Press Release Your Luck | Imagining the Truth

With the British Genre Fiction Focus on hiatus over the holidays, and most of the kids I teach in real life relaxing anywhere other than the education centre that employs me, I've had a fair bit of time to play with, lately. I don't want to tell you yet what I've been doing with it yet—I just don't want to jinx the thing before it's finished—but suffice to say this project has been as much of a time-suck as the columns I curate for Tor.com.

Long story short, I've been neglecting my inbox for a bit, so I spent a few hours picking through it this morning, in the course of which I came across a recent press release from the Institute of Art and Ideas, informing me of an event in which Jasper Fforde and Adam Robots—I mean, ah, Roberts—joined forces with Leaving Las Vegas director Mike Figgis to ask and answer questions about the imagination.

This is the pitch:

We believe reason is our best tool for acquiring true knowledge of the world. But Picasso said "art is a lie that tells the truth," and many others before him have made similar claims. Are they right? Can imagination lead us to truths hidden from the rational mind, or is this romantic hogwash?

And this is the video:

It's worth a watch.

If the embed above isn't working... well. That'd be because Blogger is being a bother. But what can it do to disrupt an old-fashioned link like this?

Now I'll be knee-deep in seekrits for the foreseeable, but I do solemnly swear to keep a closer eye on my inbox going forward, so if anyone needs me, that's how to make the magic happen.

Toodles for the time being!

The Scotsman Abroad | On Graham Joyce

Yesterday I received an email that brought both my partner and I to an absolute standstill.

We've both been reading Graham Joyce for years, you see; Memoirs of a Master Forger was my first of his works, whilst the other half has had a passion for his ghostly prose since The Silent Land. Invariably, one of us will manage to bagsy his new book before the other does, such that it's become something of a game between us.

So the news that he has cancer, that he nearly died six months or so ago... let's say it cast a dark cloud over the remains of the day. Per the press release I received:

Graham Joyce received a standing ovation at the 1,000-strong awards ceremony of the World Fantasy Convention in Brighton on Sunday 2nd November 2013. Picking up the Best Fantasy Novel Award for an unprecedented sixth time in his career, Joyce was earlier this year diagnosed with aggressive lymphoma cancer. The event marked his first public appearance since his diagnosis.

Joyce won the Best Fantasy Novel Award for Some Kind Of Fairy Tale, a story in which a young girl thought to have been abducted from the woodlands of the East Midlands returns to her family after twenty years. 

Six months ago Joyce had the experience of being revived by an emergency resuscitation team at the Leicester Royal Infirmary. Joyce said, “Just being able to stand here today is a wonderful award, thanks to the doctors and nurses of the NHS.”

Inadequate as it is, I can only express how happy I am that the doctors and nurses of the NHS managed to bring the man back, and how sorely I hope that he has many more years of good health ahead.

In any event, I've seen a fair few folks express curiosity about his work since the bad news broke, and I'd love for them to discover him as the other half and I have, so I thought I'd gather together links to the reviews I've written of his books.

Here's what I had to say about The Silent Land.

Here are my thoughts on the book he won the Best Fantasy Novel Award at the weekend for.

And to top it all off, my most recent article for Strange Horizons was a glowing review of his new novel, The Year of the Ladybird:

Almost forty years on, the scorching summer of 1976 is remembered by many; however the relative tenor of the tale depends upon the perspective of the teller, very much in the mode of local legend. Some speak of it as a bastion of all that is great about Britain... or all that was, once. Others recall the summer as a season of suffering; of water shortages, hellish heat, economic depression, and — what with the National Front nearing the peak of its power — political volatility. 

Each of these ideas has a part to play in Graham Joyce's new novel, but like the infamous insect invasion The Year of the Ladybird takes its evocative title from, they're in the background, by and large, adding if not narrative impact then immersive depth and telling texture to the text's redolent setting: a ramshackle holiday resort in a nation coming of age just as our protagonist David Barwise does over the course of this slight but delightful ghost story.

Graham Joyce is, in short, an awesome author: if you've been on the fence about his fiction, get the hell off it.

My thoughts, and my partner's, will be with him and his during this difficult time.

Press Release Your Luck | Continuing The Dark Crystal

"You could be the author of a new novel set in the world of Jim Henson’s The Dark Crystal!"

So says the banner of Penguin Books' new project: The Dark Crystal Author Quest.

Which is what, exactly? Well, almost exactly what it says in the header: a quest for an author to write a novel set in Jim Henson's fan-favourite universe.

Note that the publishers are looking for a prequel to the movie as opposed to a sequel, as some sites have erroneously reported.

In any event, roll the press release:

"The world of The Dark Crystal is a world unlike any we have ever known. Under the triple suns, the skies roil with cloud formations not seen in our skies. Seedpods spiral up and rocks scuttle off. It is a world where the wise and noble urSkeks have been split into two imperfect races, Skeksis and urRu; and the Gelfling Clans, the species most like our own, go about their lives not knowing what their future holds. This is a world waiting to be explored and expanded upon with new stories, new quests. 

"At The Jim Henson Company, we continue to be enthralled with the possibilities of this world and invite you to join us in our obsession. We have set up a portal to share what we know, a new website with all of the information about this place and these creatures: DarkCrystal.com. We invite you to use the resources, character descriptions, locations, and history on this site to join us in imagining the next Dark Crystal story."

And here are the gory details 

"From October 1st, 2013 to December 31st, 2013, The Jim Henson Company and Grosset & Dunlap of the Penguin Young Readers Group will be accepting writing submissions to find the author for a new novel set in the world of Jim Henson’s The Dark Crystal. This author search is open to all professional and aspiring professional writers. 

"This new Dark Crystal novel will be a prequel story set at the time of the Gelfling Gathering, between the Second Great Conjunction and the creation of the Wall of Destiny. We will be placing all known lore from this era on DarkCrystal.com, the definitive home of The Dark Crystal. There you will find all the knowledge available for you to shape and build your story—and all we ask is that you share your stories with us."

Me, I wonder why they haven't simply solicited an actual author to compose a proper prequel. Surely The Dark Crystal canon is deserving of established talent rather than being farmed out to fandom.

Then again, I can be awfully old fashioned...

That said, I can't imagine many established talents would put up with the shady small print:

Each entry will be the sole property of the Sponsors. By competing in the Contest and/or accepting a prize, each entrant (including the prize winner) grants to Sponsors the right to edit, adapt, publish, copy, display, reproduce and otherwise use their entry in connection with this Contest and in any other way, in any and all forms of media now known or hereafter devised, throughout the world, in perpetuity, including publication on www.darkcrystal.com. Further, each entrant (including the prize winner) grants to Sponsors the right to use each entry and the winner’s name, likeness, and biographical information in advertising, trade and promotional materials, without notice, review or approval, or further compensation or permission, except as set forth herein, and except where prohibited by law. Sponsors are not obligated to use, publish, display or reproduce any entry.

All for $10k — with no prospect of royalties — which is not, in all honesty, a whole lot. Don't sign your souls away so easily, readers!

Overall, though, this is exciting news, no? Not because of the Author Quest itself — at least, not from my personal perspective — but because it suggests renewed interest in one of my all-time favourite fantasy films.

Could this move be indicative of The Jim Henson Company's intentions to make a new movie?

Could this be a potential test of our appetite for The Dark Crystal 2? Yes!

Oh, let it be true...

Press Release Your Luck | Ravenstone Rising

News of a new challenger just hit my inbox, and considering the source, I thought you all might like to know a modicum more.

Ravenstone is "a brand new children's imprint" poised to join Solaris' genre fiction and Abaddon's pulp under the Rebellion umbrella next summer. But the press release says it better:

Rebellion Publishing is proud to announce the launch of its new line of Children’s and Young Adult fiction – Ravenstone.

Showcasing the very best in literature for the young, Ravenstone will publish one book a season. It will exist to highlight works of genre-busting adventure, and incisive and challenging writing.

Ravenstone’s titles will be published in hardback, paperback and e-book formats in the US and the UK, allowing new generations of readers the chance to explore new worlds and new horizons. They will be distributed by Simon and Schuster.

Editor-in-chief Jonathan Oliver said: “The Young Adult market is a vibrant and exciting melting pot of genres and ideas and I’m delighted to lead us into this territory with our new imprint.”

So far, so standard - this must be as inevitable a move as it is exciting - but alongside the above, Ravenstone announced their debut book: Johnny Cash's kid, John Carter Cash has had three children's stories and a biography published before now, but the new imprint insists Lupus Rex is his first novel proper. Here's a bit about it:

The imprint’s launch title will be the beautiful debut novel Lupus Rex, by the high-profile musician and writer John Carter Cash. To be published in June 2013, Lupus Rex will have enormous appeal to children and older readers alike. This astonishing new tale is in the tradition of Watership Down, The Rats of Nimh, the Redwall series and Duncton Wood.

Isyl and Cormo are two quail who must risk their lives when they are driven from their home by the crows when the Murder fractures over the decision of who shall rule the Tree. The disorder this brings to the region comes to the attention of the wolf Asmod and he sees an opportunity to make himself King. To restore order the quails must venture far from their home to seek an audience with a potentially dangerous ally, the hawk Pitrin. As the forest trembles with the approach of Asmod’s army, the two quail will find themselves entangled in an epic struggle, as they fight to bring peace to the Field.

This is a major release from a debut imprint and Cash shows himself to be a beautiful writer in his first novel. With a stylish and classic cover by Wicked series artist Douglas Smith, this tale of nature is full of strong characters and sets the bar very high for an emerging literary talent.

I don't know what it is about this blurb - no, scratch that: it's probably the nods to Redwall and Watership Down, which I loved as a little - but I'll be reading Lupus Rex as soon as ARCs are made available. You?

And I hope you'll join me in giving Ravenstone a warm welcome to the world. If it's all it appears to be - and with Jonathan Oliver at the helm, whose Magic anthology I'm adoring at the moment, I have hope - we could be in for an exceedingly exciting time.

Press Release Your Luck | Join the Voyager

Even these days, with self-publishing so regrettably prevalent, it isn't easy to turn that manuscript you've been tip-tapping away at for the better part of a decade into something substantial: into a book, with a cover, media-savvy marketing materials and a purposeful publicity push to get it into stores other than Amazon, and hands other than those of your immediate family.

A large part of the problem is that no publisher in its right mind is going to open the floodgates to unagented submissions. Maybe things have changed since I last looked into it, but the act of convincing an agent that he or she has a chance of successfully selling the fruits of your fingers has ever been an almighty obstacle, and a dam against the inexorable flood of utter rubbish.

Every now and then, though, an organisation will break with tradition, presumably looking for precious gems amidst all that filth. Angry Robot Books have opened their doors before, to widespread applause, and now, divisions of Harper Voyager in the UK, the US and Australia have joined forces to do it all over again.

Have a gander at the press release for more details:

"In this time of accelerated evolution in the field of digital publishing, the editorial leaders of Harper Voyager in the United Kingdom, United States and Australia are delighted to announce an exciting joint venture that will offer talented aspiring writers the chance to join the global science fiction and fantasy imprint.

"For the first time in over a decade, Harper Voyager is offering writers the chance to submit full, unagented manuscripts for a limited two-week period. The publisher is seeking new authors with fresh voices, strong storytelling abilities, original ideas and compelling story-lines. Harper Voyager is home to some of the biggest names in science fiction and fantasy, including George R. R. Martin, Kim Harrison, Raymond E. Feist, Robin Hobb, Richard Kadrey, Sara Douglass, Peter V. Brett and Kylie Chan, among others.

"The submission portal [...] will be open from the 1st to the 14th of October 2012. The manuscripts will then be read and those most suited to the global Harper Voyager list will be selected jointly by editors in the USA, UK and Australia. Accepted submissions will benefit from the full publishing process: accepted manuscripts will be edited; and the finished titles will receive online marketing and sales support in World English markets.

"Voyager will be seeking an array of adult and young adult speculative fiction for digital publication, but particularly novels written in the epic fantasy, science fiction, urban fantasy, horror, dystopia and supernatural genres. Submission guidelines and key information can be found at www.harpervoyagersubmissions.com."

Much as I sympathise with the slush readers one can only imagine Harper will have to hire on worldwide for this epic endeavour, I love that this sort of this seems to be becoming a tradition. A year-round open door sounds like a recipe for disaster, quite frankly, so there needs be some compromise, and if you ask me, declaring a brief free-for-all is exactly the way to go.

In short, if you've been looking for the chance of a lifetime of late, then make no mistake, my fellow wannabe authors: this is very probably it.

Press Release Your Luck | The Angry Robot and The Open Door

Maybe we all have a novel in us - maybe, just maybe that's true - but there aren't many of us with agents, are there? And without an agent, our great works languish... unrepresented, unknown and unloved.

For fully two weeks a little later in 2012, all that is set to change. According to a press release I received yesterday, reproduced in full below, Angry Robot Books, in conjunction with their new YA-oriented imprint Strange Chemistry, is set to crack the floodgates a second time, after the success of its first Open Door Month. Read on:

During April last year, Angry Robot Books temporarily suspended its usual submission policy to run its first Open Door Month; accepting unsolicited, un-agented manuscripts from would-be genre fiction authors.

The scheme was a huge success: nearly 1,000 submissions resulted in publishing contracts for three authors - Cassandra Rose Clarke, Lee Collins, and Lee Battersby - and the commissioning of at least six brand new novels for publication for the Angry Robot lists in 2012 and 2013.

Today, Angry Robot are announcing that Open Door will return, with a second phase running from April 16th - April 30th 2012. During this frantic fortnight the floodgates will once more be opened to admit brand new work by hopeful (and, of course, hugely talented) writers from across the globe.

This time around, the rules are slightly different. Angry Robot will only be considering submissions that meet the following genre criteria:

a) Epic Fantasy - ideally with a bit of an edge or the sort of left-field twist the Angry Robot audience has come to expect.

b) YA - any subject welcome, but must be science fiction or fantasy, and intended for a Young Adult audience, for potential publication via Angry Robot's new Strange Chemistry imprint.

More details can be found at http://angryrobotbooks.com/opendoor

So consider yourself on notice, folks: if you've got a manuscript you want to dust off and polish up until it's positively a-glow, now would be the time.

This is of course a hell of an opportunity for the unagented among us, and three cheers to Angry Robot and our own Amanda Rutter's Strange Chemistry for giving peace, love and understanding a chance!

Press Release Your Luck | Eric Brown Explores Weird Space

This announcement is only minutes old, so let's get to it before it loses that lovely fresh bread smell!

Best-selling author Eric Brown has created a brand new shared world for Abaddon Books: Weird Space.

This thrilling space-opera series will begin in June 2012 with the release of The Devil's Nebula by the best-selling author of Helix, Engineman and The Kings of Eternity.

In the first book in this epic new series, Brown will introduce readers to the human smugglers,  veterans and ne’erdowells who are part of the Expansion – and their uneasy neighbours, the Vetch Empire.

When an evil race threatens not only the Expansion, but the Vetch too - an evil from another dimension which infests humans and Vetch alike and bends individuals to do their hideous bidding, only cooperation between them means the difference between a chance of survival and no chance at all.

Brown has meticulously created a massive shared world of interstellar potential, which other writers will explore with each new book.

With the launch of this new SF epic, Abaddon is adding to its series of shared worlds which already include the post-apocalyptic The Afterblight Chronicles, the new take on Arthurian legend Malory’s Knights of Albion, the World War One soldiers marooned on an alien world in No Man’s World, steampunk adventure in Pax Britannia, the zombie-infested Tomes of the Dead and the fantasy quests of the Twilight of Kerberos.

Says the author of his involvement in this brave new world:

It's great to be part of the team working for Abaddon on the Weird Space project, and it's a fantastic imaginative opportunity to be developing the background and working on the first novel, The Devil's Nebula. The Weird is vast in scope - borrowing on an age-old tradition of everything that's best is space-opera - and will allow the writers to tell exciting, human stories set against an eerie, thrilling, futuristic back-drop. I'm more than a little excited at being part of the team!

So that's quite exciting.

In the past I've tended to steer clear of the shared worlds projects such as this, largely because the idea of a universe with no unifying authorial vision to tie it all together leaves me rather anxious. But for new Eric Brown?

Well, not exactly anything. But most things, totally. :)

Press Release Your Luck | Kindle is King as E-Book Sales Soar

The Association of American Publishers has reported that e-books are on the rise, bringing in more revenue during the month of February than any of the other categories the AAP monitor. Dollar for dollar, more money was made by EPUBs and Nook Books and Kindle editions, in cumulative terms, than by either hardcovers, paperbacks or mass market editions.

A watershed moment, and make no mistake.

Add to that the landmark percentage growth e-book sales have demonstrated year on year: this February e-books earned more than $90m, a triple-figure rise of 202.3% versus sales in February 2010. 

Yet hand-in-hand with every rise, a fall, and traditional dead tree texts have borne the brunt of the increased demand for e-books this February. The combined adult trade categories - to reiterate, that's hardcovers, paperbacks and mass market PBs - are down more than a third compared to sales from the same period in 2010. And we wonder why the likes of Borders and Waterstones are in such hot water...

However all is not lost: though printed literature has taken a substantial hit - another on top of another, in fact - such products still handily outsell e-books at a ratio of 2:1, a relatively comfortable margin for the moment. Certainly it will seem a comfortable margin a year from now if these trends continue, as indeed they appear set to.

But all told, it's not game over just yet, and the AAP's report included a certain something we might take heart in, for though combined earnings from the children's and YA market have fallen, they've only fallen half as much as in the adult market: a dip of 16.1% as opposed to 34.4%. Tech savvy children, it seems, aren't quite so quick on the e-reading uptake as us 'dults.

...either that or they're reading adult e-books. Or else they're waiting for e-book readers to drop in price: even the cheapest Kindle would set them back in excess of $100, after all, and that's a fair bit of pocket money.

But enough doom and gloom. This is meant to be the cheery bit! And there are bright sides to all this miserable news - you just have to squint ever so slightly to see them:

• Our children still like a good paper book.

• Books fashioned from dead trees still outsell e-books 2:1.

• And in total, the amount of money flowing through the publishing industry has held relatively steady - it's just that the proportions spent on this versus that are shifting rather significantly.

So. Good news? Bad news? Or not news?

I'd cast my vote for option four: all of the above. Way to take the diplomatic tack!

###

Source: The Association of American Publishers

Press Release Your Luck | And Then What Happened?

This one's fun! :D

So a couple of weeks ago, the lovely Sam Eades, Press Officer for Headline, got in touch to tell me about a project she'd been cooking up to celebrate the PB release of Stories, "an anthology for the ages" of all-new short stories from a who's-who of contemporary authors, and edited by none other than Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio.

You should really click on through to peruse the full TSS review of Stories if you don't remember reading it. And hey, buying the thing itself has never been a more affordable endeavour. I'd heartily recommend you do. Here's a link to that end and everything.

But what I was saying was, Sam invited me and a handful of other bloggers to participate in a project which hones closely to the underpinning ethic of the collection aforementioned: "And Then What Happenend?"

Me, Amanda of Floor to Ceiling Books, The Book Smugglers, Caroline and Catherine, Wondrous Reads and The Book Zone, a bunch of others... we were each of us tasked to write 100 words. No more and no less. The first 100 words would be sent to the second contributor, who by hook or by crook was to continue the narrative begun by the first blogger, then send their 100 words along to the next blogger in the great chain, and so on until everyone had written a bit, and the story was told in its entirety.

This morning I got word from Sam that the results were in.

They've even been set and formatted all pretty-like. :)

Just as soon as Neil's finished pottering around with whatever he's been pottering around with of late, you'll be able to read the resulting story on Monsieur Gaiman's blog, so I hear. However, I'm totally going to scoop him! This gives me no end of pleasure.

Click on each of the images below to embiggen them, for ease of seeing, and then... well. Let the games begin!

Page 1

Page 2

Page 3

Page 4

So what do you think? Delete as appropriate from:

The Good

The Bad

The Butt-ugly.

Who wants to guess which bit I wrote? Guess correctly and you can have... well, let's see. How about this here spare copy of Songs of the Dying Earth?

Seriously, I had so much fun doing this. My thanks to Sam for the invitation, and to all the other bloggers who helped make "And Then What Happened?" what it is. I don't know that what we came up with necessarily does Stories justice, but hey, it was a good time, and all for a good cause.

Press Release Your Luck | Genre For Japan

I've had my differences with undisputed Queen of Twitter and erstwhile Floor-to-Ceiling Books blogger Amanda Rutter, here on TSS and elsewhere. No bones shall be made about those today, or ever again. I only mention them so that you understand, when I tell you I'm all the way with her on this, believe you me: I'm with her all the way on this.

Genre for Japan is... well, why I don't let Amanda tell you herself?

We’ve all heard the news and seen the horrific pictures coming from Japan in the aftermath of the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami – and no doubt we’ve all wondered how to help.

Following the example of Authors for Japan, where bids are now closed, we’d like to introduce Genre for Japan, a chance for the comics, science fiction, fantasy and horror communities to unite and show our generosity to those who need it right now.

We are planning to run auctions for genre-themed prizes and we need YOU to donate. We are looking for really fantastic prizes: examples might include signed first editions, coaching sessions with agents for that perfect submission letter or original artwork!

Some of the prizes already donated include a year's supply of books from Tor, signed artwork from Solaris Books and editing/critiques from professional authors and editors. 

The prizes will be auctioned on our website, through JustGiving, in aid of the British Red Cross Tsunami Appeal. 

If you have something really special to donate, please drop us a line at

genreforjapan@gmail.com

including information such as a starting bid amount, a sentence or two about the item, and whether you wish to send the prize to a central collecting point or would be willing to post it to the winning bidder. Photos would also help us to list the item, if relevant. 

The deadline to receive offers of prizes is 25th March, with the auction set to begin on 28th March. 

Find out more information on our website: 

http://genreforjapan.wordpress.com/ 

Follow us on twitter: @genreforjapan 

Or e-mail us at: genreforjapan@gmail.com

Of course there's rather a lot more to Genre for Japan than just our Amanda - respec' to each and every one of Jenni Hill, Louise Morgan, Ro Smith and Alasdair Stuart, not to mention all those who've donated - but I do believe Amanda spearheaded the initiative, and if I may be so bold, on behalf of the community haunting speculative fiction blogs like this very one:

Amanda Rutter, I salute you!

The auctions for Genre for Japan should begin here, in maybe ten minutes. Buy a few good books for a great cause; go on.

In fact, since I've missed the donation deadline, If it's alright with you and alright with Amanda, whoever spends the most between today and Sunday coming can have a few free books on me. Every little helps, I guess, and frankly I'm due a bit of a spring clean in any even. So drop me a line with your address, come the time, or demand Amanda do it, and we'll see what lovely proofs I can rustle up.

Now then. Go forth, my pretties, and bid!

Press Release Your Luck | Stormdancing On Ice

In the darkest reaches of a new, improved, Aeroglass-infused taskbar, my email client of choice: Mozilla Thunderbird. And in Mozilla Thunderbird... a certain inbox.

(My own, as a matter of fact. I'm really a league behind on the emails at the moment; if you're waiting on a reply, I'm hoping to be good and caught up before I'm off on me hols - which is to say Monday. So there's that.)

Anyway. In that inbox, in that email client, pinned to that there taskbar - the very one! - a press release, would you believe. From the UK arm of the publishing monolith Tor, the announcement of a novel due sometime in 2012 from Melbourne-based author Jay Kristoff:

"Stormdancer is a dystopian fantasy set in steampunk feudal Japan and follows Yukiko and her warrior father who are sent on an impossible mission to capture a legendary Thunder Tiger – a griffin. But an accident means Yukiko finds herself stranded: a young woman alone in her country's last wilderness, with only a furious, broken-winged griffin for company. Even though she can hear his thoughts, and even though she saved his life, all she knows for certain is that he’d rather see her dead than help her. 

"Meanwhile, the country around them is on the brink of collapse. A toxic poppy-based fuel is slowly killing the land; the omnipotent, metal-clad Guild is publicly burning those that they deem Impure; and the Shogun cares about nothing but his own power.

"In hopes of saving her country – and herself - Yukiko must earn the griffin’s trust to become a symbol to her people; a myth, a legend... 

"...a Stormdancer."

A Scotsman's thoughts, then, conveniently arranged in the order I thought them:

• My, that's a lot of genre buzzwords, isn't it? And all at once like that. Digital crispy bacon to the first person who can name another dystopian steampunk fantasy set in feudal Japan!
• With griffins too, eh? Well then.
• I drawn the line at toxic puppies myself. To think someone would take things a step too far and then somehow harvest fuel from the toxic puppies too. Imagine!
• Wait... poppies? Well, I take it back. Poppies are totally evil within acceptable tolerances.

Obviously there's a long distance to travel yet between here and the day I get to properly go on about toxic puppies, but for all that I might raise an eyebrow at Stormdancer's rather overblown early synopsis, I trust in Julie Crisp, whom you might recall brought us the awesomeness that was Alden Bell's The Reapers Are The Angels last year - only the last rise on a mountain of sumptuous speculative fiction she's acquired on Tor's behalf - and of Stormdancer she has the following to say:

"This is an incredibly imaginative and well-executed fantasy... a wonderful read that everyone in-house fell in love with."

So I'm in.

But what do you guys think?

Press Release Your Luck | #Torchat on Twitter

One of the... the "perks" of blogging, I suppose you could it, is that in this day and age, with the increased visibility - if not necessarily the increased credibility - a decent readership brings comes a level of contact between author and audience which has been heretofore the exclusive stomping grounds of a select few; media elites and the like.

The other day, for instance - and this is not at all to toot my own horn - I mentioned how I'd been disappointed by the first 50 pages of The Unremembered, a debut novel due out this Spring from an author Tor appear to be pitching as the next big name in epic fantasy. I expected that to be that, but the next morning an email arrived in my inbox from the gentleman himself: Peter Orullian was writing to say he was glad I'd taken the time, whatever my initial impressions of his book. Terribly decent of him, really, particularly considering some of the things I'd written.

(And in case there was any confusion, I will be reading the rest of The Unremembered - because it's a big deal, for one thing, and because I wouldn't feel justified in offering up an opinion on the whole without having experienced the thing itself in its entirety.)

Of course, there's a certain element of insidiousness in the shift that's occurred; or at the least, there's room for such. As yet, however, I'm very much of the mind that the positives of the exponentially increasing familiarity between reader and writer far outweigh the negatives - if you'll pardon the pun, I wouldn't trade my postcard from Bas-lag for all the tea in China.

*ahem*

With that in mind, readers dear, it gives me great pleasure to report that Tor are hoping to extend the reach of their stable of speculative fiction craftmasters beyond us humble bloggers and still further. For on the third Wednesday of every month for the immediately foreseeable, the hashtag #torchat will make for a moderated discussion between you, me, and the likes of Greg Bear, whose brains you might like to pick about his contribution to the Halo mythos.

Here's the press release in full:

"New York, NY – Wednesday, February 9, 2011 – Tor Books is excited to announce the launch of #Torchat, a new SF/f genre-themed, hour-long chat series hosted on Twitter. Guest authors will join fans in lively, informative and entertaining discussions of all that’s hot in genre fiction (140 characters at a time) from 4 - 5 PM Eastern on the third Wednesday of every month. Each #Torchat will revolve around a different genre topic of interest, with new guest authors and exclusive fan giveaways from @Torbooks.

"Next Wednesday’s first #Torchat will revolve around a discussion of “hard” science fiction, that ambiguous and often narrowly defined subgenre of SF that purports to extrapolate from “real science.” Special guest authors Greg Bear (@spacegriz), Steven Gould (@StevenGould), and M.J. Locke (@MorganJLocke) will lead a fan chat on what Hard SF means, whose really doing it (and whose not...), and the science behind the fiction, using the Twitter hashtag #Torchat. 

"The chat will be introduced and (loosely) moderated by Tor publicist Justin Golenbock (@jgolenbo), with giveaways of advance copies of upcoming summer SF releases from @TorBooks preceding and following the 4 PM chat."

If at some point in the future I can work out how to magic US time into GMT, I'll certainly be joining in next Wednesday. #Torchat sounds like it could be a right lark.

Plus, free books. Did you hear? Who doesn't want free books? :/

Press Release Your Luck | Meet Stephanie Meyer

Meet Stephanie Meyer. She wrote the publishing sensation of the decade... you know the one. No, not Harry Potter. The other one.

There she blows!

So. D'you fancy grabbing a cup of tea with Ms. Meyer herself?

We all know I'm not a great devotee - though there's an article yet to tell of my attempts to understand the zeitgeist's sudden fascination with sparkly vampires  - so no, I'm not likely to qualify as "the ultimate Twilight fan," but I thought to myself: as like as not there are a few of you reading this wee blog here that might consider themselves such. I bet you guys would love the chance to meet the lady who gave the world a rivalry fit to match the Old Firm in the form of the right honourable Teams Jacob and Edward.

So here. Read some of this press release, and maybe - you never do know - a couple of months from now you could be doing just that:

Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, a division of Hachette Book Group, will host a special International Fan Event, featuring Twilight fans from around the world.  Ten fans will be chosen to have an once-in-a-lifetime intimate meeting with international bestselling author Stephenie Meyer.  The event coincides with the upcoming release of The Twilight Saga: The Official Illustrated Guide (April 12, 2011; £17.99).

Little, Brown US is partnering with the Twilight Saga publishers around the globe to find the lucky Twilight fans who will attend this event. Atom (an imprint of Little, Brown Book Group UK) will be running a competition in their international English language territories (Australia, India, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa and the UK) to find one super fan to join fans from Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico and Taiwan at the exclusive event.  Each special guest will receive an advance copy of The Official Illustrated Guide and get to talk extensively with Meyer, who will answer their Twilight-related questions. 

 “The one thing I miss most about my first book tour was the chance I had then to spend quality time with my readers,” said Meyer.  “At an event with just ten or twenty people, I was able to get to know everyone a little bit.  I could also more effectively answer each person’s questions.  I’m so excited to have that opportunity again, and to get to spend time with fans from many different places and backgrounds.”

“We receive hundreds of travel requests for Stephenie from our foreign publishing partners every year,” said Megan Tingley, Senior Vice President and Publisher of Little, Brown Books for Young Readers.  “Since it is physically impossible for one author to be in so many places, we thought this would be a great way to bring some fans to her.” 

 Fans from Atom’s international English language territories will be invited to upload a short video clip explaining why they are the ultimate Twilight fan. Finalists from Australia, India, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa and the UK will go on to a final judging round, from which the ultimate Twilight fan will be picked. Further details can be found at www.stepheniemeyer.co.uk.

 Due to the intimate nature of this event, details regarding the location and timing are being kept confidential.  Photos and additional details will be distributed upon the event’s conclusion.

One way or the other, I know I'll be watching some of the videos resulting from this competition. They're going to be priceless. You know it, and I... well.

Still and all, other than your dignity, what have you got to lose? And what's a little self-respect next to a chance to meet Stephanie Meyer? I know I'd give up more for a session with Guy Gavriel Kay, or a sit-down with ol' China of the Mieville.