Welcome to the New Alert Nerd!
Dear Readers,
You may have noticed that things are a little different around here. Or…well, okay, a lot different. We’ve got a shiny new look and a shiny new focus and we hope you’ll join us for the ride (which is shiny! And new!). Details below (and archived forever on our About Page).
Love,
Matt, Sarah, Jeff, and Chris
What is Alert Nerd?
Alert Nerd is a collective of writers and artists examining geek culture and personal experience through fiction, creative nonfiction, and other media.
What was Alert Nerd?
For more than four years, Alert Nerd was a blog that spat hundreds of thousands of words into the ether on all kinds of geeky stuff. From it grew Grok, a PDF zine that contains much of the same kind of material that makes up Alert Nerd now—fiction, comedy, memoir, long-form essays, and the like—as well as Alert Nerd Press, a boutique (we’re so vain) publishing house presenting books for geeks, by geeks, and about geeks and the stuff they love.
Inspired by Grok and the desire to pursue more creative projects together and apart, Alert Nerd the ranty blog became Alert Nerd the creative blog. The end!
What amazingness can I expect from Alert Nerd this week?
On Wednesday, Matt launches his serialized novel, Retcon Punch. And on Friday, look for Part I of Sarah’s One Con Glory mini-sequel “With Violet Light,†featuring some pretty swell extras (oooh!).
Can I contribute to Alert Nerd?
While Alert Nerd has an editorial team made up of its primary contributors and the founders of the old-school Alert Nerd blog, we encourage contributions from anyone interested in sharing their work, within these categories:
- Short fiction
- First-person essays
- Long-form criticism and analysis
- Humor/satire
- Comics
- Poetry, spoken word, music, videos, whatevs
Pitch your ideas to us at submit@alertnerd.com! Writers retain full ownership of their work; all we ask is a seven-day exclusive window before you post material on your own site (in the case of material that has not previously appeared in another outlet). We also may invite you to contribute work to upcoming publications from Alert Nerd Press but participation is optional and you will be asked for permission before your work is included.
This is Comic-Con
So…Comic-Con. I don’t even know how to describe it. A whirling mass of insanity? Of awesome? Of…something like that? Let’s re-live some Vaseline-lensed highlights.
SDCC Nerd Alert! Alert Nerd!
Comic-Con, guys! Comic-Coooooooon.
So one fourth of the Alert Nerd collective (me! Sarah!) will be in attendance this year. I’ll have copies of One Con Glory (newly-emblazoned with blurbs from some of my favorite people, still emblazoned with the original blurbs from equally favorite people) for sale ($10, cash only). Just find me or my husband.
I look like this:
He looks like this:
I will be Tweeting our locations, as well as possible con discounts and the like.
There are a few places you should definitely be able to find me, though. Below, a tentative schedule!
Thursday, July 22
5:30-6:30 p.m. Geek Girls Exist Panel, Room 8
Moderated by Geek Girls Network’s Kristin Rielly, this panel features Morgan Romine (The Frag Dolls), Bonnie Burton (The Star Wars Craft Book), Marian Call (singer/songwriter), Jill Pantozzi (Has Boobs, Reads Comics), Veronica Belmont (Qore), Kari Byron (MythBusters), Kiala Kazebee (GeekWeek.com)…and me!
Friday, July 23
12:30-1:30 p.m. Spotlight on the Immonens, Room 9
Can’t miss the Immonens.
5:00-6:00 p.m. Girls Gone Genre Panel, Room 24ABC
Felicia Day and Kathryn Immonen and Marti Noxon and Gail Simone and…well, okay. Twist my arm.
6:00 p.m. io9 Meetup, Fluxx Nightclub
Dropping in before the night’s main event…
8:00 p.m. Geek Girls and Friends Tweet-Up, Jolt’n Joe’s
Drink drink drink.
Saturday, July 24
3:00-4:00 p.m. Community Panel, Indigo Ballroom, Hilton Bayfront
Hilarity will ensue, right?
5:30 p.m. Pop Candy’s Comic-Con Meetup, Wine Steals
And more hilarity here.
Additionally! I wrote the introduction for Lydia: The More Than Complete Edition, which is dropping at the con and includes the entire run of Kevin Church and Max Riffner’s amazing strip, as well as some fun extras. Buy it at the Agreeable Comics booth (Small Press N-11)!
In between the scheduled thingies, there will be tons of show flooring, impromptu drink-ups, and…other fun-sounding stuff. I’ve sketched in a few more panel possibilities here, but as usual with SDCC…everything is subject to change! Twitter will probably be the most up-to-date source, so follow along. Hope to see you there!
Grok #6: Avatar
Summer again! Comic-Con countdown time! Ridiculous rerun-watching time! Exclamation point overuse time!
And also…time for a new Grok.
If you’ll recall, this is our PDF zine you can read on your computer screen or print out and tote wherever you desire. Within, you will find fiction, essays, and other general hilarity dedicated to geek culture and the nerd experience, all centered around a delightful theme. This time ’round, we’re all about…Avatar. Not the movie. The thing.
No, seriously. Not the movie.
In this issue…
An Open Letter to the Total Stranger Who Scolded Me About Political Awareness on Facebook, by Caroline Pruett: Sarcastic Facebook comments: you leave ’em and go back to watching 30 Rock and that’s it, right? Right?! Well…no. Not when there are Total Strangers lurking about, all too ready to engage you in social media-fueled “conversation.”
My Xbox Avatar Choices Become Too Life-Like, by Ivan Sian: Fourteen hours later, it totally looks just like me!
Strong at the Broken Places, by Anika Milik: Anika is Carol Danvers and Olivia Dunham and Ro Laren. And here, she explains why.
Monkeyshines79, by David Accampo: Julia — 30, single, and prone to LLOL (literally laughing out loud)-worthy disasters — is about to break one of her most dearly-held personal principles. Thou shalt not date on the internet. Sounds like a recipe for major double-u tee eff.
Alien, by Matt Springer: Tor-Kar just wants to enjoy the free Days Inn breakfast buffet in peace. Earthers, is that too much to ask?
Noble and Grand #0, by Jeff Stolarcyk, Matt Springer, and Joe Mulvey: Get a sneak peek at Alert Nerd Press’ first foray into comics! Superheroes! Terror Bears! I.T. experts! It’s crazy-amazing or amazing-crazy or whatever.
Avatars, Cultural Appropriation, and Chris Claremont’s GeNext, by Jennifer Smith: Jennifer looks at the real meaning of “avatar” as it applies to Claremont’s work. When we say “real meaning,” we don’t mean “blue people” or “that sweet animated Jacob-from-Twilight .gif you just uploaded to Livejournal.”
There Was an Old Woman…, by Daniel R. Faust: Brother Ofwynn has lost his way…but his journey’s just beginning.
With Violet Light, by Sarah Kuhn: Julie’s boyfriend is a total Star Sapphire. Julie’s best girlfriend won’t shut up about Sex and the City. Julie herself can’t seem to channel her own pink, girly side without cursing a few billion times…or can she? Find out in this sequel to One Con Glory!
Plus: Rejected Sims Expansion Packs! Hilarious graphics! And much, much more!
Alert Nerd Press Spotlight: Reading Rainbow
One of our not-so-secret Ultimate Alert Nerd Press Dreams is to someday host a “Greatest of Grok“-type night of live readings, featuring the contributors giving voice to their various creations. I mean, can you imagine Ken Simon (actually trained in acting!) reenacting his childhood telephone obsession for all the world to see (Connected, issue #2)? Or Matt Springer (once commandeered the stage in a school production of Godspell!) mixing high comedy and plaintive drama to put on his best “lady in love with Cthulhu” voice (Love, Lovecraft Style, issue #3)?
Geography and other annoying factors make this Dream kind of an impossible one, but that doesn’t mean we can’t prepare for the day it might happen. I actually had the chance to do a bit of on-the-spot prep earlier this year and I will now share this tale with you.
