Why do single moments have such a lasting impact on our lives and culture? What goes into making a touchstone moment or memory? The openness of this topic is a challenge for the author, as there are many types of moments to explore, from intensely personal and intimate secrets to confluences of external events that can dramatically reshape a whole culture.

Beyond the moment itself, the challenge becomes to relate that moment in a way to convey its significance, perhaps the machinations that put this moment into being, or the reverberating echoes it has on the characters years afterward. We’ve deliberately framed this topic to be as open as possible. In essence, the sky is the limit, and we’re encouraging our submitters to find a unique perspective and creative take on the idea.

Please keep in mind that ROAR is a general audience publication, featuring anthropomorphic fiction. Desired submission size is 5,000-12,000 words. Submissions can be made through Google Docs or sent directly to BuckCTurner@baddogbooks.com. Questions and suggestions can all be sent to BuckCTurner@baddogbooks.com as well.

Your editor,

Buck Turner

BDB is proud to announce that for the month of April, all BDB books will be sold on FurPlanet at a $5 discount, meaning that all prices drop from $19.95 to only $14.95. Even Kamui’s new art book Work In Process is dropping from $16.95 to a measly $11.95 – a wonderful and witty full-color tutorial and self-help book for the price of a super-sized meal. What a deal!

Have a poke around the catalog on baddogbooks.com (remember, this reduction applies only to FurPlanet!), or head straight to the BDB catalog on FurPlanet. Hurry!

Also, FANG and ROAR are accepting submissions for their next volumes, respectively with the themes ‘Life After High School’ and ‘Neon and Noir’. Check out www.baddogbooks.com for more information!

Alex Vance will present a Bad Dog Boot Camp panel on every day of the con — Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday, always from 4 to 5 PM in the San Carlos room.

Friday, 4 PM, San Carlos Room: The Fundamental Story, exploring the most fundamental storytelling structures. A good start for novice writers, and excellent exercise for more experienced ones.

Saturday, 4 PM, San Carlos Room: Visual Storytelling, demonstrating effective uses of visual and narrative techniques to help convey information more effectively, enjoyably, and flexibly, using examples from several well-known furry comics (and, perhaps, some examples taken from an as-yet-unpublished yet staggeringly popular anthro graphic novel

Sunday, 4PM, San Carlos Room: Narrative Techniques, a class focusing on some of the more subtle and complex emans by which a writer can exert control over their reader.

Monday, 4PM, San Carlos Room: Meet the Editors, a round-table Q&A with the editors of Bad Dog Books, and guest panelists from Sofawolf Press and FurPlanet.

See you there!

In the absence of the illustrious Alex Vance, Ben announces the theme for the new issue of ROAR, which is currently accepting submissions, in his own unique… idiom.

Furthermore, he presents a reading of the short story ‘Head’, part of the Arcanum Arcanorum series, as well as a ‘test pilot’ episode of the upcoming audiobook experiment ‘Apocalypse Then’.

Please enjoy, and happy Saint Pikitznio’s Day!

Each of us have also had other projects to consume our precious time. Ben Goodridge, not satisfied with simply promoting his debut novel White Crusade has been writing some new ones, and for my part, I’ve allowed Heathen City to take up an inordinate amount of my Brain Time.

Still, we’re setting our sights forward, forward, forward.

New issues of FANG and ROAR are accepting submissions, we’re opening the Free Press Program (at last), and Ben Goodridge hosts the newest noir-themed episode of the BDB Podcast.

We hope you’re all having a wonderful time, and e’ll see you in the new year!

Alex, Ben and Cinnamon

You plan months in advance, really take your time to prepare and make sure everything’s perfect. You keep quiet about it so you can surprise people with it.

Then, a few weeks before the deadline, something happens, or you discover something, that means that all your work is for nothing and you have to do it all over again. Whether this be book formatting, editing, webdesign, writing — any and all.

Then, a week before the deadline, just as it seems as if you’ll make it, it happens again. Start over.

Le sigh.

But we at BDB are indomitable. We knew that Anthrocon would be a big thing for us, and despite everything the Fates have thrown our way, we’re actually ready for it. (This mail will only be a quick sum-up; I’ll properly give a blow-by-blow when I’ve had some sleep. According to my calendar, I’ll have time for that in about three years.)

• FANG Volume 3 is being published. FI-NAL-LY. It’s taken a long time, but it’s been worth it.
• FANG Volume 4 is also being published — but it’s changing its name, and will be published as ROAR Volume 1. Yeah, I know it’s weird, but you’ll understand when I get around to explaining it better!
• The Hero: a gay fantasy novel by Teiran Dragon, who also the popular High School Days series.
• El Burrito de los Muertos: gay erotica novel by Anré Blaireau, sequel to Everybody Loves Luther.
• White Crusade: Ben Goodridge manags to juggle his editorial duties at BDB with a healthy writing career of his own. I fought him tooth and nail for the rights to his debut novel, the post-apocalyptic sci-fi White Crusade. He objected because publishing it through BDB would make it look like he was self-publishing. I told him to hand over the damn book or he’d be out of a job.
• Website’s been updated. I know people say that the baddogbooks.com website is revamped more often than it’s actually updated, but you know what? I’m kind of proud of that. Behold: the majesty that is www.baddogbooks.com. Go look.
• Free Press Program. I babbled about this in the March podcast, and right after Anthrocon, it’ll finally be ready for prime-time.
• All the books mentioned above are now available in Trade Paperback format, by popular demand, through BDB directly, and all will be available on the FurNation table in the dealer’s room at Anthrocon this weekend while supplies last, so be quick! The usual $19.95, and worth every penny.
• All three authors of the BDB novels — Teiran, André Blaireau and Ben Goodridge — are going to be at Anthrocon, and may give book signings, so ask at the FurNation table when you can find them there, and keep a look-out! Writers love nothing more than to hear from the people who enjoyed their work.

Well, what do you know. Got it all done before Anthrocon. Only a day or two before, but still long enough to actually tell people about it. I’d like to thank Ben Goodridge, the good folks at FurNation, the new Mystery Editor that I’ll tell you about soon, and of course you lot. Writers, readers, you know what I mean. Thank you for making BDB necessary, and helping us strive to make it something amazing.

More to come soon!

- Alex Vance
Editor-in-chief of Bad Dog Books

After a Herculean effort on the part of the BDB staff and the good people at FurNation, the new BDB releases are ready in time for Anthrocon, and this podcast can once again be updated.

Ben Goodridge provides a Bad Dog Boot Camp segment for writers (a taster, of sorts, of the panel he’ll be hosting on Saturday at 4PM at Anthrocon), and gives a reading from his rather brilliant new novel ‘White Crusade’.

Your humble host, Alex Vance, waxed prosaic, unscripted, and with very little regard for the sensitivity of the new recording equipment.