Some new characters have been added to the Characters page!

The cover of Quantum Prophecy: The Gathering (the US title for the second book in the series) has just been revealed...
Update: I've also just discovered the new cover for the paperback version of Quantum Prophecy: The Awakening!

For readers in Europe, the last postal date for Christmas is December 18th - you should order your copy of The New Heroes: Superhuman now if you want to receive it in time for Christmas! And when you place your order, please let me know to whom you would like the book dedicated - the sooner I have that information, the sooner I can mail the books!

If you haven't yet ordered your copy of The New Heroes: Superhuman and want to receive it in time for Christmas, then time is running out... Here are the official "last posting days" according to the Irish postal service:

Older readers might like to check out the latest issue of 2000 AD (#1566, dated 5 Dec '07). Hidden among the usual great stories is a one-off story, a five-page "Time Twister" drawn by Gary Erskine and written by some hack called Michael Carroll...

As you can imagine if you've been following this site for a while, I'm dead chuffed about this! I'm a huge fan of 2000 AD and it's pretty cool to finally have a story published in a comic that I've been reading since I was ten years old.

Note: these days 2000 AD is very definitely an adults-only comic, so (here comes the cheeky bit!) if you're not yet an adult you could ask your parents to buy number 1566 and only show you the pages with my story!

Many of the classic tales that featured in 2000 AD when I was in my formative years are now being reprinted in lovely big volumes; they're smart, funny, exciting and - best of all - young-person friendly!

If you're having trouble using the PayPal button to order your copy of The New Heroes: Superhuman, please click here!

The first copies of The New Heroes: Superhuman are going into the mail first thing Monday morning. More will follow on either Tuesday or Wednesday, depending on how long it takes for the stationery supply company to deliver the three hundred padded envelopes I've ordered.

As mentioned elsewhere, Superhuman is a signed, limited edition book. If you would like your copy personalised feel free to ask! Also, if you have a favourite number (between 1 and 1000) then I'm sure that won't be a problem, as long as your number hasn't already been taken (and hurry, because quite a few of the good numbers are already gone!).

This is what 1000 copies of Superhuman look like! Yes, the book is finally here! Order your copies as soon as possible to ensure that they will arrive in time for Christmas! (Of course, I can't guarantee that they'll arrive in time for Christmas, but the sooner you order them, the greater chance you'll have!).

Not much news to report lately, except to say that The New Heroes: Superhuman has gone to the printer and the books will be delivered in the very near future. I've posted a more detailed report on the New Heroes Forum.

I'm back from my travels around Ireland for the Children's Book Festival... It was exhausting, but a lot of fun. Check out the report for all the juicy details...

Scotland! Yes, after many years of "getting around to it" it looks like I'm finally going to be heading across the water to visit our Caledonian friends! Next February 2nd and 3rd, Inverness will be home to Hi-Ex, a comics and arts convention that will boast some of the greatest names in the comics industry, plus me.

I'm also hoping to visit a few schools and / or libraries while I'm there; details to follow.

I'm half-way through my tour for the Children's Book Festival... Galway has been successfully conquered, now I'm off to Waterford and Wexford. Back on Wednesday evening, so expect a lengthy report shortly after that!

As promised, here's the latest schedule of my upcoming appearances at the Children's Book Festival... Feel free to drop in and have a listen if you're in the area (best to check with the venues beforehand just in case any of the details change).

Before all that, of course, I'll also be attending Octocon 2007 (the National Irish Science Fiction Convention) in the Glenroyal Hotel, Maynooth, Co. Kildare, Ireland, on October 13th and 14th (I'll probably be there for pretty much the whole weekend).

The competition has closed, the votes have been cast, and I'm delighted to announce that the winner of the 2000 AD September Art Competition: The New Heroes is Matt Timson (AKA Johnny Eyebrows), who submitted this absolutely fantastic painting of Quantum:

Matt has won a complete set of the HarperCollins New Heroes books, plus a copy of the US edition of Quantum Prophecy: The Awakening.

Thanks to everyone who took part in the competition. Click below to see all their excellent entries!

The question I am asked most frequently these days is this:

A good question indeed... I've been dodging the answer since even before the third book was published back in July!

The truth is that right now I don't know the answer. Whether there will even be a fourth New Heroes novel is up to my publisher, HarperCollins. If they decide that the sales have been strong enough to warrant further books, then we'll continue the series.

However, while the future of the fourth novel is currently undecided, there almost certainly will be a fourth book.

What does that mean? You'll see what it means if you click here...

I've recently added some new features to this website's Restricted Area, which - as always - can be accessed by those who know the correct password...

Just thought I should mention this (in fact, I probably should have mentioned it a few weeks ago - sorry!)... Pretty much every month on the official 2000 AD website there's a fan-run art competition, and this month - September - the topic is... the New Heroes characters!

There aren't many entries yet (I'm hoping that there'll be a rush towards the end of the month!), but if you want to see some artists' interpretations of the characters, skip on over and check it out:
2000 AD September Art Competition: The New Heroes

I realise that it's a bit short notice, but you can also participate in the competition if you're a member of the 2000 AD site (it's free and easy to join!).

Upcoming Events...
Sub-Con - Mark Saturday September 29th in your diary, for that is the day of SubCon! Come along to the Central Hotel, Exchequer Street, Dublin 2, for a chance to meet some of the most talented people in the comics industry (I'm not a guest at this one, but I'm going to do my best to be there!)

Octocon - This year's National Irish Science Fiction Convention takes place on October 13th and 14th, in the Glenroyal Hotel, Maynooth, Co. Kildare, Ireland. Once again I'm a guest at this year's con, which means I'll be participating in panels and generally pretending to know what I'm talking about.

Children's Book Festival - The long-awaited sequel to last year's world-wide tour of Ireland. Some of the details are still to be confirmed, but so far it's looking like I'll be in Galway on October 16th and 17th, Waterford on October 22nd, and Wexford on October 23rd and 24th. I'll post the full details soon!

Dublin City Comic Con - Following the success of last year's event, the DCCC is moving to a new venue - Tara Towers Hotel, Dublin - and expanding to two days: 17th and 18th November (I'm not a guest at this one either, but again I'm hoping to be there).

Please note: All convention appearances are subject to work commitments...

Users of Facebook might like to check out the New Heroes Facebook group... There aren't many folks on the group yet, but every group has to start somewhere! Join up today!

The US release of the second book in the series is scheduled for publication on July 3rd 2008. It will be called Quantum Prophecy: The Gathering.
More news - plus a cover image - coming soon!

Just launched: the brand new Quantum Prophecy Forum! Please drop in and sign up to chat with other readers about the books, characters and other aspects of the New Heroes / Quantum Prophecy books! From now on I'll be posting news and such on the forum as well as this website.

Over the years I've regularly received queries about writing, mostly from people who want to write but haven't yet done so. In recent months the numbers have tripled (at least). So I've decided to put down some thoughts about the process... On Writing

Here's a little something from way, way, way back in the past: my first ever published comic strip! It's also my first serious attempt at a superhero story, so there is a connection to the New Heroes, sort of.

"Overman" appeared in 1994 in a magazine published by the Irish Science Fiction Association, and it hasn't seen the light of day since. But now, thanks to digital cyber-wizardry and all that, I present a rare piece of genuine Michael Carroll fiction that is older than quite a lot of the New Heroes' readers...

How cool is this? Talented New Heroes fan Jenni Jack recently sent me her ideas for new costume designs for Energy...

Forgive me for this little rant, but I feel it's something that I need to get off my chest!

Quite a few reviews of the New Heroes books have made a comparison with - or a reference to - the Pixar movie The Incredibles... There have even been suggestions that my books were inspired by that movie.

Well, the truth is that I wrote the first book long before I'd ever even heard of The Incredibles. In December of 2002 I sent an early draft of the book - then called Hero - to a publisher in the UK. It normally takes some time for an unsolicited manuscript to go through the system, but by September of 2003 I had heard absolutely nothing from the publisher so I sent off an e-mail asking what was going on. I was told that the situation would be chased up - not the best news, but at least I finally knew that the book had arrived! But then January 2004 rolled around without further communication from the publisher, so I decided to give up on them and start looking for an agent. On March 1st 2004, I received a one-line rejection from that publisher. That was fourteen months after I sent them the book, and the rejection letter wasn't even signed! How rude is that?! (But I didn't care by then because I already had an agent... I merely chalked it up to experience and vowed that I would never, ever work with that publisher nor recommend them to any other writer.)

The Incredibles was released in late 2004 - two years after I'd first sent the book to a publisher - and even more years after I began working on the idea. So there's no way I stole the idea from Pixar! Sometimes these things are just a coincidence.

It really doesn't bother me that much any more: I think that anyone who has read the New Heroes books will know that any similarity with The Incredibles is purely superficial. They're very, very different stories with very different approaches.

Anyway... This was all brought back to me recently because of what's happening with Michael Scott's book The Alchemyst: The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel. Since the book was announced, an awful lot of people on the internet have implied that it's an attempt to cash in on JK Rowling's Harry Potter novels. Some have even gone as far as to suggest that Ms Rowling should sue Michael Scott for plagiarism.

Now, I've known Michael Scott for sixteen years. He is one of my closest friends and without doubt one of the most imaginative, intelligent and skilful writers working today. He would never knowingly steal an idea from another writer: he would never need to! Trust me on this: the man is absolutely brimming with ideas. He has more great ideas for books than any dozen other authors you could name - combined!

So with regard to The Alchemyst, let me lay down the truth: Nicholas Flamel was a real person and not a character invented by JK Rowling. See Flamel's entry on Wikipedia.

Nicholas Flamel is mentioned a few times in the first Potter book, but he's not a character (and certainly not a "Harry Potter character"). As far as I recall, he doesn't actually appear in the HP books: in the first one he's mentioned as the discoverer of the Philosopher's Stone (or Sorcerer's Stone as it's annoyingly - and inaccurately - called in the US editions).

In The Alchemyst, Flamel is one of the main characters. The plot revolves around him - he is not merely a "name-dropped" character.

You see, contrary to what some people believe, fiction did not begin with with Harry Potter! Just because JK Rowling and Michael Scott's books are both referencing the same historical character does not mean that Mr Scott is stealing Ms Rowling's idea! After all, Nicholas Flamel also appears in Victor Hugo's classic The Hunchback of Notre Dame (which was published 166 years before the first Harry Potter book).

Unfortunately, the same people who believe that Flamel is somehow "off-limits" because Rowling mentioned him are likely to get annoyed with me: I'm not disparaging the Harry Potter books. Why would I? They're great. And more than that, they reintroduced reading to a whole new generation of young people. If not for Rowling's success a lot of writers (myself included) would not be where we are today.

Okay... Rant over! (That's one of the problems with a job in which there are no co-workers and no bosses: there's no one to complain to about all the annoying things!)

Something I should have mentioned a long time ago: The New Heroes series is now available on Play.com. As with almost everything on that fine website, the prices are low (UK£4.99 or €7.99) and the postage is free. Click the links below to go directly to the appropriate page.

The third book in the New Heroes series, Absolute Power, is officially published today! I've already heard from some readers who ordered their copies on-line from Amazon.co.uk, but as of today it should be available in all good bookstores across the UK and Ireland.

As mentioned before, in the unlikely event that the book isn't available in your local bookstore you should simply ask at the one of the assistants to order the book. Then you have to get every person you know to do the same! If you do, I'll be your friend!

A sketch of Titan by professional (and extremely talented) comic artist PJ Holden!