Ted R. Blasingame is © Ted R. Blasingame

Ted R. Blasingame (2009)

Ted R. Blasingame has been a writer since his 8th grade Creative Reading class in 1975. Already an avid reader before then, especially with the stories of Kenneth Robeson, Robert Heinlein and Ray Bradbury, he decided to try his own hand at storytelling. As with all new writers, the stories that began with The Hydrazine Project were not well written, nor were many of them seen to completion, but Ted continued to have fun with his tales.

It was not until he had discovered ElfQuest in 1979 that he actually completed a story called "Brothers In All But Blood" that was later published in the first issue of WaRP Graphics' authorized Yearnings fanzine. Thereafter, he joined twelve separate chapters of the ElfQuest National Fan Club and spent the entire decade of the 1980s writing EQ-based stories. In 1984, he created and operated his own ElfQuest chapter named the Timber Valley Holt until it shut down in 1990 following a six-year run with 60+ members.

In the early 1990s, he joined an Amateur Press Association (APA) group called Mind's Eye, which focused on stories, poems and artwork relating to the ESPers popular in Japanese animation programs of the 80s. It was there that Ted began work on what would later become a novel-length esper-related tale called Treasure Hunt - Flight of the Zephyr. At the behest of several friends, he tried to get his book published, but was unable to find a buyer for the tale. With a relatively new concept called POD (publish-on-demand), Treasure Hunt was available as a self-published paperback through Lulu Press for a short time. As of early 2009, however, the title of the book was shortened to Flight of the Zephyr, with a complete renovation of the opening chapters.

Following his interest in Espers, he was introduced to anthropomorphic fiction by friends Mark Barnard and Steve Carter in a brief membership with Tai-Pan, where he wrote three stories which never saw print. He was then involved in writing stories and typesetting of the 2-issue run of Mark Barnard's furry-zine, Midnight Sonata (which later spun off the successful comic book, Havoc, Inc.). After the end of Sonata, his interest in anthropomorphic fiction continued and evolved into a continuing online story project called Blue Horizon with his wife Eileen and friend Steve Carter that has lasted twelve years. A spin-off tale in the Blue Horizon universe under the title of Hoenix has been submitted to several commercial publishers over a few years, but as yet it has not yet been picked up. Hoenix has since been released through Lulu Press as a hardcopy publication, and was a final nominee for Best Anthropomorphic Novel of 2004 in the Ursa Major Awards.

Another related Blue Horizon tale called Twelve Sixty-One recently completed production, recounting the first adventure of Merlin Sinclair's ship and crew at the start of the business, and is also available through Lulu Press.

Work on an unrelated anthropomorphic novel called Sunset of Furmankind began production in April 2009, and as of April 2010 there have been thirty chapters posted online, with another thirty yet to be written.

Through the years, Ted has worked with several friends in a number of publications that have seen print and distribution and has enjoyed his life as an amateur writer for over thirty years.