In every chat and website I've had to make this announcement, I've struggled. This isn't going to be any different. Earlier this evening I received a phone call from one of Comicality’s relatives. As many of you may know, he has been very sick on and off for over a year now which was the result of a failing liver. I was informed that on Tuesday, 04/16 he lost his battle and quietly passed away, taking a piece of all of our hearts with him. He leaves many of us with the amazing work that he has shared throughout the decades that he has been “COMICALITY” to us and much like that work, I know my heart along with many others, is now forever incomplete.

We are going to have a discussion in the office and figure out what we can/should do to keep all of the projects we've worked on with him alive like this site. Almost 6 years ago I got to see firsthand how much work he put into everything he did to entertain us all when we aided in reviving his IMAGINE Magazine. His persistence and level of dedication re-lit that flame for myself and even though the magazine was supposed to simply be hosted by us, I’ve had my hand on the wheel and followed along as he pointed. It’s hard to imagine moving forward without him, but we do want to move forward for him. Myself and the entire team (real and 3D) are all brokenhearted and need our vision to clear so we can do his work justice.

– Rest in Peace Coms, We’ll continue safeguard all that you created until we join you on the other side.

Hello Readers,

It's TSL again with hat in hand, yes it is that time of year again when we ask you our loyal readers to help keep our sites up and running. You may well know our sites are run almost entirely on your generous donations! When your donations do not cover all of the cost, the difference comes out of our pockets. We have no ADs on our sites and no Premium Tiers! There is no charge to our authors for hosting their stories nor any charge for you the readers to read them. We would appreciate it if you could find a way to donate any amount to keep our sites AD-free and running. So please check between your couch cushions and under your car seats any amount will be gratefully accepted. No amount is too small. We thank you very much for all of your help over the years.

To sweeten the pot a bit, we are running the following promotion again, simply put, make a $10 USD donation get a free Joel Book.

Have you considered helping to keep these sites up and running? Are you also a fan of Ted Louis' "Joel" series? Well, Ted has informed us that he found a case of assorted Joel books. Yeah, "actual" in print books! He decided that anyone willing to make a $10 or larger donation within the US to the hosting service paying the bills for the Fort Family Community of sites, he is willing to send you your very own copy of a random book in the series, autographed by Ted Louis himself as a thank you!

What to do:

1. Click on https://dsshosting.net/donations/donation-form/ and click on "Donate Now".

2. Make a qualifying donation of $10 or more.

3,. Email your name and mailing address to joel-offer@fortfamilyforums.com

4. Once the donation has been confirmed, Ted Louis will send a random autographed copy of one of his books to you directly.

(One book per donation. This offer will be withdrawn once the limited number of books has been sent. The early bird gets the worm! Unfortunately, only US residents due to expensive international shipping :( We'll take down the offer as soon as we confirm that no copies remain.)

Hey everyone! Yes, I am still here and doing more than just relaying news. The unfortunate part about a website where all the active authors are undead and in hiding is that it's hard to come across new authors. Well, out of the darkness R. Eric has brought us his ongoing story "Blueblood: A Dark Southern Aristocracy" which is a Southern love story that truly has a desperate undertone that will make you believe that love conquers all. Well, at least it pushes you to overcome!

So be sure to check out his new story, and tell your friends that the archive is still here and still open. I'd say we need to turn more authors to wake up the archive but, yeah, that's probably a bad idea. - Catch you all soon!

Another off for New Adventures
Posted by JeffsFort

I've been on the fence about this for a little while. Not so much what to post about this as I was considering "if" to post this. Why?

Back in 2004, we had been contacted by a concerned author/reader regarding a free forum we were using that was laced with ads and crap to gather and talk to a small handful of fairly well-known authors of the time. The "community" was considered back then, some form of author support. LOL! That concerned author/reader purchased a parent domain and the software to build an internally supported forum to move the conversation to and gifted it to us. You see the name August Christopher come up for us, this is why. That was the official birth of what we now know as the Fort Family. We all came from small beginnings, the oldest of us were developed in a relatively young internet and needed to change with the times. Our forum is gone now but because of the interconnectivity of the modern internet, the forum became obsolete. So now we focus on hosting the sites that keep online authors' work available to the world. Are we alone in this task, heck no.

On September 9, Dude (IRL - Vale Mike Wengert) founder of the online community "AwesomeDude" that is as old as we are, passed away from a massive heart attack at the age of 79 years old. Just shy of his 80th birthday :(

All of our communities face issues that unless managed could knock us off the internet. This is why there are so few of the "Old Guard" (as ACFan put it to me earlier) left out there. The death of the founding member is bad, when that founding member was also the person managing all the bills and accounts, it is more than a speed bump, it's a mountain to overcome. When August Christopher passed, we were in danger of losing all that had been built so, we have seen that mountain, and feel for the AwesomeDude community.

If you have time, please reach out to them and offer them some positive energy and support. Not only are they facing a difficult battle but they are mourning the loss of a close friend. That mourning has to take a back seat when dealing with trying to save their creation and I can say from experience, that part sucks! Our community was only a year old when we dealt with this loss and fought to get our hands on the wheel of what felt like an out-of-control bus. Their community was established almost 20 years ago, around the same time our community became something we could also call a community. So it is more the size of a freight train compared to the bus we needed to learn how to drive.

Even though over the years all these "competing" communities had fences between themselves and others of its kind, I've always considered us in competition with no one. Just another group or gathering supporting independent authors and offering a hand to get them exposure. That's all any of these sites ever offered. Dude was one of those people who felt the same way, and his absence will be felt by us all.

RIP Dude and best wishes to the community you created and those within.

https://awesomedude.com/