James Roberts

😬😬😬

If you email mtmte.books@gmail.com to register you’re interest, you’ll be added to an email list and atomically get notified of new releases

It would be more jarring if it was in the first person. Believe me, I’ve seen both versions

Ah! My target audience

The final book release from me in 2025 is this:

Thanks to Adam Roberts/Bunker Creative for art direction and design; and to the 50+ people who agreed to be interviewed (and in some cases let me borrow their fanzines)

PLUS a Postscript by Jack Lawrence and an Afterword by Nick Roche.

Copies will be available at TFNation on 9th and 10th August, and again later in the year via mail order. It’s a limited edition, so keep an eye out for derails of how to order

Cover reveal! Generation Mechs: Transformers Fan Culture In The 90s, the first release from Empurata Books, is out next month — and this is what it looks like.

496 pages, hardback, embossed cover, spot-varnished dust jacket and 3 x 12-page glossy inserts featuring hi-res photos of 60+ TF fanzines

It’s utterly grim that the framing of political stories by political editors is “what does this mean for the prime minister’s authority” instead of “how many disabled people will starve or trans people won’t get the support they need”. It’s like football commentary rather than serving the public.

The latter, I’m afraid. If it’s any consolation, @markerguru.bsky.social wasn’t a fan of that direction either

Karin Smyth Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care) The Government is continuing its work with the National Health Service to reform gender services, to ensure young people receive timely, holistic care and support, while reviewing the use of cross-sex hormones in line with recommendation eight of the Cass Review. The Cass Review said that NHS England should review its policy on cross-sex hormones. The review noted that the option to provide cross-sex hormones is available for patients aged 16 years old and over, but that "extreme caution" was recommended along with a "strong clinical rationale for providing hormones before the age of 18". In line with Dr Cass's recommendations, every case for treatment is now discussed by a national multi-disciplinary team, and NHS England is reviewing its clinical commissioning policy on cross-sex hormones. A public consultation on the evidence is anticipated to take place this summer, and an updated policy is expected to be in place by April 2026. With regard to private prescribing, a working group has been established by NHS England to provide advice to Government officials and the Chief Pharmaceutical Officer. The remit of the working group is to provide practical advice on the operational consequences of introducing any restrictions on private prescribing and advice on how to manage any risks to patients. The working group is made up of consultant endocrinologists, pharmacy and primary care leads, and national commissioners. It is not the working group's role to decide whether restrictions on private prescribing should, or should not, be introduced. Neither is the group providing advice on the future use of cross-sex hormones by NHS clinicians. The Department will use the outputs of the working group to inform ongoing policy development.

The Cass Review has not been peer-reviewed.

But it has now been critiqued in depth and from every angle and fully discredited as pseudoscience by ELEVEN peer-reviewed publications.

So when the government uses the Cass Review to justify any policies it is not “following the science”.

It’s in there…!

Will do. Will I see you at TFN?

Deal!

Cover reveal soon. It’ll be available at @tfnationltd.bsky.social and via mail order later in the year

So! Here’s a glimpse of the worlds that await you inside Generations Mechs, the definitive critical and cultural guide to being a Transformers fan in the 1990s, when (for most of the decade) it looked like we’d reached The End Of The Road

£40, but worth every penny

I’ve interviewed over 50 creators, industry execs and fans (especially fanzine editors) and dug up very rare new info about the early days. I’m really happy with how it’s turned out. It’ll be a “proper” book in that bookshops and libraries can order copies

Oh god, I should say what the book’s ABOUT. The subtitle is “Transformers Fan Culture in the 90s”, and it’s a detailed exploration of the rise of organised TF fandom from… well, the mid-80s to 1999. It’s all new content. Part critique, part reference guide, part oral history

I’ll be posting a similar message on X, Insta, Facebook and Tumblr — **please do not Like more than one**. Thanks x

So if you think you’ll be ordering a copy or picking one up at TFNation, please like the first post. RTs to maximise the sample size are also appreciated

I’m still waiting on final costs (which will of course be determined in large part by the size of the print run), but I think I’ll be selling each copy for around £40 (plus shipping). I’ll be signing them and sending them out in bespoke packaging

I’m not inviting pre-orders/payment, but I’d appreciate it if those of you who intend to buy a copy would let me know by liking the first post in this thread. I say “intend to buy”, but there’s no obligation. If you change your mind, fine. I just need a rough idea of demand

For this reason, I’m only going to do a single print run. Gen Mechs will therefore be a limited edition (I *may* do a softback second printing in a few years, depending on demand). Thing is… I’ve no idea how many copies to get printed. And this is where you come in

I’m doing things differently with Gen Mechs. It’s a large format, 500 page hardback book with glossy inserts, a dust jacket and an embossed spine. It’ll be expensive to produce. The cost-per-book is greater the smaller the print run, to a more pronounced extent than the notebooks

Normally, I do a small run of notebooks for the cons then wait until I’ve taken people’s orders before doing a second print run. That way, I know exactly what the global demand is and I don’t over-order

Generation Mechs - a favour

This will be a thread, so bear with me.

Gen Mechs is going to print in a few weeks. I’ll be selling and signing copies at @tfnationltd, and then later in the year I’m going to make it available to order, as I’ve done with the MTMTE notebooks

TFNation attendee Josh, in his Camps International Shirt, holding Galvatron and Ultra Magnus

We're proud to be sponsoring TFN attendee Josh, who is raising funds for an aid-giving trip to Cambodia.

He'll be building schools, kitchens, bridges; planting trees & cleaning up beaches.

Please support if you can - full details below!

tfnation.com/blog/20...

#TFNation #Transformers

99% sure it will, yes

Hahahahaha