The Cirque Du Freak Fanzine is a lovely little online freebie that's been going for quite a few years now. Put together each year by a fan of the book, who invites other fans to submit drawings or stories or poems or cosplay photos (or a mixture of those). I always love checking it out when it goes live around Halloween.

It's going ahead again this year, and is now open to submissions, so if you want to submit a piece of work -- or create a piece of work to submit -- CLICK HERE. You have until October 26th.

10 WORST HORROR MOVIES?!?

A new month = a new "Cirque Du Freak is one of the worst movies ever" article!!! :-)

This time round it's the good folk at COLLIDER, who compiled a list of the 10 Worst Horror Movies Based On Great Books, and placed Cirque Du Freak in the #10 spot. Which I guess is tragedy heaped on insult -- if a film of yours is going to make a list like this, I imagine you'd probably want to at least be #1 on the list, is only for the notoriety value!!!!

A list like this is always something of a mixed blessing for me. On the one hand, they're slagging off a movie based on my books, which isn't very nice -- but on the other hand, they're saying my books are GREAT, which is extremely flattering for ME!!!

Since I had nothing to do with the making of the movie, I guess I should just take the plaudits and keep quiet, but as I usually do in this situation, I must confess that I do truly like the film on its own terms. Yes, I think it should have been a lot more faithful to the books. Yes, I think it might have worked better if they'd involved me in the adaptation process. And yes, it's nowhere near as dark as it should have been.

But lots of people who'd never read my books (or even heard of me) saw the film and liked it enough to go read the books afterwards. I met quite a few of them at my recent event in Hungary, as I usually do when I meet with a large group of Shansters. It was their introduction to my world, and even though their opinion of it might have dipped after they read the books and realised how much of the source material the movie-makers had junked or changed, many of them still look upon it fondly. As do I.

So -- great books? Yes, immodest little chap that I am, I'd agree with that 100%!!! But one of the ten worst horror movies ever?!? Nay. Not in my opinion. Indeed I'd say very far from it.

Anyway, to check out the entire list of the unfortunate ten movies, CLICK HERE

NATIVE JAMES

I received quite a few presents on my recent trip to Hungary, which came as a pleasant surprise -- I genuinely wasn't expecting anything. Art, postcards, snacks, some alcoholic drinks (hic!!) and more. While every gift was of course warmly accepted and cherished, two in particular just blew me away. The first, by a fan called ANNA, is what she terms a booknook -- a display to sit between books on a bookshelf. She made it from scratch, providing us with a glimpse backstage at the Cirque Du Freak -- there's Mr Crepsley's hand holding Madam Octa... Mr Tall's hat... Harkat Mulds... and loads of other tiny details -- you see more and more the longer you look into it!!

The other was a little lamp box, made by a fan called EVA. Each face presents a different scene from my books -- Harkat... Mr Crpesley and Darren... the Wolf Man. It's absolutely stunning, especially when the light is turned on.

As I said, every gift was special to me, but the work and time that went into these just astounded me, and I was honestly left somewhat speechless on the day. Suffice to say, a little bit of my heart will always remain in Budapest.

CIRQUE DU WHAT?!?

A FREAKY CALLBACK

A Shanster called Morgan was reading Zom-B Bride recently when he noticed a VERY familiar line!! See if YOU can spot it too -- if not, I'll point you towards it at the bottom of this entry...

While there are, of course, lots of coincidences in the world, this line was inserted deliberately, as a little Easter Egg for sharp-eyed fans who had read Cirque Du Freak. It seemed like a fun little way to hark back to the start of that series, and while I don't normally include anything like that, as it can break the spell of a book and jolt readers out of the world that I've carefully created for them, this was one instance where I just couldn't turn away from the idea once it presented itself to me.

Or... I suppose it might also have been... DesTiny?!?

****If you still haven't located the line in question, look at the third line from the bottom in the photo***

WRONG ADAPTATIONS

XAVIER'S LETTER

***Some letters from fans take a while to compose, but are worth waiting for! This one from XAVIER is a case in point, and made my heart throb with joy when I read it...***

Dear Mr. Shan, My name is Xavier. I've been trying to figure out how to write this correspondence for about 14 years now. It began as a letter I first tried to write at 10 years old, back in 2010. I never could put together the right words to say. Now, as a young adult in his mid 20's, I've decided to take another shot expressing my gratitude. I guess I'll start at the beginning and I promise not to take too much of your time. I was 10 years old in a new school district with new people and no friends. Our teacher took us to the massive school library. Well it wasn't massive, I was just small. I wandered around not finding anything and feeling discouraged until I stumbled upon Demon Thief. It was the only book of yours on the shelf at that time. I was so excited! I finished that book in 2 days. I can't even explain my excitement when I found out there were NINE MORE books! I ended up finishing that series withing a few months.

I saw myself in Grubbs, and, in fact, I found pieces of myself in many of your characters. From Dervish, to Bec, to Bill-E all the way to Bran/Beranabus (holy plot twist by the way!!). Each character showed me bits in pieces of myself and helped me grow as a person. But after finishing the series, now what? The Saga of Darren Shan, that's what! Unfortunately, my school library didn't carry those. That didn't stop me though, I had them special order every single one of those books until I finished that series! That series showed me what it really meant to be courageous, selfless, and how to face my fears. From there, I moved onto my favorite novel of all time, The Thin Executioner. What a piece of literature! It was so amazing, that I bought the novel for my girlfriend to read recently!

Now you may be asking, why am I telling you all of this? There are so many people out there with my story, what's so different about mine? As an adult, I was diagnosed with ADHD and High Functioning Autism. Through therapy, I've been learning a lot about myself, especially my childhood. My mom was dealing with substance abuse and wasn't that present, my dad wasn't a big factor in my life, and my step-dad didn't want to overstep so he never really contributed to my personal development. And if you recall from earlier in the email, I had just moved to the district and I had a lot of trouble making friends. My point is, your books helped me develop my imagination, sense of self, and so much more. I imagine that’s exactly what you hope to achieve as an author, crafting characters that resonate with readers in such personal and profound ways.

I'm proud to say that I am the Vice President of one of the largest school districts in my state, and I also work in the State Assembly leading the charge on productive change. Keeping everything in perspective, I wouldn't be where I am today without you. So thank you for helping me become me.

Recently, I’ve started reading Archibald Lox, and I’m already captivated by the world you’ve created. It’s incredible how, after all these years, your stories still have the power to draw me in and spark my imagination. I’m excited to dive deeper into this new series and see where it takes me.

Best regards, Xavier

COMPETITION

I released Father of the Future (my latest book for adults, released under the author name of Darren Dash) around this time last year. A darkly comic time-travelling tale that looks at the dangers of living in a world where Artificial Intelligence is kingpin, it's becoming more and more relevant with every passing day. I signed some copies of the hardback on its release day, and also dated them and scribbled in publication day for extra emphasis. I'm offering two of those signed copies as prizes in this month's competition. To be in with a chance of winning one of them, all you have to do is answer a simple question and email it to me, along with your name and address. After that, keep your fingers crossed and hope that YOUR name pops out of the electronic hat when I make the draw!!

1) Answer this question: "What is the title of my latest book for adults?" (This isn't a trick question! It really IS that simple!!!)

2) Send your entry to: [email protected]

3) Put your NAME in the SUBJECT BOX when you send your e-mail. Make sure you INCLUDE YOUR FULL POSTAL ADDRESS in the body of the e-mail, as well as the answer, so that I can easily send your prize to you if you win

(4) Closing date is 11.59pm UK time, Tuesday, October 15th, 2024.

(5) This competition is open to fans everywhere in the world, unless you work for one of my publishers or are one of my relations.

(6) You can only enter the competition ONCE. If you try to enter more than once, ALL of your entries will be disqualified.

(7) Only one entry per household -- if you send in more than one entry, ALL of your entries will be rejected. If more than one person in a house wants to enter, you'll need to make a joint entry.

(8) The draw for the winners will be made on or after Wednesday, October 16th, 2024. It will be a completely random draw, made by Darren Shan personally (I use an online number generator to pick the winners). I will try to notify the winners by e-mail, and will post their names in my social media channels too.

(9) Information submitted by entrants WILL NOT be shared by me with any other individual or company.

(10) My decision will be final.

IT'S A WRAP!

And that's it for October. I hope you all have a wonderful Halloween. If you're going trick-or-treating, may your bags bulge with goodies by the end of the night! If you're staying in that night, please treat those trick-or-treaters sweetly!! And if you plan to go partying, watch out for demons on the dance floor!!! I'll hopefully see you back here at the start of November. Until then, all my bloody best, Darren Shan. x x x

Follow Darren Shan on Facebook and Twitter. He also has a (very rarely updated!) YouTube page.

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