A Blood Work Update...
Hello to all of my fellow Blood Workers! First off, let me thank you all for the kind support you've all shown Blood Work over these many years! It's hard to believe that in only two short years this space here will reach it's TENTH ANNIVERSARY! That's an insane thought... So, once again, from all of us here at Blood Work, a big thanks to all of you, whether you're just getting here or an eight year veteran!
As you've all probably noticed, it's been getting a little quiet here, exponentially as the months and years continue. Rest assured that the quiet only means that we are diligently working on future projects such as the recently published full length novel:
A big thank you to everyone who has supported this project of ours! Defacer was years in the making and ton of hard work! And if you haven't yet had the chance to get your hands on a digital copy of Defacer, just follow the link below! Every purchase helps keep Blood Work alive, helping fund future projects!
Follow this link to purchase Defacer
Speaking of future projects...
The writers here at Blood Work haven't stopped working, even after publishing Defacer! Here's a little sneak peak at what they're diligently working on...
Work is well underway on the sequel! The first draft is already finished and we've been hard at it editing and refining, trying to make this next book the best it can be. So, if it seems a little quiet here that's only because we're tirelessly working away. And the sequel to Defacer isn't the only project we have in the works either...
There's another all original project that has taken much of our time. This project is another full length novel focusing on one of our favorite subjects: NINJAS! If you've been frequenting Blood Work over the years then you well know that we here love ninjas! We've always wanted to tell a story about ninjas and samurai set in historical Japan. This novel does just that. The fine writers here at Blood Work have their hands full, but this, like Defacer, is a pure passion project that will hopefully see release in the next year or so! More on that later...
Back to Defacer; while the book is still only in digital format at the moment, we hope to have a print hardcopy available sometime this year. We're still patiently waiting for an official cover to use for the hardcopy. When that cover finally comes in expect a big announcement right here! Until then the digital version is readily available!
THE GENERAL STUFF (or "how we've been keeping our sanity")
Movies
It's important to temper work with pleasure and make time for the things that bring us joy, especially during the hard times in life. While we've been hard at work on our various projects, we need to refuel our creativity with things that inspire us. Movies, television, comics, books, video games, and more. We haven't seen a new movie since SPIDER-MAN: NO WAY HOME, which we still feel is the best chapter of the MCU since 2019's Spider-Man: Far From Home. We are hoping to get out to the movie theaters again soon though, to see the new SCREAM film! Beyond these we've been watching old Christopher Lee horror films from the Severin Films box set; The EuroCrypt of Christopher Lee. Every film in the set was new to us and each one greatly anticipated! The Torture Chamber of Dr. Sadism perhaps shines brightest among the set!
Television
On the home entertainment front, we've been really losing ourselves in some fantastic animes! Always late to the party, we only recently started watching the anime FAIRY TAIL. More than 50 episodes into this 328 episode epic, we can confidently say that we're hooked! We're loving the main cast of characters; Natsu, Lucy, Erza, Gray, and Happy! Such a fun show in the vein of Dragon Ball! Hopefully as the show continues, it will only get better and we'll completely fall head over heels for this show! That's the way it's looking so far!
Then we've also started watching another anime classic: CODE GEASS - LELOUCH OF THE REBELLION, the original series! I remember being told to watch this show ten years ago and am only now just getting to it. Better late than never, right? Again, I am really getting into this one as well! I have a strong fondness for GUNDAM WING, ESCAFLOWNE, EVANGELION, and other giant mech shows. Code Geass feels like a slightly more mature version of these and we're loving it! The character designs are by the group CLAMP who have also designed another anime we love; X 1999.
On top of that, we're going through the anime FOOD WARS: SHOKUGEKI NO SOMA! This is a show that has brought us much joy over the last year! Again, we discovered Food Wars rather late (albeit not as late as the previously mentioned shows), but have come to absolutely love this show! No hyperbole, we've watched this show through three times already and are currently going through it for a fourth time. This show is so well done and uplifts our spirits more than most shows have of late. We can't speak highly enough of this show, truly a new classic and top favorite!
We're even attempting to start the endless epic, ONE PIECE, as we've heard so many good things about it!
Reading Material
As far as comic books go, yes, we swore off current comic books and, for the most part, we're keeping fairly true to that proclamation... with a few exceptions. Peter David's Symbiote Spider-Man and Maestro mini series have been excellent and perhaps the best comics we've read in a long time. Death of Doctor Strange by Jed MacKay was pretty good despite neglecting that seminal Doctor Strange story by Steve Englehart and Frank Brunner where Dr. Strange is killed by Silver Dagger, battles and defeats Death herself, and resurrects with the Ankh of Life fused with his body (Doctor Strange #1 June 1974 thru #5 ), only one of the greatest Doctor Strange stories EVER! Silver Surfer Rebirth also looks promising. Other than this... current comics continue to disappoint us personally.
We're still very invested in comic books though. Back issues have become our main focus now (you know, I guess they always have been our main focus as every year I've been collecting I think I've purchased more back issues than current because... well, there's obviously more back issues in existence than current issues! So, I'll rephrase by saying our sole focus is on back issues now... with the occasional mini series here and there). The back issues we've been focusing on lately have been the 1968 volume of Sub-Mariner (which is a huge undertaking!). I've read most of this volume and it is excellent! The print run on these issues were low throughout its entire lifespan so tracking these issues down has been a quest for sure!
Then there's the Shang-Chi: Master of Kung Fu omnibuses that are slowly going out of print (not surprising really as Marvel seems to want to distance themselves from this book they deem "problematic" ). Shang-Chi has long been a favorite character and I had been meaning to pick these up for a while, but there are SIX BLOODY VOLUMES of this! I don't know about you, but purchasing six omnibuses is no small feat! So far I've collected four of the six, both volumes of The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu being the sole remaining volumes I need. It's been a joy rereading these issues, spies, espionage, badass action, and intrigue along with an amazing cast of characters!
In regards to reading in general, I finished two novels recently; Shinju by Laura Joh Rowland, a period piece mystery thriller set in 18th century Japan and the beginning of the Detective Sano Ichiro series. I enjoyed it and look forward to continuing with the series (these books have been and will hopefully continue to be great sources of information for our own period piece Japanese based novel!). In addition to that, we just finished reading the first book in the Forgotten Realms: Legend of Drizzt series: Homeland by R.A. Salvatore and have already begun reading the sequel; Exile. Again, I'm late to the party but glad I started this series as it's proving to be an excellent read!
Video Games
And lastly who can forget about one of our longtime favorite hobbies: video gaming! Lately we've been playing Shantae and the Seven Sirens and loving it! This is the first Shantae game we've ever played and let me say that this is a wonderful Metroidvania style game from top to bottom! The gameplay, the music, the characters, the graphics, all of it are absolutely terrific! It's a light-hearted and uplifting gaming experience that just makes you feel good. I'm looking forward to tracking down the other games in the Shantae series now! For a more challenging gaming experience we've been working our way through the higher difficulties of Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon trying to unlock everything in the game. We absolutely love this game as it is essentially the spiritual successor to Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse for the NES! Another great, yet challenging, game!
For fighting games (because we can't live without this genre of gaming) we've been digging deep into King of Fighters XIV Ultimate Edition and Soul Calibur VI, both fantastic games in two of our longtime favorite franchises! We played a little bit of Dragon Ball FighterZ as well and that may be one of the best new fighting games released in a long time (it's Arc System Works, is it any wonder?)! I can't stress how important it is to support Arc System Works and their fighting games as they have truly reinvigorated and mastered the genre!
And that about brings you all up to speed with us!
As more things develop and more projects reach fruition, rest assured, you'll be the first to know, right here!
And as always
Keep the blood flowing!
