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Photos
Photos of Ro and me in New York here.
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New York calling
Ooh, I do like it here. It's like being at the sea side - the air is all fresh and there are doughnuts. My speech went well, I think, and here's my write up of the event in The Bookseller. Ro is being an utter delight and a charmer and New York has fallen at his feet. Hardened taxi drivers play peep bo with him. Huge doormen tickle his toes. Surly diner staff bring him tiny plates of strawberries on the house. I think we'll come back here.
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Fabulous review of Thaw
Blimey. Read it here.
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The gentle art of comedy
Thanks to all those who saw my anguish at missing the first episode of the new season of Fags, Mags and Bags and rushed forward to help. Em even got an e-mail from one of the cast (good samaritan Omar Raza, who plays Sanjay) who sorted me out with a download of the episode in question. I consider that to be decidedly amazing and great. I also thought, while I was on this subject, that I might try to explain what it is I like about the show, just in case anyone out there has a moment's curiosity on that score.
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Bittersweet
Well, in radio terms, the almost unthinkable has happened. A new series of Fags, Mags and Bags has started and I've already missed a week. It's my favourite thing on radio, so that's quite a blow. BBC iPlayer will let me grab episode 2, but episode 1 is already lost to the ether. 10 days after broadcast the wavefront of the program will be around 260 billion kilometers from Earth, well beyond the orbit of Pluto. My chances of getting a radio and a tape recorder out there in order to record the programme are slim. So unless the BBC rebroadcasts it, or someone else on planet Earth decides to share their copy, I'll have to make do with the other five episodes of this series. But still, five episodes of radio comedy gold is cause for celebration. Unless something else goes wrong...
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Oh, I meant to ask
The Bookseller ran a piece on our profits this week, and it's subscriber only. Can anyone send me the full text?
On that note, we've just reported to Companies House that we made a profit of £14.5k last year. The previous year was £17k, which we would have beaten were it not for £8k of bad debts from various people going bust around us.
Yes, you heard right. We're profitable, again, in the most ridiculous market where customers keep dropping like flies. Do we get a medal or anything?
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Large apples
So, this is exciting. Ro and me and Rob and Verity Ann (commenter to the SnowBlog and girlfriend of Rob, in that order) are pushing off to New York tomorrow. I have a five minute speech to give at Tools of Change on Tuesday (4pm, the Ignite session, if you're going. Cheer loudly, throw roses, etc) about how to make catalogues in 5 minutes, but apart from that and a bit of listening in at TOC we'll have NYC to ourselves for a week. Any tips on what to do and what to see would be great! I will be taking a copy of Ghosts of Manhattan which is just back from the printer and is very timely.
(Try not to email whilst I'm gone. I won't reply when I'm there, and I'll probably just delete all 1600 emails that I'll inevitably have when I get back. Or, at least, I'll be sorely tempted.)
Think of me at 5pm tomorrow when I take my seat in Economy with a 16 month old...
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Pirate perks
Whoever drew this little 'infographic' (click on the link or picture to see what I'm talking about) does a nice job of illustrating what I've said about DVD anti-piracy sermonising for a while now. The big advantage to stealing movies instead of paying for them is that you don't get treated like a criminal (you may wish to reread that sentence). If I could buy legitimate DVDs for maybe 50p extra that weren't loaded up with warnings, ads and trailers I think I'd go for it. Currently my only option would be to strip those things out myself, quite possibly breaking the law. I do hope we all get our heads screwed on straight about copyright before I have to read e-books full of ads, warnings and official threats.
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Thaw
Oh now look. Here's a lovely review of the outstanding Thaw from Fiona Robyn. Get it whilst it's hot!
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Super things
There shine brightly two super things this week: firstly, this review of George Mann's forthcoming Ghosts of Manhattan and secondly an endorsement of Mark Hodder's forthcoming Spring Heeled Jack from none other than Michael Moorcock (Michael Moorcock!) who says "This is the best debut novel I have read in ages". Click below for the full glowing review.
Imagine you're me and you started a company a few years back, and stuff happened, time passed, and then seven years later you get a review like that for a book you're publishing from a childhood hero. Chuffed doesn't begin to cover it.
Oh yes, and I'm going to New York next week. With Ro. Whee!
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e-Brooker
'Yes, there's no "new book smell", no folding the pages over, and if you drop it in the bath you've ruined it - but on the other hand, the whole "electronic ink" malarkey actually works...'
See what Charlie Brooker has to say about e-books in the Grauniad today.
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My contribution
It seems that I'm part of a movement. Some of my lifestyle choices seem to align quite closely with these people. Not sure I want all humans to vanish, though. Could we just keep ten million or so, if they promise not to break anything.
(And CSS doesn't damage our ecosystem. I wouldn't be averse to a bit of prettification of their website.)
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Calm about the wrong things
26 per cent - a rise of 10 per cent in just three months - do not believe the world is getting hotter. link
I really didn't see this coming. Apparently a decreasing number of people accept the idea of manmade climate change. A couple of screw-ups and a bit of fudging by some researchers has invalidated the whole concept for a lot of people and apparently that's giving the Conservative Party some political cover to back off on their pledges to do something about CO2 levels if (when) they get into power (link).
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Clamour King on audio
And here's The Clamour King - out loud.
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Audibletastic
Ooooh, look here. Or listen, rather, to the new audio book of The Affinity Bridge. It's the first in a series of Audio Snowbooks (Snaubooks, if you will) coming over the next few months. Next up: The Osiris Ritual and The Clamour King.
Isn't it weird, and also super, to hear a familiar book read aloud? There's a clip on the Audible site where that link above goes to for you to have a listen.
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Filter-feeding
I can't remember if I've recommended Clay Shirky's book about publishing (it's got a slight emphasis on newspapers rather than books, perhaps) and the interwebs, but if I haven't, I should have done. (If only there was a way I could check, but who wants to go through all the longhand drafts of their blog posts looking for familiar phrases?) It's called Here Comes Everyone and it's good for people trying to think about the commerical future of publishing. (Surprisingly, that doesn't describe by any means the majority of publishers, but maybe there are a few interested readers out there.) Well, here* is a little flavour of his thinking in a very easy-to-watch talk about privacy and information overload. Link.
*Yet again, prompted by BoingBoing linking to it first.