Things for next Year - The Wine of Angels

I've been waiting for them to reprint this book since I shelved The Remains of an Altar when I was working at Waterstones. Intrigued by the basic premise I went book in the series and found it was out of print. Like many people I hate starting a series midway through but out of print is out of print.

Once I'd read The Remains of an Altar my desperation intensified but fortunately, according to Amazon at least, the book is being re-released in March 2011. I already have my copy on pre-order.

The Nostalgic Smell of Tube Trains

I went to the London Transport Museum, for research purposes, and after stepping around drifts of off season tourists I stepped inside an old red 1960s era tube train. I was instantly caught in the undertow of nostalgia and dragged back to the thousands of hours I spent riding that exact type of train in my youth. Back when the silver Jubilee Line trains were the height of modernity.

It wasn't the look of the carriage as the smell and this is where I find the limitations of my prose. Dust certainly, something that might have been electricity (except the carriage had been sitting in a museum for twenty years) and a musty smell that could have been the seat covers. Really, just as honey smells of honey and shit smells of shit what the carriage smelt of was 1960s era tube train(1).

(1) I think it might have been either 1959 or 1962 Stock but I can't tell.

I Shall Eviscerate You In Fiction - Part 2

The question for any writer when faced with criticism is simple - having restrained yourself from homicide what should you do next?

Walk away, turn the other cheek, do unto others as you would have them do unto you...etc etc. Us writers, let's be honest, are driven by an arrogant sense of entitlement so this is not really an option unless --- The insulter is high up in the publishing, film or news media and is likely to retaliate in kind. The insulter is much, much, bigger than you or under the age of criminal responsibility. You happen to be in a lasting relationship with sex, bed and/or food being conditional on your good behaviour.

Eviscerate them in fiction. This is the preferred choice ever since a popular Archean female singing trio dismissed the Iliad as a trite war story and ended up being depicted as murderous women headed birds. Try to keep it in proportion though; Micheal Creighton portrayed one of his critics as a child rapist with a tiny penis which is overkill, everybody knows that on the sliding scale of fictional evisceration a bad review merits a horrible death (real or social depending on genre) - they'd have to be something personal involved to get me up to Creightonian levels.

So remember my fellow writers: kill em in fiction, is cheaper, less likely to get you arrested and almost as much fun as the real thing.(1)

(1) If it isn't you are not a writer but a psychopath please report to your local mental health institution and turn yourself in.

I Shall Eviscerate You In Fiction - Part 1

Here is an unpalatable truth about writers - we're not good with criticism. Or to clarify:- criticism of a writer's work drives them to an immediate and almost uncontrollable rage. Any criticism, about any aspect by anybody = psychopathic episode. Any writer who tells you differently is either lying, in denial or being ghosted by somebody else entirely.

I realise that many people are unaware of this from the blithe way that readers, critics and, occasionally, people who sit next to you on the bus flirt with death. I suppose it could be a novel form of extreme sport or TV reality programme(1). In an effort to reduce the number preventable deaths I offer the following safety advice.

If you must criticise an author to his face then be sure to do it at the end of the conversation. The killing rage begins with the first unfavourable comment, beyond that point the writer has ceased to listen to a word you're saying and is instead imagining how good it would feel to rip your arm off and beat you to death with the wet end.

When dealing with an enraged author never, ever, state that you have no intention of buying their next book. The only thing keeping you alive is the squeaky little voice in the author's head that reminds him/her that dead people don't buy books... It's a very tiny little voice at the best of times.

Before making a criticism ensure that you are not alone, standing by a ship's railing, pool of lava or acid bath or conveniently far from any CCTV coverage. Writer's are very weakly socialised and it's only fear of arrest and prison that is holding them back.

Next week - advice for writers on how to vent in safety.

(1) 'When Authors Attack' presumably.

Midnight Riot Cover (US)

This is the US cover for Midnight Riot (which is what River's of London is called in the states). See him, I wouldn't mess with Constable Peter Grant if I was you!

Moon Over Soho (UK) Cover

This is the almost finalised cover for Moon Over Soho I like the blue colour and the way it thematically matches the Rivers of London cover.

Moon Over Soho will be the second book in the continuing adventures of Peter Grant, Detective Constable and Apprentice Wizard.

Turbulence by Samit Basu

I was first sent this novel as a very large word file and was asked to read it as a favour to my agent. I procrastinated, as I always do in these circumstances, but finally when at eleven o'clock in the evening there was nothing left to watch on telly I opened the file.

I'll just give it a quick scan, I thought to myself.

Three o'clock the next morning I finished reading with that rare sense of loss you get when you finish a book you never really wanted to end.

I'm terrible at summaries and reviews so I'll just say that it involves superpowers, politics, the limits of human responsibility and is fast paced, deep, crisply written, full of vim, vigour, wit, wisdom and zest.

Plus it's really, really funny. As the man with the long name at the bottom of the cover says...

"You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll gasp and YOU WILL demand a sequel!"

Zoo City by Lauren Beukes

I don't write reviews partly because I'm lazy and partly because I don't feel I can do justice to someone's work without doing way more writing than I'm willing to do without a contract. I do like to recommend books that I enjoyed and then loot them for any useful craft wisdom the author might have left lying around their text.

Zoo City by South African author Lauren Beukes is a wonderful fantasy noir thriller and then some and you should read it for that reason alone.

However if you are a writer you should also read it because it is a masterclass of how to weave exposition into your book and when and where to spring those little details that bring a setting vividly to life.

So that's my recommendation and my looting - enjoy.

Moon Over Soho Cover

This is the American cover of my second book which will be published in February/March. Just to clarify; the first book will be titled Rivers of London in the UK and Midnight Riot in the US.

Del Rey have informed me that this isn't the finished cover so I'm taking it down until the official cover is released.

Rivers of London Cover

This is the UK cover for my upcoming novel 'Rivers of London' which will be available from all book stores, good, bad and indifferent, from January 20th 2011.

Sometimes more really is more....

I've always felt that a great many modern films could be improved by the judicious snipping of about twenty minutes of material from the final print. If you see a film with a running time of over 2 hours its often a safe bet that the surplus is superfluous - I'm looking at you Cameron.

The Sorcerer's Apprentice is an exception, there are obvious gaps where chunks of character development have been pruned out and the movie suffers as a result. In this case I would welcome a bloated self indulgent Director's cut.

Not that the film is perfect it has a pointless and grating prologue which adds no information that is not given later and does nothing except drain tension from the narrative. That has the strong stink of the gibbon about it.

Less easy to blame on the hooting of the studio primates is the lacklustre and oddly static climax but in this the Sorcerer's Apprentice is hardly alone; many recent action films including the A-Team and the last two Bonds have ended with action sequences that were less exciting than those that preceded them.

Pushy Minor Characters

What is it with these pushy minor characters? You're tooling along nicely from plot point A to plot point B you need someone to lay some pipe or ease you through a transition and the next thing you know the fuckers are measuring curtains. You've moved on to the next scene and they're still prancing around going "Look at me I'm so three dimensional; use me, use me!" It's like Bottom in a Midsummer's Night's Dream any little part and they're telling you how good they'd be doing. "Oh I can deliver that exposition,' they say. "Just give a chance, I don't mind doing nude scenes or dying, let me die. I can always come back as a zombie or my own twin brother, please, please, please."

I've got one character in the first book who's sole original function was to open the fricking door and now she's a fricking regular - a regular - my publishers are asking when she's coming back. Except my sodding viewpoint character is going "How come she gets all the best lines, if you love her so much why don't you get her to do the first person narrative." It's these pushy minor characters that put the 'extruded' into extruded fantasy series and the 'bloat' into bloated sequel.

Well it's not happening to me you hear? I'll put every one of you against the wall and have you shot - you see if I don't. No minor character is safe in one of my books and nobody's coming back as their own twin sister - evil or otherwise.

Blake's 7 on BBC 7 in June

Yes folks there will be 4 B7 Audio Episodes on BBC 7 this June, two of them written by me and two by inestimable Simon Guerrier. You can listen to them live or 'catch up', as those funky teenagers say, on iPlayer or direct from the BBC7 website.

I will, of course, be reminding you closer to broadcast time so there is no excuse. The transmission dates are as follows....

Blood and Earth by Meeeeeee! Tuesday 1st of June at 18:30
The Dust Run by Simon. Wednesday 2nd of June at 18:30
The Trial by Simon again. Thursday 3rd of June at 18:30
When Vila Met Gan by Meeeee...again! Friday 4th June 18:30

You owe it to your children's children to listen to these shows.

In Praise Of: The Charles Paris Mysteries

Bill Nigh is note perfect as the ageing actor, occasional lothlorio and reluctant amateur detective Charles Paris. Beautifully adapted from the Simon Brett novels by Jeremy Front the mysteries are compact little masterpieces that have never failed to delight.

You can read what Front says about the adaptations here and at least one of the mysteries is available as a CD from all good stockists.

My Macaroni Ostrogoth

Just a quick note to say that my three book deal with Gollancz is now official. I'd post more but for some quaint reason Del Rey and Gollancz labour under this strange notion that just because they've paid for something it ought to be delivered on time.