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Full-Service Design for Your Growing Company's Needs
Website Design • Online Advertising • Banners • Brochures • Catalogs
June 2009 arrives with the optimism that a long-dormant economy will be eclipsed by a more fully functioning edition, bringing with it signs of a light at the end of the tunnel. The New Moon is a symbol of hope and promise. Here at New Moon Design, we work to help individuals and companies shine a brighter light on their visual brand. For organizations looking to start up, develop or invigorate relationships with existing and potential customers, New Moon Design delivers quality creative services on-time and within your budget. http://www.thenewmoondesign.com/
New Book Features Shinnick's Illustrations This month also marks the St. Martin's Press release of "This Will Kill You," an enlightening guide to the ways in which we go, written by HP Newquist and Rich Maloof, and featuring the illustrations of New Moon Design's Jim Shinnick. For further information about New Moon Design and how it can help your business grow, contact jim@thenewmoondesign.com.
This Will Kill You
Click on the links below to see sample chapters from the new book
Black Widow Spiders
Bullet Wound
Hole in the Head
Knife Wound
Snakes
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| Q&A with HP |
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We were fortunate to spend a few minutes with HP Newquist, guitar aficionado, humorist, and most recently, expert on pushed-up daisies, one-way tickets to Toyland, kicked buckets, and dirt naps. This is what he had to say about his latest, and hopefully, far-from-last masterpiece, This Will Kill You. |
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Q: |
What made you want to write about all the different ways we can die? |
| HPN: |
Everybody knows that they are going to die, they just don't know how. And it struck me that almost no one understands why specific things kill you the way they do. Everyone freaked out after the whole "anthrax in an envelope" scare, but no one really knew why anthrax was lethal. Same for getting hit by lightning, or dying from pneumonia, or contracting the Ebola virus. It also amazed me that so many people were reading my Celebrity Death Trio blog, which chronicles the death of those celebrities who die in threes over the course of a week. That proved to me that people like the opportunity to yank on the Grim Reaper's chain -- as long as that chain isn't attached to them. |
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| Q: |
What is your favorite Celebrity Death Trio of all time? |
| HPN: |
Well, the literary response is to say that "They're like my children; I love them all equally." But really, they're more like old girlfriends. Some you remember more fondly than others. Some you really don't want to think of ever again. I remember the ones that qualified as a "terminal trifecta," or three celebs dying in one 24 hour period. That happened with Rodney Dangerfield, Gordon Cooper, and Janet Leigh in October 2004, and then with Ingmar Bergman, Tom Snyder, and Bill Walsh in July 2007. |
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| Q: |
If you had to choose, which of the many kinds of death described in
This Will Kill You would send you to the next phase? |
| HPN: |
I would prefer not to choose. But mostly I wouldn't choose burning at the stake. Or getting attacked by an alligator. Or sarin gas. |
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| Q: |
Please finish this statement: People that read this book are going to. . . |
| HPN: |
. . . want to buy copies for everyone they've ever met. It's life changing. |
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| Q: |
What book do you think everyone should have on their coffee table?
This is not a trick question... |
| HPN: |
Anything where the author is cited as "HP Newquist" is a good book to have on a coffee table. That goes for dining room tables, night tables, card tables, and picnic tables, too. |
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| Q: |
What actor would play "aneurysm" in the movie version of this book? |
| HPN: |
Ernest Borgnine or Patrick Swayze. |
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| Q: |
Are you sick or something? |
| HPN: |
No, I'm just a little stuffed up from allergies. |
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| Q: |
Do you think we view death in a strange way in this country? |
| HPN: |
I think everyone in this country gets a huge laugh and even a charge out of death jokes, dark comedies, and scary movies. But that's only in private; they're afraid to admit it or acknowledge it in public. Executions used to be a form of public entertainment, yet today we're afraid to talk out loud about someone's death. Does that count as strange?
Death can be funny, as long as it's happening to someone else. Jack Daniel, of bourbon fame, died from gangrene after kicking his office safe when he couldn't remember the combination. Steve Irwin, "The Crocodile Hunter," wasn't killed by a crocodile, he was killed by stingray. You know that somewhere, "The Stingray Hunter" is thankful he dodged that bullet. In 1993, a lawyer in Canada broke through a skyscraper window while he was showing law students how strong modern glass was. He fell straight to his death. Try not to laugh when you read that, okay? |
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| Q: |
What is your favorite deathbed quote besides "For God's sake, don't
tell Happy!" |
| HPN: |
Oscar Wilde allegedly said "Either that wallpaper goes, or I do." Needless to say, the wallpaper stayed. |
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