Random

Music: AEROSMITH

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PerryJ-RocksBecause I’m currently reading Joe Perry‘s Rocks, I thought I’d just share some of Aerosmith’s music videos. First, though, here are the details of the book, which is published by Simon & Schuster:

Before the platinum records or the Super Bowl half-time show or the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Joe Perry was a boy growing up in small-town Massachusetts. He idolized Jacques Cousteau and built his own diving rig that he used to explore a local lake. He dreamed of becoming a marine biologist. But Perry’s neighbors had teenage sons, and those sons had electric guitars, and the noise he heard when they started playing would change his life. 

The guitar became his passion, an object of lust, an outlet for his restlessness and his rebellious soul. That passion quickly blossomed into an obsession, and he got a band together. One night after a performance he met a brash young musician named Steven Tyler; before long, Aerosmith was born. What happened over the next forty-five years has become the stuff of legend: the knockdown, drag-out, band-splintering fights; the drugs, the booze, the rehab; the packed arenas and timeless hits; the reconciliations and the comebacks. 

Rocks is an unusually searching memoir of a life that spans from the top of the world to the bottom of the barrel—several times. It is a study of endurance and brotherhood, with Perry providing remarkable candor about Tyler, as well as new insights into their powerful but troubled relationship. It is an insider’s portrait of the rock and roll family, featuring everyone from Jimmy Page to Alice Cooper, Bette Midler to Chuck Berry, John Belushi to Al Hirschfeld. It takes us behind the scenes at unbelievable moments such as Joe and Steven’s appearance in the movie of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (they act out the murders of Peter Frampton and the Bee Gees).

Full of humor, insight, and brutal honesty about life in and out of one of the biggest bands in the world, Rocks is the ultimate rock-and-roll epic. In Perry’s own words, it tells the whole story: “the loner’s story, the band’s story, the recovery story, the cult story, the love story, the success story, the failure story, the rebirth story, the re-destruction story, and the post-destructive rebirth story.”

I’m about 100 pages into the biography, and really enjoying it so far. I should be able to post a full review in the next week or so, time willing. Now, on with the music… Continue reading →

An Aside: On a Bit of a SF Buying Binge…

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I seem to be on an unusual sci-fi purchasing kick at the moment. Or, if not actively purchasing/pre-ordering sci-fi novels, I’m filing them away on my To Buy list, or on my Amazon wishlist. Today, I purchased Becky Chambers’s The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet — which was recently published by Hodder.

This is a little bit strange, because I don’t really read much sci-fi. Sure, I read almost everything set in Black Library’s Horus Heresy series (which is becoming a tad drawn-out), and I used to read every Star Wars novel I could get my hands on (as long as it was set after New Hope). But, over the past couple of years, I’ve cooled on SW novels (mainly because I haven’t really liked any that I’ve tried to read over the past couple of years). This has left a rather gaping SF hole on my shelves. Save for a mere handful of SF novels by Richard Morgan, Rachel Aaron, and … well, actually I think that’s about it… I just don’t read much SF. I read the first book in James S.A. Corey’s Expanse series, Leviathan Wakes (Orbit), which was pretty good.

This fleeting observation made me look at my various lists and TBR pile, and it looks like there are going to be some interesting SF book in the next few months. Alongside Chambers’s novel, above, I recently acquired an ARC of Kim Stanley Robinson’s next novel, Aurora (Orbit, July 9th), which I’m really interested in reading; and also Justina Robson’s The Glorious Angels (Gollancz). I also pre-ordered Jason LaPier’s Unexpected Rain (Voyager, May 7th), and will probably buy Jamie Sawyer’s The Lazarus War: Artefact (Orbit) in the not-too-distant future. Looking a bit further ahead, Rob Boffard’s Tracer looks interesting (Orbit, July 2nd), as do Mike Brooks’s Dark Run (Del Rey UK, June 4th), Alex Lamb’s Roboteer (Gollancz, July 16th – I’ve preordered this, only £1.99!) and Al Robertson’s Crashing Heaven (Gollancz, June 18th). There’s also J.P. Smythe’s Way Down Dark (Hodder, July2nd). And, of course, there’s Ernest Cline’s Armada (Century, July 16th)… [Details for all of these titles after the break.]

So, maybe I have a few months of (uncharacteristic) sci-fi reading coming up?

Continue reading →

New Greatcoats Competition from Jo Fletcher Books

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deCastell-2-KnightsShadowUKToday marks the release of Knight’s Shadow, the highly-anticipated follow-up to Sebastien de Castell‘s debut, Traitor’s Blade. To celebrate, Jo Fletcher Books are running a competition on their website.

There is a test every magistrate must take before becoming a Greatcoat – it comes in the form of a puzzle from a very old book called Peritas Aequitum, which literally means Perils of Justice. It’s quite possible that this book was the original text used to train the very first Greatcoats in centuries past.

This puzzle asks the examinee to decide the outcome of a case for which Tristia’s complex laws provide several different — equally valid — legal outcomes. The Greatcoat confronted by this situation is thus forced to render a verdict even though any choice they make is guaranteed to make matters worse…

To be in with a chance to win a copy of the new novel, head on over to JFB’s website for full details on how to win. In the meantime, here’s the synopsis for the novel:

Tristia is a nation overcome by intrigue and corruption. The idealistic young King Paelis is dead and the Greatcoats – legendary travelling magistrates who brought justice to the Kingdom – have been branded as traitors. But just before his head was impaled on a spike, the King swore each of his hundred and forty-four Greatcoats to a different mission. 

Falcio Val Mond, First Cantor, with the help of fellow Greatcoats Kest and Brasti, has completed his King’s final task: he has found his Charoites – well, one at least, and she was not quite what they expected. Now they must protect the girl from the many who would see her dead, and place her on the throne of a lawless kingdom. That would be simple enough, if it weren’t for the Daishini, an equally legendary band of assassins, getting in their way, not to forget the Dukes who are determined to hold on to their fractured Kingdoms, or the fact that the heir to the throne is only thirteen years old. Oh, and the poison that is slowly killing Falcio.

That’s not even mentioning the Greatcoat’s Lament…

I already have a copy of the novel, and I intend to start it ASAP – either next, or next-but-one.

Also on CR: Interview with Sebastien de Castell; Guest Post “Where Writers Get Their Groove”; Review of Traitor’s Blade

Interesting, Different Conventions in Publishing… Synopses

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DenfeldR-EnchantedUSHC Crop

I’ve been thinking a lot about some various different conventions in book publishing. Partly because I keep moving around, but also because one element of one of my jobs at a literary agency is keeping track of international editions of clients’ novels. Couple these two things with my ‘work’ on this blog, and I spend a lot of time reading publishers’ websites and catalogues. Recently, I’ve spotted a few books published in the UK and North America with quite different synopses (as well as covers), and I thought it might be interesting to take a look at a couple here. The differences aren’t massive by any means, and maybe I only picked up on them because I read so many. The differences between conventions in cover artwork are, however, much greater – I’ll put together another post about this in the future, I think.

The two novels that jumped out at me were Rene Denfeld‘s The Enchanted and Helen Giltrow‘s The Distance. I spotted them both first in Toronto, and thought they both looked really interesting (and, naturally, have bought them). Since then, I’ve seen that the novels are also published in the UK by Orion Books. With different covers and synopses, my interest in reading them only grew. To be clear, I don’t think whoever wrote the back cover text for either of these books’ North American editions did a bad job. I just think the UK synopses are a bit better, and exhibit some different conventions. Both of the novels are among my 2015 Must Reads. Let’s take the books one-by-one… Continue reading →

Interesting Open Road eBook Sale – “Growing Up Magical”

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I received the information about this sale from Open Road Media yesterday, and I thought it was an interesting selection of titles. So, I decided to share it here. Click on the image to go through to the publisher’s page:

OpenRoad-GrowingUpMagicalAd

Titles on sale:

I hope to have a couple of excerpts from these titles to share on here in the coming weeks.

The Strand’s 2015 Reading Resolutions…

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Strand-2015ReadingResolutionsMyke Cole tweeted a picture of a sign outside of New York’s magnificent Strand Bookstore (right), and it got me thinking: which books would I choose to meet these resolutions? Ordinarily, I find making resolutions of any kind a pointless task, as I will not stick to them (and likely not even try). But, the Strand’s list was interesting and so I thought I’d come up with some books that I could pick to follow them, should I wish to follow them. Which I still probably won’t. Here they are, in case the photo’s not clear enough:

  • Read a book that intimidates you
  • Read a book that is ~100 years old
  • Read a short story collection
  • Read a book before seeing the movie
  • Read a book you’ve lied about reading

The first is interesting. I’m rarely intimidated by a book, but I think I’d pick a massive novel and/or non-fiction title: so, maybe Donna Tartt’s The Goldfinch and/or Robert A. Caro’s The Power Broker. I’ve started the latter, actually, and while it is excellent, its exhaustiveness is also a little exhausting in almost equal measures. Another novel could be James Clavell’s The Noble House: sequel to Tai-Pan which is one of the best books ever written (and easily one of my favourites, as well as the novel that got me reading properly). Not intimidating in terms of a single book, but maybe one of the epic Big Book fantasy series? Malazan Book of the Fallen, Stormlight Archive or Wheel of Time, perhaps? I’m interested in trying the first two, but to be honest not as interested as I am in reading many, many other series…

A book that is over 100 years old? Hm. I had thought of picking something by Virginia Woolf, but her most famous novels were all published less than 100 years ago — except, that is, for her debut, The Voyage Out (1915). I’d never heard of the novel, before looking up Woolf’s publication dates. It sounds kind of interesting, though:

The young Rachel Vinrance leaves England on her father’s ship, the Euphrosyne, on a voyage to South America. Despite being accompanied by her father and her aunt and uncle, Helen and Ridley Ambrose, the passage leads to Rachel’s awakening, both as a woman and as an individual. As the ship is wracked by storms, she finds herself romantically entangled with Richard Dalloway, an encounter that leaves her troubled and confused.

Upon arrival in Santa Marina, Rachel strikes off alone to contemplate her identity, and finds finds herself with the aspiring novelist Terence Hewet. As the emerging romance between the two is complicated by their disagreements about gender and art, another storm, and tragedy, appear on the horizon.

Other novels that could work: Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest (1895), John Hay’s Democracy (1880)…

Reading story collections isn’t really something that I’m new to, but I do read fewer anthologies than I do novels and novellas. I’m rather tempted by Benjamin Percy’s The Language of Elk and Refresh Refresh, though, as I loved Red Moon [review], and am so very excited for The Dead Lands.

Read the book before I see the movie? I’d hoped this would be Joe Hill’s Horns, but Alyssa gave me the movie for Christmas, so I feel we will end up watching it before I can read the novel. I could cheat, and point to Michael Lewis’s Flash Boys, which is being adapted for screen by Aaron Sorkin? But yeah, that’s a real big cheat… Oh, maybe Suzanne Collins’s Mockingjay? I’ve seen the first two movies, but never read the trilogy. I do have them already, too, so I don’t really have any excuse.

A book I’ve lied about reading…? I’ve never felt the need to lie about having read a book. If I haven’t read something, I don’t say I have, because that’s a) weird, and b) bound to lead to embarrassment. So I guess I get to skip this one. Or, I could change it to: “Read a book everyone else has read but you haven’t”? So I guess that would be most of the English Literature classics people were taught in class, but because my year was invariably an “experimental” one, we didn’t. There are so very many, so I won’t list them here. This one could double up with the over 100 years old resolution.

Which books would you pick, if you were following the Strand’s resolutions?

*

While I’m at it, if you haven’t read Myke’s novels, then you really should: Control Point, Fortress Frontier and Breach Zone make up his debut trilogy, Shadow Ops. Later this year, Ace Books (US) and Headline (UK) are publishing a stand-alone prequel, Gemini Cell. Military fantasy at its best, well worth checking out.

Also on CR: Reviews of Control Point, Fortress Frontier, Breach Zone; Interview with Myke Cole (2011); Influence & Inspirations Guest Post

Hodderscape’s Handy Hodder Holiday Help Sheet…

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At the end of the year, sharing lists of gift suggestions is always popular. This year, Hodderscape has produced this handy graphic to help you decide which of their books you should get yourself (or friends and the book-lovers in your lives). They shared it on their Facebook page, from whence I have shamelessly lifted it:

HodderXmasShoppingList2014

A great selection on here, too. I’ve only read three of the books on there — Straight Razor Cure, Lagoon and The Three (all three are excellent) — but all of the others are on my Must Read list. Here are links to the publisher’s pages for the books in the graphic:

Scott K. Brown, TimeBomb

Pierce Brown, Red Rising

Stark Holbrook, Nunslinger

Stephen King, Revival

Rebecca Levene, Smiler’s Fair

Sarah Lotz, The Three

Daniel Polansky, Straight Razor Cure

David Ramirez, The Forever Watch

Laini Taylor, Daughter of Smoke and Bone

Tad Williams, The Dirty Streets of Heaven

Books Make the Best Gifts… (& Giveaway)

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No, really. Hear me out. “Duh” is the most appropriate answer to the question “Are books the best gifts?” However, that makes for a rather short blog post. So, here are eight quick reasons why books make the best gifts (in no particular order), from the serious to the whimsical…

Passion for Reading POS

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Gollancz to Publish Dan Abnett’s THE WIELD in 2016

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This is pretty great news: Gollancz announced today that they have acquired rights to publish a trilogy of “self-contained action-packed heroic fantasies” by Dan Abnett.

Abnett has been a prolific writer for Black Library (primarily where I know him from), 2000AD (where I first read his work),* and multiple comics publishers. His first original fiction was published by Angry Robot Books — Triumff, which was a rather fun swashbuckler. Long-time readers of CR will know that I’m a big fan of his contributions to Black Library’s Horus Heresy series as well as the long-running Gaunt’s Ghosts series (the latest of which, Warmaster, should be out pretty soon). Abnett’s run on Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy is also the story the recent mega-popular movie was based on.

There’s no official synopsis available, just yet, but here’s the press release’s description of the series:

The highly original THE WIELD trilogy takes place in a human-populated society with a vivid dark ages culture. Following an ancient and elite band of warriors, THE WIELD books are dynamic heroic fantasy adventures packed with vivid action and bloody battles. The flawed but engaging characters and the enthralling premise with a clever twist, will appeal to readers of Dan Abnett’s bestselling Black Library books, and fans of David Gemmell and dynamic heroic fantasy.

I am quite looking forward to this. The three novels will be published between November 2016-18. So, it’s still quite a long wait… But it never hurts to have something to look forward to.

In the meantime, I’d recommend you check out First & Only, Horus Rising and Xenos (published by Black Library), Embedded (Angry Robot) and The New Deadwardians (Vertigo Comics) — just a small selection of his work, but probably my favourites and good starting points.

Abnett-BestOfForNewbies

* I can’t remember if it was Sinister Dexter or Durham Red that I read first, but I liked them enough to make a note of the author’s name. Both were very good.

Well I’ll Be Damned — My 16yr Old Self…

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Gubbinz-1999I stumbled across a pair of articles today that have brought a rush of memories back to me: my first two “published”… well, “articles” — the quotation marks are entirely appropriate, as you will see below. The articles are on tUGS.

When I was a teenager, I was quite fond of Games Workshop’s games — especially those that didn’t require much financial investment (Necromunda, Blood Bowl, and GorkaMorka). Partly this interest in the “smaller” games was lucky, because I also didn’t have anyone to play the games with, thanks to constantly changing country and attending a school whose denizens were oh-so-obsessed with “cool”. (Yup, I was that kind of geek.) Nor, for that matter, could I afford the ever-increasing prices.

Anyway, in my enthusiastic teen years, I submitted two articles of “rules” for GorkaMorka, the Mad Max-style tabletop game of ork warfare. Both of them were accepted and published in Gubbinz, a compilation of extra rules and whatnot. Up until today, I had completely forgotten about them.

So, with a certain amount of nostalgia and slight embarrassment, here are my two, insignificant contributions to Games Workshop’s back-back-list of games: Rokkit Paks and Rebel Grot Pogo Stikks. (The posts contain download links for PDFs of what I cobbled together.)

 GorkaMorka