2015 Overview

Linzi Gold and Alan Glass

2015 ... here's some thoughts ... It started with some good news for Sam’s daughter Linzi … we met by accident with a friend of a friend, the ex-drummer with The Marmalade, Alan Whitehead, who, it turned out, was acting as a music agent. He heard Linzi singing, loved her, and signed her up!  He introduced her to a brilliant producer/musician called Alan Glass, and on 1st Jan, Linzi Gold had an initial meeting with Alan Glass, and work started on creating her music. Under the guidance of Alan Glass, she has now created lyrics and melody for eight tracks, and has recorded a video for one of them (‘Killing Kiss’). She has two more tracks to record, and then we can put them all together in a debut album next year …

She parted company with Alan Whitehead mid-year, but is continuing to work with Alan Glass to complete the album.

Some of her tracks can be found on YouTube, and on SoundCloud – just search for Linzi Gold in each case to find them. We also have an EP available for sale, and a DVD of the video – check her webpage at www.linzigold.com for details of how to order them.

Sam with John Barrowman

February and we were again off to LA for the annual Gallifrey Doctor Who convention – a week of friends and parties and drinking basically. As usual we had a brilliant time, and met up again with friends like Chase Masterson, and Dean Haglund (who was on the verge of moving to Australia!). Unfortunately despite everyone’s best efforts, we weren’t able to get to meet with Clive Barker again – the week we were there, people at Clive’s place fell ill with throat infections and were called out to other cities on business … so we couldn’t make it happen. We’ll try again in 2016!

One highlight of the visit was that David finally got to see the Baxter Building – a distinctive place in Downtown LA, which was used in the film Blade Runner, as well as being the main location for the ‘Demon With a Glass Hand’ episode of the sixties series The Outer Limits. It’s an amazing place! (see howeswho.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/the-bradbury-building.html for pics!)

David with Jason Connery

After the news last year that we had a new kitty in the form of Jinx, sad news in March, as on the 10th, she was hit by a car on the road out front and killed instantly. We were distraught. We have decided not to get another cat as it’s not fair – that road is so dangerous and cars go down it at 90 miles an hour (even though it’s a little country lane). Even next door’s cat was killed on it, in the same way, a few months later.

We had a busy first part of the year with events in Pwllheli, Peterborough, Lincoln, London, EasterCon in London, and Wales Comic Con in Wrexham. All seemed great, and we were visiting a friend down in South Wales when the world turned on its head.

It was Sunday 3 May, and we were heading to Cardiff to see the Doctor Who Exhibition there, when David started to feel ill. A couple of miles further on, we stopped at a service station just inside Wales, and David basically collapsed. It turned out he was having a massive heart attack, and so was rushed by ambulance to Cardiff University Hospital, where he was emergency-stented and his life saved.

David was in hospital for a week, and then Sam brought him home … and so the next six months were devoted to getting better and stronger and recovering from the attack. Of course all events and travel had to be cancelled, David was earning no money from working, and so we resorted to living off what money we had saved.

David, Sam and Patricia record the 'Zombie Special' edition
of THE STONE TAPES

Thankfully David has pulled through and is now back to being hale and hearty once more. He’s on medication for life now, but as this keeps him alive, we don’t mind too much.

In the middle of all this, we also recorded Linzi’s music video, and Sam recorded the first of her monthly radio shows on SirenFM, Lincoln University’s Community Radio station. It’s a genre chat show, covering music and books and films and television and is called THE STONE TAPES after the old seventies Nigel Kneale play, The Stone Tape. It seemed suitable. We have recorded 8 editions so far, and they have all been great fun indeed.

If you want to listen, then they are all stored as downloadable Podcasts and can be found here:

southsidebroadcasting.podbean.com/category/the-stone-tapes/

David’s first event post-Heart Attack was in July, at HorrorCon in Rotherham, which was an excellently organized affair with some great guests.

Sam with Gunner Hansen

We met the lovely Gunner Hansen there, who played the original Leatherface in the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre and he was a nice man. We were saddened to hear that he had died later in the year.

The big event of the year was of course our Wedding. Planned since last year, it finally happened in October, and was as fun and laughter-filled as we could have hoped for … We wanted it to be all about family and friends, and we hope we achieved that.

It was also ‘Steampunk’ which meant dressing up … and the array of outfits was superb: From Uncle Brian’s ‘Ozzy Osbourne’ to corsets and Victorian Ladies aplenty, top hats and tails, and beautiful dresses and glamorous people. We had an absolute ball, and the photos reflect all the fun and laughter we had on the day.

I've put a pile of pictures on this blog here: howeswho.blogspot.co.uk/2015/12/wedding-pictures.html

After the wedding, we didn’t head off immediately on honeymoon … the reason being that we had been invited to two USA conventions: Long Island Who, and Chicago TARDIS; which were two weeks apart. So we planned to head over to both, and to use the week in between for a honeymoon break. So that’s what we did, and spent an amazing time in Las Vegas …

David with some friends in Las Vegas

Sam in Vegas

We didn’t gamble, but watched, and when we did decide to spend $20 on the machines, we stopped when we had won $38 and came out ahead! We’re not daft!

At the tail end of the year, David also released another book!  This is a selection of his reviews of Doctor Who on television, and covered all of the Chris Eccleston and David Tennant years. He called it Then and Now as it represented all the reviews as published at the time, together with additional notes and comments on a re-watch this year. The book has been very warmly received, and David hopes to do a follow up volume when Peter Capaldi eventually leaves the role ...

Copies are available from Amazon as follows:

UK: www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1518776000/ref=s9_simh_gw_p14_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_s=desktop-1&pf_rd_r=0Q1DAMX857R3W6DK9CHD&pf_rd_t=36701&pf_rd_p=577048407&pf_rd_i=desktop
USA: www.amazon.com/Then-Now-Doctor-Who-Review/dp/1518776000/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1451578674&sr=8-1&keywords=then+and+now+howe

SAM’S WRITING

2015, and Sam finally managed to find an agent who could represent her. This is a smashing lady called Hazel Latus, who we have met with and have high hopes of working with on all manner of projects.

The books Sam has had out this year (2015) are as follows:

VAMPIRE GENE REPRINTS: Sam sold the rights to her popular Vampire Gene series of novels to Telos, and they have all been reissued with smart new covers …

The next edition, JADED JEWEL, is due for release in 2016.

JINX TOWN: This is a post-apocalyptic novel involving alien invasion, death and disaster … It’s a great read and had some brilliant reviews.

KAT OF GREEN TENTACLES: This was another in Sam’s brilliant Steampunk Adventure series. This time it’s Anne of Green Gables mixed with the Fae and a Cthulhuian monster in the basement …

All those are from Telos here: www.telos.co.uk

SHORT STORIES: Not such a good year for these due to David’s heart attack, but one that Sam did manage to complete was ‘Sabellaed’, a tribute to the author Tanith Lee who passed away this year, which was printed in an anthology called Night’s Nieces edited by Storm Constantine and published by Immanion Press. Copies available here: www.immanion-press.com/info/book.asp?id=483&referer=Hp

Another piece which finally saw light this year was the first piece for the audio publishers Big Finish, when 'Freya' appeared as part of Series Four of their Confessions of Dorian Gray series. This can be ordered here: www.bigfinish.com/releases/v/the-confessions-of-dorian-gray-series-04-1195

A further Kat Lightfoot story was written as a special Wedding favour for our guests. We published it as a short chapbook and it featured our wedding, and the guests, as Kat battles the forces of evil around us … great fun! We still have a couple of copies available for sale if anyone's interested: www.sam-stone.blogspot.co.uk/p/sam-stone-merchandise.html

TELOS PUBLISHING

Despite the health issues, we’ve managed to keep things moving forward at Telos, with 29 new titles coming out, plus Kindle and new POD editions of many other titles on top.

We have lots of Romance titles there now, for those who like that, as well as more horror and non-fiction titles.

For full details, check out our website at www.telos.co.uk.

IN SUMMARY

On balance, 2015 contained some superb highs – the wedding – and some dramatic lows – David’s heart attack. Overall it was good, with lots of love and laughter, but we’re hoping for a healthier 2016, with lots more fun and friends and events and good news.

Wedding Pictures

Here's some pics from Sam and my wedding in October 2015 :)