Okay, I’ll be doing a signing at Forbidden Planet in Shaftesbury Avenue on 5th April from 1 till 2. There’ll be copies of the hardcover Line War and doubtless numerous others of my books, including paperback copies of Hilldiggers. Bring you old copies of my books and I’ll sign them too … bring copies of other people’s books and I’ll sign them, bring your electricity bill … I’m not proud.
Tag: Books
Work Work Work.
Hey, guys, I didn’t think I would have much time to blog, but obviously the last entry refutes that idea. I’m presently working on Orbus, should be receiving edits for Scorpion Memory sometime soon, have put together the short story collection and recently had some other work hit me out of the blue. Over the last week I’ve been working on some ideas for a ‘Heavy Metal’ feature, but though I’d like to tell you more about that, I can’t. Really, if I told you I’d have to then post this special optic virus I’ve created. It loads through your eyes the moment you look at it and turns your brains into Ardennes pate, and sliced tomatoes.
Potugese Cowl Cover.
French Covers
The French cover for the trade paperback of The Skinner, illustrated by Stephan Martiniere has to be the best I’ve seen. Now the publishers Fleuve Noir have once again shown how good they are at this sort of thing. Here is their mass-market paperback cover of The Skinner and their cover for Cowl. Those who have read the books will be able to work out which is which without understanding the language.
Line War
Now, as I was reminded over on myspace: let’s not forget the main event. Line War will be published on the 4th of April. And you can obtain it here on Amazon.
The Gabble & Other Stories
Woot! Here we go…
Oh, and lest I forget. George Mann posting on here has reminded me that you can find two of my Mason’s Rats stories in the The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction.
Writing News Update
Okay, that’s a wrap. Gardner Dozois has accepted a story for his New Space Opera II. It’s called Shell Game, involves the Polity and another new set of rather nasty aliens. Other news: I’ve just sent off the short story collection to Macmillan. Some of you will have read some of the stories since they are ones that have appears in Asimov’s, Interzone and various ‘Year’s Best’ collections, but I guarantee none of you will have read them all. Here’s a list of the stories, which may be subject to change:
1. Softly Spoke the Gabbleduck
2. Putrefactors
3. Another England
4. Garp and Geronamid
5. The Sea of Death
6. Alien Archaeology
7. Acephalous Dreams
8. The Veteran
9. Snow in the Desert
10. Strood
11. Choudapt
12. Adaptogenic
13. The Gabble
2. Putrefactors
3. Another England
4. Garp and Geronamid
5. The Sea of Death
6. Alien Archaeology
7. Acephalous Dreams
8. The Veteran
9. Snow in the Desert
10. Strood
11. Choudapt
12. Adaptogenic
13. The Gabble
At some point, when I can easily work out how to change an Adobe image to a jpg I’ll put up the cover here with its seriously weird gabbleduck picture.Addition: Here’s something I probably haven’t mentioned. You can go listen to one of these stories over here at Escape Pod!
Writing News Update
Here’s a bit of an update on the writing and so forth: My Czech publishers – Polaris – have offered for rights of The Voyage of the Sable Keech. Publication will be within 12 months, licence limited to 4 years. Nightshade books are publishing Shadow of the Scorpion on May 1st this year. This is a book (longer than Prador Moon) covering some early episodes of Cormac’s life: Raised to adulthood during the end of the war between the human Polity and the vicious arthropoid race the Prador, Ian Cormac is haunted by childhood memories of a sinister scorpion-shaped war drone and the burden of losses he doesn’t remember. In the years following the war he signs up with Earth Central Security, and is sent out to help either restore or maintain order on worlds devastated by Prador bombardment. There he discovers that though the old enemy remains as murderous as ever, it is not anywhere near as perfidious or dangerous as some of his fellow humans, some closer to him than he would like. Amidst the ruins left by war-time genocides, he discovers in himself a cold capacity for violence, learns some horrible truths about his own past and, set upon a course of vengeance, tries to stay alive. As for writing done while in Crete: I completed the above mentioned book, a 10,000 word story for Gardner Dozois’s New Space Opera II and am more than a third of the way into Orbus, a follow-up to The Voyage of the Sable Keech: The Old Captain, Orbus – a sadist in charge of a crew of masochists – became a reformed character at the end of The Voyage of the Sable Keech and took over the captaincy of the spaceship the Gurnard. Meanwhile, the Prador Vrell, mutated by the Spatterjay virus into something powerful and dangerous, had seized control of a Prador dreadnought, killing its entire crew, and was heading back to the Prador Third Kingdom to exact vengeance on those who tried to have him killed. Both these characters are heading for ‘The Graveyard’ (mentioned in Alien Archaeology – Asimov’s) a buffer zone between the Polity and the Prador Kingdom, the perhaps into the kingdom itself. Orbus has a few unresolved issues about the Prador and about Vrell in particular …
Nothing Much Happening Here For a While.
God is not Great — Christopher Hitchens
Having watched, listened to and enjoyed numerous video clips of Christopher Hitchens on You Tube I decided to buy his book God is not Great (How Religion Poisons Everything) and now, being about a third of the way in, I can make some comparisons between it and the Richard Dawkins’ book The God Delusion. In essence the two writers have assaulted the same territory and the books are very similar, but they have approached it from different directions. Dawkins is a scientist used to conveying his ideas in an as clear and concise a manner as possible and, having donned some literary garb, is still doing the same thing but in a much more palatable way for the general reader. Hitchens has approached the whole territory from the literary side and is more focused on that angle than the sometimes quite arid and exact scientific viewpoint, which certainly comes out when you hear Dawkins speak. Certainly Hitchens is just as sincere and strong in his opinions as Dawkins, but he’s also more concerned with writerly flourishes and probably the opinion of the literary critics in his circle. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still enjoying his book’s pyrotechnics immensely, and recommend it, however, thus far I prefer The God Delusion.