Artist Guest of Honor — Howard Tayler

Howard Tayler is a full-time cartoonist. His comic strip, Schlock Mercenary, has appeared online every day since June 12, 2000, and schlockmercenary.com now serves up over ten million pages a month to over 200,000 unique IPs. He has three books in print, Schlock Mercenary: The Tub of Happiness, Schlock Mercenary: Under New Management, and Schlock Mercenary: The Blackness Between, and is working on a 500-strip compilation project whose working title is Schlock Mercenary: The Teraport Wars.

Howard prepared for his cartooning career with an eclectic mix of education and employment. He graduated from Brigham Young University in 1993 with a BS in Music Composition. He worked for Novell, Inc. for eleven years (1993-2004), and moonlighted for five of those years as an independent record producer. In his four-decade sojourn on this planet he has also been a rock musician, composer, drama geek, role-playing gamer, tech support weenie, Sunday school teacher, public speaker, accountant, middle manager, marketing puke, husband, and father.

Howard lives in Orem, Utah with his wife and four children. He can be observed cartooning (or sometimes just messing around) on most weekday afternoons and evenings at The Dragon’s Keep in bustling downtown Provo.

Author Guest of Honor — Emily Hogan

Six of Em’s books were published by ROC/NAL under the Emily Devenport pen name: Shade, Larissa, Scorpianne, Eggheads, The Kronos Condition, and Godheads. Emily Devenport stories appeared in ASIMOV’S SF MAGAZINE, the Full Spectrum anthology, and ABORIGINAL SF, whose readers voted her a Boomerang Award (which turned out to be an actual boomerang).

As Maggy Thomas she wrote Broken Time, which was published by ROC/NAL in the U.S. and by Urania in Italy. Broken Time was nominated for the Philip K. Dick award.

As Lee Hogan she wrote Belarus and Enemies, which were published by ROC/NAL in the U.S. and OPUS in Israel.

Currently Em is writing Urban Fantasy and YA SF & Fantasy, some titles alone and some with her husband, artist/writer Ernest Hogan, as E. E. Hogan (two Es, no waiting). She works at Borders Books & Music and lives in Glendale with Ernie, Sam the Bad Cat, and Lovey Howl (a dog, not the rich broad from “Gilligan’s Island").

Emily's Bibliogrpahies: Emily Devenport, Lee Hogan, Maggy Thomas

Author Guest of Honor — Ernest Hogan

Ernest Hogan is a child of the Atomic Age, and the great-grandson of one of Pancho Villa’s curanderos. He was born in East L.A. He has worked as a cartoonist, illustrator, and writer. He is no relation to the Ernest Hogan who coined the word “ragtime,” back in the nineteenth century.

His novels, Cortez On Jupiter, High Aztech, and Smoking Mirror Blues, and short fiction, including “The Frankenstein Penis” (that was made into short film called “Phall-O-Krat” that can be seen online as series of video clips) and most recently “Human Sacrifice for Fun and Profit,” in Voices for the Cure, an anthology benefiting the American Diabetes Ass’n, have given him the reputation as a international cult author. Though he is not now and never was a card-carrying cyberpunk, people in places like Greece and Brazil insist that he is. He is currently finishing up his mainstream novel, Walter Quixote: or, Love in the Time of Terrorism, and some collaborations with his wife Emily.

Ernest's Bibligraphy

 

Special Effects/Makeup Artist Guest of Honor - David Ayres

David Ayres is a local Special EFX Makeup Artist who specializes in >science-fiction, horror, fantasy, and character makeup, utilizing creative makeup, prosthetics, masks, and props. He has contributed to the films: CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE 3RD KIND, BATTLESTAR:GALACTICA (78), BUCK ROGERS, EMPIRE OF THE ANTS, TOURIST TRAP (78), THE HILLS HAVE EYES (79), SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES, and the original HALLOWEEN, and more.
According to David, "I grew up in Mesa, AZ and became a "Monster Kid" loving the classic
monster/science-fiction films and TV shows. Halloween became my favorite time of the year. I fell in love with this creative art at an early age and have never stopped. I also enjoy teaching workshops.
MOVIE MAKEUP MAGIC is his website.

 

Local Artist Guest of Honor — Liz Danforth

Liz started out as an ordinary fan in Phoenix fandom, where Ken St. Andre introduced her to roleplaying games with his game Tunnels & Trolls, published by Flying Buffalo Inc. After freelancing awhile, she went to
work for Flying Buffalo as staff artist, writer, game developer, productions director, and as game and magazine editor. Around 1985, she returned to freelance as her primary work, doing art, editing, writing, and scenario design to some 100 different game and publishing companies, notably Wizards of the Coast, Bantam Books, TSR, AEG, GDW, Interplay, EA, DAW, St. Martin’s Press and many more. In 1996 she was inducted into the Academy of Gaming Arts and Design’s Hall of Fame.

For many years she lived a double life, working part time for Phoenix Public Library. In 2004 she entered the UA’s master’s degree program in the School of Information and Library Science where her background in gaming is putting her on the cutting edge of the profession. Her year-long final research project explores “21st Century skills” translating into real life, but learned in World of Warcraft which she plays almost daily.

Liz currently lives in Tucson, working for Pima County Public Library. She is writing fiction again, after a very long dry spell, and still gets to do some art and mosaics.

Visit Liz's website at OakHeart.com


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