Many writers, if not most, would love to see their work show up on the big screen or the small.  We're in love with Hollywood, after all, where storytellers get paid well even if they're sometimes treated like second class citizens.  In TV, writers are accorded more respect, in general, than they are in the movie business.

 Lately, comic books and graphic novels are booming in movies and TV.  Many of the big box office hits of the last few years started out as comics.

 My original horror graphic novel Zombie Cop is making it to TV, ten months after being released by Image Comics/Shadowline, but not in the traditional way.  Instead, it's making a guest appearance on the hit CBS series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.  

 It started on Wednesday, with an email from the publisher, forwarding an email from the show's property master, seeking permission to use the book on an upcoming episode.  I responded positively (of course!).  By the end of business that day I'd had a conversation with the property master, signed the necessary paperwork, and the publisher had shipped copies of the book over to the production office.  They shot the scene last night (as I write this--Friday night, two days after the initial contact).  In the scene, someone's reading the graphic novel in a diner, and that serves as the lead-in to a gunfight.

 Now, I have various connections to CSI.  I used to edit a line of CSI comics.  I've met Anthony Zuiker, the creator of the hit franchise, been a guest on the set of CSI: Miami, and written graphic novels based on CSI and CSI: Miami.  I wrote a CSI: Miami novel called Right to Die that came out last year.  This coming Tuesday, August 25, my first CSI novel (based on the original series), CSI: Brass in Pocket, goes on sale, and I'm just wrapping up the final polish on the next one, CSI: Blood Quantum.  I know people who work on the show, and people in CBS licensing in New York.

 But the property master who selected the book was unaware of all that until we talked on the phone.  He just liked the cover and title and thought it was an appropriate way to lead up to the gunfight.

So the six-degrees thing here is more like two degrees, or one--but those connections had nothing to do with my book making its small-screen debut.  It's more like a cosmic coincidence... but I'll take it!

 The episode airs on October 15, and Zombie Cop appears in the opening teaser segment. Here's what to look for: