Thursday, 2 July 2009

e-books, limited editions, and exciting anthologies

Pleased to note that Best Served Cold, and the First Law Trilogy, are now available on e-book via Waterstones.com:

The Blade Itself
Before They Are Hanged
Last Argument of Kings
Best Served Cold

The prices are a tad disappointing - £10 and change for Best Served Cold when a hardback is selling at £8.50, and around £6 for the First Law books when mass-market paperbacks are available for a mere £4.

My own feeling about e-piracy and so forth is that it's virtually impossible to put a stop to - the more popular you are the more torrents will endlessly spring up, and most of them in places where folks don't respond to a polite email. The only effective way to combat it is to provide people with a higher quality service than pirates do, more easily available and at a price that seems reasonable. Then I think most will be happy to pay.

One problem is that a lot of users somehow think that e-books, since they don't have to be printed, are pure profit for the publisher and should therefore be virtually free whereas, of course, the great majority of the costs that go into making a paper book (commissioning, editing, artwork, marketing, repping, promoting and, erm, paying the author) still apply with an ebook. Champions of a revolutionary future of free-love filesharing where writers and readers will all be liberated from the shackles of publishers tend to forget the vital role they play as gatekeepers and ensurers of a certain level of quality (you may think some books that are published are rubbish but believe me, until you've seen a slush pile you really have no idea).

Even so, selling ebooks at more than the cost of the paper books is going to look just a wee bit like taking the piss to some buyers, I suspect. I'd like to see them retail at most at the same price as the paper equivalents, and ideally somewhat lower. At the moment most publishers and booksellers are still focused on the paper market where heavy discounts are applying more and more widely, making ebooks something of a speciality item and hence relatively more expensive. Hopefully in due course that will change, and I'll certainly be pressing them to lower the price as soon and as much as possible but, hey, it's a start.

In other news, I am delighted to relate that Subterranean Press, purveyors of high quality limited and special editions to the world's bibliophiles, will be publishing a signed limited edition illustrated hardcover of The Blade Itself. If it does well, and let's all hope it does, they will follow up with the rest of the trilogy. Not sure of the details yet - how many shall be the print run, who shall be the artist, how many and what style of plates shall be involved, but they have a great track record of involving the author closely so you will know when I know. Believe me, these guys make some beautiful books.

And finally, I probably mentioned a little while ago that I was writing a short story for a Sword and Sorcery anthology. Just heard a list of names of some of the other authors who will be contributing, and it's a strong line-up. VERY strong. Can't give any names yet, but I think lovers of edgy and interesting fantasy both old and new will get quite excited about this one...

Labels: announcements, news

Monday, 29 June 2009

Back from Scandinavia

I have returned from my trip to Scandinavia, and it went most well. It was a flying visit - a day in Stockholm, a day in Gothenberg, and a day in Oslo, with four hours in airports, five hours on planes, and ten or eleven on trains in between - and hence slightly knackering. I spent the whole time in a slightly disoriented state of mild bafflement. Even more so than usual. But I got to meet my Swedish publisher, who are releasing The Blade Itself in Swedish in August (split in two books, but released together). They are actually keeping something close to the original title as well, unusually. Their translation comes close to 'the tempting steel' apparently. Ooooh. Tempting.

I also got to do some events at some great specialist bookstores, and meet a lot of very keen Swedish and Norwegian readers. Particular respect has to go to the guy who turned up at Oslo having only just been discharged from hospital with tongue cancer, had half his tongue removed and was sporting scars that would've made Black Dow proud to know him. Now that's dedication.

Some things that I learned about Sweden and Norway from my brief encounter:

Scandinavia is very clean compared to London.

Scandinavians speak ludicrously good English.

And hence read a lot of books in English.

Scandinavians like fantasy and sci-fi a lot.

And hence have excellent, very well stocked and informed specialist fantasy and sci-fi bookshops with real senses of community and involvement about them.

This is a good thing.

Scandinavian trains are great.

Scandinavia is not necessarily cold. In fact it was boiling hot, brilliant sunshine pretty much the whole time I was there. I really needn't have packed my ice-pick.

So thanks again to all the publishers and booksellers that put me up, fed me and looked after me, and also to all the good folks who came out to get books signed or listen to me talk rubbish. Maybe I'll see you again some time...

Labels: appearances, news

Monday, 22 June 2009

The Brief, Wondrous Road of Oscar Finch

For a man who reads few books, I have read quite a few books recently. Three excellent pieces of fiction in particular, though only one of them could be considered fantasy and that of a rather peculiar and fungus-ridden variety. Still, I warmly recommend all three to anyone capable of reading in English, for they are excellent (as I said above), and all quick, sharp, page-turning reads as well. You could probably fit all three into a hollowed out hardcover of Storm of Swords and have room left over for a banana. And believe me, once you'd finished the last of them, you'd really need that banana.

First up - Junot Diaz' Pulitzer prize-winning The Brief, Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. The exodus from the Dominican Republic of Trujillo and the immigrant experience in the US as examined through the eyes of several members of one dysfunctional family. If you expect that the winner of such a heavyweight prize would have to be written in an overbearing, difficult, heavyweight way, then (in this case, at least) you're WAY wrong. This is airy, readable, conversational, bursting with humour and personality. My mum gave me a great piece of writing advice - always be truthful, always be real, and this book has authenticity in spades. It's also told partly from the point of view of a geeky child obsessed with Lord of the Rings (among other fantastic and science fictional things) and so is littered with some brilliant genre-based metaphors for those of you who know about that sort of thing (not me, obviously), sometimes hilariously innapropriate (the great dictator, when assassinated, stumbles from his bullet-riddled limousine having taken 400 hit points of damage). There's one brilliant paragraph in which Diaz manages to use a metaphor from Star Trek and one from John Boorman's Point Blank. Has he been inside my mind? The book's split into several parts, each from the point of view of a different member of the extended family, some going back to the 30s and 40s in the Dominican Republic (which is wild, vivid and dangerous enough to virtually qualify as a fantasy world, especially for someone who grew up in 80s Lancaster), some taking place right up to the present day. For me some sections worked better than others, but overall it's a joyful, characterful, rewarding read.

Next up, Jeff Vandermeer's Finch. A compromised detective struggles to solve a difficult double murder in a bizarre, crumbling city occupied by enemy forces. So far so noir. Except the enemy are giant mushrooms. I hadn't read any of Vandermeer's stuff before, but his reputation is ... kinda literary, I guess. All these distinctions are fundamentally bullshit, of course, but nonetheless I was expecting something complicated, difficult, possibly with wild ideas and beautiful writing but perhaps not too much in the way of coherent story. But the writing, though vivid, is tight as a drum, never over-complicated, and the imagination as man meets fungus meets city and all three flow together into a noir nightmare is like nothing else I've read. He makes the book work both as a crazy fantasy and as a tough detective story, both parts complimenting the other. If I were to go for a filmic metaphor I might have to say Chinatown meets Naked Lunch with a sprinkling of Tetsuo II: The Bodyhammer. And a side of mushrooms. Giant, man eating, hallucinatory mushrooms. There are a few moments, perhaps, where the forward momentum slackens and we come dangerously close to infodumping, the plot seems to creak a little and there's a risk that - like a jet fighter driven forward only by its own thrust - it might come crashing to the ground, explode and kill its pilot in an almighty fireball. But then the fungal afterburners kick in and the book blasts once more into the heavens of imagination. Nothing's fully explained at the end, but that isn't really the point of a book like this (if there are any other books like this, which there probably aren't). I read this in proof form, and I don't think it's out for a few months, but I strongly advise you to pick up a copy when it does appear because I very much doubt you'll have read it's like before. A must for fans of fantasy, noir, great writing, or, of course, fungus.

And so we come to the end. Of this post, and the world. Cormac McCarthy probably doesn't need my help in drawing the attention of readers to his (also) Pulitzer-winning The Road, since it's been out for a long time, has been on Oprah and that and sold squillions of copies, and is being made into a film even as we speak with that nice Viggo Mortensen. But if you've been frozen in a glacier for the last few years, allow me to expound. The Road is an irripresible comedy of manners that will have you chuckling from the very first page. Perhaps that's not entirely accurate. Unless by irrepresible comedy of manners you mean ash-blasted post-apocalyptic horrorshow, and by chuckling you mean gripped and harrowed. This is one bleak-ass book, but also a completely magnificent one that in the midst of its brutality, desperation and utter waste somehow manages to be strangely inspiring. I'd read a couple of McCarthy's books before and found them interesting but difficult to get into, so stripped bare and brutal are the prose, the characters and the events. But the stark and ruthless writing matched the content beautifully in this book, no doubt. Awe-inspiring.

Anything else - er, there's an interview up with me at SF Signal, should anyone be interested, and with that I'm off to Scandinavia to talk at some bookstores. If any of you will be attending in Stockholm, Gothenberg, or Oslo, I will look forward immensely to seeing you there. The rest of you, I will post when I get back...

Labels: interviews, reading

Sunday, 21 June 2009

Almost Glory

The validity of the David Gemmell Legend Award was called into serious question on Friday night when I didn't win.

A ha ha.

Andrzej Sapkowski won for his Blood of Elves, so congratulations to him (forced spittily through gritted teeth, of course). In many ways not that surprising since he's much the biggest selling author on the list - bigger than Stephen King in his native Poland and pretty massive in translation in Europe and elsewhere - it shows the huge difficulty authors who don't write in English face getting translated into English that Sapkowski has only in the last couple of years had UK and US releases. So it may be that the award had a lot more votes from outside the inward-looking English-speaking world (apparently only 500 out of 10,000 votes were from the UK, for example, though my figures might be only hearsay) or it may be that people just thought Sapkowski's book was better than the others on the list ...

But I won a pewter battle-axe which, though small, probably has enough heft to cause serious injury, which was nice, and even better got the opportunity to hold a full size full-on steel one which most definitely could cause serious injury:


It makes you feel powerful, believe me, but is frakking heavy. And before you ask I wasn't extremely drunk, just naturally heavy-lidded. (Thanks to Liz for the photo, which I have nicked without permission from her website - bit like I get the ideas for my books, now you mention it).

In any case, it was a great event, very well organised, much the most professional genre awards I've ever attended (not that I can say I've attended that many). I think it's a good thing that there should be an award for epic/heroic/commercial fantasy, and that it should commemorate David Gemmell's own contribution. I hope it continues to grow and flourish and get wide involvement in years to come.

In other news of almost-glory Best Served Cold made number 11 on the Nielsen hardcover bestseller list in its first week out in the UK. Brilliant news on one level, of course, but a tad frustrating on another to just miss the top ten and hence be unable to (honestly) call myself a Times Bestseller. "Nearly Bestselling Author Joe Abercrombie" doesn't have quite the same ring to it, does it. Still, it was a tough week and with heavy-hitters of mainstream publishing like James Patterson, Wilbur Smith, Sarah Waters and Lee Child ahead of me, I don't suppose I can grumble. Well, I could. I kind of am. But I definitely shouldn't be. I should be thanking all the hard-working folks at my publisher for their hardworkingness and congratulating them on getting the book to 11. And keeping it at 20 this week, for that matter. It's a great showing for a book of its type (that is one unlikely to find its way onto supermarket shelves where a lot of bulk sales occur these days). So congratulations to the minions of Orion in all their guises, and we shall wreak a bloody vengeance upon the bestseller list next year, mark my words. You hear me, Patterson and the rest? I'm coming for you!

Oh. Might be the year after, though...

Labels: news

Saturday, 13 June 2009

Best Served Cold Reviewed ... Lots

Much movement upon the blogosphere and, indeed, in the realms of printed media, with all manner of opinion expressed about Best Served Cold . I will try to get through all the ones I'm aware of. First up, a review from that esteemed organ of the US book trade Publishers Weekly has also weighed in, with a starred review, no less:

"Abercrombie returns to the blood-drenched arena of the First Law trilogy (The Blade Itself, etc.) with this skillfully crafted and bleakly humorous sword and sorcery adventure. Duke Orso imagines that he can become king by ending the civil wars that have devastated Styria, but he errs by trying to kill his overly popular general, mercenary Monza Murcatto. Recovering from her massive injuries and mourning her murdered brother, Monza vows vengeance on Orso and half a dozen of his accomplices. Employing her own motley crew of death dealers, Monza gets her revenge, but it's neither simple nor satisfying; each target requires fresh strategy, and each death has unexpected effects. Abercrombie is both fiendishly inventive and solidly convincing, especially when sprinkling his appallingly vivid combat scenes with humor so dark that it's almost ultraviolet."

You want more stars? How about five of the bastards from UK Genre magazine Sci-Fi Now:

"All in all, we can't say enough good words about Joe Abercrombie's latest addition to the genre."

Oh, go on! Give it a try!

"It's intelligent, measured, thoughtful, well paced and considered, but retains a sense of fun that has flavoured the rest of his excellent bibliography. We can't recommend it enough."

Nice. And another from from Mark Yon at SFFWorld:

"For all its gruesomeness, its bleakness and its moral cynicism it is a rich, memorable tale, exciting and well structured. This will be a ‘best of the year’ novel for many in the genre. It is still a pleasure to see this author’s talent develop."

It certainly would be a pleasure to see it develop. Yet another opinion on Best Served Cold at Drift Line

"Not exactly very heroic, but very human. One of the strengths of Joe’s writing is his very believable, very human and very complex characters. They are mesmerising and engaging, and are a joy to read."

Be mesmerised. And even yet another from Simon A at BookGeeks:

"It's a testament to Abercrombie's skill as a storyteller that he can, over the course of your acquaintance with them, make you care about generals, assassins, cut-throats, barbarians, poisoners and (worst of all?) politicians so much, and in spite of their dubious deeds. Best Served cold is definitely this author's best work to date."

Lovely. And I'll leave the last word for Dave Bradley, editor of SFX:

"Overall this is an immediately rewarding experience. There are unexpected reveals in the final third that are unexpected yet satisfyingly logical. The standalone nature of this instalment should attract new readers, and its tight, uncompromising focus makes for an absorbing read. Best Served Cold? Modern fantasy doesn't get much hotter than this."

Well said, that man. I'll bring you some slating just as soon as I find some but, and I'm being totally honest here, when it comes to shitty opinions about Best Served Cold, as far as I can tell the internet cupboard is bare ... so far. Ah, with all these props what a fine book it must be. But don't take my word for it, or even that of all these blogging and journalistic worthies. There's an attractive young man with a very full head of hair talking about it on the Border's newsletter. Weirdly enough the piece was also edited by yours truly. I am indeed multi-untalented.

Oh, I almost forgot in all the excitement over new books, a thoughtful comment on that crumbly old fossil The First Law fromElf M. Sternberg if that is his real name,

"Abercrombie's series has everything you could want ... The characterization is astounding, and his characters go deep and real. It is a brilliant and bold story that climbs over the bodies and scales the battlements of extruded fantasy product, unbuttons its fly and pisses all over the generic doorstops that litter the big box bookstore shelves. And yet, for all the astounding dramatic pyrotechnics, the ending leaves me vaguely depressed, vaguely upset, and without sympathy for losers, without celebration with the winners, without any real heroes."

Score!

Labels: reviews

Tuesday, 9 June 2009

Resident Evil 5

Man, what with the house move, and the baby, and the book promoting, I'm so behind on everything. I played this what feels like fifteen years ago, and only now am I organising my thoughts.

I was a big fan of the first Resident Evil when it was released on the Difference Engine in 1892, but the series did rather wane over the hundred years that followed. Resident Evil 4, however, was a brilliant, brilliant game. Mind-blowing in many ways, and had that rare feeling games sometimes have of everything working really nicely, all the rough edges being smoothed. Number 5, like a less gifted younger son living endlessly in the shadow of a far more famous brother, suffers by comparison. It's still a very accomplished game but, for me, it just doesn't push things on far enough to make its own mark.

It's been generally spruced up, particularly (as one would expect), in the graphics. It looks great, especially the characters' faces, which have a slightly uncanny sweaty sheen about them. But the overall content of shooting lots and lots of zombies is largely the same, and the ham-fisted control system is more or less identical, and less and less forgiveable as the years roll on and more fluid over-the-shoulder shooting games like, say, Uncharted, make it look ludicrously slow and laborious. Lots of time spent running from corner to corner of a game area so that you can have time to turn round and raise your gun to fire for a bit from a standing position, before lumbering off again.

The plots of Resident Evil games have long been a little on the silly side, but 4 at least ignored most of what went before and started afresh, making some kind of crazy sense viewed on its own. 5 tries too hard to cobble together and unite all kinds of ill-conceived bits of previous games and ends up a jumble, not helped by creaky script and voicing. There's too much bibble-babble and not enough drama.

In some areas it seems to have taken rather baffling steps back. Resident Evil always left you with only just enough equipment to do the job, and ammunition preservation was elevated to an art form in number 4. Number 5 would seem to do the same, until you realise that, due to its strangely clumsy saving and checkpointing methods, you can play a stage on easy setting collecting ammunition, then simply carry it across to a stage on hard setting and blast away with impunity.

The most disappointing thing, though, is that it just isn't very scary. Partly it's that many of the sequences (attack by chainsaw-wielding, bag-headed freakoids, for example) we saw already in the last game. Partly it's that where the game does innovate, it occasionally tends towards the silly (motorbike riding zombies, now? Are you sure?) Partly it's that you always have your trusty partner alongside you, and they're actually, perhaps for the first time ever in a computer game, reasonably effective and resilient, so you always feel someone's got your back. And partly it's that the hero, Chris Redfield, has evidently been working out. A LOT. He's about the size of Lou Ferrigno if the man had, you know, taken the whole gym thing a bit more seriously. He looks as if he could crush a zombie between his eyebrows. It's simply hard to believe that a small African country full of hideous mutants could put him down.

Don't get me wrong, it's still a highly enjoyable game once through - there are some great moments and blasting zombies' heads off with a shotgun will never get entirely old - but it feels nothing like the leap forward for the series (never mind gaming in general) that its classic predecessor did, is oddly rough round the edges, and in its gameplay already feels a little dated. Resident Evil 4 was so good that a rerun is no bad thing, but you feel they'll need to step things up a bit with the next outing.

7/10

Labels: games

Saturday, 6 June 2009

Tour Finishes, Email begins

Well, my mini tour of the UK promoting Best Served Cold has now come to an end. Seemed to go very well, on the whole. Talk in Manchester was good, despite at one point losing my train of thought and standing staring into space for an awful lot longer than was comfortable. An informed and enthusiastic audience - got to be a good thing. Then got the train back to London, took a brief tour of book stores there to sign stock. Then another little talk, q&a and reading at Forbidden Planet in Covent Garden. Only fitted in a couple of questions because of time constraints, which was a shame because in spite of everyone standing (or perhaps because of it), there was a nice informal feel to the event. Finally to Bath, this morning, where again there was a decent turnout, maybe thirty or so, and then to my knackered house full of boxes.

So my heartfelt thanks to all those who came out to show their support at any of those places, and especially to those who bought books. All in all, another few hundred copies signed. My hand hurts. Ah, and someone gave me an amusing and accomplished First Law-influenced cartoon, which shall get pride of place on my noticeboard.

While I was away the broadband fairies visited the new house and left a lovely new internet connection, so now I can catch up on various blogging responsibilities, start to chisel away at the massive email backlog I've built up over the last month, and, who knows ... maybe even do some writing. The question I got asked most often, after all, while presenting a new book to the world?

When's the next book coming out?

There's just no pleasing some people...

Labels: appearances, news

Monday, 1 June 2009

Release Date

Rejoice, my friends, for Best Served Cold now walks among you! In fact it's been available in bookshops here and there for a few days, as UK bookshops have a flexible attitude towards release dates, but from today it should be in Waterstones across the nation and is also, it would appear, shipping from amazon uk as well as other reputable internet purveyors...

And what better way for an author to celebrate the publication of one of his books than to sign a few?


A thousand, in fact, at the warehouse. Two pallets full. I'd never done anything like this before, so it was quite strange to see so many in one place. After signing about fifty your signature (which is a bit of a scrawl in my case anyway) turns into a complete shambles. You can't remember how it works any more at all. Then, strangely, after about a hundred, it goes onto automatic and comes out pretty well. Took about two hours to do the lot, with help from the wonderful folks at Littlehampton Book Services, and I swear, by the end, my hand hadn't hurt so much since I was thirteen.

Writing for three hours solid in an English exam, obviously. What did you think I meant?

Apologies, by the way, for ongoing email silence. Still don't have a regular internet connection, let alone my email accounts repaired. This time next week, with any luck, we should have actually moved into the new house and things might be up and running again. We shall see...

Labels: news, process

Monday, 25 May 2009

Bedlam, Bath

Experiencing the most manic couple of weeks of my life at the moment. Been to Portugal for a wedding and Southport for a funeral with a two year old and a two month old in tow, and during the two days in between the two trips entirely packed up and moved all our stuff into storage, sold our flat in London, bought a house in Bath. That house has been rewired, has the plumbers in and will be shoddily decorated by me this week, then I'm off next Monday to sign a thousand books at the warehouse, will be looking after the kids on tuesday, will actually move in on wednesday, then I'm off to manchester, then london to do signings on thursday and friday. Life's rich tapestry.

Progress on the new book, as you might imagine, has been negligible. At least this once I have an excuse.

To add to my woes my email is screwed, so I can get emails via the usual route (see contact page) but unfortunately cannot send any. So do not hope to get a reply to anything any time soon...

In the meantime, I note that Pat of the redoubtable Hotlist, noted organ of the internet sf&f scene, has reviewed Best Served Cold and he actually quite liked it thank you very much:

"Abercrombie's latest is his most ambitious work to date. Moreover, if it's any indication of what he is capable of, it bodes well for the future indeed. His accessible style could make him one of the biggest names in the genre in the years to come."

11 letters surely makes mine one of the biggest names in the genre already...

"Best Served Cold is an excellent tale of murder and vengeance. It's a morally ambiguous work with many shades of gray. The good guys become the bad guys, and vice versa, and back again. There are more twists and turns than in The First Law, and I get the feeling that Joe Abercrombie truly came into his own while writing this one. Best Served Cold is filled to the brim with all the elements that made The First Law such an enjoyable reading experience, yet it is definitely the work of a more mature author."

I have been accused of many things, but never before maturity.

"If you are one of those poor drifting souls who have yet to give Joe Abercrombie a shot, Best Served Cold is your opportunity to get acquainted with the author's style. For fans of Abercrombie, it will scratch that itch and more. Hard to put down."

You heard the man. Scratch that itch, people.

Right, back to the madness...

Labels: Other Life, reviews

Saturday, 9 May 2009

Best Served Cold UK Tour '09

It's only three weeks until Best Served Cold comes out in the UK. Can you feel the excitement? Can you? To celebrate the occasion, I will be doing an exhaustive tour of the UK, where you will be able to get lovely new beautiful hardbacks of Best Served Cold signed, and perhaps even lined and dated, in my flowing, fantasy-esque script. Other books too, maybe. Details are still being confirmed, but I thought I'd let you know what we do know so you can cancel your holidays/reschedule weddings or funerals/sell your children in order to attend one if not more of these once in a lifetime literary sensations:

Thursday 4th June, 7pm, Manchester
Talk and signing at Waterstones,
91 Deansgate,
Manchester M3 2BW
Tel: 0161 837 3000

Ah, my old hunting grounds in Manchester, where I attended University. Well, when I say attended, obivously I mean sat for three years in an array of freezing/filthy student houses playing Street Fighter II for 3 years. Happy days. When I think of my college buddies, Ryu, Guile and Blanka, it brings a tear to my eye. We used to call ourselves the four amigos. Ha ha ha. The stuff we got up to. Dragon punching, and Sonic Booming, and all that. Great times, man, great times. Haven't been back for a long while, so I'm quite looking forward to this one. There'll certainly be a reading, a Q&A, and some signing, plus maybe a bit of chat about the new book, we shall see...

Friday 5th June, evening, time TBA, London
An event of some kind at Forbidden Planet,
179 Shaftesbury Avenue,
London WC2H 8JR
Tel: 020 7420 3666

Thence to London, where I'll be doing something at Forbidden Planet on Shaftsbury avenue. The signing for Last Argument of Kings there was actually really well attended, so this year we're hoping to do something more. Possibly some kind of talk. Possibly some kind of Q&A. Possibly some kind of informal circulation, like that Barrack Obama doing town halls, only without the handsomeness, charisma, eloquence, power, appreciation, or sense of history obviously. So not like Barrack Obama at all. Except for the standing and talking.

Saturday 6th June, 1pm, Bath
Signing at Waterstones,
4-5 Milsom Street,
Bath BA1 1DA
Tel: 01225 448 515

And finally Bath, which will, by this point, be my manor, so to speak, since we're packing up and leaving London on the 21st of May. Farewell big smoke, hello Georgian splendor. Well, you know, Georgian splendor partially ruined by rubbish, compromised, Prince Charles-esque bullshit modern development with no architectural merit. Don't get me started. Oh, you didn't? Sorry. Anyway, town planning will be neither here nor there at the Bath Waterstones (which is a fine Waterstones) on Saturday the 6th. Fantasy fans of southwest Britain, I expect to see you there...

Other dates, plus the details of the Forbidden Planet event, will no doubt be announced in due course.

EDIT: The FP event will consist of a reading and Q&A, followed by signing of books. Lack of seating prevents anything more elaborate...

Labels: appearances

Thursday, 30 April 2009

Scandinavians Rejoice!

Why? Because you have some of the most progressive governments, longest life expectancies, best education systems, aesthetically pleasing modernist furniture, and finest public services in the world? No, not that nonsense! Because of this:


I am coming to visit you!

Yes indeed, from the 25th to the 28th of June this year, to read from Best Served Cold, sign (and sell) that and other books, and answer all those questions you dare not ask by email. The itinerary looks a little something like this:

25th June 18.00 - Stockholm
SF Bokhandeln, Vasterlanggatan 48, 10317 Stockholm

26th June 18.00 - Gothenberg
SF Bokhandeln AB, Ostra Larmgatan 16, 41107 Gothenburg

27th June 14.00 - Oslo
Outland, Ostbanehallen, Jernbanetorget 1, 0154 Oslo

Man. It's enough to make me wish I was Scandinavian. Just look at that poster. See how I smoulder. Look at the eyes, the eyes. Are you on fire yet? ARE YOU?

Labels: appearances

Tuesday, 28 April 2009

Klatching on

I mentioned earlier that I would be appearing on a panel at sci-fi London on this Sunday May 3rd at 11.00, discussing the new heroic fantasy along with Stephen Deas, Adrian Tchaikovsky and my dear personal friend and bitter rival Tom Lloyd. Don't miss it. As a further irresistible inducement, I can now confirm that later in the day I will be doing a Coffee Klatch, as they say, or Kaffeeklatsch, or whatever. An informal little round table thing where a handful of people can pick my enormous brains about whatever subject should please them. I imagine a lot of corduroy, a spotlit affair in which faces taut with emotion occasionally edge from the inky darkness. A bit like a high-stakes televised poker game. An event where you will not only be able to hear and see me, but smell my characteristic odour. What could be finer?

It's free, but numbers are limited, and tickets are on a first come first served basis. I urge you to apply here.

I would hate to be klatsching alone, after all, if that is even possible...

Labels: appearances

Friday, 24 April 2009

Exciting News!

Oooooooh.

Looks as if Best Served Cold will be Waterstones sci-fi/fantasy book of the month for June. That's exciting for me, of course, because it means all kinds of excellent selling opportunities like end displays and tables and stickers, and those little tags on the shelves where x says they love y because of z. It's exciting for me because I love sales like Scipio Africanus loved dead Carthaginians. That boy could NEVER get enough, and neither can I. Sales, that is, not Carthaginians.

But maybe you're thinking - "Hold on. I don't know if that's all that exciting for ME. I can see why you're excited, Joe, but why should I be, huh? I already knew the book was coming. I've already been jonesing for the book ever since I finished Last Argument of Kings. My life has been on HOLD, man. I've already ordered the book. I'm not going to get it until the 18th of June when I'll lock myself in the bathroom so I can read it six times and my friends will all think I've died. I don't need Waterstones to tell me to buy it. So just what good is this to me, Joe, huh? Why the hell should I be excited? WHAT'S IN THIS FOR ME, JOE, FOR ME?"

Whoah, there, calm down. What's in it for you is that Waterstones want to make it book of the month for June, right? That means the whole month. That means right from the start of June, not just from the 18th. That means publication comes back. That means the book's going to be out in the UK on June 1st, not June 18th. Imagine how many times you could read it locked in the toilet for those WHOLE EXTRA 18 DAYS.

Now do you see why you should be excited?

Do ya?

Labels: announcements, news

Monday, 20 April 2009

Back in the Trenches

Just been through the page proofs of Best Served Cold and made a few teensy little adjustments, which means the book is now officially out of the door as far as I'm concerned.

Done, finished, and complete.

I'm actually very happy with it, now, which is good, because for a long time - probably up to about two-thirds of the way through the first draft - I wasn't particularly happy with it. The central character, in particular, took quite a while to come together. The characters of the First Law had been developing and maturing in my head for a long time - some of them since childhood - and so they leaped much more fully formed onto the page. A couple of the point-of-view characters in Best Served Cold came out easily but the more central, more complicated ones took a fair bit of trial and error to find the right voice, the right style of writing. It took a while for me to know who they were, if you like, and that was somewhat worrying and damaging to the confidence. That's right. My confidence is not the impenetrable tower of adamant it seems. Within this harshly beautiful, heroically manly shell lies a heart-achingly vulnerable little boy who just wants to be loved. And that little boy worried. I wondered if I'd ever write a book as good as my previous one again. I would say things like, "well, not every book you write can be great." Had I lost it, if, indeed, I ever had it? Would I ever have it again? What is it anyway?

To put it more succinctly, I was worried the book would be shit.

Probably this is the kind of tosh that every writer ceaselessly bores their family and editor with. And when I say ceaselessly... As a result it took a fair bit longer to write than Last Argument of Kings - maybe 18 months compared to 14? It was also intended to be a bit shorter - around 175,000 words, and ended up about the same length - around 225,000. Still, things have to be the length that's right, and I think it justifies the girth (unlike my abdomen) and reads pretty quickly, covers a lot of ground for a single book. Perhaps it doesn't have quite the depth of characterisation the First Law had, but it's certainly a lot tighter, leaner, more economical and more focused (again, unlike my abdomen). Smoother in the pacing, too, and rather richer and more precise in the worldbuilding (that's right, the worldbuilding, would you believe). I'd say it's my best book yet, for what that's worth, though no doubt my own feelings will change over time, particularly as it goes out into the world, like a bright-eyed child off for their first day of school, knowing nothing of the bullying, homework, teen pregnancy and hard drug abuse that is to come. How will the readers respond? Will they think it's my best book yet? Hmm. Opinions always vary, and I'm sure they'll vary this time...

But even before it hits the shelves I'm back in the trenches of my next book, about 11,000 exploratory words into my first draft, fumbling with plot and wrestling with structural issues, worrying that I don't really know who the characters are, that they won't be sympathetic, won't be realistic, won't be compelling, and saying things like, "well, not every book you write can be great." If only I'd been through this before, and could look back and say, "you were worried last time, and it all came out fine." Ah well...

In other news, I note that voting on the David Gemmell Legend Award has now opened. So pop over to the site and get involved. You could even vote for me, if you fancied it, but hey, if not, you could vote for Joe Abercrombie, or maybe Last Argument of Kings. The choice is yours.

As I've probably said before, I reckon it's a good thing, overall, to have an award that's aimed squarely at the more commercial end of fantasy, which tends to be a little bit overlooked by existing genre awards. I preferred the original idea of a public vote to establish a shortlist of 5 from which a winner would be picked by a panel, as that seemed to ensure a popular shortlist while preventing winners from being chosen purely on the basis of internet popularity or (dare one say) actual fraud. A full-on public vote seems to me to reward the most popular author, the biggest series, the best-known book, which I've always thought of as a little pointless since it basically rewards sales, which are kind of their own reward, and gives publicity to those who need it least.

But, you know, every award is a poll of one group or another with its own makeup and natural biases, and every award is endlessly criticised for the particular group it chooses to poll. Those that use membership of a certain convention as an academy (like the Hugos) tend to get accused of being unrepresentative and out of touch. Those that use a professional body (like the Nebulas) tend to get accused of being a club which gives an award to the most popular member of the club. Those that are based on public vote are accused of being populist, pointless, and subject to fanboy tampering. Panel-based ones are accused of being elitist, random, and over-literary. There's really no pleasing everyone. Especially on the internet. Good article from Adam Roberts on the issue, for anyone who hasn't read it.

Still, This year's shortlist actually seems to me quite a varied one, within the confines of the epic/heroic/secondary world-ish end of the spectrum. Two americans, a new zealander, a brit, and a pole. I'd find it hard to pick a winner. Sanderson was doing nicely and his profile has no doubt been much boosted by his involvement with Wheel of Time. Weeks, though only published recently, has already hit the NYT bestseller list, so he must have a fair few readers out there. Sapkowski, though only recently translated into English, has been a massive-selling author in Poland for some time, and has probably sold more books than the entirety of the rest of the list combined. Marillier is more of an unknown quantity to me - though strangely enough she interviewed me a while ago for a writers website, and on my visit to Holland recently Wim Stolk was fulsome in his praise for her books. She's a writer who doesn't get duscussed much on the forums and blogs I occasionally frequent, but her being on the shortlist only demonstrates what a surprisingly unrepresentative world those forums and blogs can sometimes be, even of the wider internet, let alone the reading public as a whole.

If the aim of the award is to a) commemorate Gemmell and his contribution to the genre, and b) celebrate continuing contributions, they seem to be making a pretty good stab of it, especially since, as I understand it, publishers and booksellers seem to be interested in getting involved and doing some promotion based around the shortlist. And you know, it's hard work to launch something new, and if it works out it will take a few years. There are bound to be teething issues to begin with. As long as they help me win, who cares?

A ha ha.

Labels: news, process

Friday, 17 April 2009

Appaloosa

Me thinks I haven't done much talking about films recently, so ... I watched Appaloosa last night. Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen are steely-eyed lawmen in a tough western town. Renee Zellwegger comes between them. Jeremy Irons and Timothy Spall stretch their accents past the point of complete credibility in support. Good cast.

I love me a western. Really I do. Especially of the revisionist modern variety. The Outlaw Josey Wales may be my favourite film of all time. But honestly, I'm not sure I've seen one since Unforgiven that really needed making. 3.10 to Yuma was weak. Open Range was actually not bad, which is a surprise, since I'm not so great a Costner fan, but it was nothing amazing. Ride with the Devil, yes, but it's more civil war picture than classic hick-town six-shooter stuff. South of Heaven, West of Hell was baffling nonsense. Appaloosa, well, it was nicely acted, and nicely shot, and started reasonably but, well, overall...

I still haven't seen a western since Unforgiven that really needed making.

5/10

EDIT: Erik makes a good point about Deadwood, which is, of course, brilliant. I guess I was thinking of films rather than tv, he says, lamely. No doubt there will now be an avalanche of comments pointing out all the wonderful westerns made over the last fifteen years...

Labels: film and tv