>Some people will complain about
>anything. I enjoyed NTL and I think you
>did a great job with it. I also liked
>the graphic novel. You also mentioned
>The Diamond of Jeru. I finally watched
>the movie a couple of weekends ago. I
>enjoyed it. I'd love to see another LL
>story made into a film though I'm not
>sure how likely that is to happen now.
>Skyring Water sounds interesting. I'll
>definitely buy it and read it if you
>ever decide to finish it. Just because
>you're not your dad it doesn't mean
>you're just some kid writing fan
>fiction. You're a good writer in your
>own right.

Thanks! I'm sure people would have fewer complaints if I was simply writing my own stuff ... but then the complainers probably wouldn't be reading it!

Those were all very different projects with different goals

- NTR was the missing story in the Yondering Series and the goal was to make it fit in that style.

- TDOJ is super complicated because I rewrote Dad's kind of campy (aimed at the 1950s "Men's Adventure" type of magazine) short story into the sort of thing that he might have written for the more sophisticated Saturday Evening Post or Colliers in the same era. Then we turned it into a movie and I expanded it a good deal to cover the story of the Lacklans more completely AND many others had various sorts of input. There's no "one writer" on a movie once you've included everyone who has the power to have input on the script. Then the audio expanded it once again, adding in the story of the Borneo natives (which explains how Jeru became JERU) and I tried to solve some of the problems that came up in the film as well as including many things I'd learned making the film.

- LOTDB was also complicated. We had originally intended to do Son of a Wanted Man, since I had a script ready to go. It was actually TOO ready to go because I was in discussions with a producer about making it into a movie. The producer was concerned that if a film company discovered the Graphic Novel rights were being exploited by someone else then they would no longer be interested in the film ... so we shifted to Law of the Desert Born. SOAWM ended up not being optioned as a film but it took many months to get to that point.

Now SOAWM (you can listen to the audio to hear the movie script) is a MUCH more traditionally written script. It's a Classic Western similar to Red River. LOTDB was intentionally turned into something very different a neo Western or Noir Western or something. The sort of "film" (because it was also a film script) that had a deeply "independent" and kind of edgy sensibility.

I had wanted to have several film scripts ready to go in differing styles. That sort of edgy Western seemed to be a good fit for the world of comics. Traditional westerns aren't accepted in comics at ALL in the USA (they, oddly, have more of a tradition in Europe) but Westerns with zombies and aliens and stuff like that does sell in the American market. So we weren't really bothered when we shifted to LOTDB. But some L'Amour readers were FREAKED out. We got a lot of blow back in social media even before the book came out and then when it did there was even more ... but it was sort of like "how dare you make a comic book."

That sort of response doesn't bother me that much because those people are just saying, "I am not ever going to be part of the market for this product." They didn't want it to exist in the first place ... which is odd because all they have to do is not buy it!

Then there were those who were horrified at the language. There are cuss words in it. I've gone into this before but, quickly: the first paragraph of the short story actually describes one of the characters cussing, but doesn't say the horrible offending words. We kept it pretty PG (and mostly in Spanish) in the Graphic Novel but as soon as you move away from the purely imaginary prose text and into pictures and dialog you have to get more "real." Same with a movie or audio. Sometimes you can do that without "realistic" language and sometimes you can't. It depends on the style you are setting ... again, SOAWM was much more traditional.

On the comics (meaning non LL fans) side the reaction was a mixed bag too. The younger and really out there comics fans were never going to be interested in a Western. The older and more sophisticated aficionados seemed to really get into it. We got a LOT of good press, "One of the Years Best" at the Village Voice, a nomination for an Eisner Award (like an Oscar in comics!) and some really good reviews. It did what we wanted to do, it moved LL's work out of its comfort zone and in to a very different realm.

In the end adaptations and the like are like "covers" in the music business. A "cover band" may end up playing at weddings but the covers that are interesting and get all the airplay are the new take on an old favorite. Think of the instrumental version vs the rock version of Clapton's Layla! Listen to the album version of Concrete Blonde's Ghost Riders in the Sky, it probably horrifies traditional audiences but it REALLY communicates the damned, Sisyphean, fate of the riders, and the moral of the song. Different mediums and different interpretations explore different aspects of a work of art.

Check out the Jamestown Revival Louis L'Amour album in the link at the top of this page. THOSE guys really get it. Every song is a different perspective yet still something a traditional fan would enjoy.