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Sep 30, 2009

Wednesday Roundup

Back from chilling out in Vegas. I've just started 'Paris Under Water' by Jackson. Non fiction and so far fascinating - who knew Paris flooded - when I think of floods I think of Venice. Bought the first of the 'Turkish Delight' mystery series by Mehmet Somer because I just requested an arc for the third in the series and thought maybe I should read the other two first! I also have in my box a manuscript which I'm going to give the 50 page treatment.

At breakfast this morning Sally or 'the beloved' as we call her said that on a Utah talkshow they called the staff at TKE snooty. I've worked with this lot getting on for four years and they are like family to me and they are lovely, whip-smart on their chosen subject and fairly savvy on the rest of the inventory, we try and greet all our regular customers by name and we say hi to anyone who walks into the store. How is that snooty? Comments welcome - good bad whatever - I want to know what you the book buying public think of us staffers at TKE.

Finally one of the blogs I read on a regular basis is Nathan Bransford's - an agent at Curtis Brown - and he always has some great insights into the industry but yesterday's post bordered on genius. As a writer I'm working my way through the list of agents I can submit to with varying degrees of success. Nathan suggests that while submitting to an editor at a big press is a no-no, you can still submit to smaller presses. In fact some of the people commenting on his post said that they got a deal with a small press before they got an agent. I'm still going to work my way through the list but at the same time I'll start compiling a list of small presses.

Sep 23, 2009

Research teaches you the weirdest things (part 3)

So Tball is rolling along nicely but I wanted some factual reports on a particular substance because while it sounded tailor made to my plot it had 'Urban Legend' written all over it. Most of the reports seem to be coming from Colombia and there are sites that let you read the local papers - all over the world. So off I go to 'paperboy.com' and load a bunch of Colombian online newspapers.

The first thing that happens is my system slows down, way down. My babel fish translator seems to have hopped off my computer and google translator is having a really hard time. I killed all the tasks I had running, rebooted and then ran virus and adaware scans. In the 10 minutes I was in virtual Colombia my computer picked up 14 dataminers and 1 keylogger. I'm having coffee with a friend this morning over at 'the evil giant' so I will make full use of their medical dictionaries and see if this stuff really exists.

Virtual Colombia - bad!

Same idea - different direction I hope!

Our trip starts tomorrow so will be off until next week. So here's something to think about. Why is it that every year you get pairs of books that are so similar in subject that the authors could've been looking over each others shoulders while they were writing them. I'm not saying that they did I'm saying that ideas are viral almost like a radio station you can tune into if you know how. Just by comparing the blurb Neuropath shares many traits with Mariposa by Greg Bear. I may try and read Mariposa since it doesn't come out until November. Another thing the title didn't exactly shout tech thriller at me in fact it made me think of flower arranging!

Sep 20, 2009

Neuropath - freaky!

I just finished the arc it's a near future thriller with elements of The Matrix and Frankenstein about it oh there are plenty of mad scientists in here. The thing that will keep me up at nights for a while is the fact that science can already pinpoint which areas of the brain respond to which stimuli. How soon will some overzealous scientist start trying to rewire the best computer ever - the human brain?

Sep 18, 2009

2 new arcs and no I haven't read The Lost Symbol - yet

I ordered my copy of Crush this week - hope that this lives up to the blurb!

Managed to snag a couple of arcs yesterday. Neuropath by R Scott Bakker and Pais Under Water by Jackson. Neuropath (like Psychopath) comes out next month so I'll get cracking on that one first. The Paris arc is Jan 2010.

We sold out of all of our copies of Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol and because of the drum-tight secrecy there were no advanced reader copies. I may have to buy a copy to read on the plane in December. On Saturday we've all been drafted for the Shannon Hale event because she is local and has such a loyal following the store will be packed and time will fly.

Sep 12, 2009

The Twelve

This was a quick read, I liked it but there wasn't any real conflict. Max leads a fascinating life and the book poses some theories of what could happen when the Mayan calendar ends. So here's the blurb.

Max Doff is a bright little boy with a strange affinity for numbers. On a routine visit to the Doctor's office Max 'dies' and before returning to his body he is shown a list of twelve names. Over the course of his life he comes into contact with each of the twelve in order. Synchronicities occur that ensure this happens. Max's role seems to be to bring this group together but can they bring on the planetary shift that could save humanity and who is The One.

Sep 9, 2009

Up for Nano again this year

I wasn't going to do Nanowrimo this year - the idea I've been working on has run its course and produced not one but three manuscripts - one finished, one a work in progress and the last one is still as raw as the day I finished Nano last year. But. Well I'm going to do it again because I had a cracking idea over the weekend. I was re-reading dialogue that I wrote for one of my characters and the idea just popped into my head! The craziest thing is it was such an off-the-cuff remark and I already have a name I can use for the main character because I saw it last week and thought that's such a cool name. One change of format this one won't be first person, first person is hard!

Sep 7, 2009

From my own collection

Come on admit it. Like me you all have books that you don't loan out - to anyone - ever. And I respect that, really I do because in some cases the books a) went out of print in the 80's. b) are priceless signed first editions or c) you still have that battered old copy of Lady Chatterly's Lover with PC 4 SL in it. Anyway I digress. On our UK trip in May I managed to bring home both my remaining Lovejoy books and this afternoon I re-read the Sleepers of Erin and fell for the rouge all over again.

Lovejoy is a charming, roughish antiques dealer, he is also what is known as a 'divvie' someone who can tell just by looking at an antique if it's real or fake. His track record with women and local law enforcement is about as solvent as his bank account. In East Anglia he's something of a legend amongst the antiques community. Lovejoy's antiques patter is as fascinating as his schemes are harebrained and he's not a man to be mucked about. The sleepers of the title are part of a scam going down in Ireland with Lovejoy trying to stay one step ahead of a gang of con artists and keep both feet out of his own grave. Aided by a ward sister and her suitor Gerald - who resembles a stick insect it's up to Lovejoy to sink the scammers and liberate a few choice antiques along the way.

So that's Sleepers of Erin for you. Better yet Gash didn't stop writing Lovejoy novels, he's still out there with a brand new one coming in December!

Sep 3, 2009

curse of the arcs

I've come to the conclusion that arcs have blunted my judgement. In life before TKE - yes there was such a thing - the book jacket told me all I needed to know. I bought the book, read the book, loved the book (or in a few cases left said book in a variety of public places - youth hostels, trains, on several transatlantic flights so that someone else could dispose of it but lets not dwell on that.)

Now my modus operandi goes like this, hear about a hot new author, go to work and look for the arc, read arc, blurb, etc. Not this time. Two books that sound really good and we have no arcs for them. Worse than that we haven't got any on order. What's a girl to do? Go back to the old fashioned way. So yesterday I ordered copies of Crush by Alan Jacobson and The Twelve by William Gladstone. They had better not suck!

Good news for those of us who love Flavia De Luce - Alan Bradley is hard at work on a second novel. If you haven't read The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, Bradley's first Flavia mystery, then what are you waiting for? Flavia is a great character and in crossover land I would love to see what Jasper Fforde's bookworld would make of a meeting between his Thursday Next and little Flavia.

Sep 1, 2009

Her Fearful Symmetry Audrey Niffenegger

Elspeth Noblin’s will leaves her Highgate flat in London to her American twin nieces Julia and Valentina. The twins look alike, dress alike but as with Elspeth and her sister Edie one is more dependent therefore more dominant than the other.

Living in London Valentina wants to attend art college and starts a relationship with Elspeth’s downstairs neighbour and lover Robert Fanshawe. Julia becomes friends with Martin an obsessive but brilliant crossword compiler who cannot leave his own flat because of crippling OCD. The stage is set for hauntings, doomed love and a breathtakingly callous betrayal that will alter your perception of one character completely. If there is a moral to this story it’s be careful what you wish for – you may get it but it might not be your own wish.

Available September 29th

The Coral Thief Rebecca Stott

In the breathing space between the exile of Napoleon and the coronation of a new King young Daniel Connor arrives in Paris but his job may be over before it starts. While he slept a beautiful stranger stole his papers of introduction and priceless coral specimens.

Daniel becomes obsessed with this philosopher thief. As the soldiers of foreign governments strip the city of treasures plundered by Napoleon she opens him up to heretical new ideas of evolution and becomes his first love but men in love are careless and a corrupt official with an old score to settle is closing in.

Available September 15th

Hammer – A Novel of the Victorian Underworld Sara Stockbridge

Amid the gritty backdrop of the infamous Whitechapel murders, Brick Lane, Bell Lane and sundry public houses old Horatio Blunt is searching for Grace Hammer. Grace, protector of her children, but putty in the hands of handsome Jack Tallis keeps her family out of the gutter not by turning tricks but by picking the pockets of any rich tourists fool enough to venture into London’s dark heart. It’s a down and dirty Victorian underworld full of scheming women like Miss Spragg and Mirabelle Trotter, weasel Ivor Spall, killer for hire Happy Harry Harding and watchful Byron Stanley. Blunt is now hot on Grace’s trail and when he finds her he plans to reclaim his twice stolen property and wring Grace’s neck.

In the Valley of the Kings Terrence Holt


A collection of short stories and one novella. Difficult to classify as any one genre, the topics range from a word as plague and deep space paranoia to the macabre tale of a son who keeps his father’s still beating heart in a jar. The novella about a man’s obsession with a missing Egyptian king and his ‘words of power’, Charybdis and ‘O Aoyoo’ are standouts. Sometimes the writing verges on poetry but with a creeping undertone of unease.

Stardust - Joseph Kanon



1945 : Ben Collier, US Citizen but German Jew by birth arrives in Hollywood to sit by his brother Danny’s deathbed. Danny took a drunken swandive off a rented apartment balcony. His wife Liesl thinks he tried to kill himself the police have it down as an accident but some of the pieces don’t fit. Seeing the life Danny had and the wife Ben’s having trouble keeping his hands off he can’t see why Danny would try to kill himself. But did Ben really know his brother at all. To find out what happened to Danny Ben will have to become him, walk the same paths, inform, cheat, lie, steal. Enmeshed in the studio system, Ben is caught between the German émigré community, the unions and an ambitious commie hating Senator who wants Hollywood to dance to his tune. This book is a rich tapestry of old Hollywood glamour, shot through with glimpses of the show trails of the McCarthy era.

Published 29 September.