An event at the American Book Centre in Amsterdam with Bill Campbell, Rochita Loenen-Ruiz, Corinne Duyvis, Marieke Nijkamp and Tiemen Zwaan, on Nov 21st, 2015. Come meet us and chat about our books!
My schedule:
Saturday 7 November
10:00-11:00 Kaffeeklatsch
Getting up early has never been so fun. Enjoy a cup of coffee (or tea) while talking about books, stories and other geek-related subjects with authors Aliette de Bodard, Zen Cho, Rochita Loenen-Ruiz, Bill Campbell.
14:00-15:30 Q&A and booksigning Aliette de Bodard
Author Aliette de Bodard will talk about and read parts from her debut The House Of Shattered Wings.
Will be pleased this year to be attending the Worldcon in Spokane, August 19th-August 23rd, 2015.
Aug 19 01:00 PM to 01:30 PM (30 minutes)
Reading – Aliette de Bodard. Will be reading from The House of Shattered Wings!
Aug 19 02:00 PM to 02:45 PM (45 minutes)
Headology & Boffo – Character and Cunning on the Discworld
Aliette de Bodard , Shanna Swendson , Gillian Redfearn , Patty Panek (Moderator) , Denise Connell
Aug 20 01:00 PM to 01:45 PM (45 minutes)
Understanding the Science Behind Computers
Fred Moulton (Moderator) , Aliette de Bodard , Ramez Naam
Aug 20 03:00 PM to 03:45 PM (45 minutes)
Kaffee Klatche – Aliette de Bodard
Aliette de Bodard
Aug 21 01:00 PM to 01:45 PM (45 minutes)
Autographing – Aliette de Bodard, P. C. Hodgell, Richard Kadrey, Devon Monk, Michelle Sagara, Lawrence M. Schoen
Aug 22 01:00 PM to 01:45 PM (45 minutes)
Witches, Werewolves, Seamstresses and Soldiers – The Women of Discworld
Denise Connell (Moderator) , Anne Hoppe , Charlotte Lewis Brown , Patty Panek , Aliette de Bodard
Aug 22 04:00 PM to 04:45 PM (45 minutes)
Science and Technology of Discworld
Charlotte Lewis Brown (Moderator) , Aliette de Bodard , Fran Wilde , Karen G. Anderson , Sam Scheiner
Q: will there be copies of The House of Shattered Wings at Worldcon?
A: Yes! Bookseller Larry Smith has confirmed he will be carrying copies. I will be delighted to sign them, either at my official signing or if you grab me in a corridor and I’m not rushing to somewhere else.
Q: I have an ecopy of the book and would like you to sign something?
A: I will have promo postcards–come chat me up!
Just a quick reminder I’ll be at Eastercon this year, but just Friday and Saturday (have a snakelet to take care of after that :p).
My schedule is here (with many thanks to Tim and Judi for working out miracles). Note that my reading has moved compared to the original time: it’s now Saturday at 12:30 (and I’ll be reading from House of Shattered Wings, so if you’re curious about the novel, this is the place!).
Just a reminder I’ll be a guest at North London Lit Fest tonight, 17:30-19:30–where I’ll be taking part in a panel with Stephanie Saulter and Farah Mendlesohn. More info here; it takes place at Middlesex University, Hendon Campus.
So… September is just around the corner, and I’m quite happy to reveal the US cover for House of Shattered Wings, aka “OMG OMG so pretty” (also, creepy. Yes, this is a dark fantasy book, why do you ask? :p). The art is by Nekro, who also did this lovely piece I pinned on Pinterest a while back.
A book about a devastated Paris, fallen angels and the ruins of a once great House? Sounds about right!
(more seriously, I really like this. It’s got oodles of atmosphere, it says creepy in all the right places, and the burning feathers are just a lovely touch from the opening scene of the novel. This is meant to be Morningstar’s throne in Notre-Dame, in its current state, and I love the ruined city in the background! I’m sure that makes you want to pick up the book, right? *big grin*)
And here’s the cover copy:
In the late Twentieth Century, the streets of Paris are lined with haunted ruins. The Great Magicians’ War left a trail of devastation in its wake. The Grand Magasins have been reduced to piles of debris, Notre-Dame is a burnt-out shell, and the Seine has turned black with ashes and rubble and the remnants of the spells that tore the city apart. But those that survived still retain their irrepressible appetite for novelty and distraction, and The Great Houses still vie for dominion over France’s once grand capital.
Once the most powerful and formidable, House Silverspires now lies in disarray. Its magic is ailing; its founder, Morningstar, has been missing for decades; and now something from the shadows stalks its people inside their very own walls.
Within the House, three very different people must come together: a naive but powerful Fallen angel; an alchemist with a self-destructive addiction; and a resentful young man wielding spells of unknown origin. They may be Silverspires’ salvation—or the architects of its last, irreversible fall. And if Silverspires falls, so may the city itself.
More info here, and you can pre-order the book here: Amazon.com|Barnes and Noble|Book Depository|Amazon UK (obviously the last amazon link is the UK edition, which won’t have this cover). Out tail end of August (August 20th for the UK edition, beginning of September for the US edition).
Aka the sekrit project! Quite happy to announce we’re lanching “Where Ghost Words Dwell”, a website dedicated to words that didn’t make it into our final manuscripts. “We” is a group of authors that will slowly be revealed: the website is the brainchild of Rochita Loenen-Ruiz, and in the coming weeks we’ll be featuring posts by Victor Fernando R Ocampo, Karin Tidbeck, Joyce Chng, Tade Thompson, Haralambi Markov, Cindy Pon, Vida Cruz, and more writers! Posts are anonymous: you will have to follow the links embedded into them to see who wrote them and where the final version of the words appeared.
The first post is up. Er. No prizes for guessing who wrote it. No prizes for guessing where it was excerpted from, either! (but it’s the first long bit of House of Shattered Wings on the internet–come read it and wonder what words did make it into the final version ^^)
We would love to hear what you think, either at the blog itself, or here–and would also be quite grateful for signal boosting!
Terry Pratchett has died, and I feel like there’s a big hole in the world. I didn’t know him personally, but I knew his books–I taught myself English (and puns on British life) with the Discworld (one of the very first books I bought when we moved to the UK was Hogfather, still a perennial favourite), and came to the fantasy and science fiction bookshelves of Waterstone’s because that was where you could find his books. His books followed me from teenager reader to adult writer of SF, and I always enjoyed reading the latest one (and I did the embarrassed fangirl thing at Interaction in Glasgow, too). It’s hard to state how much his writings have shaped me and what I write today.
My condolences to his family and friends. The world is a darker, hollower place without him.
Just a quick reminder that tonight (11:59pm Pacific Daylight Time) is the deadline for the Hugo Awards. You can nominate here.
If you’re still looking for something to put on your ballot, my awards consideration post is here, with a list of stuff I’ve liked in the past year. I’ve tried to focus it on online and diverse works–would be quite honoured and grateful if you had a look at some of it.
Er. So I’ve sold the story I wrote last week to Carl Engle-Laird at Tor.com. Wow. I’m over the moon. I love what Tor.com is doing (and I love their art too, which is always striking), and I’m really glad I shall be appearing with all the cool kids.
This is a bit of a change from my usual stuff: it’s, er, dark post-apocalyptic fantasy [1]. With a twist.
Many thanks to Elizabeth Bear, Scott Lynch, D Franklin, Gareth M Skarka and Mur Lafferty for the seed of this; and to Rochita Loenen-Ruiz, D Franklin and Rachel A Marks for the read!
They bury you at the bottom of the gardens–what’s left of you, pathetic and small and twisted so out of shape it hardly seems human anymore. The river, dark and oily, licks at the ruin of your flesh–at your broken bones–and sings you to sleep, in a soft, gentle language like a mother’s lullabies; whispering of rest and forgiveness; of a place where it is forever light, forever safe.
You do not rest. You cannot forgive. You are not safe– you never were.
