Works by Eric

Posts showcasing new books, articles, features, etc. by Eric

Is there still an interest in Hurricane Sandy survival stories?

The title question is a legitimate question, and one I want an answer to for legit, tangible reasons. It’s not just because I have a personal experience with the storm, though as this video taken from my bedroom window will tell you, I do: It is not because I lived it — LOADS of people did, and a great many had far, far worse experiences than I did — but because I devoted a lot of time to talking to people and writing about their experiences, and I’d like to see that material see the light of day. Years ago, I wrote a feature for the Philly Weekly about my Sandy experience that ended up winning second place in the 2014 Keystone Press Awards. Cool(ish). (Second place…
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Speak & Spells, Scratch & Sniffs, and another foray onto Youtube with Hours in the Attic

Part of the fun of doing Hours in the Attic with Nerd Out With Me‘s Tig Carson is that you get to play with the goofy old shit you played with as a kid. And part of that fun is realizing just how damn lame that stuff really was. The Speak & Spell, for instance: Why was this a thing? I have no idea, as is clear from our all-too-brief video on the topic. Poor Tig. I’m sure he thought we were going to squeeze a lot more out of it than that, too. On the other hand, we had a lot more fun scratching 30-year-old scratch n’ sniff stickers and being reminded of grandpa smells. For real: Smelling old stickers. This is my life….
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Check out the gorgeous cyberpunk art of Ian Sokoliwski, with a soundtrack by yours truly

I love the art and photography of Ian Sokoliwski. His sense for color, staging, and composition is outstanding, and his cyberpunk, gothic and steampunk art brings new worlds to life. I was honored to work with him on a story in Pitched 2, and just as thrilled when he asked if some of my music could accompany montages of his work. I happily said yes. Take a look at his killer artwork, accompanied by “Without Waking” and “Spinning Lecterns,” both from my m2 project:    

Now I’m on Youtube. What have I gotten myself into?

I don’t know what the hell I was thinking. When my buddy Tig Carson asked me to do a nerdy video series with him, the idea excited me because doing nerdy stuff with friends is always a good time. Tig is the curator of Nerd Out With Me (follow them on Facebook here, and Twitter and all that jazz), and the author of A Space Story, a Hitchhiker’s Guide-esque science fiction adventure. I have fun talking about geek stuff with him. The idea of a video series sounded like fun, too. We’d talk about old toys and cartoons from our youth and whatever. It would be a good way to spend an afternoon. Then we set up a spot and filmed some material as a…
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Why without George Romero, there is no The Walking Dead

The following is an excerpt from Dissecting The Walking Dead: Slicing Into The Guts of Television’s Hottest Show, available in paperback and for Kindle. Without George Romero, there is no The Walking Dead. His 1968 film, Night of the Living Dead, invented the modern zombie genre. Robert Kirkman himself has said on many occasions that his comic series and television show is essentially an extended take on Romero’s legendary film, borrowing all its core elements and reimagining them as an ongoing story rather than a single night of terror. In other words, if you want to understand where The Walking Dead comes from, you must understand Night of the Living Dead and the Romero mythos. As I examined in a previous post, Romero didn’t create the…
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