adam becomes afraid of losing control of himself:

“It was getting harder to hold back my shifts, and I didn’t like the realization. I’d noticed a bit of it in Queen’s Hat. It had been too easy to shift, and it had been too hard to change back. I’d also stayed in my weretiger form for longer than I ever had, and the beast almost changed me into a full tiger.” (Binary Pair, p. 449)

Star Justice is superior space opera for the first four books. The plot details are well justified, and the action scenes are long and well choreographed. The sequence in Zeta Hack where Adam transforms into a tiger-warrior to singly take out a squad of thirty fully-armored riot police is over ten pages long. If you like “band of misfits in space” action-adventure, you can’t do any better than this.

However, by Burning Bright Earle has clearly begun padding the series, keeping it going past its natural conclusion; reaching for ever-more desperate battle action and hairbreadth escapes for Adam. Eve, Z, Paula, and Kasta devolve from strong individual characters into Adam’s Women, females who must be rescued; and a new, even more bad-ass Space Valkyrie is introduced to submit to Adam. Will Book 6 and Book 7 be the final volumes? Not if Earle can keep spinning Star Justice out for more.

– Fred Patten

Like the article? It takes a lot of effort to share these. Please consider supporting Dogpatch Press on Patreon. You can access exclusive stuff for just $1, or get Con*Tact Caffeine Soap as a reward. They’re a popular furry business seen in dealer dens. Be an extra-perky patron – or just order direct from Con*Tact.

Categories: News

Awww. Weird, but Awww.

In-Fur-Nation - Fri 10 Nov 2017 - 02:58

Every year we visit several comic book conventions, and every time we run across artists who specialize in cute. One of the latest is Rizzo Michelle. If you visit the official web site you’ll see artwork of little bunnies, little kittens, and sad little sharks (believe us, it works…), often in rather odd but fun settings. The art is available not only as prints but magnets, tote bags, and even plush toys.

image c. 2017 by Rizzo Michelle

Categories: News

The Summoning

Furry.Today - Thu 9 Nov 2017 - 17:36

Looks like Cartoon Hangover has a new series called "The Summoning". ...yes, it's a bit random.
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Categories: Videos

Iris Jay Hacks The Planet With 90’s Infused Anthro-Cyberpunk In Crossed Wires

Dogpatch Press - Thu 9 Nov 2017 - 10:05

Welcome to Bessie, of Marfedblog, a comics review and criticism site. There’s furry stuff there, and much more, with the devoted curation of a fan doing exactly what they love. It’s my favorite kind of writing – thoroughly researched, thoughtfully presented, in magazine style long form. I suspect it may be underexposed considering the high quality, so if you like this, give it a follow. And expect more syndicated content reposted here. (- Patch)

Each and every single one of Iris Jay’s comic creations sounds like one of the greatest film that was never made, ever. The descriptions of each read like the fevered elevator pitch of some fresh-faced starry-eyed youngster who has grown up on a diet of the trashiest entertainment, 90’s nostalgia and a deep love of forgotten films. Comic worlds inhabited by gun totting robots, gangster piloted mechs and laser-firing wolves partnered with grizzled FBI agents, all armed with the perfect action movie one liners. You are kidding yourself if you didn’t want to see a hulking supernatural fluorescent rat declaring “I couldn’t free your minds. But I can free your teeth!”

Iris is a graduate from Savannah College of Arts and Design (with a B.F.A. in Sequential Art and a minor in Story boarding, in case you were wondering) who has produced comics online since 2005. Ranging from self published mini comics to webcomics, including the bittersweet story of loss, Bunny, or the hilarious tale of obsession, Space Jam Man. Epiphany, her tale of religion, responsibility and errant slacker gods, started out as a webcomic in 2008, becoming her longest running comic and eventually coming to an end in 2013 with a successful Kickstarter campaign which resulted in a print version of its entire run. Around two years ago Iris returned to the world of web comics with Crossed Wires introducing us to Alan Winters, a geeky student by day and elite hacker by night who travels the online world under the super cool alias of ‘Ultra Drakken’ complete with a katana-welding dragon avatar. From page one Crossed Wires jacks itself into the cyberpunk tradition drawing strong inspiration from writer William Gibson and influences from the criminally underrated 90’s “classic”, Hackers. It’s a comic that should give a little bit of a nostalgic smile to the faces of those who recall a (slightly) more innocent time when people used the term “cyberspace” frequently and un-ironically. Hacking and database cracking are visualised by frenetic samurai sword fights and shoot outs, juxtaposed with more down to earth scenes of our ‘hero’ and his ramman chugging gamer entourage.

Like the rest of her comic work, Jay’s Crossed Wires is characterized by bold lines, animated figures, playful monochromatic pop art colouring and smartly-paced action scenes, this time firmly entrenched in the visual language of video games. Alex holds an everyday conversation about a mysterious girl at his college while battling through a first person shooter environment, complete with re-spawning and power up graphics, while others are set in vast kitch cyber landscapes with superb art, retro futuristic stylings and lovable slacker characters.

Crossed Wires can be read for free over at crossedwires.irisjay.net

Like the article? It takes a lot of effort to share these. Please consider supporting Dogpatch Press on Patreon. You can access exclusive stuff for just $1, or get Con*Tact Caffeine Soap as a reward. They’re a popular furry business seen in dealer dens. Be an extra-perky patron – or just order direct from Con*Tact.

Categories: News

The Big Dad Wolf

Furry.Today - Wed 8 Nov 2017 - 19:54

Who knew werewolves could be so darn cute? (Thanks to SpykeT - Ghostbuster for pointing out this one)
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Categories: Videos

Dubiously Canon, by Rukis – Book Review by Fred Patten

Dogpatch Press - Wed 8 Nov 2017 - 10:00

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

Dubiously Canon, by Rukis
Dallas, TX, FurPlanet Productions, June 2017, trade paperback, $19.95 (199 pages), e-book $9.95.

This is a mature content book. Please ensure that you are of legal age to purchase this material in your state or region. (publisher’s advisory)

“Synopsis: Tales from Red Lantern (that may or may not have happened)

A collection of stories chronicling the lives of characters in the Red Lantern universe, and their sexy misadventures.”

This collection contains five stories that originally appeared online. Four were written by reader demand to introduce two popular characters from throughout Rukis’ Red Lantern cartoon-art universe to each other, whether or not such a meeting would be possible by the story logic of this universe. So the stories are “dubiously canon”.

The four are “Language Barrier”, “Sinful Behavior”, “By Touch”, and “Ship to Ship”. All are narrated in the first person by one of the characters, most of whom are strangers to each other. Almost no names are mentioned. For readers familiar with Rukis’ Red Lantern art pages and her other novels, the descriptions of the characters will make it obvious who they are. In “Sinful Behavior”, for example, the wolfhound is Johannes Cuthbert from Red Lantern and Heretic and the bobcat is Shivah from the Off the Beaten Path trilogy. (That’s Shivah on the ship’s cannon on Rukis’ cover.) If you’re not familiar with Rukis’ Red Lantern universe – Mataa’s rocky coast in Legacy, the colony of Serwich in The Long Road Home, and so on – the locales and the characters won’t matter. All that really matters is that two healthy individuals come together, and erotic nature takes its course. M/m and m/f. Each of the four stories has a full-page NSFW illustration.

In “Language Barrier” it’s two males. A Mataa aardwolf desert estate guard on leave on Mataa’s coast helps a young Amurescan castaway dog sailor – a German shepherd or coyote, by Rukis’ illustration — who doesn’t speak the local language, to get home, for a share in his hidden alcohol.

“‘I know where the recent rum shipment went,’ he said, patting the crate next to him. ‘Twenty-two more like this. The Captain cached them down the coast a-ways, to get around paying the outrageous taxes to the local clans. I relocated the cache, after…’ He paused at that, clearing his throat. ‘Well, we had a falling out.’

‘You and your Captain?’ I ask, amused.

‘More me and my whole ship,’ he said with a frown.” (p. 9)

The two become homosexually involved. After their m/m tryst, they remain locked by the dog’s penis knot.

“He’d knotted me, like a son of a bitch, and I knew canines well enough to know we’d be stuck for a time.

‘You’re a bastard,’ I muttered, using the Huudari word that would best fit the insult.

‘I knew my father, thank you,’ he grumbled from behind me.

‘It means you’re an ass,’ I sighed. ‘Speaking of. How long until you can get off of me?’

‘I… honestly don’t know. It’s different every time.’” (pgs. 32-33)

In “Sinful Behavior”, the Amurescan Navy is hastily evacuating its untenable colony of Serwich in the humid Dark Continent. The young Carvecian Native bobcat woman (Shivah), who has gotten involved with them and brought to Serwich, is trailing the second-most high-ranking officer in the colony, unsure of whether she will assassinate him or not.

“The tall, wiry-furred, grey canine stood in the doorway and waited for me. He seemed dressed down, or at least dressed-down by his people’s standards. He was without his coat, his cravat and spats, and even his dark leather vest, but he still wore his ever-present chest harness over a simple white shirt, which meant, I knew, that he was still armed. No gun, though. No crossbow… no sword. Just the knives strapped to his back and chest. I wondered vaguely if he slept in the thing.” (p. 40)

They become emotionally involved enough to go to bed together, but it’s as a gentle older man to a young woman who is used to being abused, and whose first real lover has been recently murdered. There is sex, but there is also quiet pillow talk.

“‘Someday.’ I said quietly, ‘I will love again. Maybe… a lover, I don’t know. I’ll be honest, I’m not certain I want to be romantically in love, again. Maybe I’ll have another child, I… I don’t know.’ I gave a soft sigh, then, forcing a chuckle through a suddenly dense throat, murmured, ‘I promise you this much. It won’t be Grayson. That man is, at his best moments, amusing. But that’s all, I promise you. He’s too in love with his boat… and himself… to love anyone else, anyway.’” (p. 73)

The two characters in “By Touch” are the cattle dog Luther Denholme, Admiral of the Amurescan fleet evacuating Serwich, and a Carvecian shaman blind fox (obviously Puck, to those familiar with the Off the Beaten Path trilogy). Both are homosexual. Luther is a self-assured seaman on shipboard, but unsure how to treat a fox who is much smaller than he is, and blind as well, in a bedroom situation.

“Did you have any trouble finding your way here?’

‘No,’ he says with a quiet confidence that astonishes me. ‘May I come in?’

‘Absolutely,’ I say a little too enthusiastically, and remind myself to dial it back as he steps gingerly through the threshold. I watch him take small, silent steps inside, forever amazed with how fox tails just seem to glide effortlessly a few inches over the floor. It’s mesmerizing. He navigates his way into the center of the main living room, only needing to tap his walking stick once against a chair I probably should have pushed closer to the table, and turns to regard me with his ears, his multicolored white and brown fur catching yellow at the edges in the warm candlelight. I find myself wishing I could see him in his winter coat before he leaves, but it’ll never grow in this weather.” (p. 130)

Canon by Rukis

“Ship to Ship” features Shivah again, with Grayson, the wolf captain of the ship taking her to the Dark Continent. Ships in the Red Lantern universe do not take women on board, for reasons of custom and superstition. Shivah doesn’t know anything about that, and Grayson doesn’t care; but this means that there are no quarters for women aboard a wooden Privateer warship. Grayson’s solution is to have her share his cabin. And his bed.

“I’ve been digging my elbow into Grayson for about half an hour now, and slowly pushing. The end goal is to wedge the far heavier wolf onto his half of the bed, as per our long-standing agreement. I’d come to believe he only agreed to the rules I’d set forth because he fully intended to spend most of the time in our cabin = his really, but part of the agreement was that I could stay here so long as he got to tell his crew we were doing more than strictly sleeping next to one anther – unconscious and thus not accountable for his actions. And he was a snuggler in his sleep. Gods, was he a snuggler.” (p. 158)

Needless to say, they do more than sleep next to each other by the story’s end.

The fifth story, “Singh Gets Punched in the Face”, is only a three-page comedy; a fitting mood-piece to end the book.

Dubiously Canon has a lot of explicit sex in it, both homosexual and heterosexual, but all clean and between consenting adults. The emphasis in each story, however, is on the personality of the characters. You will get much more out of the book if you are already familiar with Red Lantern and with Off the Beaten Path, Lost On Dark Trails, and The Long Road Home, and you want to spend more time getting to know Luther Denholme, Shivah, Johannes Cuthbert, Puquanah, Grayson, and Rukis’ world of Red Lantern.

– Fred Patten

Like the article? It takes a lot of effort to share these. Please consider supporting Dogpatch Press on Patreon. You can access exclusive stuff for just $1, or get Con*Tact Caffeine Soap as a reward. They’re a popular furry business seen in dealer dens. Be an extra-perky patron – or just order direct from Con*Tact.

Categories: News

Into the forest

Furry.Today - Wed 8 Nov 2017 - 01:52

I think I would have let the wolf have the basket. "You know the story - a child with a basket meets a wolf in the forest. But this time it will not be the same. Inside the woods nothing is what it seems."
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Categories: Videos

Felicia: The Night of the Basquot, by Chas. P. A. Melville – book review by Fred Patten.

Dogpatch Press - Tue 7 Nov 2017 - 10:58

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

Felicia: The Night of the Basquot, by Chas. P. A. Melville. Illustrated by the author.
Seattle, WA, CreateSpace, September 2017, trade paperback, $12.00 (257 pages), Kindle $9.99.

“‘So!’ crowed Felicia happily. And then she frowned. ‘So,’’ she repeated, more uncertainly. And then, in puzzlement, ‘So.’ Her ears flicked as she turned to stare at the rising sun. ‘So, what’s a ‘Basquot’ anyway?’” (p. 86)

Felicia cla di Burrows, the vixen renegade sorceress blackballed from the Magic Council, is thirty years old this year. She first appeared as an enigmatic background character when Melville began self-publishing The Champion of Katara comic book, #1 dated August-September 1987. Now she has her first novel.

Spiteful and egocentric, all that was really clear was that Felicia had been horribly mistreated as a child. She began studying sorcery — including forbidden black magic — to gain revenge against those who had destroyed her family. But her heart was not really in being evil, and she kept using her magic to help others while postponing her vendetta against her family’s enemies. As a flawed ‘good guy’ and a colorful, charismatic character, Felicia became the most popular of Melville’s anthro animal cast when he moved to Seattle and became active in the furry community there, and he resumed his comic-book stories for Edd Vick’s MU Press in the 1990s. Felicia’s most dramatic and complex adventure was the 184-page graphic novel Felicia: Melari’s Wish (August 1994). Later in the ’90s, she starred in three lighter stand-alone stories as a sorceress-for-hire without the dark background of her vengeance goal, written by Melville and drawn by Bill Schmickle, in MU’s anthology comic-book ZU.

Melville later brought Felicia back in a series of text novelette booklets, with illustrations every few pages, published by CaféPress. These continued the lighter stories in ZU. Felicia became a professional sorceress-for-hire/detective who got involved with finding and dispelling ancient evils, or preventing their escape to wreak havoc in Katara and its neighboring animal kingdoms of Dogonia, Bruinsland (bears), Scentas (skunks), Rodentia (mice), and others. Melville wrote five of these, from Felicia and the Dreaded Book of Un (February 2004) to Felicia and the Border Collie Patrol (January 2008). One, Felicia and the Tailcutter’s Curse (June 2004), won that year’s Ursa Major Award in the Best Short Fiction category. All five were republished as a single book, The Vixen Sorceress (CreateSpace, December 2008).

Melville began producing a Felicia webcomic, Felicia, Sorceress of Katara, in December 2007, but for the last nine years there have been almost no Felicia text adventures. Now Felicia is back in a 257-page novel.

Felicia: The Night of the Basquot is her origin story, and an introduction to her world (which might be described as Tolkien lite, with funny animals). It begins when Felicia emerges in Katara from a mysterious seven-year disappearance, crackling with magic energy and ready to join the all-powerful Magi Council (a.k.a. the Brotherhood of the Candle) as its newest and youngest sorceress. Instead, she is shocked and infuriated to learn that she has been rejected.

“There was a liquidly pop, and somebody stepped through into the middle of Manwa Katdu’s private office.

Felicia swept her cloak out of the way and marched in, looking furiously about before centering her sights upon the wizard. ‘You!’ she snapped, angrily advancing upon him. She pointed at him, her fist still grasping an official letter. ‘Are you Manwa Katdu? I want to speak to you!’

Manwa [a cat wizard] lowered the still-sparking mace, but kept a tight grip upon it. ‘Who are you?’ he demanded indignantly. ‘How dare you just barge in to my sanctuary this way? Do you have any sense of proper decorum?’ More to the point, he wondered, how did you break through a series of protective spells set in place by a committee of the most powerful Magi?

‘Blow it out of your peaked hat,’ snapped the vixen shaking the letter at him. ‘I want to know what this means!’

[…]

Felicia resumed glaring at him and continued her harangue. ‘How can you possibly dismiss my application so casually? Don’t meet your minimum standards? Why, you’ve no idea what I’m capable of!’

‘That is precisely the point,’ Manwa told her. ‘We don’t know.’ He studied her more carefully. ‘You are Felicia, correct? The old Sorceress’ apprentice? Then you know as well as anyone should how careful the Council is in accepting applicants to its order, even from among its own brotherhood. […]” (pgs. 36-37)

Felicia’s determination to keep how she learned her magic a secret (part of her planned revenge against the powerful wolf nobleman who murdered her family when she was a child) keeps the suspicious Council from accepting her. This world has two gods, or a god and a demon, the good Aln and the evil Murk; and the Magi Council will not admit anyone to its ranks until they are certain that the applicant is not an agent of the Murk. Felicia is obviously powerful enough, but she will not revel her training or the source of her magic.

Before the matter of her rejection by the Council can be resolved, this world undergoes a major attack by the minions of the Murk. The wizards and sorceresses of the Council rush to oppose it, while Felicia is sidetracked by the enemy who killed her family.

“It’s too soon, a voice in the back of her mind warned. You’re not ready yet! ‘I should have known,’ she growled to herself. ‘From the very beginning, I should have known. When I first saw the tray! Only he would have had access to it and all of the other property stolen from my parents!’ She pulled on the reins, forcing the horse to take a fork that led along a deep stream. Startled night creatures scattered at her approach, chittering as they fled into the high grass. You’re not ready yet! her inner voice reminded her firmly. It’s too soon! This isn’t according to the plan! First, you get established and make a name for yourself! Remember? Then, you slowly, slowly, acquire friends among the powerful, until you have enough to worry him. When it’s time, you move your friends against him. But you need time!

‘I don’t have time!’ she snarled aloud, and snapped the reins again to urge the horse faster. ‘He’s up to something now, and he’s using my parents’ wealth to do it! By Aln! I’ll make him suffer for this!’” (pgs. 126-127)

Felicia: The Night of the Basquot (cover by the author) is a fast-paced mixture of drama and humor, well-blended although occasionally descending into silliness, as when Felicia wins the dubious support of a band of miniature dog warriors…

“‘We’re the Toy Pooch Patrol! We’re the fighters that everyone forgets, but who forget no one. We’re the ones who watch over the overlooked, and guard against the injustices done to the little folk.’” (p. 155)

…or with names like Bill Sneakyshoes. On the whole, though, if you like Disney-fairy-tale-type desperate battles of funny-animal knights against monsters, good versus evil wizards and sorceresses, noble sacrifices and tragic deaths, you will enjoy Felicia: The Night of the Basquot. Melville presents a broader picture of his animal world, and the mood is generally more serious than in his novelettes like Felicia and the Cult of the Rubber Nose with its mime assassins.

– Fred Patten

Like the article? It takes a lot of effort to share these. Please consider supporting Dogpatch Press on Patreon. You can access exclusive stuff for just $1, or get Con*Tact Caffeine Soap as a reward. They’re a popular furry business seen in dealer dens. Be an extra-perky patron – or just order direct from Con*Tact.

Categories: News

TigerTails Radio Season 10 Episode 49

TigerTails Radio - Mon 6 Nov 2017 - 17:46

Categories: Podcasts

Here’s the plan

Furry.Today - Mon 6 Nov 2017 - 13:09

We now have A new film by Fernanda Frick who did the wonderful When I'm Scared [1]. ...All the feels. [1] https://vimeo.com/78139587
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Categories: Videos

Griffin Ranger. Volume 2, The Monster Lands, by Roz Gibson – book review by Fred Patten

Dogpatch Press - Mon 6 Nov 2017 - 10:46

Submitted by Fred Patten, Furry’s favorite historian and reviewer.

Griffin Ranger. Volume 2, The Monster Lands, by Roz Gibson. Illustrated by Cara Mitten, Amy Fennell, and Roz Gibson.
Dallas, TX, FurPlanet Productions, August 2017, trade paperback, $19.95 (557 pages), Kindle $2.99.

Griffin Ranger. Volume 1, Crossline Plains, 369 pages, was published in January 2015. It ends on a cliffhanger. This book is not so much a sequel as the conclusion of a single 926-page novel. There is a 3-page What Has Gone Before, but you really need to have read Volume 1 and then continue directly with this Volume 2.

To condense what I said about Crossline Plains:

“Griffin Ranger is set in a totally alien alternate universe. The land masses are the same as on our Earth, but the life forms and civilization that have evolved are dominated by birds. (The reader will have fun identifying both geographical features such as the Twin Continents, the Alpha River, the Five Lakes, and the Endless Ocean, and the cities and towns like Defiance, Flatlands City, and Foggy Bay.) Since birds don’t have hands, the main intelligent landbound mammals are the raccoon/lemur-like ‘hanz’ that are their symbiotic partners, and two species of canines: the wild wolfen, and the more domestic herders that have evolved from them. This Earth’s civilization is dominated by the griffins, who are the principal inhabitants of what the reader will recognize as the Americas, Europe, and Asia. But in the last few hundred years the greenies, an aggressive bird species, have erupted from the Emerald Isles (New Zealand) to spread over the world. The griffins of the Northern Continent have allowed the greenies’ partial settlement there under strict supervision, but there are suspicions that the greenies are preparing to take over totally.

“Griffins during their adolescence traditionally go on a continent-wide ‘wander’ of exploration. Harrell, the Griffin Ranger in charge of an area north of Earthquake City, learns that his daughter Aera, who is on a joint wander with four companions, is a week overdue. They went missing near the central Northern Continental agricultural city of Crosstown Plains, populated about equally with griffins and greenies. Harrell is worried, but not enough to abandon his territory to search for the missing youths, until his ex-mate Vaniss, the Ranger in charge of Earthquake City and his organizational superior, assigns him to find them. To aid Harrell, Vaniss gets him two assistants: Kwaperramusc (Kwap), an exotic griffin from the islands north of the Dry Continent (Indonesia and Australia) and the Rangers’ best Investigator, and Tirrsill, an inexperienced but willing young female hanz.

“Harrell, Kwap, and Tirrsill go to Crossline Plains, despite unexpected opposition. The lower-ranking greenies are cooperative, but they don’t know anything. The non-cooperation of the greenie officials is expected; what is more troubling is the unconvincing innocence or open hostility of the local griffins, especially the resident griffin ranger.

“The trio learns that other griffins and their hanz have gone missing near Crossline Plains. Their investigation draws them into a series of violent attacks, attempted murders with a high body count of bystanders, and more. Someone is desperate to keep them from learning anything. What they find could destroy their whole world.”

Crossline Plains ended with Harrell, Kwap, and Tirrsill learning that the greenies there and their unexpected alien allies have constructed a dimensional gateway. The trio go through it, Harrell is captured, and Kwap and Tirrsill escape into the alien dimension – our own Earth. The Monster Lands is set almost entirely around what would be Crossline Plains in our Earth, and tells two stories: Harrell’s captivity in the fortified gateway building of the greenies and their human allies, and Kwap and Tirrsill’s desperate struggle to remain free and either rescue Harrell or somehow communicate with their world to summon help. There is a deadline unknown to them: the greenies and their human allies are planning the genocide of all griffins and hanz in their dimension.

One of Gibson’s nice touches in The Monster Lands is that the trio don’t just step into a different world than they are used to. Our Earth is toxic to them. The air is almost unbreathably thin to them, and full of potentially deadly diseases. They don’t know what foods are safe to eat. In addition, Kwap and Tirrsill cannot let themselves be seen by the monster natives, and the villains have sent agents to kill them. The book is 557 pages of almost nonstop suspense. That’s 557 pages almost to the edges of the paper with very narrow margins, too.

Some of my favorite quotes:

“Kwap flew straight up, trying to escape the corona of light that surrounded the monsters’ building. His lungs burned with effort. The air had no substance as if he were flying through a vacuum. Riding on his back, Tirrsill clutched his equipment harness so tightly the straps dug into his breast and stomach, making it even harder to breathe. Behind him, the greenies screeched as they poured out the door. He had a small lead, but there was no way he could outfly them carrying Tirrsill. He had to find somewhere to hide.” (p. 11)

“Silence for a moment, then a voice much closer, echoing in the dwelling. ‘Look at all this blood! Did he get shot?’

‘Not unless the hanz shot him by mistake. None of our people had any weapons,’

‘Maggoty rotten rules! Make sure to gather up every single feather here. We don’t need the locals wondering where they came from.’

‘What about the blood?’

‘Nothing we can do,’ the first greenie spoke louder. ‘Kenkret-Eet! Peep them back! Have them send some more builders here to help us search this area!’” (pgs. 26-27)

“When the monsters returned to clear the food dishes, they were accompanied by the white-tunic alpha and three others wearing white. One of the newcomers had skin that was a very dark brown, with fur on the top of its head that flared out in a circle. Harrell thought the monsters had only two color varieties – pale tan and pink – and he was surprised to see a different color. Beyond the dark skin and odd fur texture, it was the same size and proportion as the others. Maybe the monsters were like herders and had a number of color variants.” (p. 153)

Griffin Ranger. Volume 2, The Monster Lands (cover by Char Reed) was also funded by a successful Kickstarter campaign. Fortunately! Crossline Plains is a great appetite-whetter, and its ending on a cliffhanger is really frustrating. It would have been maddening if this conclusion had not achieved the funding to get published. It’s been a 2½-year wait, but here it is!

In case you need it spelled out, Griffin Ranger. Volume 2, The Monster Lands is most highly recommended.

– Fred Patten

Buy on Amazon

Like the article? It takes a lot of effort to share these. Please consider supporting Dogpatch Press on Patreon. You can access exclusive stuff for just $1, or get Con*Tact Caffeine Soap as a reward. They’re a popular furry business seen in dealer dens. Be an extra-perky patron – or just order direct from Con*Tact.

Categories: News

These Animals ROCK… If You Want Them To

In-Fur-Nation - Sun 5 Nov 2017 - 22:22

[Just back from PAW-Con in Northern California, and STILL getting caught up on stuff from Stan Lee’s LA Comic Con!] Here’s a useful item with a Furry Fandom twist: My Audio Pet is “…a powerful Bluetooth speaker that enables you to listen to your favorite music, podcasts, or shows wherever you are. All My Audio Pets feature: Easy wireless connection to most smartphones, tablets, and other Bluetooth-enabled devices, a built-in mic for convenient hands-free option, and a rechargeable battery allows for portable tunes wherever you go.” Not to mention, they come in several cute animal designs — all with equally cute names like “Owl-capella”. Visit their web site to see all their current designs.