I've noticed lots of positive blogs popping up from subscribers and contributors. It'd be nice to see some of them here too. And if Murky Depths #3 doesn't float your boat we'd like to know why not.

Whispers have posted a new review of issue # 3 on their site. Go check it out @:
http://www.ookami.co.uk/html/murky_depths__3.html

All the best,

Ian.

Ouch. I feel like the bastard child of the issue. Live and learn.

Pike

Bit of a lazy review when it came to the comic stuff. Perhaps a little bit of prose-related snobbery.

Yes, the whispers have been rather wicked lately, haven't they? Let's all quit writing anything thought-provoking or original and ...hell, let's just give up writing SF and horror and fantasy altogether and give the 'declining readership' what it wants. Why bother?

I wonder if some of these reviewers ever had to eat out of a Dumpster, or lost a child, or were nearly raped at knifepoint.
I wonder if any of them ever hit anyone in anger, or have been hit in anger themselves (quoting Rod Serling there.) I wonder how many head injuries they've had, or car wrecks they've been in.

I wonder if they even have any idea how hard some of us work just for that two seconds of exposure or that one check that we do cartwheels over just because it'll buy a case of Top Ramen.
I suppose they think we're all trust-fund babies who sit around and write just to annoy them in between coke binges and orgies.

I wonder how many of them have gambled the whole rest of their lives on their craft while everyone else sneers at them for not being out there making money and babies.I wonder how many jobs they ever lost because they were too mentally ill to do anything but sit around and write demented stories for people to write snotty reviews about.  

Wow. I'm keeping this on here, not because I think any of what I just said is at all professional, just that I had no idea I had it in me. I'll delete this at the first sign of Enraged Villagers. But... wow. I really need to 'go out to the dump and shoot rats', as some wise screenwriter or another put it. Signing off in a hurry. ---ed.

"They talk about it while we live it." --- Method Man
 

Don't worry, Ed. It's only one person's view, and you'll find that people will read your story first just to see if they agree with the reviewer and be pleasantly surprised, whereas the stories they've been told are good will probably disappoint. However, how many people actually visit Whispers?

I read the review its not that bad just extremely short, or have I missed something .
Is Murky Depths going to the Comic Con in Bristol?

I'm feeling a little lame here. As one of the writers, I should have gone off with both barrels but crawled off with my tail between my legs. Edward, you're an animal! thanks for thrashing out a heaping pile of venom for the rest of us.

But seriously, one sour review does not mean that MD 3 tanked, or that any of us are untalented. I haven't finished the book yet but have been extremely impressed with the pieces and talent that brought them to life. And after reading Michelle's review in the Fix I was able to pick up my pen and go at it again. It's all so damned subjective, but in all I'm proud of what we did and greatful that Terry and the MD gang gave us a place to throw out our wears for all to see.

Aaah, I just got bent out of shape, you guys. I know one swallow doth not a summer make, etc. etc. It's just hard when you're in a place where you _need_ good press b/c you're trying to sell as many works as possible so they don't come shut off the lights, and you see some snotty bastard saying that a story "irritated" them because it was "flash fiction masquerading as..." whatever "with a tacked-on supernatural twist" or whatever. In other words, the review for "Hair of the Dog" in issue 2 pissed me off more than the one for "9/10."

Let me tell you a little story about "Hair of the Dog." I spent the night in that alley hanging out with "Marisela". I just wanted a place to go hide and drink Wild Irish Rose wine. She was, as you see in the story, occupied with other forms of substance abuse. Then her pimp showed up, pulled a gun on me and jack-rolled me for my wallet. So, yeah, I'm a little sensitive about that one.

But in both cases... I agree with everyone's subsequent comments. Thanks for letting me spew some venom. Most of the other reviews and comments, etc., that I've seen have been positive. If I see any new ones, I will pass them along. ---ed.

Murky Depths is in the fortunate/unfortunate position of having set the bar extremely high right from the get-go. Issue one didn't skulk round the edge of the playground like a new kid in school, it marched right up to the biggest kid in the yard and said, "Do you wanna go?!"

There's something about early success which just seems to bring out the worst in critics.

For what it's worth, Edward, I don't think the Whispers Guy was even reading the same magazine as me. Issue 3 was a blinder. Well, I wasn't too fond of the front cover... but, never mind, eh?

Poor Richard Calder. He has his fans and I'm sure they got a kick out of his cover.

Issue #3's review didn't cheese me off too much, I just made the mistake of reading that one, the one for issue#2, and a bunch of really frustrating reviews of some of my other stuff in Tangent. The Tangent ones were, overall, good, but I get so bent when I hear "The innovative presentation might throw some readers..." etc.

My Muse Serena tells me that's the curse of writing from the edge, but that's where Art comes from, I always thought. Up there where the thunderclouds grind together and make lightning, the border where nothing is safe or guaranteed...

"Stay and let salvation damn you, or straddle an auroral beam and paddle from Rigel to Betelgeuse. If there be no accepting that such rivers and oceans lie beyond this Earth, stay and travel upon steamships with schedules that can be depended on... or one day board the phantom thing that was seen over the city of Marseilles, August 18, 1887 and ride on that, bearing down upon the Moon, giving up for lost, escaping by the swirl of a current that was never heard of before..."

---Charles Fort, New Lands

And stuff like that.All reviewers aside, though, everyone's enthusiasm for this material has made me dust off every single damn draft from that period in my life and bark them into muster. Thank you for all your enthusiasm, and your own kick-ass work. As Dangerfield used to say, "What a crowd, huh? What a crowd."

And I thought the Calder cover was quirky and over-the-top funny, like the 80's-future-that-never was you see lurking around the edges in movies like "Scarface."  Everyone's using Blender and Maya and stuff like that to do art nowadays (hell, even a couple of toon pornos I saw clips of online.) I think this one just went over most people's heads because they don't get the wry tie-in with the material.

So when's Calder going to start marketing the hyperskirt? I know at least one indie design company down in LA that would snap up the idea in a heartbeat...

Yes, the 'Maiden' looks absolutely delicious, doesn't she? I'm in two minds about using 3D art for comic strips, but it does looks gorgeous.

I could not have been prouder to be in #3 and there wasn't a single story in it that I didn't find fascinating or terrifying or just plain good.

I am irked that Mr. Jones spent more words on my title than the actual story - you know, because that's all I do: obsess over titles so the actual story suffers.

I'm over it.  

The other reviews I've seen have only reinforced what I've thought since the issues arrived - it's an issue to hang your hat on, and my first international sale. *beams*

I am stupid proud to be a part of #3 and a hearty handshake to everyone involved.  The artwork - I smiled and showed my husband, "see," I said, "they got it." I'd buy you all a round, but the exchange rate would murder me.