Me And My Big Mouth

Disappointing Classics

Have you ever read a supposed classic novel only to be terribly disappointed?

Or, just slightly better, mildly underwhelmed?

I would like to nominate The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Not scary, not thrilling, actually quite dull.

Also, Howard's End. I love pretty much everything else by Forster but this one was vague and without any real heart

The Death of Ivan Ilyich struck me as having no redeeming features whatsoever. Just a bunch of pages with words on.

And regular readers will know that I was recently rather annoyed by Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.

So, which classic disappointed you? And am I wrong about these ones?

Do tell.

Publication Day!

My book is published today.

Please all go out and buy hundreds of copies.

The print edition should be available in all good bookshops. Shit bookshops may not have it, what with them being shit.

The ebook is a bargain at £2.99, if you can't be bothered to get off your arse but want to show willing.

Thank you x

21st Century Dodos: The Blog Tour is Go!

To promote publication of my new book, 21st Century Dodos: A Collection of Endangered Objects (and Other Stuff), I am travelling the world from the comfort of my own armchair in a blog tour that is so far scheduled to have over 20 dates. I feel like Take That. Although I don't think they have ever played Israel. I am going there. As well as the good old US of A and New Zealand and lots of perfectly decent places around the UK.

For those of you unfamiliar with the concept of a blog tour, it is really very simple. I will make a guest appearance on someone else's blog every day between now and whenever people stop asking me. I will do a different party turn at each blog - an interview, video, an extract from the book, whatever - and hopefully bring the wonder that is 21st Century Dodos to millions (or perhaps dozens) of eager readers.

All very exciting.

So, where am I going?

Here is the current schedule. Imagine it on the back of a tour t-shirt.

28th Sep The Nik Perring Show

29th Sep Caroline Smailes' Blog

30th Sep Bah! to Cancer

1st Oct Jonathan Pinnock's Write Stuff

2nd Oct My Baby Loves a Bunch of Authors

3rd Oct The View From my Garret

4th Oct Follow the Thread

5th Oct Catherine, Caffeinated

6th Oct The Blog on the Bookshelf

7th Oct Strictly Writing

8th Oct The World According to Al Vimh

9th Oct Kat in the Navy

10th Oct Bear Mountain Books

11th Oct Bookie Monster

12th Oct Talli Roland's Blog

13th Oct Paul Fitzsimon's Blog

14th Oct Bringing Up Charlie

15th Oct This is Not the Six Word Novel

16th Oct Writer's Little Helper

17th Oct London Mewsings

18th Oct My Little Notepad

19th Oct Ben Johncock's Blog

20th Oct Teolog på afveje

21st Oct The Argonaut's Almanac

I do hope you find time to visit me on one or two of these excursions. I will still be blogging here, of course, but I will also be blogging there. I do get about a bit, as they say.

Go Wyld in the Country

If I told you this was a book about how war can change people's lives then it might put you off.

So forget I said it.

If I were to mention that it is a quiet book about sad people then you might not want to read it.

So scratch that.

It is both of those things but, you know, it is other things as well.

Frank holes up in his grandparents' old house by the sea. He is recovering from a destructive relationship and doesn't seem to give a shit what happens. He ekes out an existence and reluctantly builds a small circle of friends, all of them as broken as himself.

Years earlier, Leon tries to keep the family bakery aloat when his father leaves for the Korean war, only to be called up himself when Vietnam kicks off.

As they progress, these parallel narratives are revealed to be linked and once you are aware of this the book starts to work its magic on you.

Wyld has written about modern and past Australia in a way that conjours up the people and the landscape in vivid fashion. It is bitter and raw and utterly believable. I was reminded of Tim Winton but unlike Winton, her writing didn't bore me. Instead it lured me in and as the book went on I was totally immersed in the story she had created.

There are no great twists here, no tricks or devices, just a good story well told.

And there simply isn't enough of that these days.

After the Fire, A Still Small Voice by Evie Wyld is published by Vintage.

 

A Song for Sunday

Turn Me On by The Grates.

After the Book Swap, A Big Fat Fuck You

I can assure you that this dedication from Evie Wyld.

Will in no way influence my review of her book which I will be posting up here next week.

The Return of the Screw

Sometimes a book comes along that is so special that you want everyone you know to stop what they are doing and start reading it. Right now.

Florence and Giles is one such book.

It is an absolute joy to read.

Based loosely on The Turn of the Screw by Henry James (it takes the basic premise, approaches it from a different angle, and distorts the characters) it is a gothic thriller that is spooky and genuinely thrilling. I couldn't turn the pages fast enough as I approached the end.

Florence lives in a run-down mansion in New England with her brother Giles and a smattering of servants. They are orphans in the care of their uncle. He supports them, just about, but refuses to ever visit or see them. His involvement in their lives is minimal, except for his insistence that Florence receive no education. The year is 1891, and he clearly thinks books are no things for a lady.

But Florence has other ideas.

She sneaks into the well-stocked library and secretly teaches herself to read, gradually absorbing the knowledge, poetry and wonder contained on those shelves. She is fond of Poe and Shakespeare and, like the Bard, has a knack for inventing words. And as Florence is the narrator of the novel we get to enjoy these creations throughout the book.

She likes to use verbs as nouns and nouns as verbs, something I loved to read, looking forward to the next example which was usually only a paragraph or two away.

'a house uncomfortabled and shabbied by prudence, a neglect of a place'

'I anxioused as I reached for the bell pull. I was all best-frocked today'

and my favourite

'I would wasp her picnic'

Florence is convinced her new governess means her brother harm. She sees danger, plotting and trickery in every corridor, every dusty corner, reflected in every mirror. But is it all a child's imagination, fueled by a love of books? Or is Mrs Taylor really a nasty piece of work?

Harding leaves you guessing until the closing scenes of the book, and when the truth is revealed it is proper heart in the mouth stuff.

I haven't enjoyed a novel this much in ages. Pure pleasure. If you like The Woman in Black, or the spookier bits of Sarah Waters, or Poe, or Henry James, then I suspect you will love this.

Also, I'd suggest it as a great book for teenagers or young adults who want to read some 'proper' grown-up fiction. Nothing here would be unsuitable for them and loads that they would love.

I am thinking of reading it to my own kids soon.

21st Century Dodos: A Big Favour

Hello everyone.

You are all looking lovely today, if I may say so.

What's that? Am I after something?

Well, perhaps.

You see, my new book, 21st Century Dodos: A Collection of Endangered Objects (and Other Stuff), is published one week today. Copies will start trickling into bookshops from this weekend but the official publication date is the 29th September.

And here is the favour I have to ask.

If you have any intention of buying the book, and it isn't compulsory (more's the pity), then it would be amazing if you could pre-order a copy today. Getting a whole bunch of pre-orders in the run up to publication will make a huge difference to how the book performs in its first week and a good start is really important, especially with a humour title like this in the very busy Christmas season.

There are lots of ways to place a pre-order and any one of these would offer a boost to my book.

Pop into your local independent bookshop and place an order. If the shop already has stock coming in then they can put once aside for you when it arrives. If, for some inexplicable reason, they don't have any on order then this may prompt them to actually sort out such a ridiculous oversight.

Pre-order on Amazon. This is the option that has the most impact as a rising Amazon ranking makes the book more prominent on the site and if it manages to make the Hot New Releases chart then it is a nice ego boost for about ten minutes.

Place an order from another online retailer. It is available at Play, Book Depository, WH Smith, Waterstone's, Books Etc and pretty much anyone else who has an online store.

Or pop in to your nearest big chain store such as Waterstone's or WH Smith. Again, if they have copies on order then they can keep one aside for you and if they don't they can bloody well sort that out.

If you are more of an ebook reader then you can still pre-order the book on Kindle or Apple.

I am sure you have much better things to do with your time and your money but if there is any chance you could find it in your warm, loving hearts to do me this favour then I will be eternally grateful.

I thank you. The little baby Jesus thanks you. My children thank you.

** UPDATE. My book sat outside the top million sellers on Amazon this morning. At the time of writing (about half past four) it is just outside the top 3,000. That's a phenomenal increase in ranking and means that lots of you lovely people have ordered the book. I am hugely grateful. Thank you. **

Tinker Tailor Soldier Yawn

I can't remember the last time I gave up on a book I was reading for pleasure.

I give up on books I have been sent to review, and submissions I receive as a publisher, all the time. It's par for the course. Too much too read, only so many hours in the day.

But when I have selected something for myself, non-work related, purely for fun, then I tend to have an excellent strike rate. I am a splendid judge of my own tastes, even if I do say so myself.

And this book had everything going for it. Classic spy novel. In print for nearly 40 years. Acclaimed TV adaptation with Alec Guinness that has achieved legendary status. New film version that people seem intent on lobbing award nominations towards. An author of genre fiction who has been accepted by the literari. The lot.

It seemed like a banker.

So why was it so dreadfully, dreadfully dull?

When I tell you that I fell asleep while reading it, I am not doing so for comic effect. I really did doze off mid-paragraph. This was in the middle of the afternoon.

But enough amusing tittle-tattle. I should try to be constructive. What made me stop reading after 104 pages?

Well, the opening is really rather clunky. A prologue, of sorts, set in a boarding school. I realise that it sets up something that comes in later on but that didn't stop it being a distraction that starts things off on the wrong foot.

Once that is out of the way things picked up a bit. The portrait of George Smiley, retired intelligence officer, is bleak and sad. Whole pages of miserable greyness that actually worked quite well.

But then the spying stuff started and I just got bored with the whole thing. It is unnecessarily complicated and irritatingly slow. Le Carre jumps from character to character with little explanation and nowhere near enough context for you to work out who they actually are. Perhaps this would have all become clearer the more I read on but, as you know, I was asleep by then.

I realise the book is supposed to give us a glimpse of the secret world of spies, and that we aren't meant to know what everything means, but I got fed up with references to the 'Circus', 'housekeepers', 'lamplighters' and so on. I could have put up with them if the surrounding story was sufficiently compelling, but it wasn't. Whole passages went past without an ounce of comprehension on my part.

Try this for size:

He held her hand, waiting. Lapin, the rabbit, she said, clerk driver at the Embassy, twerp. At first she couldn't work him out. She suspected him of being one Ivlov alias Broad but she couldn't prove it and no one would help her anyway. Lapin the rabbit spent most of his day padding round London looking at girls and not daring to talk to them. But gradually she began to pick up the connection. Polyakov gave a reception, Lapin helped pour the drinks. Polyakov was called in late at night, and half an hour later Lapin turned up presumably to unbutton a telegram. And when Polyakov flew to Moscow Lapin the rabbit actually moved into the embassy and slept there till he came back: 'He was doubling up,' said Connie firmly. 'Stuck out a mile.'

Any ideas? I haven't a fucking clue.

At first I thought it was just me. I am a bit thick and not cut out for spy novels. But when I mentioned on Twitter that I was giving up a whole host of people responded with sympathy and agreement. One person had just re-read it and couldn't work out why she had liked it first time round. Another had recently given up on it as well, a few dozen pages further in than me. Someone else hoped that the boarding school opening would be left out of the movie. A few others clearly shared my view. No one defended it, but I am sure there are millions who would. They just don't follow me on Twitter. The misguided fools.

Of course, the whole point to reading Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy now is in preparation for the movie. It is directed by Tomas Alfredson who was the man behind Let The Right One In, one of my favourite films of recent years, and the reviews have been very positive indeed.

Here's hoping that this is one movie that is better than the book. A lot better.

21st Century Dodos: Blog Tour

To celebrate the launch of 21st Century Dodos: A Collection of Endangered Objects (and Other Stuff) at the end of the month, I shall be embarking upon a blog tour.

If you don't know what that is, it's where I turn up and make guest appearances on other people's blogs in a shameless attempt to get people to buy my book.

Would you like me to visit yours?

I'll be very well behaved, will wipe my feet before I come in and won't leave any cake crumbs behind when I leave.

There are many options as to what I could do while I am there:

• An interview. I'll happily answer any questions you want to throw my way.
• Guest blog post. Let me loose on your readers with an original piece written just for them, the lucky bastards.
• Extract. You could run an exclusive extract from the book. Take your pick. There are 134 entries to choose from.
• Video blog. I will record something on camera for you to share.
• Audio blog. As above but without my face.
• Competition. Your readers could win a free copy of the book. Once again, lucky bastards.
• Any combination of the above. Or something else entirely.

If you are interested in hosting me then leave a comment here or drop me a line and we can sort something out.

*waits*

A Poem, Piled

OK, so I came across this competition at literary agent Janet Reid's site. She got the idea from novelist Tahereh Mafi.

Create a poem using the titles of books from your shelves. Take a picture of the books in a pile to illustrate your poem.

Here's mine.

WHAT I LOVED
when I was WITH BILLIE
after SHE CAME TO STAY
were THE HOURS
of SILENCE

like FALLING THROUGH CLOUDS

she got UNDER THE SKIN
of A SINGLE MAN
that EARLY SPRING

it became a YEAR OF WONDERS
on THE WILDER SHORES OF LOVE

but THEN WE CAME TO THE END
THE END OF EVERYTHING

following A SPOT OF BOTHER
with VICTORIA
in the KITCHEN

A Song for Sunday

Out of This by Autamata, with the wonderful Carol Keogh on vocals. Not an official video, obviously, but such a beautiful song I wanted to put it up here.

Saturday Supplement

Some weekend reading.

Thursday's Firestation Book Swap guest, Conor Woodman, revealed that he arranges his bookshelves in colour order. We asked him to blog about it. He did.

And then Sarah Salway decided to share a short story about that very same subject.

The lovely Holly Bell from Great British Bake Off has a blog that I am quite taken with. Lots of great recipes and she has a refreshing unpretentious style, rare from food writers these days. Recipes from a Normal Mum is well worth a look.

I haven't got round to reviewing them yet but Unfair Trade: How Big Business Exploits the World's Poor – and Why It Doesn't Have To by Conor Woodman and Florence and Giles by John Harding are two really very good books indeed.

And here is a piece I wrote for the FutureBook website about ebook pricing. It is full of stats. Lucky you.

Finally, if you have some time to kill you may want to enter this competition to create poetry out of book titles.

21st Century Dodos: Pages

I wanted to share with you some pages from 21st Century Dodos. Only some, mind, if you want to look at all of them you'll just have to buy the bugger.

Here's the copyright page. How exciting, I hear you cry, but take a closer look. I have had some fun with it.

And here is one of the chapter openers with an illustration by Dave Cornmell.

How about the entry on White Dog Poo?

This is the back cover.

And here is where I thank you lot.

Next week I will try to persuade you all to pre-order a copy but for now you can just marvel at the wonder of these photographs of paper.

The Dodos are Alive!

Ladies and gentleman, boys and girls, I give you...

21st Century Dodos!

My latest book is back from the printer and looking every bit the perfect addition to your toilet library.

There will be lots of Dodo related news on this blog in the coming weeks including giveaways, details of forthcoming events and the launch of a blog tour.

Watch this space.

The book is available to pre-order online and there is also an ebook which will sell for the bargain price of £2.99. But that's not all, you can listen to an audiobook for £1.99 which will be available to download soon.

Of course, the best place to get a copy would be your local independent bookshop. Perhaps you could pop in there and ask if they are getting some in? Publication date is September 29th.

Murakami Symposium

Can't wait for the new Haruki Murakami novel 1Q84 to come out?

Need to find some way to kill the time between now and publication date?

Here's two and a half hours sorted.

Thanks to Jay Rubin for alerting me to this.

Authonomy

So, I have a new job.

I am now heading up the Authonomy website.

Authonomy is a writing community set up by HarperCollins which enables unpublished authors to post their work which can then be read, rated and reviewed by other members. Every month, the top five titles are passed on to readers within HarperCollins for a critical assessment.

It is a neat idea and a pretty good site. It has its flaws and problems, what doesn't?, but we are hoping to make a bunch of changes to make it a lot better. A number of books have been signed up after appearing on there, not all of them by HarperCollins, and there have been three Sunday Times Bestsellers out of that bunch.

So it works, but I think it could work even better. One of my aims is to publish a lot more from Authonomy. There are lots of great manuscripts on there that could be successful with a bit of tweaking and the clout of a big publisher behind them and I intend to make sure that happens.

Do pop on over if you get the chance. You don't have to put your work up there, you can just browse the reading material that is on offer.

A bit more background to the new job can be found here. I remain as Publisher for The Friday Project. This is extra. I am looking forward to it.

Around Windsor in 80 Swaps

We just can't get enough of this Book Swapping lark.

Our regular Windsor Swap returns on Thursday, as does Marie, who has been away in New York where her book is being turned into a movie starring Sharon Stone and Christopher Walken. Nice of her to agree to mix with us mere mortals again.

And joining us will be authors Isabel Losada and Conor Woodman.

Isabel is the author of several books incuding the huge international bestseller The Battersea Park Road to Enlightenment, and now a sequel (of sorts) The Battersea Park Road to Paradise. She comes to the Book Swap just before she spends a week as writer-in-residence in the window of Waterstone's Clapham Junction. Her unusual take on all things New Age promises to entertain even the sceptics such as me.

Conor is the presenter of Channel 4's Around The World In 80 Trades and the author of the book of the same name. His latest offering is Unfair Trade: How Big Business Exploits the World's Poor – and Why It Doesn't Have To which I am racing through at the moment, and quite an eye-opener it is too.

As always, festivities kick off at 7.45pm at the Firestation Arts Centre in Windsor. Tickets are £5 on the door or free entry if you bake a cake.

Hope to see you there.

A Song for Sunday

Video Games by Lana Del Ray.

Island Life

An old man is exiled to a remote Icelandic island, punishment for annoying the wrong people. He is a healer, a calling that can sit uncomfortably in a Christian land but for which there is plenty of demand. This is the year 1635 after all. The Icelanders of that time are fond of their superstition and mystical ways. Hard not to be when surrounded by sulphur clouds, geysers and volcanoes.

Alone with just his thoughts, Jonas Palmason looks back over his life and, between rambling pages of train-of-thought, we get glimpses of his story and of what has brought him here. Jonas is at one with nature and sometimes finds himself overcome with visions, huge great elaborate things they are, wonders to behold. There is a plot, of sorts, but it doesn't really matter all that much. This book is about getting inside someone's head.

From the Mouth of the Whale is also a book steeped in folklore, myth and legend. Try this stunning paragraph:

... in Tartary there grows a plant called Boramez, the fruit of which is a lamb ... Each plant bears a single lamb on a tall stalk that grows up from the middle of the bush, like a rhubarb flower from a rhubarb patch ... The lamb foetus grows inside the bud, as white and furry as fulled wool, until it reaches maturity and wakens to life with a piercing bleating ... Then the farmers of Tartary harvest their sheep ... They go up on to the moors, their scythe blades flashing, and snip the lambs from their stalks, to which they are attached by the navel like the umbilical cord on human babes ... It must be a noisy job but well rewarded, for the meat of the Boramez lamb tastes like fish, its blood like honey ...

This is clearly a novel written by a poet. The texture of the language, the imagery, the beauty of the prose is to the fore here, and high praise must go to the translator, Victoria Cribb, for such a glorious interpretation. Sjon's style and the almost hallucinogenic story will not be to everyone's taste but that does not stop it from being a remarkable book.