tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-331023092024-03-13T18:22:09.678+01:00The Solaris Editors' BlogDavid Moorehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00886477189793178895noreply@blogger.comBlogger1062125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-32541259854344797132015-03-18T16:48:00.001+01:002015-03-25T17:56:22.312+01:00We've moved!<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Having called The When Gravity Fails blog our home for many, many (man we're old) years at the start of 2015 we decided it was time for a change...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This blog was started back in 2006 by then owners Black Library, when Rebellion Publishing purchased the imprint in 2009 it came to sit alongside our other sister imprints Abaddon Books and 2000 AD, and the blog came with it. Then back in 2013 we launched a new, exciting YA and Children's imprint called Ravenstone which promises to bring the freshest and most cutting-edge titles to the market.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">That's a whole lot of books going on, and we don't want you to miss any of our outpourings (from award-winning anthologies and novels, to classic pulp fiction, to literary genre mind-benders) so we decided it was time to bring all our projects in to one home.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">While we're sad to see the blog go (and we promise we'll keep the old posts up should you ever want to see some of the weird and wonderful thoughts we've had over the years) we hope you'll join us in our new home where you can keep track of ALL our projects under one roof: <a href="http://www.rebellionpublishing.com/">www.rebellionpublishing.com</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Come over and we'll pop the kettle on.</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-29641252793183673632014-11-26T16:14:00.000+01:002014-11-26T16:14:59.474+01:00Solaris Books to publish first independent novel from Nik Abnett<div class="BodyA">
<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Following from yesterday’s <a href="http://solaris-editors-blog.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/solaris-books-round-up-and-announcement.html" target="_blank">big announcement</a> it brings us great
pleasure to today be able to announce that we will be publishing Nik Abnett’s
first independent solo novel <i>Savant</i>
in summer 2016.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i><span lang="EN-US">Savant </span></i><span lang="EN-US">is a modern classic SF tale, taking a timely look at our
understanding of the rights of the state and the rights of individuals, set in
a future in which Earth is rendered invisible by a device known as ‘The
Shield’, humanity’s only defense from invasion. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The novel follows the story of Tobe, one of the mysterious ‘Actives’
charged with maintaining The Shield.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">No one understands precisely what the Actives do, or how, but
without them The Shield would cease to function. When Tobe finds himself caught
in a probability loop, the equilibrium of Earth’s defense is compromised. Other
Actives begin to share his malady and the world suddenly becomes vulnerable.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As the danger facing Earth escalates it’s down to Tobe’s assistant
Metoo to keep The Shield’s security forces at bay to prevent them from
undermining her friend’s already fragile condition…<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">At Rebellion Publishing we’ve had the privilege of working with Abnett
previously via our sister imprint Abaddon, where she and husband Dan Abnett
released their sublime novel <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Fiefdom-Kingdom-Novel-Dan-Abnett/dp/1781082359" target="_blank">Fiefdom: A Kingdom Novel</a></i> based in the world created by Dan Abnett in his <i>2000 AD </i>comic <i>Kingdom</i> earlier this year. As well as in our forthcoming <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Dangerous-Games-Jonathan-Oliver/dp/1781082685" target="_blank">Dangerous Games</a></i> anthology, so we are
beyond delighted to now be bringing you her first ever independent novel in
summer 2016. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Do check back for further updates on <i>Savant</i>, but for now we leave you with Nik Abnett herself talking
about the genesis of <i>Savant</i> and her
alter-ego:<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLPe0um6DAZmuIy8nbNYrKYerec9Q7kOxnkaSk08vIDRFpQ5MwuBzOtCK4k1mkUPdKaymNpPbDlQPdWtEG5kHnFnX9Slcb-PdtizqviprTLO9wz5B4fGVQbTq5CgErHj9jIkjCCA/s1600/Nik+Vincent.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLPe0um6DAZmuIy8nbNYrKYerec9Q7kOxnkaSk08vIDRFpQ5MwuBzOtCK4k1mkUPdKaymNpPbDlQPdWtEG5kHnFnX9Slcb-PdtizqviprTLO9wz5B4fGVQbTq5CgErHj9jIkjCCA/s1600/Nik+Vincent.jpg" height="200" width="158" /></a><span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Six or seven years ago, I was studying for a Fine Art degree and
wanted to do some work on identity. So, I set up an on-line persona with an
e-mail address and FaceBook page, and I bought a tablet so that all the work
she produced only existed in web-space.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Then, because I’m a writer, I picked up my laptop and began writing <i>Savant</i>, at least, my alter-ego wrote <i>Savant</i>, and she produced cover-art, too,
digitally, of course.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I’d never been very confident as a writer, and perhaps that’s why
I’d hidden behind tie-in and IP based fiction. It was a way to do what I loved
to do without taking too much responsibility. My own ideas always seemed a
little ‘out there’ a little ‘left of centre’, so I never pursued them. My
alter-ego had other ideas. She was tougher than I was, and she got things done.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I loved <i>Savant</i>, but it
wasn’t until Jonathan Oliver took an interest in the novel that it crossed my
mind that anyone else might want to read it. He’d invited me to write a story
for his <i>Dangerous Games</i> anthology,
and in one of our conversations he asked me about what else I was interested in
writing. The conversation led to horror and SF, and he probed until I promised
to send him <i>Savant</i>. The rest, as they
say, is history.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My alter-ego no longer has a web presence, because she doesn’t need
one. She never stopped writing, either.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><span lang="EN-US">About the author:</span></b><span lang="EN-US"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Nik Abnett has published work in a number of mediums, including
advertising, training manuals, comics and short stories. She has worked as a
ghost writer, is a frequent contributor to Black Library Publishing, and
regularly collaborates with her partner, novelist and comic author Dan Abnett.
In 2012 she was runner-up for the inaugural Mslexia novel-writing competition. <i>Savant</i> is her first solo, independent
full-length work of fiction and publishes summer 2016.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-42333587889998634452014-11-25T17:39:00.002+01:002014-11-25T17:39:29.024+01:00Solaris Books: a round up and an announcement<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's been an exciting couple of years here at Solaris Books: we've welcomed a new member of staff to our growing family, had a bumper year of award nominations and wins, and yesterday announced details of an incredibly exciting next step in the future of our publishing. So, with convention season wound-down for the year, we thought now would be a perfect time to look back at some of our personal highlights of the year:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Back in May we were delighted to <a href="http://solaris-editors-blog.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/introducing-our-new-fiction-pr-digital.html" target="_blank">introduce the newest member of Team Solaris</a>, Lydia Gittins, our new PR and Digital Promotions Assistant, who quickly established a "<a href="https://twitter.com/Lydia_FTS/status/528154484875091969" target="_blank">book fort</a>" on her desk in which to ensconce herself. Having already introduced her back in May we asked for her reflections six months on:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"I was so thrilled to be invited to join Solaris Books, I'd been a big fan of the imprint for several years ,and to then be given the opportunity to work closely with some of my favourite authors on their books is still just incredible to me. I love that every book Jon commissions or collection he edits is different from the last, so that every campaign we work on is a fresh challenge, and in 2015 we have some titles that I can't wait to share with everyone."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's also been another fantastic year of award nominations for Solaris Books and we can't even begin to express our gratitude to everyone who has taken the time to read, nominate and vote for books this year:<b> thank you</b>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Here are this year's titles, which join our rapidly growing list of award winners and nominees:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i><a href="http://www.rebellionstore.com/products/end_of_the_road" target="_blank">End of the Road</a></i>, edited by Jonathan Oliver (BFA for Best Anthology winner, Shirley Jackson Award for Best Anthology nominee and WFA for Best Anthology nominee)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i><a href="http://www.rebellionstore.com/products/ack-ack_macaque" target="_blank">Ack Ack Macaque</a></i>, by Gareth L Powell (BSFA for Best Novel winner)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i><a href="http://www.rebellionstore.com/products/dream_london" target="_blank">Dream London</a></i>, by Tony Ballantyne (BSFA for Best Cover Artwork winner to artist Joey Hi-Fi)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i><a href="http://www.rebellionstore.com/products/the_eidolon" target="_blank">The Eidolon</a></i>, by Libby McGugan (BFA for Best Novel nominee)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i><a href="http://www.rebellionstore.com/products/fearsome_journeys" target="_blank">Fearsome Journeys</a></i>, edited by Jonathan Strahan (WFA Best Anthology nominee)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i><a href="http://www.rebellionstore.com/products/the_best_science_fiction_and_fantasy_of_the_year_volume_eight" target="_blank">The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year</a></i>, edited by Jonathan Strahan (Hugo for Best Editor Short Form nominee)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To celebrate and to thank our readers we're throwing a flash sale on <b>all </b>our award winning and nominated titles from across the years: until December 3rd get the above eBooks, and many more, <a href="http://goo.gl/tl1hST" target="_blank">for just £2 directly from the DRM-free Rebellion Store</a>.<span id="goog_1376019078"></span><span id="goog_1376019079"></span><a href="https://www.blogger.com/"></a></span><br />
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<a href="http://goo.gl/tl1hST" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeMc-OrzAKQPq6G1dDDq9_IS9qLADuRn-INWGU2aeLOJYAZbrFKJQ4J__A6EHvd_JkZh_wrWfpz0hZqi5w9gQhuUnhwN8FzWQgpWutfTWNVtsCARUUviDkn_XTpWlKwjynXN6MFA/s1600/AWARD+SALE+BANNER.jpg" height="65" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Finally, as we hinted at in our introduction we have some really exciting news from our parent company Rebellion Publishing, who yesterday signed off on a fantastic new acquisitions plan for our front list publishing. We're delighted to be sharing the fantastic news that with immediate effect Solaris Books will be looking to sign new headline talent for our 2016/17 line-up to stand alongside our international bestselling authors, including Gail Z Martin, James Lovegrove and Rowena Cory Daniells. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Since Rebellion Publishing acquired Solaris Books in 2009 we've been delighted to continue to publish an innovative mix of new and traditional science fiction, fantasy and horror from both established authors and exciting new talent, with a commitment to promoting diversity in genre publishing. A full trade announcement about the acquisition drive can be found <a href="http://www.booktrade.info/index.php/showarticle/57007/tf" target="_blank">here</a>, but for now we leave you with a final statement from Solaris Editor-in-Chief Jonathan Oliver:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> “It’s been an incredible year at Solaris, both in terms of new talent and bestsellers. James Lovegrove’s godpunk series came to a thrilling end with <i>Age of Shiva</i>, only for him to kick off a brand new series with <i>World of Fire</i>. Gail Z. Martin returned to the Solaris fold with her terrific urban fantasy series, <i>Deadly Curiosities</i>, demonstrating why she continues to be one of our bestselling writers. We saw more from newer talents such as the incredible Dave Hutchinson, with his deeply prescient novel <i>Europe in Autumn</i>, and welcomed back the talents of such great writers as Steve Rasnic Tem with<i> Blood Kin</i>, Gaie Sebold with <i>Shanghai Sparrow</i>, and Emily Gee with <i>The Fire Prince</i>. We are committed to producing the best in genre fiction, publishing works that are entertaining, trilling and though provoking. I’m excited by what’s to come and the expansion in our commissioning remit means that we will be able to bring an even greater diversity of fiction to what is already a strong list.”</span><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEeF37WnadMH4Udn98dknaQzHAEz-zcGw-DkLg7JvDl-wm_8OWCc3z3u7BAmbsO2GdwMYFbk9IWzg4IP_WrdsbXNB3lqy_aJw3UPFsHDfTilDQURJCT4UgAcnSRt-aVqasYBUPfg/s1600/IMG_1702.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEeF37WnadMH4Udn98dknaQzHAEz-zcGw-DkLg7JvDl-wm_8OWCc3z3u7BAmbsO2GdwMYFbk9IWzg4IP_WrdsbXNB3lqy_aJw3UPFsHDfTilDQURJCT4UgAcnSRt-aVqasYBUPfg/s1600/IMG_1702.JPG" height="238" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">L-R: Jonathan Strahan and Jonathan Oliver at the World Fantasy Awards</span></td></tr>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-51656453534263836302014-11-18T15:59:00.001+01:002014-11-18T16:01:34.027+01:00The James Lovegrove Collection: exclusive excerpt from 'Days'<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdymXAHR7Vq_9fJ17Dc5UyiiFmuJ_zouAdoY2CtZDD9hYF5HeHnUOjirgRJqBacFvnWzhMI897_WfqBdCJa0_PJNU4DoNNh1gk8T7DVbD49FXiUWTEBUWKcnNnt8Rr2ETwkgM6NA/s1600/Days+bomb.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdymXAHR7Vq_9fJ17Dc5UyiiFmuJ_zouAdoY2CtZDD9hYF5HeHnUOjirgRJqBacFvnWzhMI897_WfqBdCJa0_PJNU4DoNNh1gk8T7DVbD49FXiUWTEBUWKcnNnt8Rr2ETwkgM6NA/s1600/Days+bomb.jpg" height="320" width="284" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Prologue</span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Seven Cities: According to Brewer’s Reader’s Handbook, seven cities are regarded as the great cities of all time, namely Alexandria, Jerusalem, Babylon, Athens, Rome, Constantinople, and either London (for commerce) or Paris (for beauty).</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">5.30 a.m.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> It is that time of morning, not quite night, not quite day, when the sky is a field of smudged grey, like a page of erased pencil marks, and in the empty city streets a hushing sound can be heard—an ever-present background sigh, audible only when all else is silent. It is that hour of dawn when the streetlamps flicker out one by one like heads being emptied of dreams, and pigeons with fraying, fume-coloured plumage open an eye. It is that moment when the sun, emerging, casts silvery rays and long shadows, and every building grows a black fan-shaped tail which it drapes across its westward neighbours.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> One building casts a broader shadow, darkens more with its penumbra, than any other. It rises at the city’s heart, immense and squat and square. Visible for miles around, it would seem to be the sole reason for which the houses and tower blocks and factories and warehouses around it exist. Hard rains and hot summers have turned its brickwork the colour of dried blood, and its roof is capped with a vast hemispherical glass dome that glints and glimmers as it rotates ponderously, with almost imperceptible slowness. Hidden gearings drive the dome through one full revolution every twenty-four hours. Half of it is crystal clear, the other half smoked black.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The building has seven floors, and each floor is fourteen metres high. Its sides are just over two and a half kilometres long, so that it sits on seven million hectares of land. With its bare brick flanks it looks like something that weighs heavy on the planet, like something that has been pounded in with God’s own sledgehammer.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> This is Days, the world’s first and (some still say) foremost gigastore.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Inside, Days is brackishly lit with half-powered bulbs. Night watchmen are making their final rounds through the store’s six hundred and sixty-six departments, the beams of their torches poking this way and that through the crepuscular stillness, sweeping focal haloes across the shelves and the displays, the cabinets and the countertops, the unimaginably vast array of merchandise that Days has to offer. The night watchmen’s movements are followed automatically by closed-circuit cameras mounted on whispering armatures. The cameras’ green LEDs are not yet lit.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Across the dollar-green marble floors of the store’s four main entrance halls janitors drive throbbing cleaning-machines the size of tractors, with spinning felt discs for wheels. The vehicles whirr and veer, reviving the marble’s oceanic sheen. At the centre of each entrance hall, embedded in the floor, is a mosaic, a circle seven metres in diameter divided into halves, one white, one black. The tesserae of the white half are bevelled opals, those of the black half slivers of onyx, some as large as saucers, some as small as pennies, all fitted intricately together. The janitors are careful to drive over the mosaics several times, to buff up the precious stones’ lustre.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> At the centre of the gigastore, tiered circular openings in each floor form an atrium that rises all the way up to the great glass dome. The tiers are painted in the colours of the spectrum, red rising to violet. Shafts of light steal in through the dome’s clear half, reaching down to a fine monofilament mesh level with the Red Floor. The mesh, half a kilometre in diameter, is stretched tight as a drum-skin above a canopy of palms and ferns, and between it and the canopy lies a gridwork of copper pipes.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> With a sudden hiss, a warm steamy mist purls out from holes in the pipes, and the tree canopy ripples appreciatively. The water vapour drifts down, growing thinner, fainter, sieved by layers of leaves and branches, to the ground, a loamy landscape of moss, rock, leaf mould and grass.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Here, at basement level, lies the Menagerie. Its insects are already busy. Its animals are stirring. Snarls and soft howls can be heard, and paws pad and undergrowth rustles as creatures great and small begin their daily prowling.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Outside Days, armed guards yawn and loll blearily at their posts. All around the building people lie huddled against the plate-glass windows that occupy the lower storey, the only windows in the building. Most of them sleep, but some hover fitfully in that lucid state between waking and dreaming where their dreams are as uncomfortable as their reality. The lucky ones have sleeping bags, gloves on their fingers, and shawls and scarves wrapped around their heads. The rest make do with blankets, fingerless gloves, hats, and thicknesses of begged, borrowed or stolen clothing.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And now, at last, as six o’clock approaches, over at the airport to the west of town a jet breaks the city’s silence. Its wingtips flaring like burnished silver in the low sunlight, it leaps along a runway, rears into the air and roars steeply skyward: the dawn shuttle, carrying yet another fuselage-full of émigrés westward, yet another few hundred healthy cells leaving the cancerous host-body of the motherland.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> The echo of the plane’s launch rumbles across the rooftops, reaching into every corner of the city, into the deeps of every citizen’s mind, so that collectively, at four minutes to six, as is the case every morning, the entire population is thinking the same thing: We are a little bit more alone than yesterday. And those who continue to sleep are troubled in their dreams, and those who come awake and stay awake find themselves gnawed by dissatisfaction and doubt.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> And still the day remorselessly brightens like a weed that, no matter what, will grow.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1</span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Seven Sleepers: Seven noble youths of Ephesus who martyred themselves under the emperor Decius in 250 A.D. by fleeing to a cave in Mount Celion, where, having fallen asleep, they were found by Decius, who had them sealed up.</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">6.00 a.m.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> The brass hands on the alarm clock on Frank Hubble’s bedside table divide its face in two. The perfect vertical diameter they form separates the pattern on the clockface into its component halves, on the left a black semicircle, on the right a white. A trip-switch clicks in the workings and the clock starts to ring.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Frank’s hand descends onto the clock, silencing the reveille almost before it has begun. He settles back, head sighing into duck-down pillows. The roar of the departing shuttle is now a distant lingering murmur, more remembered than heard. He tries to piece together the fragments of the dream from which he was summoned up by the knowledge that the alarm was about to go off, but the images spin elusively out of his grasp. The harder he reaches for them, the faster they hurtle away. Soon they are lost, leaving him with just the memory of having dreamed, which, he supposes, is better than not dreaming at all.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> The street below his bedroom window is startled by the sound of a car’s ignition. The window’s russet curtains are inflated by a breeze then sucked flat again. Frank hears the timer-controlled coffee machine in the kitchen gurgle into life, and moving his tongue thirstily he pictures fat brown droplets of a harsh arabica blend dripping into the pot. He waits for the sharp odour of brewing coffee to creep under the bedroom door and tweak his nose, then, with a grunt, unpeels the bedcovers and swings his legs out.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> He sits for a while on the side of the bed gazing down at his knees. He is a medium-sized man, well-proportioned and trim, although the years have worn away at his shoulders and put a curve in his upper vertebrae so that he suffers from a permanent hunch, as though he is saddled with a heavy, invisible yoke. His face is as rumpled as his pyjamas, and his hair is a grey that isn’t simply a dark white or a light black but an utter absence of tone. His eyes, too, are grey, the grey of gravestones.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In a bathroom whose midnight blue walls are flecked with stencilled gold stars, Frank urinates copiously into the lavatory bowl. Having pushed the flush and lowered the lavatory lid, he fills the basin with steaming-hot water, soaks a flannel and presses it hard against his face. Though his skin stings in protest, he holds the flannel in place until it cools. Then he lathers on shaving foam from a canister marked prominently with the same back-to-back semicircles of black and white as on the face of the alarm clock, and with a few deft strokes of a nickel-plated razor he is unbristled. He has his shaving down to such a fine art that he can leave his face smooth and nick-free without once consulting the mirror in front of him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Frank fears mirrors. Not because they tell him he is old (he knows that), nor because they tell him how worn and weary he looks (he has resigned himself to that), but because, of late, mirrors have begun to tell him another truth, one he would rather not acknowledge.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Still, it has become part of his pre-breakfast ablutions to confront this truth, and so, resting his hands on the sides of the basin, he raises his head and looks at his reflection.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Or rather, looks for his reflection, because in the mirror he sees nothing except the star-flecked, midnight blue bathroom wall behind him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Fighting down a familiar upsurge of panic, Frank concentrates. He is there. He knows he is there. The mirror is lying. He can feel his body, the organic life-support machine that keeps his mind going. He knows there is cool floor beneath his bare feet and porcelain basin in his hands because nerve-endings in his skin are reporting these facts to his brain, and fitted tightly and intricately into that skin is the configuration of flesh and bone and vein and sinew that is uniquely Frank Hubble. The air that slides over his lips as he breathes in and out tells him that he exists. He feels, therefore he is.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But the mirror continues to insist that he is not.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> He fixes his gaze on the point in space where his eyes should be. His mind is descending in an express lift, swooping vertiginously down towards a dark well of insanity where writhe not gibbering demons but wraiths, a blizzard of wraiths who float soundlessly, mouth hopelessly, twisting around each other, oblivious to each other, invisible to each other. Neither guilt nor shame, the common demons, terrify Frank. What he fears most is anonymity. The nameless wraiths flutter like intangible moths. Nothing is appearing in the mirror. Today, of all days, may be the day that he is finally swallowed up by the emptiness inside him. Unless he can visualise himself, he will be gone. Lost. Forgotten.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> He has to remember his eyes. If the eyes fall into place, he will be able to piece together the rest.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Gradually, with considerable effort, he makes two eyes emerge from the reflected wall, first the grave-grey irises, then their frames of white.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> He makes the eyes blink, to prove they are really his.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Now the lids appear, purple and puffy with sleep and age.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Now he shades in two eyebrows of the same smudgy, forgettable grey as his hair.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His forehead follows, and quickly the rest of his face falls into place—fisted nose, fettered jaw, furrowed cheeks, foetal ears.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Below his chin he has a neck, below his neck a collarbone that reaches to both shoulders from which drop arms that end in basin-bracing hands. The stripes of his pyjama jacket are sketched out in jagged parallel lines. On the breast pocket a stitched monogram of the divided black-and-white circle manifests itself.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> He can see everything of himself that is visible in the mirror. The struggle is over again for another day.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> But it is not with relief that Frank turns away from the basin. Who knows—the moment he takes his eyes off his reflection, perhaps it vanishes again. Behind our backs, who knows what mirrors do?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is a question Frank prefers not to ponder. Leaning over the bath, he levers up the mixer tap, and a fizzing cone of water spurts from the head of the shower. The mixer tap is marked with a black C on a white semicircle next to a black semicircle with a white H. Frank adjusts the water to a medium temperature, divests himself of his pyjamas, and steps into the bath, ringing the shower curtain across.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> The shower curtain, the flannel Frank uses to scrub himself, the bottle from which he squeezes out a palmful of medicated shampoo, his unscented soap, all sport the divided-circle logo, as do the bathmat he steps out onto when he has finished showering, the towel with which he dries his body off, and the robe he drapes around himself. The logo, in various guises and sizes, appears on no fewer than forty-seven different fixtures, fittings, and items of toiletry in the bathroom. Even the treacherous mirror has a coin-sized one etched into its corner.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Warm-skinned and tinglingly clean, Frank shuffles into the kitchen, using his fingers to comb his hair into a lank approximation of how it will look when dry. The timing of the ritual of his mornings is so ingrained that as he enters the kitchen, the last few drips of coffee are spitting into the pot; he can pick up the pot and pour out a mugful straight away.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Blowing steam from the rim of the mug, he opens the blinds. Staring out at the hazy silver city, he takes his first sip of coffee.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Usually Frank admires the view for all of three seconds, but this morning he takes his time. Even though the present position of every building, thoroughfare and empty rectangle of demolished rubble is familiar to him and forms part of a detailed and constantly updated mental map, he feels that, for posterity’s sake, he ought to make a ceremony out of this act of observation, so that in years to come he will remember how every morning at 6.17, for thirty-three years, he used to stand here and stare.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He suspects that all day long he will be highlighting mundane little moments like this, tagging the regular features of his daily routine which under normal circumstances he would perform on autopilot but which today he will fetishise as a long-term convict whose sentence is coming to an end must fetishise his last tin-tray meal, his last slopping-out, his last roll-call. Though it will be sweet never to have to do these things again, it will also be strange. After thirty-three years, routine has become the calipers of Frank’s life. He hates it, but he isn’t sure that he’s going to be able to manage without it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So, consciously and conscientiously he gazes out at a view that he has seen thousands of times before, either in the dark or in the false dawn or in broad daylight. He observes the thick-legged flyover, the spindly section of elevated railway along which a commuter train crawls like a steel caterpillar, the whole treeless, joyless expanse of flat-roofed concrete estates and crumpled, clustered houses. As with all employee apartments, the windows also offer him a view of Days, the distant store’s upper storeys lying like a lid over the city, but by lowering his head just a little, he can block it out of sight behind the rooftops.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Now he feels he has gazed enough. Into his otherwise tightly timetabled rising ritual he has factored two minutes of slack so that, unless there is a major hold-up, he is never late leaving the building. He has used up one of those minutes, and it is wise to keep the other in hand in case of emergency.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> It vaguely amuses him that he should be worrying about arriving late for work on what he fully expects to be his last day at Days, but a habit of thirty-three years’ standing is hard to break. How long will it take, he wonders, for the robot in him to adjust to life after Days. Will he wake up punctually at six every morning until he dies, even if there is nothing to get up for? Will he continue to take his coffee-break at 10.30, his lunch-break at 12.45, his tea-break at 4.30 in the afternoon? The patterns stamped into his brain by years of repetition will be difficult to reconfigure into something more suited to a leisurely lifestyle. For more than half his life he has been locked into a groove like a toy car, travelling the same circuit six days a week. Sundays have been days of disjointed lethargy: waking at six as usual, he passes the hours snoozing, reading the newspapers, watching television and generally feeling sleepy and out of sorts, his body unable to assimilate the hiccup in its circadian rhythm. Is that what his life will be like after he resigns? One long chain of Sundays?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Well, he will have to deal with that when it happens. For now, he has today—a Thursday—to contend with.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> He inserts a slice of bread into a chrome pop-up toaster which, with its vents and lines, calls to mind a vintage automobile. On the counter beside it sits a portable television set, which he switches on. Both toaster and television, needless to say, have the back-to-back D’s of the Days logo stamped on their housings.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The television is programmed so that whenever it comes on it automatically tunes in to the Days home-shopping channel. A pair of wax-faced women of indeterminable age are rhapsodising over a three-string cultured-pearl choker from the Jewellery Department, while a computer-generated simulation of the interior of the world’s first and (possibly) foremost gigastore planes sea-sickeningly to and fro behind them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> With a click of the remote control, Frank cuts to a news channel, and watches a report on the construction of the world’s first terastore in Australia—official title: the Bloody Big Shop. Intended to serve not just Australia and New Zealand but the Pacific Rim countries and South-East Asia as well, the Bloody Big Shop is an estimated eighteen months from completion but still, in its skeletal state, challenges its immediate neighbour, Ayers Rock, for size.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> The toaster jettisons its load of browned bread. In one corner of the slice a small semicircle of charring backs against an uncooked counterpart. This is the corner Frank butters and bites first.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Frank does not eat much. He doesn’t even finish the toast. He pours himself another coffee, turns off the television and heads for his dressing room.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Down a high-ceilinged hallway he passes doors to rooms he seldom uses, rooms whose immaculate and expensive furnishings would be under several inches of dust were it not for the ministrations of a cleaning lady Frank has never met. Shelves of books he hasn’t read line one side of the hallway, while on the other side paintings he barely notices any more cover the wall. A fussy-fingered interior decorator from Days chose the books and the paintings and the furnishings on Frank’s behalf, making free with Frank’s Iridium card. Frank has not yet paid off the sum outstanding on the card, so when he resigns he will have to surrender almost everything he owns back to the store. This will be no hardship.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> His Thursday outfit is waiting for him in the dressing room, each individual item hung or laid out. Frank put the trousers of his Thursday suit in the press the night before, last thing before he went to bed. The creases are pleasingly sharp.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> He dresses in an orderly and methodical manner, pausing after each step of the process to take a sip of coffee. He puts on a cool cotton shirt with a blue pinstripe and plain white buttons, and knots a maroon silk tie around his neck. He dons a charcoal-grey jacket to match the trousers, and slips a pair of black, cushion-soled brogues built more for comfort than elegance over the navy socks on his feet. Then he addresses himself to the full-length mirror that stands, canted in its frame, in one corner.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Patiently he pieces himself in.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> The clothes help. The clothes, as they say, make the man, and decked out in the very best that the Gentlemen’s Outfitters Department at Days has to offer, Frank feels very much made. The crisp outlines of the suit fall readily into place. The tie and shirt and shoes fill out the gaps. Frank’s head, neck and hands are the last to appear, the hardest to visualise. God help him, sometimes he can’t even remember what his face looks like. Once it manifests in the mirror, its familiarity mocks his faulty memory, but in the moments while he struggles to recall just one feature, Frank honestly fears that he has finally winked out of existence altogether, slipped sideways into limbo, become a genuine ghost as well as a professional one.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> He makes a point of fixing the time—6.34—in his mental souvenir album. At 6.34 every workday morning, give or take a minute, he has stood here newly dressed in an outfit every piece of which carries a label into which is woven a matched pair of semicircles, one black, one white, above the washing and ironing instructions. Tomorrow morning he will not be standing here. In one of the dressing-room wardrobes a packed suitcase waits. The fluorescent pink tag attached to its handle bears a flight number and the three-letter code for an airport in the United States. A first-class plane ticket sits on top of the suitcase. Tomorrow at 6.34 a.m. Frank will be aboard a silver-tinged shuttle jet, soaring above the clotted clouds, following the sun. One way, no return.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> He pauses, still unable to conceive how it will feel to be hurtling away from the city, all connections with the only place he has ever called home severed, no certainties ahead of him. A tiny voice inside his head asks him if he is crazy, and a larger, louder voice replies, with calm conviction, No.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">No. Leaving is probably the sanest thing he has ever done. The scariest, too.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Returning to the kitchen, Frank pours himself his third coffee, filling the mug to the brim as he empties the pot of its last drops.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Halfway through drinking the final instalment of his breakfast-time caffeine infusion he feels a twinge deep in his belly, and happily he heads for the bathroom, there to succumb to the seated pleasure of relieving his bowels of their contents, which are meagre, hard and dry, but nonetheless good to be rid of. Each sheet of the super-soft three-ply lavatory paper he uses is imprinted with ghostly-faint pairs of semicircles. When he was much younger, Frank used to treat the Days logo with almost religious reverence. As an icon, its ubiquitousness indicated to him its power. He was proud to be associated with the symbol. Where before he might have balked at such an act of desecration, now he thinks nothing of wiping his arse on it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> In the bedroom again, he straps on his sole sartorial accessory, a Days wristwatch—gold casing, patent-leather strap, Swiss movement. Before he slips his wallet into his inside jacket pocket, he checks that his Iridium card is still there, not because he expects it to have been stolen but because that is what he has done every morning at 6.41 for thirty-three years.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> He slides the Iridium from its velvet sheath. The card gleams iridescently like a rectangular wafer of mother-of-pearl. Holding it up to the light and gently flexing it, Frank watches rainbows chase one another across its surface, rippling around the raised characters of his name and the card number and the grainily engraved Days logo. Hard to believe something so light and thin could be a millstone. Hard to believe something so beautiful could be the source of so much misery.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> He returns the card to its sheath, the sheath to his wallet. Now he is ready to leave. There is nothing keeping him here.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Except ...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> He spends his second “spare” minute wandering around the flat, touching the things that belong to him, that tomorrow will not belong to him. His fingertips drift over fabrics and varnishes and glass as he glides from room to room, through a living space that, for all the emotional attachment he has to it, might as well be a museum.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> How he has managed to accumulate so many possessions, so many pieces of furniture and objets d’art, is something of a mystery to Frank. He can vaguely recall over the past thirty-three years handing over his Iridium to pay for purchases which took him all of a few seconds to pick out, but he is hard pressed to remember actually buying the individual items—this Art Deco vase, say, or that Turkish kilim—let alone how much they cost. No doubt the Days interior decorator was responsible for obtaining and installing many of the pieces Frank has no memory of acquiring, but not all. That’s how little the transactions have meant to him, how unreal they have seemed. He has bought things reflexively, not because he wants to but because his Iridium has meant he can, and now he is mired in a debt that will take at least another decade of employment to work off.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> But as he cannot bear the thought of another day at Days, and as what he owns has no value to him, not even of the sentimental kind, he feels no qualms about his decision to tender his resignation today. To quit, as the Americans would say. (So direct, Americans. They always find a succinct way of putting things, which is why Frank is looking forward to living among them, because he admires those qualities in others he finds lacking in himself.) He has calculated that by repossessing the flat and all that is in it, his employers ought to consider the debt squared. And if they don’t, then they will just have to come looking for him in America. And America is a very big place, and Frank can be a very hard man to find.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> His tour of the flat is complete. It is 6.43, and he has pushed his timetable to its limit. There can be no more procrastinating. He takes a black cashmere overcoat from the coat rack by the flat door and flings it on. The door clicks softly open, snicks snugly shut. Frank steps out onto the landing, part of a central stairwell that winds around a lift shaft enclosed in a wrought-iron cage. He keys the Down button by the lift gate, and there is a whine and a churning of cogs from deep down in the shaft. The cables start to ribbon.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>The James Lovegrove Collection: Volume One</i> is out December 2014 and is the first in a three part retrospective of the early works of James Lovegrove.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Pre-order <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/James-Lovegrove-Collection-Vol/dp/1781082669/" target="_blank">UK</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.com/James-Lovegrove-Collection-One/dp/1781082677" target="_blank">US<i> </i></a></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-4711342750709712562014-11-14T15:50:00.002+01:002014-11-14T15:51:09.784+01:00Solaris acquisition announcement: UBO by Steve Rasnic Tem<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Solaris Books is today delighted to share with our readers
the announcement that we will be publishing horror legend Steve Rasnic Tem’s
long-awaited first dark SF novel <i>UBO</i> in Spring 2016.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>UBO</i> is a timely and poignant look at humanity’s
relationship with violence, and has been a work in progress for Tem since the
early 80s. In <i>UBO</i> Tem combines his flair for horror with a beautifully
conceptualised future world set in the prison of “Ubo,” from which the title
draws its title, to create a poignantly realised and highly terrifying glimpse
into the darker side of human nature.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Every resident has a similar memory of the journey to
Ubo: a dream of dry, chitinous wings crossing the moon, the gigantic insects so
like roaches or cicadae dropping swiftly over the houses of the neighborhood.
Dark memb</span></i><i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">ranes and scabrous exoskeleton pass through walls and windows in some
manner magical or scientific that resembles most a deck of dusky and baroquely
ornamented cards fanning themselves from one hidden world into the next.”</span></i></div>
<br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Now in Ubo, Daniel has no idea how long he has been
imprisoned by the roaches. Each day they force him to play a different figure
from humanity’s violent history, from a frenzied Jack the Ripper to a stumbling
and confused Stalin to a self-proclaimed god executing survivors atop the
accumulated ruins of the world. The hellish scenarios mutate day after day in
this concentration camp somewhere beyond the rules of time, as skies burn and
prisoners go mad, identities dissolving as the experiments evolve toward their
mysterious end.</i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLUwfJaSBX7G3lrE0Lcq31eOYH4Cy4K3lZt6bCCRpEtyTNz9feexE5GLxVRFNFPcqa9idA8Sp2VmCWI7B-kjVlJB1W2XPLGvA9B6yrQXxjX3UzPorXcni1toedI6KXE38HBhb93Q/s1600/UBO+moodboard.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLUwfJaSBX7G3lrE0Lcq31eOYH4Cy4K3lZt6bCCRpEtyTNz9feexE5GLxVRFNFPcqa9idA8Sp2VmCWI7B-kjVlJB1W2XPLGvA9B6yrQXxjX3UzPorXcni1toedI6KXE38HBhb93Q/s1600/UBO+moodboard.jpg" height="217" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">UBO inspiration board: see more & image credits at<br /><a href="http://www.pinterest.com/stevetem/a-meditation-on-human-violence/">http://www.pinterest.com/stevetem/a-meditation-on-human-violence/</a><br />PLEASE NOTE: this board contains some images that readers may find upsetting.</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Speaking exclusively with the When Gravity Fails blog Tem
describes working on </span><i style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">UBO</i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Sometimes when you’re working on a piece you realize you’re
not yet intellectually, or creatively, or emotionally equipped to do the
material justice (and sometimes all three). My novel UBO, a meditation on
violence, has been such a project for me. I began it in the early 80s, and
showed sample chapters to a number of writers I respected. Some thought it was
wonderful and showed great promise. Others thought a book about humankind’s
propensity for violence was the last thing they wanted to read. For myself, I
knew it was the most challenging thing I’d ever attempted. More problematic,
however, was the fact that I had a 5- and an 8-year-old at home, and toiling in
the land of Ubo during the day and then playing with my children and reading
them bedtime stories proved to be a wrenching experience. I put the manuscript
aside. Over the years I’d pick it up again, but I’d discover that either I
wasn't emotionally ready to tackle it, or I doubted my level of craft. Which
brings us to today. At 64 years old I'm a little wiser perhaps; certainly I'm a
lot more foolish. I'm still rather emotional, but I've learned that for me at
least that seems to go with the job. And the book is done.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We’re incredibly excited for the opportunity to be able to
publish this amazing work, from one of our favourite authors and we hope
you’re looking forward to it as much as we are. </span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">For now we leave you with a few
words from our Editor-in-Chief Jonathan Oliver on the acquisition:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Steve is one of the most exciting and diverse voices in
genre. Granted, he’s known mainly for horror, but this move into dark SF is an
entirely natural progression for Steve. I’ve been enjoying his weird SF stories
for years and to bring these talents to a novel is very exciting. There is no
one quite like Steve Rasnic Tem.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKTWTEtY_gkIS1opiow3C-W5pyY84u0qBPf0YTohkNyWOEnBbUBkbmmZ-6J31_MW4Lo8Rb6lmQz3K9K7YjdsiNVwfKicmpu5x3o5NpBVpSWeBVi8Pww92pfvz8h8nTQHH8O_o0Vw/s1600/steve_tem_by_Debra_Lee_Fanatia.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKTWTEtY_gkIS1opiow3C-W5pyY84u0qBPf0YTohkNyWOEnBbUBkbmmZ-6J31_MW4Lo8Rb6lmQz3K9K7YjdsiNVwfKicmpu5x3o5NpBVpSWeBVi8Pww92pfvz8h8nTQHH8O_o0Vw/s1600/steve_tem_by_Debra_Lee_Fanatia.jpg" height="166" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>UBO </i>is set to publish Spring 2016.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Steve Rasnic Tem</b> is the author of over 400 published
short stories, 6 novels, 9 collections, and is a past winner of the Bram
Stoker, International Horror Guild, British Fantasy, and World Fantasy Awards. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He is the author of 2 previous novels for Solaris: <i>Deadfall
Hotel</i> (2012) and <i>Blood Kin </i>(2014).<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<o:p><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></o:p></div>
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<o:p><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Press enquires should be directed to Lydia Gittins at <a href="mailto:press@rebellion.co.uk">press@rebellion.co.uk</a> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-53041654310362252682014-11-13T11:47:00.000+01:002014-11-13T19:59:06.117+01:00Macaque Attack by Gareth L Powell: exclusive preview <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixnw2OhKkqqWUEbUX7eKbIvbvPFskkBrXO1c0J82kUdue5OhuMb4pn_igwnJi_N6ZUeO1m0JSjsKuwSUEEmLBVjxfJTFCp3bSdwSraj8Y81ckk2aCuMkkVoQNJWXHk1QQcMh6NLQ/s1600/MACAQUE+ATTACK.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixnw2OhKkqqWUEbUX7eKbIvbvPFskkBrXO1c0J82kUdue5OhuMb4pn_igwnJi_N6ZUeO1m0JSjsKuwSUEEmLBVjxfJTFCp3bSdwSraj8Y81ckk2aCuMkkVoQNJWXHk1QQcMh6NLQ/s400/MACAQUE+ATTACK.jpg" width="257" /></span></a></div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">CHAPTER ONE</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">INSTANT KARMA</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Are you sure we should be doing this?” The driver’s sharp green eyes met Victoria’s in the rearview mirror and she looked away, twisting her gloved hands in her lap. She was being driven through Paris in a shiny black Mercedes. The parked cars, buildings and skeletal linden trees were bright and crisp beneath the winter sun.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I think so.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">At the wheel, K8 shrugged. She was nineteen years old, with cropped copper hair and a smart white suit.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Only…”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Victoria frowned, and brushed a speck of dust from the knee of her black trousers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Only what?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Should it be you that does it? Maybe somebody else—”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“She won’t listen to anybody else.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“You don’t know that for sure.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I really do.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They passed across the Pont Neuf. Sunlight glittered off the waters of the Seine. The towers of Notre Dame stood resolute against the sky, their solidity a direct counterpoint to the ephemeral advertising holograms that stepped and swaggered above the city’s boulevards and streets.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Look,” Victoria said apologetically, “I didn’t mean to be snappy. I really appreciate you coming along. I know things haven’t been easy for you recently.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">K8 kept her attention focused on the road ahead.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“We are fine.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“It must have been tough for you.” During the final battle over London, the poor kid had been assimilated into the Gestalt hive mind. For a time, she’d been part of a group consciousness, lost in a sea of other people’s thoughts.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“It was, but we’re okay now. Really.” There were no other members of the Gestalt on this parallel version of the Earth. For the first time since the battle, the girl was alone in her head.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“You’re still referring to yourself in the plural.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“We can’t help it.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The car negotiated the Place de la Bastille, and plunged into the narrow streets beyond. Their target lived in a two-room apartment on the third floor of a red brick house on the corner of la Rue Pétion. When they reached the address, Victoria instructed K8 to park the Mercedes at the opposite end of the avenue and wait. Then she got out and walked back towards the house.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">With her hands in the pockets of her long army coat, she sniffed the cold air. This morning, Paris smelled of damp leaves and fresh coffee. Far away and long ago, on another timeline entirely, this had been her neighbourhood, her street. Even the graffiti tags scrawled between the shop-fronts seemed just as she remembered them from when she lived here as a journalist for Le Monde, in the days before she met Paul.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Paul…</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Victoria squeezed her fists and pushed them deeper into her pockets. Paul was her ex-husband. In the three years since his death, he’d existed as a computer simulation. She’d managed to keep him alive, despite the fact that personality ‘back-ups’ were inherently unstable and prone to dissolution. Originally developed for battlefield use, back-ups had become a means by which the civilian deceased—at least those who could afford the implants—could say their goodbyes after death and tie up their affairs. The recordings weren’t intended or expected to endure more than six months but, with her help, Paul had already far exceeded that limit.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But nothing lasts forever.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">During the past weeks, Paul’s virtual personality had become increasingly erratic and forgetful, and she knew he couldn’t hold out much longer. In order to preserve whatever run-time he might have left, she’d found a way to pause his simulation, leaving him frozen in time until her return. She didn’t want to lose him. In many ways, he was the love of her life; and yet she knew her attempts to hold on to him were only delaying the inevitable. Sooner or later, she’d have to let him go. Three years after his death, she’d finally have to say goodbye.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Scuffing the soles of her boots against the pavement, she wondered if the woman inhabiting the apartment above had anyone significant in her life. This woman still lived and worked as a reporter in Paris, was registered as single on her social media profile, and had somehow managed to avoid the helicopter crash that had left Victoria with a skull full of prosthetic gelware processors.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Victoria reached up and adjusted the fur cap covering her bald scalp.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This would have been my life, she thought, if I’d never met Paul, never gone to the Falklands…</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She felt a surge of irrational hatred for the woman who shared her face, the stranger who had once been her but whose life had diverged at an unspecified point. Where had that divergence come? Who knew? A missed promotion, perhaps, or maybe something as banal as simply turning right when her other self had turned left… Now, they were completely different people. One of them was a newspaper correspondent living in a hip quarter of Paris, the other a battle-hardened skyliner captain in league with an army of dimension-hopping monkeys.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">At the front door, she hesitated. How could she explain any of this?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">For the past two years, she’d been travelling with Ack-Ack Macaque, jumping from one world to the next. Together, they’d sought out and freed as many of his simian counterparts as they could find, unhooking them from whichever video games or weapons guidance systems they’d been wired into, and telling them they were no longer alone, no longer unique—welcoming them into the troupe. But in all that time, on all those worlds, she’d never once sought out an alternate version of herself. The thought simply hadn’t occurred to her.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Here and now, though, things were different. K8 had tracked the most likely location of Ack-Ack Macaque’s counterpart on this world to an organisation known as the Malsight Institute. It was a privately funded research facility on the outskirts of Paris, surrounded by security fences and razor wire. While trying to hack its systems from outside, K8 had discovered a file containing a list of people the institute saw as ‘threats’ to their continued operation. Victoria’s counterpart had been the third person named on that list. Apparently, she’d been asking questions, probing around online, and generally making a nuisance of herself. The first two people on the list were already dead, their deaths part of an ongoing police investigation. One had been a former employee of the institute, the other an investigative journalist for an online news site. Both had been found stabbed and mutilated, their bodies charred almost beyond all recognition. Hence, the reason for this visit. If the deaths were connected to the Institute, Victoria felt duty-bound to warn her other self before the woman wound up as a headline on the evening news, her hacked and blackened corpse grinning from the smoking remains of a burned-out car.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">From the pocket of her coat, she drew her house key. She’d kept the small sliver of brass and nickel with her for years, letting it rattle around in the bottom of one suitcase after another like a half-forgotten talisman. She’d never expected to need it again, but neither had she ever managed to quite bring herself to throw it away.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She slid the key into the lock and opened the door. Inside, the hallway was exactly as she remembered: black and white diamond-shaped floor tiles; a side table piled with uncollected mail, free newspapers and takeaway menus; and a black-railed staircase leading to the floors above. She closed the front door behind her and made her way up, her thick-soled boots making dull clumps on the uncarpeted steps.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The feel of the smooth bannister, the creak of the stairs, even the slightly musty smell of the walls brought back memories of a time that had been, in retrospect, happier and simpler.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In particular, she remembered an upstairs neighbour, a woman in her mid-forties with a taste for young men. Often, Victoria had found she had to turn up her TV to hide the bumps and giggles from above. One time, a lump of plaster fell off the ceiling and smashed her glass coffee table. Then, in the morning, there would usually be a young man standing in the communal stairwell. Some were lost, some shell shocked or euphoric. Some were reassessing their lives and relationships in the light of the previous night’s events. Victoria would take them in and make them coffee, call them cabs or get them cigarettes, that sort of thing.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She liked their company. In those days, she liked being useful. And sometimes, one of the boys would stay with her for a few days. They used her to wind down, to ground themselves. Sometimes, they just needed to talk. And when they left, as they inevitably did, it made her sad. She would rinse out their empty coffee mugs, clean the ashtrays, and fetch herself a glass of wine from the fridge. Then she would settle herself on the sofa again, rest her feet on the coffee table frame, and turn the TV volume way up.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Somebody screamed. The sound cut through her memories. It came from above. Reaching into her coat pocket, Victoria pulled the retractable fighting stick from her coat and shook it out to its full two-metre length. Was she already too late? Taking the stairs two at a time, she reached the third floor to find the door of the apartment—her apartment—locked, and fresh blood spreading from beneath it, soaking into the bristles of the welcome mat.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She’d been around the monkey long enough to know she’d only hurt herself if she tried shoulder-charging the door. Instead, she delivered a sharp kick with the heel of her heavy boot, aiming for the edge of door opposite the handle. The lock would be strong, but only a handful of screws held the hinges in place. She heard wood crack, but the door remained closed. Leaning backwards for balance, she kicked again. This time, the frame splintered, the hinges came away from the wall, and the door crashed inwards and to the side.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Victoria pushed through, stepping over the puddle of blood, and found herself on the threshold of a familiar-looking room. A body lay on the floor by the couch. It had shoulder-length blonde hair. A tall, thin man loomed over it, a long black knife in his almost skeletal hand. His shoes had left red prints on the parquet floor, and there was a long smear where he’d dragged the body. As she burst in, he looked up at her. His face was set in a rictus grin, and she swallowed back a surge of revulsion.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Cassius Berg.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His expression didn’t change, and she knew it couldn’t. His skin had been stretched taut over an artificial frame.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Who are you?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Victoria swallowed. She felt as if she was talking to a ghost. “The last time we met, I dropped you out of a skyliner’s cargo hatch, four hundred feet above Windsor.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He tipped his head on one side. His eyes were reptilian slits.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“What are you on about?” He stepped over the corpse and brandished the knife. “Who are you?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Victoria moved her staff into a defensive position.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I’m her.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She couldn’t bring herself to look directly at the body. As a reporter, she’d seen her share of violent crime scenes, and knew what to expect. Instead, she looked inside her own head, concentrating on the mental commands that transferred her consciousness from the battered remains of her natural cortex to the clean, bright clarity of her gelware implants.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Berg’s posture tightened. He glanced from her to the body, and back again.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Twin sister?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Something like that.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Lucky me.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The first time she’d fought him—or at least the version of him from her own parallel—he’d been superhumanly fast and tough, and he’d almost killed her. She’d been left for dead with a hole punched through the back of her skull. She tightened her grip on the metal staff. This time would be different. This time, she knew all about him, knew his methods and limitations, while he remained blissfully unaware of her capabilities.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Visualising her internal menu, she overclocked her neural processors. As the speed of her thinking increased, her perception of time stretched and slowed. The traffic noise from outside deepened, winding down like a faulty tape. In slow motion, she saw Berg’s muscles tense. His legs pushed up and he surged towards her, black coat flapping around behind him, knife held forward, aimed at her face. His speed was astonishing. A normal human would have been pinned through the eye before they could move. As it was, Victoria only just managed to spin aside. As momentum carried him past, she completed her twirl and brought the end of her staff cracking into the back of his head. The blow caught him off balance and sent him flailing forwards with an indignant cry, through the remains of the front door and out, into the hallway.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He ended up on his hands and knees. Victoria stepped up behind him, but before she could bring her staff down, Berg’s spindly arm slashed backwards, and his knife caught her across the shins, slicing through denim and skin. The pain registered as a sharp red alarm somewhere at the back of her mind, way down in the animal part of her brain, and she tried to ignore it. It was a distraction, the gelware told her, nothing more. Her heart thumped in her chest, each beat like the pounding of some great engine. He’d hurt her before; she wouldn’t allow him to hurt her again. She stabbed down with her staff, pinning his wrist to the hardwood floor, and leant her weight on it. She ground until she felt the bones of his hand snap and crack, and saw the knife fall from his fingers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Berg’s head turned to look at her. Although the grin remained stretched across his face, his eyes were wide and fearful.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Who are you?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I told you.” Victoria could feel blood running down her shins, soaking into the tops of her socks. She glanced back at the dead woman in the apartment, and saw blonde hair mixed with wine-coloured blood, and an out-thrown hand with torn and bruised knuckles. The poor woman hadn’t stood a chance. She’d been butchered, and all Victoria could do now was avenge her.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I’m Victoria Valois.” She stepped forward and raised her weapon high over her head. She wanted to bring it down hard, driving the butt end into the space between his eyes. She wanted to feel his metal skull cave beneath her blow, feel his brains squish and perish. He had killed at least three people, probably more, and would kill her too if he got the chance.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He deserved to die.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And yet…</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">CHAPTER TWO</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">UNCLEAN ZOO</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Taking off from a private airstrip on the outskirts of Paris, Victoria and K8 flew across the English Channel in a borrowed seaplane, with Cassius Berg handcuffed and gagged in the hold. They were heading for a sea fort that stood a few miles off the coast of Portsmouth. When the old structure came into sight, they splashed the plane into the waters of the Solent, carving a feather of white across the shimmering blue surface, and taxied to the rotting jetty that served as the fort’s one and only link with the outside world.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The seaplane was an ancient Grumman Goose: a small and ungainly contraption with which Victoria had somehow fallen grudgingly in love. The little aircraft had two chunky propeller engines mounted on an overhead wing, and the main fuselage dangled between them like a fat-bottomed boat bolted to the underside of a boomerang.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">When she stepped from the plane’s hatch, Victoria found a monkey waiting for her, fishing from the end of the jetty. It wore a flowery sunhat and a string vest, and had a large silver pistol tucked into the waistband of its cut-off denim shorts. Overhead, the sun burned white and clean.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I’m Valois.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The monkey watched her from behind its mirrored shades. She couldn’t remember its name. A portable transistor radio, resting on the planks beside the bait bucket, played scratchy Europop.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“So?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Behind the monkey, at the far end of the jetty, the fort rose as an implacable, curving wall of stone. Victoria swallowed back her irritation. The breeze blowing in from the sea held the all-too-familiar fragrances of brine, fresh fish, and childhood holidays. Considering it was November, the day felt exceptionally mild.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Where’s your boss?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Does he know you’re coming?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Don’t be stupid.” She slipped off her flying jacket, pulled a red bandana from her trouser pocket, and wiped her forehead. Keeping hold of its rod with one hand, the monkey produced a rolled-up cigarette from behind its ear. The paper was damp and starting to unravel. It pushed the rollup between its yellowing teeth, and lit up using a match struck against the jetty’s crumbling planks.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I don’t think he’ll want to see you.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Smoke curled around it, blue in the sunlight. Victoria sighed, and raised her eyes to the armoured Zeppelin tethered to the fort’s radio mast.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Is he up there?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Yeah, but he ain’t taking no visitors.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“We’ll see about that.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She went back to the Goose and pulled Berg out onto the jetty’s planks. He blinked against the sunlight. Victoria slipped a loop of rope around his neck, and jerked on it like a dog chain. Leaving K8 to secure the plane, she led her prisoner past the startled monkey, along the jetty, and into the coolness of the stone fort.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The corridors were dank with rainwater, and she was surprised to feel a sense of homecoming. Despite the frosty welcome, this little manmade island felt more like home than anywhere else on this timeline. She’d spent the past six weeks in Europe, but it hadn’t been her Europe. Everything about it had been different and, to her, somehow wrong. She looked forward to getting back to the familiar cabins and gangways of the armoured airship, and Paul.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Would he even remember her?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Dragging Berg, she stomped her way across the fort’s main flagstone courtyard.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Standing in the English Channel, several miles off the coast of the Isle of Wight, the circular fort had been built in the 19th century to defend Portsmouth from the French. Made of thick stone and surrounded by water on all sides, the structure had lain derelict until the turn of the millennium, when an enterprising developer had converted the stronghold into a luxury hotel and conference centre, complete with open-air swimming pool. Fifty years, and two stock market crashes, later, the weeds and rust had returned; and now that the place had been ‘liberated’ by the monkey army, it more resembled an unclean zoo than an exclusive resort. The water in the swimming pool lay brown and stagnant, its scummy surface speckled by shoals of empty beer cans and the wallowing bleach-white bones of broken patio furniture. Shards of glass littered the patio area.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The steps up to the base of the radio mast were where she remembered, still overgrown with lichen, grass and mould. The grass whispered against her leather boots, and she knew suspicious eyes watched her from the fort’s seemingly empty windows.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Stupid monkeys.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She’d only been gone six weeks.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Once aboard the airship, Victoria led Berg to the artificial jungle built into the vessel’s glass-panelled nose. Cut off from the rest of the craft by a thick brass door, this leafy enclosure formed Ack-Ack Macaque’s personal and private sanctuary and, at first, the monkeys guarding it didn’t want to let her in.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“He’s in a foul mood,” warned the one wearing a leather vest.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Victoria tugged at the rope around Berg’s neck, making him stumble forwards.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“He’ll be in a worse one by the time I’m through with him. Now, are you going to let me past or not?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The monkeys exchanged glances. They knew who she was, yet were obviously nervous about troubling their leader. Finally the older of the two, a grey-muzzled macaque with a thick gold ring in his right ear, stood aside.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Go ahead, ma’am.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Thank you.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Victoria pushed open the heavy door and stepped inside. The chamber was a vast vault occupying the forward portion of the airship’s main hull. The floor had been covered in reed matting, on which stood hundreds of large ceramic pots. Palm trees and other jungle plants grew from the pots, forming a canopy overhead, and it took her a minute or so to make her way through the trees to the wooden verandah overlooking the interior of the craft’s glass bow. Birds and butterflies twitched hither and thither among the branches. The air smelled like the interior of a greenhouse.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ack-Ack Macaque stood at the verandah’s rail, hands clasped behind his back and a fat cigar clamped in his teeth. He didn’t turn as Victoria walked up behind him.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“You’re back,” he said.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I am.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">From where he stood, he could see the sea fort and the blue waters of the Channel.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Any luck?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Some.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She took her prisoner by the shoulder and pushed him down, into a kneeling position on the planks at his feet. Ack-Ack Macaque looked down with his one good eye.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Who’s that?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Cassisus Berg.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The monkey gave the man an experimental prod with his shoe.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Didn’t you kill that fucker once already?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Not on this timeline.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ack-Ack frowned at her. Her face was pale despite her exertions, and her eyes were red and tired-looking. He could see she hadn’t slept well in several days. “And your other self? Did you find her?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“We were too late.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A wrought-iron patio table stood a little way along the verandah. Behind it stood a wheeled drinks cabinet filled with bottles of all shapes and sizes. Victoria left Berg kneeling where he was and walked over and helped herself to a vodka martini.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A parrot squawked in one of the higher branches, its plumage red against the canopy’s khaki and emerald.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Six weeks ago, Ack-Ack Macaque had tried to talk her out of getting involved with another version of herself but, predictably, she hadn’t listened—and he’d had more than enough to do trying to keep control of his monkey army. The problem with being the alpha monkey was that they all looked to him to tell them what to do and arbitrate all their pathetic squabbles. When faced with any kind of decision, they were more than happy to pass the responsibility up the chain of command until it dropped into his lap. It was the way primate troupes worked; it was also the way the military worked, and he didn’t like it. It was a pain in the hole. He was used to being a maverick, a grunt, an ace pilot rather than an Air Marshal. Being a leader cramped his style.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Considering the figure at his feet, he said, “What are we going to do with him?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Victoria took a sip from the glass, and wiped her lips on the back of her gloved hand.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“He’s a cyborg, same as before. A human brain in an artificial body.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ack-Ack Macaque twitched his nostrils. The man smelled like an old, wet raincoat. He gave the guy a nudge and, arms still cuffed behind him, Berg tipped over onto his side.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“It’s definitely him, though?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He watched as Victoria swirled the clear liquid in the bottom of her glass.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Mais oui,” she said. “And you realise what this means, don’t you?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ack-Ack Macaque scowled at her.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Should I?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“It means Nguyen’s on this parallel, too.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ack-Ack Macaque’s hackles rose. His scowl turned to a snarl, and his fingers went to his hips, where two silver Colts shone in their holsters.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Where is he?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Paris, I think. An operation calling itself the Malsight Institute. I had K8 pull up some information on it.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“And?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Officially it doesn’t exist. There’s nothing about it until two years ago. Rumours, conspiracy theories, that sort of thing. Very secretive, government money. Black research. Heavy security.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Sounds familiar.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“If he’s there, and he’s building another robot army, we have to stop him.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ack-Ack Macaque growled, deep in his throat. Doctor Nguyen had been the man responsible for creating them both in his laboratories—their own personal Frankenstein. He took the cigar from his lips and rolled it in his fingers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“We leave in an hour,” he decided. He was overdue for some action, and, after spending the last six weeks trying to sort out the complaints and squabbles of a troupe of irritable, irresponsible monkeys, he was itching to bust some skulls. “Reactivate your husband and recall the crew.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“What are you going to do?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“What do you think I’m going to do?” His lips curled back, revealing his sharp yellow fangs. He clamped the cigar back between his teeth. Leathery fingers bunched into fists. “If Nguyen’s here, I’m going to grab the bastard by the ears and rip his fucking head off.”</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Macaque Attack is out January 2015</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Pre-order <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Macaque-Attack-Ack-Ack-Gareth-Powell/dp/1781082855" target="_blank">UK</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Macaque-Attack-Ack-Ack-Gareth-Powell/dp/1781082863" target="_blank">US</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Netgalley reviewers can request a review copy here <a href="https://www.netgalley.com/catalog/show/id/55575" target="_blank">now</a>.</span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-78331174649726753982014-11-12T18:20:00.001+01:002014-11-12T18:24:32.871+01:00Introducing Cannonbridge by Jonathan Barnes<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Here at Solaris Towers we're starting to look ahead to next year's schedule, and over next few weeks we'll be in touch with some of our personal highlights from the coming year. So, what what better way to start than by returning to the 19th Century with the critically author of 2007's debut breakthrough novel <i>The Somnambulist</i>, Jonathan Barnes, for his latest foray into this past world....</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ladies and gentlemen, we introduce to you the greatest literary figure of our time: Matthew Cannonbridge.</span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Flamboyant Matthew Cannonbridge was touched by genius, the
most influential mind of the 19th century, a novelist, playwright, the poet of his
generation. The only problem is, he should never have existed, and recently
divorced 21st century don Toby Judd is the only person to realise something is
wrong with history.</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Cannonbridge was everywhere: he was by Lake Geneva when talk
between Byron, Shelley and Mary Godwin turned to the supernatural; he was
friend to the young Dickens as he laboured in the blacking factory; he was the only
man of note to visit Wilde in prison. His extraordinary life spanned a century.
But as the world prepares to toast the bicentenary of Cannonbridge’s most
celebrated work, Judd’s discovery leads him on a breakneck chase across the
English canon and countryside, to the realisation that the spectre of Matthew
Cannonbridge, planted so seamlessly into the heart of the 19thcentury, might
not be so dead and buried after all…</i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Cannongridge</i> is out February 2015, pre-order in the <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Cannonbridge-Jonathan-Barnes/dp/1781082979" target="_blank">UK</a> & <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Cannonbridge-Jonathan-Barnes/dp/1781082979" target="_blank">US</a> now.</span><br />
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">***</span></i></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitoN7kyhGpeattnp6CBuB45YlZcWCtsvlNCmM6g7KzkwyIMzdORIRorv1-10Q_yi1flZd3FAV5sTaac8-BYUf5lBE0QrH6_BOcnNkU-MRExZ43SMdF4ThHjliek54Wt2rIAGl1uw/s1600/JBarnes.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitoN7kyhGpeattnp6CBuB45YlZcWCtsvlNCmM6g7KzkwyIMzdORIRorv1-10Q_yi1flZd3FAV5sTaac8-BYUf5lBE0QrH6_BOcnNkU-MRExZ43SMdF4ThHjliek54Wt2rIAGl1uw/s1600/JBarnes.jpg" /></span></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Jonathan Barnes</b> was born in 1979 and was educated in Norfolk and at
Oxford University, where he graduated with a first-class degree in English
Language and Literature.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His first novel, <i>The Somnambulist</i>, was published in 2007 and
his second, <i>The Domino Men</i>, in 2008. Between them they have been translated
into eight languages. He writes regularly for the <i>Times Literary Supplement</i> and <i>The Literary Review</i> and has contributed to the Arts pages of <i>The Lancet</i>. He is
a lecturer in Creative Writing at Kingston University. He is also the author of
several full-cast audio dramas from Big Finish Productions, featuring
characters from Sherlock Holmes, Frankenstein and Doctor Who. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His third novel, Cannonbridge, will be published in February
2015. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His blog - Pantisocracy - can be found at
<a href="http://jonathanbarnes.blogspot.co.uk/">http://jonathanbarnes.blogspot.co.uk/</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">*** <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As an extra bonus we also have not one, but two cover reveals for you, with our US (artist <a href="http://erikmohr.com/" target="_blank">Erik Mohr</a>) and UK (artist <a href="http://pyeparr.blogspot.co.uk/" target="_blank">Pye Parr</a>) covers:</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVGfhIK3xc7v2Zcy0QzCHGqraPc42ZunILSuQ8I5lvuyCbxb2WeMl7G8vVotHTMnmMG1OZrb4m9toq7YCgMVR2dBNMtHe5yB3ZyfXQqGoMizEG886kFCL0k1br7FuMpMayms3IiQ/s1600/CANNONBRIDGE+US.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVGfhIK3xc7v2Zcy0QzCHGqraPc42ZunILSuQ8I5lvuyCbxb2WeMl7G8vVotHTMnmMG1OZrb4m9toq7YCgMVR2dBNMtHe5yB3ZyfXQqGoMizEG886kFCL0k1br7FuMpMayms3IiQ/s640/CANNONBRIDGE+US.jpg" width="409" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">US cover by Erik Mohr</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_KVzDnW16UwrsCtLAPGXG4Ah6dvwJaOp9WP9nD2ILHs5-RUObng4K-dJg_CTMJRwD-dzO5N0Xse-anEZx9bh4AH3-C47mP1S9ZtT-TDddH6YOs7w7a9B3rPOczkbMhZlGWSh_ug/s1600/CANNONBRIDGE+UK.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_KVzDnW16UwrsCtLAPGXG4Ah6dvwJaOp9WP9nD2ILHs5-RUObng4K-dJg_CTMJRwD-dzO5N0Xse-anEZx9bh4AH3-C47mP1S9ZtT-TDddH6YOs7w7a9B3rPOczkbMhZlGWSh_ug/s640/CANNONBRIDGE+UK.jpg" width="408" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">UK cover by Erik Mohr</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Have a favourite? Let us know know <a href="https://twitter.com/SolarisBooks" target="_blank">@SolarisBooks</a> or in the comments section below!</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-65879794733888903132014-11-11T14:14:00.000+01:002014-11-11T14:14:14.807+01:00Wakening the Crow - publication day review round up<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivPVkhdKeHncTtmmi8jbrvnK7FDhJ9JgqxVUcvlKdTAX0NGaCvc-l8aIeVj444zr3tap893qoJg19bCQr5QNN-fi6tLH5IjXaSBOC9f-q3qtpyRITcQ6xmKJZy9HqoFZBvIhz42Q/s1600/WAKENING+THE+CROW.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivPVkhdKeHncTtmmi8jbrvnK7FDhJ9JgqxVUcvlKdTAX0NGaCvc-l8aIeVj444zr3tap893qoJg19bCQr5QNN-fi6tLH5IjXaSBOC9f-q3qtpyRITcQ6xmKJZy9HqoFZBvIhz42Q/s400/WAKENING+THE+CROW.jpg" width="253" /></span></a></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Oliver Gooch comes across a tooth, in a velvet box, with a handwritten note from 1888 to say it’s a tooth from the boy Edgar Allan Poe. He displays it in his new bookshop, and names the store Poe’s Tooth Books.</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Oliver took the money from his small daughter Chloe’s accident insurance and bought a converted church to live in with his altered child and wife. Rosie hopes Chloe will came back to herself but Oliver is secretly relieved to have this new easy-to-manage child, and holds at bay the guilt that the accident was a result of his negligence. On a freezing night he and Chloe come across the crow, a raggedy skeletal wretch of a bird, and it refuses to leave. It infiltrates their lives, it alters Oliver’s relationship with Rosie, it changes Chloe. It’s a dangerous presence in the firelit, shadowy old vestry, in Poe’s Tooth Books.</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Inexorably the family, the tooth, the crow, the church and their story will draw to a terrifying climax.</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Wakening the Crow is an overt homage to the work of Edgar Allan Poe
and the book captures that feel perfectly.” – <a href="https://www.kirkusreviews.com/features/science-fiction-fantasy-and-horror-books-youll-wan/" target="_blank">Kirkus Reviews, November Picks</a><br /> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Like the book Gooch fantasises from time to time about writing,
Wakening the Crow is “something so dark and disturbing and demanding of the
readers, so odd and unusual and out of the ordinary” that it’s apt, at the
last, to be overlooked. If you have the heart for it, however, expect to expose
a fiction of human horror of the highest order.” – <a href="http://tor.com/">tor.com</a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Gregory invokes the unquiet ghost of Poe, in the figure of a small boy
whose shadow looms large, yet deftly manages to surpass the power of Edgar’s
darkest imaginings in this fine example of literary horror.” – <a href="http://www.horrorafterdark.com/2014/11/review-wakening-crow-stephen-gregory/" target="_blank">Horror AfterDark</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Stephen Gregory writes fantastically well.” – <a href="http://completelydifferentblog.blogspot.se/2014/11/wakening-crow.html" target="_blank">Completely Different</a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“A great read for a dark and stormy night, filled with gothic imagery
and a overriding sense of unease.” – <a href="http://lipsyy.wordpress.com/2014/11/07/a-vestry-edgar-allan-poe-and-a-mischievous-crow/" target="_blank">Lipsyy Lost & Found</a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“A masterpiece of dark fiction that weaves psychological horror with
hints of the supernatural in a tale of a flawed family, fractured by tragedy,
only to have their lives and sanity shattered by the presence of a carrion
crow.” – <a href="http://jonrecluse.booklikes.com/post/1038759/wakening-the-crow-by-stephen-gregory" target="_blank">Reclusive Reads</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Highly recommended for not only fans of horror, but also for fans of
literary fiction and psychological tales. This book is not easily categorized,
but it's worth reading, if only to watch a genius at work.” – <a href="http://charlene.booklikes.com/post/1033640/wakening-the-crow-by-stephen-gregory" target="_blank">Char’s HorrorCorner</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“consuming coldness<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">with musty little secrets<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">tinged by a nightmare<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">gloriously different<br />
pure Poe-inspired creepiness”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">- <a href="http://www.themarveloussite.com/marvelous-upcoming-new-book/" target="_blank">The Marvellous Site</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“<span style="background: white; color: #191919;">The author has some
beautiful turn of phrases that really catch the reader’s attention.</span>” –
<a href="http://carabosseslibrary.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/wakening-crow-by-stephen-gregory.html" target="_blank">Carabosse’s Library </a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“[Gregory’s] hoarding of details and doling out of information only
until you need it is quite masterful… the slow psychological reveal is fast
becoming a lost art in storytelling especially in the horror genre. This is why
I recommend Wakening the Crow so highly. 4/5” – <a href="http://thenovelpursuit.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/simmering-psychological-horror.html" target="_blank">The Novel Pursuit</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Wakening The Crow is one of the most beautiful, thoughtful, and unsettling
novels that I have ever read. A slight deviation from my normal penchant for
horror, it did not leave me wanting. Stephen Gregory writes as if he created
language; his words are poetry without pretence.” – <a href="http://andreya.booklikes.com/post/979455/review-of-wakening-the-crow" target="_blank">Andreya’s Asylum</a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“A wonderful, wicked novel that could have been written by the dark master
(Poe) himself. Fiendish.” – <a href="https://cayocosta72.wordpress.com/2014/08/28/wakening-the-crow-by-stephen-gregory-published-by-rebellion/" target="_blank">Cayocosta72</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“This story has the perfect setting, and excellent plot lines that
swirl together to create an old time creepy tale. One that doesn’t need blood
and gore to frighten.” – <a href="http://bloggabook.wordpress.com/2014/08/30/wakening-the-crow-by-stephen-gregory/" target="_blank">Blogga Book</a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">***</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Wakening the Crow is out now:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Wakening-Crow-Stephen-Gregory/dp/1781082413" target="_blank">UK </a>| <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Wakening-Crow-Stephen-Gregory/dp/1781082421" target="_blank">US </a>| <a href="http://www.rebellionstore.com/products/wakening_the_crow" target="_blank">DRM-free eBook</a></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-63909497655032591292014-10-30T13:55:00.000+01:002014-10-30T13:57:16.911+01:00Days of the Dead blog tour 2014: Gail Z. Martin on Hiding Under the Covers<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><a href="http://www.rebellionstore.com/sale" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0B1E2O9D0ez97rUdWNHP0Jh8SsCQTQ4iEWOQq3yWImu83LqsifaZC7LkSrXw2xNWtbu5S_wOpfHfRkKcxic0EAckQLPEUpTMT8bOhZP6fS6f9vjY9nvON7z7Bq1m-WjclwM2IGg/s1600/halloween+banner.jpg" height="108" width="400" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><a href="http://www.rebellionstore.com/sale" target="_blank">The Rebellion Store eBook sale is now on - selected titles just £1.50</a></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Hiding
Under the Covers</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">By
Gail Z. Martin<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I’ve
always liked ghost stories. Well, let’s say that I’ve always had a love/hate
relationship with ghost stories. I love them when it’s daylight and the lights
are on. I’m not so keen on them in the dark.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As
a kid, I remember being scared of some of the oddest stuff. There was a
children’s encyclopedia that had an entry on “hallucinations” and the drawing
accompanying the definition gave me nightmares for a week—no idea why. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Even
so, I kept coming back to re-runs of shows like <i>The Twilight Zone</i>, <i>Outer
Limits</i>, <i>Night Gallery</i>, <i>Tales from the Crypt</i>, <i>Alfred Hitchcock Presents</i> and the
monster movies that used to run on Saturday afternoon TV. And I loved any book
I could get my hands on that included magic, witches, ghosts, and the
supernatural. One of my favorite books in middle school was <i>Jane-Emily</i> about a girl being haunted by
the ghost of her vindictive cousin. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicJPKpeCkk9yEQSGUEumTnPL1rqnJO8eZPT2XVmrXiYQwQu0I1rTrCxPllHKR9srgbIW9J6DCAb354xiUlJFLXsnq8d4jF2RwJC2K1fKJh-cW4rd9_mnvPHKyUbD8nxxk0hlAR7g/s1600/twilight-zone-2.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicJPKpeCkk9yEQSGUEumTnPL1rqnJO8eZPT2XVmrXiYQwQu0I1rTrCxPllHKR9srgbIW9J6DCAb354xiUlJFLXsnq8d4jF2RwJC2K1fKJh-cW4rd9_mnvPHKyUbD8nxxk0hlAR7g/s1600/twilight-zone-2.jpeg" height="216" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I
remember watching the old monster movie <i>Them</i>
about giant radioactive ants destroying the world. I was eating popcorn and
watching the movie on TV alone in the dark. All of a sudden, a huge beast with
black shaggy fur and a hideous, green-eyed gorilla face jumped out at me from
behind the couch. I think in that case, my dad got more than he bargained for
because even after he took off the mask and the fur coat, I wouldn’t stop
screaming until every light in the house was on. #ParentingFail<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As
a kid, cemeteries were favorite places. My mom was a teacher and had to stay
late at school to grade papers. When I was 10 or 11, she would let me go up the
block and wander around the old historic cemetery (times were different then).
It’s a beautiful place with a lot of historic graves, and I used to pass the
time by reading the epitaphs and making up stories about the people. In high
school, I planned the family vacation to make sure we hit Salem, Massachusetts
so we could go to all the witch trial museums, and some of the old cemeteries. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Nowadays,
I absolutely love going on ghost tours when I visit a city. Rome, London,
Dublin, New Orleans, Charleston, and more—it’s always on the itinerary. I’ve
dragged my family through the Capuchin crypts in Rome where the monks used
human bones for decorating, and on tours of cemeteries in several countries. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I’m
more a fan of ghost/suspense types of scary movies. I don’t do slasher/gore
flicks. But I do love something like <i>The
Woman in Black</i> and <i>Rose Red</i> that
have a good, creepy vibe. When it comes to books, quite a bit of what I read
includes vampires, magic, ghosts and the supernatural, although it tends to
skirt being outright horror. I enjoy Stephen King’s stuff, but I have to admit
that after I read <i>IT</i> I kept the
lights on!<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My
Days of the Dead blog tour runs through October 31 with never-before-seen cover
art, brand new excerpts from upcoming books and recent short stories,
interviews, guest blog posts, giveaways and more! Plus, I’ll be including extra
excerpt links for stories and books by author friends of mine. And, a special
50% off discount from Double-Dragon ebooks! You’ve got to visit the
participating sites to get the goodies, just like Trick or Treat! Details here:
www. AscendantKingdoms.com<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%;">Trick or Treat: Enjoy an excerpt from
Buttons, the short story that led to the Deadly Curiosities book series <a href="http://www.ascendantkingdoms.com/short-stories-and-more/the-deadly-curiosities-adventures-2/buttons/excerpt-from-buttons/" target="_blank">here</a>.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%;">And a bonus excerpt from Collector, one of
my Deadly Curiosities Adventures short stories <a href="http://www.ascendantkingdoms.com/short-stories-and-more/the-deadly-curiosities-adventures-2/collector/excerpt-from-collector/" target="_blank">here</a>.</span></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-32600264947368747042014-10-28T16:36:00.001+01:002014-10-28T16:39:05.957+01:00Announcement: Paul Kearney - The Wolf in the Attic<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In 1994 <i>Riding the Unicorn</i> by Paul Kearney published
to warm critical acclaim. Ten years later,
and today at <i>Solaris Books,</i> we
concluded our 2014 re-issue of Kearney’s lost classic Different
Kingdom’s trilogy with <i>Riding the Unicorn</i>, featuring a beautiful
new cover by the incredible Pye Parr. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">For us there could be no better day therefore to share with you
the announcement of our next collaboration with Kearney, on his new book <i>The
Wolf in the Attic</i>:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Publishing summer 2015 <i>The Wolf in the Attic</i> is a
brand new novel from iconic fantasy author
Paul Kearney.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In 1920's Oxford a little girl called Anna Francis lives
in a tall old house with her father and her doll Penelope. She is a refugee, a
piece of flotsam washed up in England by the tides of the Great War and the
chaos that trailed in its wake. Once upon a time she had a mother and a
brother, and they all lived together in the most beautiful city in the world,
by the shores of Homer's wine-dark sea. Anna remembers a time when Agamemnon
came to tea, and Odysseus sat her upon his knee and told her stories of Troy.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But that is all gone now, and only to her doll does she
ever speak of it, because her father cannot bear to have it recalled.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She sits in the shadows of the tall house and watches the
rain on the windows, and creates worlds for herself to fill out the loneliness.
The house becomes her own little kingdom, an island full of dreams and
half-forgotten memories.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And then one winter day, she finds an interloper in the
topmost, dustiest attic of the house. A Romany boy named Luca with yellow eyes,
who is as alone in the world as she is. <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In this way she meets the only real friend she will ever
know.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>The Wolf in the Attic</i> marks an exciting, new chapter
in Kearney’s career, moving away from the epic and military fantasy for
which he’s known to create an enchanting new story of a young girl, that
retains the essence of Kearney’s world building and stylistic prose. <i>The
Wolf in the Attic</i> is a poignant and touching story, with a timely
exploration of our cultural sense of self; one which will have fans of Tolkien
and Pullman finding a new home amongst its
pages. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Like Robert Holdstock, Ursula le Guin and Philip Pullman, Kearney pushes back the boundaries of what fantasy can actually do. Yes these stories are strange, yes they are speculative – but they are also very human, and that is what makes Kearney one of the most vital authors in genre.” - Jonathan Oliver, Solaris Editor-in-Chief</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>The Wolf in the Attic </i>is out from Solaris Books
summer 2015 – check back soon for more details.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Paul Kearney</b> is the critically-acclaimed author of <i>The
Monarchies of God</i> and the <i>Sea Beggars</i> series. He has been
long-listed for the British Fantasy Award.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: start;">All three standalone books in the Different Kingdom series are out now:</span></div>
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<a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Riding-Unicorn-Paul-Kearney/dp/1781081905" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeODzDAdRiydOV-OwIPM9xgmtkuTQGMC5SUQsg4RjH8CLwSXRYmiaWVpjJ9qgrUthIEGWWiy_5BZ3pGq2Gpdf_HZRG0OuzXnlr0F__JbGJN-vUEFT_zSLP1OkgQHKIfMevxLckLA/s1600/9781781081914.jpg" height="200" width="128" /></a><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/A-Different-Kingdom-Paul-Kearney/dp/1781081875" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgi9xkApkW08tgIWhDBLEIfwNLh9Fqq6GIbWrufYtY3xSs3G6TySJKnSzpTVfnITqZKFQUf2Vr1r9wAQHPjTtk6FOPIEW6cL7IEzE6tdgBxu7k90Y1vxUSJoja7NERM-E4F-IueDA/s1600/A+different+kingdom.jpg" height="200" width="127" /></a><span id="goog_727229961"></span><span id="goog_727229962"></span><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Way-Babylon-Paul-Kearney/dp/1781081883" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifT1w57bjVWHPrTHj56T71g7C2mzSFaqRmDBMffKwEY4AV8n9uuCe7y_JygCy2q3lIcz1fV-J8Mo62101l3SeQ19os6bJRNk4x5Uksnt1YqvqdQss5w0cVSUS89-Q7f4Zye_q5dw/s1600/9781849976725_250x380.jpg" height="200" width="131" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"Paul Kearney's prose is wonderfully eloquent, and he succeeds in crafting a world that you can almost sense through the pages</span><i style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">." - </i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Cult Den on </span><i style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A Different Kingdom </i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"Its setting is simply superb; its central characters are a class apart." - Tor.com on <i>The Way to Babylon</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Kearney tells his story well and ends it on just the right note.” – SFX (1995) on </span><i style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Riding the Unicorn</i></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-84697266698729154802014-10-23T12:35:00.002+02:002014-10-30T13:58:34.621+01:00Nyctophobia Review Round-Up<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Newly-married architect Callie and her wealthy husband Mateo move to Hyperion House, a grand old home in southern Spain. It's an eccentric place built in front of a cliff: serene and beautiful, but eerily symmetrical, and cunningly styled so that half the house is flooded with light, and half – locked up and neglected – is shrouded in darkness. Unemployed and feeling isolated in a foreign country, Callie determines to research the history of the curious building. </i></span><br />
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But the past is sometimes best left alone. Uncovering the folklore of the house's strange history, Callie is drawn into darkness and delusion. As a teenager Callie was afraid of the dark, and now with her adolescent nyctophobia returning she becomes convinced there's someone in the darkened rooms. Somewhere in the darkness lies the truth about Hyperion House. </span></i><br />
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But some doors should never be opened.</span></i><br />
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<b> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">REVIEWS</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"As with the best supernatural stories, Fowler demonstrates that the medium – as well as chilling the blood – can be a repository for some truly elegant writing." - <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/features/scifi-and-fantasy-books-roundup-extraterrestrials-are-joined-by-elves-and-goblins-9814290.html?origin=internalSearch" target="_blank">The Independent</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Where it wins out is in its deeply uneasy atmosphere, and Fowler’s assured, witty prose.” 4/5 – SFX</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Fowler has managed to come up with some very neat twists and frissons on this archetypical theme. The novel provides lots of quiet discomfort without gratuitous splatter or nastiness, and that’s rare in today’s marketplace.” – <a href="http://www.locusmag.com/Reviews/2014/10/paul-di-filippo-reviews-christopher-fowler/" target="_blank">Locus Magazine</a> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“As the nights draw closer and everything gets colder, sometimes the thing you really need is a nicely-paced ghost story to help you go and make friends with the winter months. Nyctophobia is Christopher Fowler’s latest horror novel and it’s just the thing for dark nights. – 8/10” – <a href="http://www.starburstmagazine.com/reviews/book-reviews-latest-literary-releases/10054-nyctophobia-book-review" target="_blank">Starburst Magazine</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> “Fowler demonstrates that the medium – as well as chilling the blood – can be a repository for some truly elegant writing.” – <a href="http://www.crimetime.co.uk/mag/index.php/showarticle/7363" target="_blank">Crime Time</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“This is a creepy, atmospheric tale that blends the psychological and the supernatural effortlessly. If you’re in the mood for a ghost story that is going to make the hairs on the back of your neck stand on end, then look no further.” <a href="http://www.theeloquentpage.co.uk/2014/10/17/nyctophobia-by-christopher-fowler/" target="_blank">The Eloquent Page</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> “Fowler’s prose is visual, and he is a master of creepy imagery” – <a href="http://booksbrainsandbeer.wordpress.com/2014/09/22/nyctophobia" target="_blank">Books, Brains and Beer</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“If you prefer your ghost stories to move at a slower pace, but with some truly eerie moments, this is your book.” – <a href="http://teripolen.com/2014/10/06/nyctophobia-by-christopher-fowler/" target="_blank">Books & Such</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“The best thriller I have read in ages.” – <a href="http://universeinwords.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/review-nyctophobia-by-christopher-fowler.html" target="_blank">Universe in Words</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I liked it for the intimacy of its horror… and the way the author entwined this so neatly with social and psychological ‘ghosts’.” – <a href="http://violininavoid.wordpress.com/2014/10/15/nyctophobia-by-christopher-fowler/" target="_blank">Violin in a Void</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“If you appreciate the literary tradition that flowered in du Maurier and Rayne, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman: well, here's a house I'd like you to visit” – <a href="http://archiestandwoodsreviewsandwritings.blogspot.co.uk/2014/08/review-nyctophobia-by-christopher-fowler.html" target="_blank">Mallory Heart Reviews</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Those who are already happy to be a little scared when they read will find something to enjoy here.” – <a href="http://www.fruitlesspursuits.com/2014/10/book-review-nyctophobia-by-christopher.html" target="_blank">Fruitless Pursuits</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“If you are in the market for a ghostly, psychological thriller that takes a few Spanish siestas here and there, Nyctophobia could well be the book for you.” – <a href="http://thebookshelfgargoyle.wordpress.com/2014/10/14/an-adult-fiction-haiku-review-nyctophobia/" target="_blank">The Bookshelf Gargoyle</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Amazing. Horrific. Terrifying.” – <a href="http://www.iheartreading.net/reviews/book-review-nyctophobia-by-christopher-fowler/" target="_blank">I heart reading</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“This one keeps the pages turning and the night lights burning.” – <a href="http://bloggabook.wordpress.com/2014/08/23/nyctophobia-by-christopher-fowler/" target="_blank">Bloggabook</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“An incredibly creepy and beautifully written story” – <a href="http://abibliophilesjourney.wordpress.com/2014/10/08/book-review-nyctophobia/" target="_blank">A Bibliophiles Journey</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>FEATURED </b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“If you're looking for a haunted-house read of a different color, take a look at Nyctophobia” – <a href="https://www.kirkusreviews.com/features/12-excellent-horror-reads-month-october/" target="_blank">Kirkus Reviews, 12 Excellent Horror Reads for the month of October</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Persephone Magazine – <a href="http://persephonemagazine.com/category/pop-culture-features/31-days-of-halloween-pop-culture-features/" target="_blank">31 Days of Horror Halloween recommended book</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Tor.com October <a href="http://www.tor.com/blogs/2014/09/british-fiction-hitlist-early-october-new-releases" target="_blank">hitlist</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Daily Dead Indie spotlight <a href="http://dailydead.com/indie-spotlight-129/" target="_blank">recommended read</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://civilian-reader.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/new-books-julyaugust.html" target="_blank">Civilian Reader</a></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A Fantastical Librarian <a href="http://www.afantasticallibrarian.com/2014/06/anticipated-books-summer-fall-2014-science-fiction-and-horror.html" target="_blank">Anticipated Books Fall 2014</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Out now <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nyctophobia-Christopher-Fowler/dp/1781082103/" target="_blank">UK</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Nyctophobia-Christopher-Fowler/dp/1781082111" target="_blank">US</a> | <a href="http://www.rebellionstore.com/products/nyctophobia_uk_edition" target="_blank">DRM free eBook</a></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-28057276157467004732014-10-21T13:16:00.005+02:002014-10-21T13:16:46.360+02:00A day in the life of the Solaris PR department<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The story that follows is a totally, 100% typical day in the life of our PR department.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Publishing overlord Ben Smith summons the PR department. "There's been a delivery," he says "it's got your name on it," he says.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There's something about his smile... the fear in the department is tangible. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The walk down to reception seems to take forever. Then there it is.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The box.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Oh god, it's huge. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgC34qBHG7_vffROrFo-CcPd9w_6ZfxX4McYU3lIfP-TJE_OCGH99eRXlP2LndMgVhPnjoBY60sIpbtejiHFl5moWWgtO-ZrURBsY0shIRyheYMfSojJIWeZ7QIBGOFWITO65cl2w/s1600/WP_20141021_001.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgC34qBHG7_vffROrFo-CcPd9w_6ZfxX4McYU3lIfP-TJE_OCGH99eRXlP2LndMgVhPnjoBY60sIpbtejiHFl5moWWgtO-ZrURBsY0shIRyheYMfSojJIWeZ7QIBGOFWITO65cl2w/s1600/WP_20141021_001.jpg" height="320" width="179" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"I said 5'6!" PR cries.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"Maybe it's just a trick of the light," editorial offers up.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As the un-boxing commences PR nervously retreats into a corner, rocking gently. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"No, wait! It's not that bad. In fact it looks great!" editorial coaxes.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioVLPGRr7YzPJNPQ1sCwK6xsNuW_ya2OFMiyJpGIPYo4f2WLuo7sudHqXqHd6M99cPO7ffD2MIs4Swnh8yXhgzuIvkCmu5q2yi00MM31_FlxEfqQn3pglxI5mARFm1iz6IPZBLSg/s1600/WP_20141021_003.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioVLPGRr7YzPJNPQ1sCwK6xsNuW_ya2OFMiyJpGIPYo4f2WLuo7sudHqXqHd6M99cPO7ffD2MIs4Swnh8yXhgzuIvkCmu5q2yi00MM31_FlxEfqQn3pglxI5mARFm1iz6IPZBLSg/s1600/WP_20141021_003.jpg" height="320" width="179" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Shuffling gently forward the beautiful object contained within the box is slowly revealed, and PR's mood rapidly shifts from "Shitshitshit they're totally going to fire me for this" to "Take my photo with the monkey. Take my photo with the monkey."</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi51JfBccZ2Q9lFO7Hcu2I0xKAZesdrDQU0lEimLjz7-aRm2vmKiE2YFhiRF9ygqeABGgtZkrj1WrGGVjdgeSDngm-NBE9idGpvRlvTj9o8jINuLzoCjz95FSo4cDauo38MRyjL6A/s1600/WP_20141021_005.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi51JfBccZ2Q9lFO7Hcu2I0xKAZesdrDQU0lEimLjz7-aRm2vmKiE2YFhiRF9ygqeABGgtZkrj1WrGGVjdgeSDngm-NBE9idGpvRlvTj9o8jINuLzoCjz95FSo4cDauo38MRyjL6A/s1600/WP_20141021_005.jpg" height="320" width="179" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Rapidly followed by "Hey wait, no you didn't let me sort out my lipstick." </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">If you'd like your photo with Ack Ack Macaque catch him on tour with his pet author Gareth L Powell from January next year. We'll even let you brush your hair first.</span><br />
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<ul style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; color: #444444; line-height: 20px; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0px 0px 20px 30px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<li style="background: transparent; border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Thursday 15th January, 6:00 pm – Forbidden Planet <a href="http://forbiddenplanet.com/events/2015/01/15/gareth-l-powell-tour-bristol/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; color: #a8101d; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Bristol Megastore</a></span></li>
<li style="background: transparent; border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Friday 16th January, 6:00 pm – Forbidden Planet <a href="https://forbiddenplanet.com/events/2015/01/16/gareth-l-powell-tour-cambridge/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; color: #a8101d; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Cambridge Store</a></span></li>
<li style="background: transparent; border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Saturday 17th January 1:00 pm – Forbidden Planet <a href="https://forbiddenplanet.com/events/2015/01/21/gareth-l-powell-tour-southampton/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; color: #a8101d; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">London Megastore</a></span></li>
<li style="background: transparent; border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Wednesday 21st January, 6:00 pm – Forbidden Planet <a href="https://forbiddenplanet.com/events/2015/01/21/gareth-l-powell-tour-southampton/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; color: #a8101d; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Southampton Megastore</a></span></li>
<li style="background: transparent; border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Thursday 22nd January, 6:00 pm – Forbidden Planet <a href="https://forbiddenplanet.com/events/2015/01/22/gareth-l-powell-tour-birmingham/" style="background: transparent; border: 0px; color: #a8101d; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Birmingham Store</a></span></li>
</ul>
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<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 20px;">More dates TBC</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 20px;">Macaque Attack by Gareth L Powell publishes January 2015.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #444444; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 20px;">Pre-order <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Macaque-Attack-Ack-Ack-Gareth-Powell/dp/1781082855" target="_blank">UK</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Macaque-Attack-Ack-Ack-Gareth-Powell/dp/1781082863" target="_blank">US</a></span></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-27620085943003780832014-09-25T15:26:00.000+02:002014-09-25T15:31:58.862+02:00Team Solaris on what keeps them up at night<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In the Christopher Fowler’s chilling new novel <i>Nyctophobia</i> he addresses one of humanity’s
oldest, and most primeval fears: darkness.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>“It’s a strange thing, nyctophobia. You’re not born with it.
It can start at any time. It comes and goes, and it’s one of the only phobias
you can transmit to other people.”</i><o:p></o:p></span><br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcs-htUafDUms9YeBUOytmqbrbADDPLiwrgmI2bOS7jdMrsVdi-IOLNQBrDyunZ3YLaYsrHIZ772hyXhg9ScMDp2BkWElVSlptborB-K-3DfH0W7-OCcmzTAYs0Vf54mwuqRdlFg/s1600/NYCTOPHOBIA+UK+COVER.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcs-htUafDUms9YeBUOytmqbrbADDPLiwrgmI2bOS7jdMrsVdi-IOLNQBrDyunZ3YLaYsrHIZ772hyXhg9ScMDp2BkWElVSlptborB-K-3DfH0W7-OCcmzTAYs0Vf54mwuqRdlFg/s1600/NYCTOPHOBIA+UK+COVER.jpg" height="320" width="213" /></a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqF2R5nd-AJvmDLUYJFYfn25Ja-IZU3EKng5KjR8eHdVZO0NSDokMcZLX54xeUMNh8AjgnCQsXkI1wyvFSzfgOFgrec9-qBfBWGFOmiXtdJVGn5a5IjfDx-iEqGqaLsf8xF-ieAQ/s1600/NYCTOPHOBIA+US+COVER.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqF2R5nd-AJvmDLUYJFYfn25Ja-IZU3EKng5KjR8eHdVZO0NSDokMcZLX54xeUMNh8AjgnCQsXkI1wyvFSzfgOFgrec9-qBfBWGFOmiXtdJVGn5a5IjfDx-iEqGqaLsf8xF-ieAQ/s1600/NYCTOPHOBIA+US+COVER.jpg" height="320" width="213" /></a></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In anticipation of the book’s release I sat down with some of
the Solaris publishing team and in a badly thought out form of group therapy
got them to reveal what keeps them awake at night…<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jonathan Oliver,
Editor-in-Chief<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As with so many things, you can blame it on TV. Well, you
can blame it on one specific TV show that I saw around Christmastime when I was
6 years old: <i>The Box of Delights</i>.
Yes, <i>The Box of Delights</i> for a time
gave me a phobia of wolves. I blame the opening title sequence with that
grinning wolf’s head; that haunted my dreams for years afterward. I would wake
from a nightmare where a man in a suit with a wolf’s head was standing in my
bedroom doorway. It’s certainly a silly thing to be afraid of, especially
living in the UK where there aren’t that many wolves around. But the surreality
of the wolf imagery in that old BBC show probably exacerbated the fear. For a
while I found werewolf movies scarier than they probably were intended to be,
and even images of wolves in documentaries gave me a frisson of fear.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">No longer, however; I’ve grown out of it. There are much
more horrible things to be scared of as an adult. Ali – my wife – and I
recently revisited <i>The Box of Delights</i>,
watching the BBC adaptation. It’s still quite weird, but it’s showing its age,
and it’s particularly sad to watch Robert Stephens put in a lacklustre
performance, clearly unwell, clearly suffering from the ravages of addiction.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Children take images and turn them into something way more
sinister thanks to the power of imagination, and in the winter of 1984, and for
several years afterwards, for this young boy, the wolves were running.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoDEKxZDzOw0jyeu4Ss8D5N4sKp-8hG_jzV1o-MzrKo2Id-l-KiauZK6wN0hH1eZXE7mzbO1S_oThvIE7PP9Qizdu4KWOXJ9_4UKUQV5IOzHQq8KbDuqD4cDLSd4vYepr7VXzfXg/s1600/wolf+gif.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoDEKxZDzOw0jyeu4Ss8D5N4sKp-8hG_jzV1o-MzrKo2Id-l-KiauZK6wN0hH1eZXE7mzbO1S_oThvIE7PP9Qizdu4KWOXJ9_4UKUQV5IOzHQq8KbDuqD4cDLSd4vYepr7VXzfXg/s1600/wolf+gif.gif" height="179" width="320" /></a></div>
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<b style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ben Smith, Publishing Manager</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Who needs a phobia when you have experienced real, rational terror?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My brothers and I were going to see Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark at the cinema, but when we got there it was sold out. However my mum – normally a careful, caring woman – spotted another movie that had Spielberg’s name on the poster and got us tickets to that instead. The movie was Poltergeist. I was six years old.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I had nightmares FOR YEARS.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So no, I have no phobias. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But if a television set comes on by itself, let’s just say I’m not staying in the building.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjokNYrtXW_BDgElRQbSuW8HekuZv9ILcI_2mgztzJ2oXX3FL4udsQwWyHngG95goKdMXBMbjrxEYOLehwh4FsTWY1iteox83Twgsf0DwKhwPDJzDJR9MVk0kP1G2sf7iSVDnDgJw/s1600/phobia.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjokNYrtXW_BDgElRQbSuW8HekuZv9ILcI_2mgztzJ2oXX3FL4udsQwWyHngG95goKdMXBMbjrxEYOLehwh4FsTWY1iteox83Twgsf0DwKhwPDJzDJR9MVk0kP1G2sf7iSVDnDgJw/s1600/phobia.gif" height="240" width="320" /></a></div>
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<b style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">David Moore, Editor</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My phobias – although I’d hesitate to call either of them
phobias, for different reasons – are spiders (sort of) and heights.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I hesitate to consider my discomfort with spiders a phobia,
since phobias (phobiae?) are irrational, and – frankly – I grew up in
Australia. Spiders over there will fuck your shit up. I don’t scream, scarper,
freeze or any of that nonsense; my response can generally be classed under
“unrestrained bloody carnage.” </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Man, fuck those things. I actually like spiders
– they’re beautiful, fascinating, extraordinary creatures – but if I see one of
the fuckers in my house it gets the shoe.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5SrtDXGWiyGmIYRfdFn36WTBvREtBnIfZG67r4QGlVeH4CII2-yijxN9fR5gfjy79E_jYwsq58KeV_BycysvhUuhwihdmDjvvbXnkA032LQMrhv6zgVrg4I30MrVeycZaB8vBOQ/s1600/spider+nest.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5SrtDXGWiyGmIYRfdFn36WTBvREtBnIfZG67r4QGlVeH4CII2-yijxN9fR5gfjy79E_jYwsq58KeV_BycysvhUuhwihdmDjvvbXnkA032LQMrhv6zgVrg4I30MrVeycZaB8vBOQ/s1600/spider+nest.gif" height="184" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Vertigo is an odd
one. As a kid, like most kids, I scampered up and down climbing frames, trees
and all sorts left, right and centre. I don’t even have a trauma to refer to,
or remember developing vertigo; it crept up on me over the years. I think when
we stop climbing stuff, we lose the nerve to do it. The weird thing about
vertigo is, it’s almost more physical than anything else. Rationally, I can
look over a balcony or down from the London Eye very calmly, knowing I’m
perfectly safe. But if whatever I’m standing on and holding onto isn’t
obviously, visibly, very secure, my legs start to tense, my knees tingle, my
back tenses – everything, in fact, starts to react except my mind. It’s weird.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So I guess my
greatest fear would be falling from a great height into a nest of spiders. Or
falling off a big spider or something, I dunno.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0zTcXUXvvYcg6T2n-lPPBEfg328-vx8UD_nKD9qogdhd7YqTN5wge6xtx-gADlTRnG5_GipUAaeXgCiGzQModuhyphenhyphenLf7xFjKSCu7Vzd5XTY4WGr4zK0PFoHF7zhnergh-K7ZVGrA/s1600/david+phobia+better.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0zTcXUXvvYcg6T2n-lPPBEfg328-vx8UD_nKD9qogdhd7YqTN5wge6xtx-gADlTRnG5_GipUAaeXgCiGzQModuhyphenhyphenLf7xFjKSCu7Vzd5XTY4WGr4zK0PFoHF7zhnergh-K7ZVGrA/s1600/david+phobia+better.gif" height="232" width="320" /></a></div>
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<b style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Lydia Gittins,
Digital Promotions & PR Assistant</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Needles. Even just writing the word makes me feel anxious. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In theory this is a totally logical fear; it’s
letting someone deliberately insert a foreign object THROUGH YOUR SKIN. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Sadly though, as someone with multiple piercings when I present
this phobia (normally in the context of a busy doctor’s surgery, to an
over-worked nurse and via the medium of the ‘dead faint’) it somehow gets a
little harder to rationalise to other people and a lot harder to sympathise with...<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So basically, don’t come anywhere near me with a needle,
unless you’re covered in poorly though-out tattoos and work in a dubious
piercing salon. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkWQO-nuTe5kxcq-N16A5QGM-oMJPZYgAUHFTdsbZMXaeHyeJPmhwR__QPx1jhMYT0YHvWXWHg5zUG4S9G_xjdQ0LOP83OJ54GNgTo0WGCXAbEdYKt7fRivZszulrqq1fe8U-pyg/s1600/Hell+no.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkWQO-nuTe5kxcq-N16A5QGM-oMJPZYgAUHFTdsbZMXaeHyeJPmhwR__QPx1jhMYT0YHvWXWHg5zUG4S9G_xjdQ0LOP83OJ54GNgTo0WGCXAbEdYKt7fRivZszulrqq1fe8U-pyg/s1600/Hell+no.gif" height="212" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Oh, also morph suits. I bloody hate morph suits. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHHoEEJFfbxMNAv9iIhKoOD1PwkyKCxxTWQ8jBCk9wi6nhfw1NSI6WYd3aH17kl_M_D6idAeHJOZta44TBfgIvHs3qzyX9C_r9rhvtvyPeg1hzB6ptibfUJleNswC-eImVexs4vA/s1600/morph+suits.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHHoEEJFfbxMNAv9iIhKoOD1PwkyKCxxTWQ8jBCk9wi6nhfw1NSI6WYd3aH17kl_M_D6idAeHJOZta44TBfgIvHs3qzyX9C_r9rhvtvyPeg1hzB6ptibfUJleNswC-eImVexs4vA/s1600/morph+suits.gif" height="115" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Simon Parr, Head of
Art and cover artist for <i>Nyctophobia</i></b><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I FEAR NO MAN<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">(except for Hulk Hogan)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBX780fAwnKSaBgbU80RjOlyr-wBq_QYSQVPjnRg8WGn4X-AAaK4sRjQ7eRdl8V05bVkYSdEd83hhT21KzD8UbuVu9hQdtsWxFsLI1uDQW03TJ8ouGyh34Te98DwSHgiqFg2cFEA/s1600/hogan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBX780fAwnKSaBgbU80RjOlyr-wBq_QYSQVPjnRg8WGn4X-AAaK4sRjQ7eRdl8V05bVkYSdEd83hhT21KzD8UbuVu9hQdtsWxFsLI1uDQW03TJ8ouGyh34Te98DwSHgiqFg2cFEA/s1600/hogan.jpg" height="305" width="320" /></a></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ed: The image used for
Simon’s phobia is the one supplied by him with his statement. It has also directly contributed to a
more general office-wide fear of the Hogan-infinity-beard. Thanks Simon.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Nyctophobia </i>by
Christopher Fowler is out October 2014<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Pre-order: <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nychtophobia-Christopher-Fowler/dp/1781082103" target="_blank">UK</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Nyctophobia-Christopher-Fowler/dp/1781082111" target="_blank">US</a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Advance praise:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i> </i>“It's wonderful to be in this beautifully
created world where you know something very strange is going to happen, and as
in all his work that astonishing sense of atmosphere, of being in Fowlerville.”
– Jake Arnott<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Fowler demonstrates that the medium – as well as chilling
the blood – can be a repository for some truly elegant writing” – Barry Forshaw,
Crime Time<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“A successful and highly recommended ghost story.” – Books,
Brains & Beer<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“This one keeps the pages turning and the night lights
burning.” – Bloggabook<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“<i>Nyctophobia</i> is
the best horror book I’ve read in 2014, and I doubt I’ll find a better book any
time soon. The writing was exquisite, rich in detail, atmospheric and haunting.”
– I Heart Reading<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“The most effective and chilling horror novel I've read since
House of Leaves -- be prepared to sleep with the light on for a while once
you've finished it.” – James, a bookseller<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Netgalley reviewers: Request a review copy </span><a href="https://www.netgalley.com/catalog/show/id/52136" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;" target="_blank">today</a></i></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You can follow the Solaris team on twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/SolarisBooks" target="_blank">@solarisbooks</a> - feel free to drop by and sympathise with our crippling fears. Or send pictures of spiders. </span></b></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-68897339602103533272014-09-24T17:42:00.000+02:002014-09-24T17:42:26.324+02:00Riding the Unicorn by Paul Kearney: exclusive excerpt<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih7ukyEsYHrPhyXE_yt93IQSEoYrZVK3xpUvuJCT0O-aBzSE4UPjsxi_rLqD4ekC9fTBMRl9FG4FaJhYeCNN_LLmQbM81SzwmZu6FleLVDO8c_iX7mWiMXoxaNLF4M2biTxO-fqA/s1600/9781781081914.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih7ukyEsYHrPhyXE_yt93IQSEoYrZVK3xpUvuJCT0O-aBzSE4UPjsxi_rLqD4ekC9fTBMRl9FG4FaJhYeCNN_LLmQbM81SzwmZu6FleLVDO8c_iX7mWiMXoxaNLF4M2biTxO-fqA/s1600/9781781081914.jpg" height="400" width="257" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 150%;"><i><br /></i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 150%;"><i><br /></i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 150%;"><i>H</i></span><span style="line-height: 150%;"><i>e
sees them</i></span><span style="line-height: 150%;"><i> in his
dreams...</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A
column which extends for
miles. It comes down from the mountains, a snake of people marching
south with the rime and bite of the high passes written on their
wind-burnt faces. Warriors in furs with iron swords, leading tall
horses. Women crammed in the few wagons that have survived, or
stumbling along beside their mates. Children hollow-eyed and silent,
tramping with their elders or carried on bent backs. An entire people
is on the move, their faces set towards the green world of the south
whilst behind them the huge snow-covered peaks and ridges pierce the
sky as far as the edge of sight—mountains they once deemed
impassable. Tens of thousands march south bruising the grass and
scattering the wild things as they go. Thousands more lie frozen and
still on the road behind them. They march like an army intent on
conquest.</span></div>
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</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>A</i><i>t
night he</i><i> hears the
stamp of their feet, the thunder of a hundred thousand hooves. In his
sleep they move ever farther south, and he can smell the close-packed
smell of the Host at their campfires. They are never stilled. They
eat away at his reason.</i></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">PART ONE</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Willoby’s Madness</span></div>
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</div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">One</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The
early shift—the one he
hated most. A dark, just-birthing morning, and the whole wing was
filled with the sluice and clatter of buckets, brushes, the catwalks
crawling with the pail-emptying queues, the smell already inching out
of their covered containers. All the excrement of the night was being
poured away by men still half asleep. They shuffled in blue-clad
lines, yawning, grinding the slumber from their eyes or staring
stupidly into space. Unlit cigarettes dangled from the lips of a few.
They were pasty, grey-yellow in the light of the overheads.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Come on, Greggs, we haven’t
all fucking day.’</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘I dropped me fag in the
bucket—me morning fag!’</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A ripple of laughter. ‘Shouldn’t
have been sticking your nose into it, then! What were you looking
for, your breakfast?’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Screw you!’, but said
without conviction.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Move along and shut your
mouth.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They shuffled past endlessly.
Most did not look at Willoby as he stood, a black, silver-flecked
statue, but some raised eyes filled with blank hatred, flicking away
just before his own locked with them. A few, a very few, smiled or
winked at him.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mawson the Mass-Murderer paused
beside Willoby with his mop and pail. He was a tiny, wizened
broomstick of a man, his bald head as pale and pitted as a golf ball.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Morning, Mr Willoby—another
fine day in our salubrious establishment. ‘</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Willoby only grunted in reply.
Mawson made his flesh creep. Despite his nickname, he was only in for
one murder: that of a pretty young man on a London to Edinburgh
train. But he had been in so long and behaved so well that he had
become a trusty of sorts. Christ knew the Governor made some odd
decisions in that line.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘A nice film lined up for
tonight we have, and ping-pong for those as likes it. I’m thinking
we—‘</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Fuck off back to work Mawson,’
Willoby said mildly, and the man shuffled away, mopping as he went,
face expressionless.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Some screws cultivated Mawson,
for he knew all that went on in the wing—in the whole prison. But
he was a queer, a right fucking nut-case in Willoby’s opinion. When
he got out, whenever that might be, he would be chatting up pretty
boys in trains again.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Christ, the smell. The piss smell
in the morning, the unwashed smell, the old food smell. It had sunk
into the very bricks and boards of this place. It had clotted in the
mortar. High time they pulled the shithole down, built something new.
Something’ different, for God’s sake.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He snatched a glance at his
watch. Eight hours to go. Purgatory passing. Looking up, he saw the
blackened skylights high above. Still dark. Still night. Somewhere
beyond the glass the stars wheeled; Canopus the Dog was rising and
Venus was a last gleam on the lightening horizon, but not a man in
here would see them until the steel gate of Her Majesty’s pleasure
had banged shut on his back. Years hence it would be, for some of
them.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The prison tang caught in his
throat for a second and the sweat popped out along the rim of his cap
as he fought the panic, the screaming pressure of the walls and the
creeping queues.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Oh, Jesus, not here.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But it passed, and he was Willoby
the big bad screw again. Willoby the hard bastard with the flint
eyes.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My luck won’t last for ever, he
thought as the last of the trembling died away. One day it’ll hit
me as I stand here, and they’ll laugh their fucking heads off as I
go down.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The thought steeled him. His face
stiffened further. Passing prisoners avoided the fish-cold stare,
affording him a grim kind of pleasure. He was lucky in being a big
man, with a prize-fighter’s nose and shoulders broad as a door. The
years were thickening his middle, but by Christ he could still
hospitalize any bastard that tried it on with him. Oh, yes.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They were filtering back to their
cells now, preparing for breakfast. He jangled the chain of keys in
his pocket gently. When this shift finished he would not go straight
home. He would drive out of the city, up to the moors, and he would
sit with the windows open and listen to the wind and the silence.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Except that he would not. He knew
he would go homewards, and pick up Maria from school, and crack Jokes
she never understood on the way. And he would doze in front of the
telly until Jo came back from work and cooked his dinner.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Just there, hovering still—the
panic and the blackness at the edge of vision. The need for violence,
shouting and running. He closed his eyes momentarily, hoping to see
something else when they were open again, some other world, perhaps.
Mawson slopped water on the shining boots from his mop and went
ashen, but Willoby did not even see him.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Close—so close.</span></i></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But no cigar. Not this time. He
had sweated through it again, and the inmates had not even noticed.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘You all right, Will?’
another black-uniformed figure asked, striding up.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘In the pink, Howard. These
bloody early shifts, though—I hate them. It’s a God-awful hour to
be awake.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘The dog watch, I know.’ Both
Howard and Willoby had been in the army before this, and they knew
the limb-leaden weariness of the last hours before dawn, when the
body was at its lowest ebb.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Still, finishing at three
isn’t so bad. I get a lot done around the house after an early, and
the wife likes the dinner cooked for her for a change.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Willoby looked at him quickly.
Howard was a purple-faced, corpulent man, the kind who would
accumulate weight with every year he made it past thirty until the
first heart attack at forty. He liked his grub. So did Willoby, but
that did not necessitate cooking it himself. </span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Things to do.’ AndWilloby
walked away with his hands behind his back. He was blind to the line
of prisoners; the last of the slopping-out line. Breakfast smells
wafted from the mess hall below overlaid with a rancid veneer, like
greasy fingerprints on a glass. His own stomach was knotted and
closed. He was not a breakfast person. A tot of whisky, though—that
would be welcome now, by Christ. A little pick-me-up. And he glanced
around as though the thought had been audible. But the kitchen
clatters and the talk and the feet on the metal catwalks were enough
to drown out a storm.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What is wrong with me?</span></i></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The notion popped into his head,
as startling and un-welcome as a whore at a wedding. It sat there
with the early morning racket playing around it.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Give us a fag, Bromley!’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Fuck off—smoke your own!’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘You tight bastard!’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘That’s enough there, Sykes.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Nothing wrong that a stiff drink
and a bit of quiet wouldn’t cure. The wind-rushing stillness of the
moors, with only the buzzards for company.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Move along there. We don’t
want our breakfasts to get cold, do we lads?’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘It’s always bloody cold
anyway.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Yesterday’s bloody
leftovers, I shouldn’t wonder.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Oh, Christ, that fucking noise!
Couldn’t they shut their mouths just for one morning—just once?</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The sweat was trickling down his
face and his back felt like l sun-heated sand under the heavy tunic
and shirt. Too warm—too warm in here. Too many people, all of them
fucking scum, criminals, wasters. Wouldn’t they love it if hard man
Willoby cracked up in front of their eyes? They’d fucking cheer.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Here it comes again.</span></i></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mustn’t, mustn’t. Must not.
All that money spent keeping them here, just so John Willoby could
walk up and down this brick and iron hell in a stifling coat, with a
black hat squeezing down on the bones of his skull.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He groaned aloud, the sound lost
in the morning cacophony. The world blurred, and he had to grip the
metal handrail that bordered the catwalk with both hands.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Sweet Christ, what’s wrong with
me?</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It was the voices again, the
voices in his head, except that they were louder this time, more
insistent. He could never understand the words. They were speaking
foreign gobbledygook.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">No one else heard them. They were
his alone. He had carried them for months now, as some men carried a
hidden cancer. Ghosts, spirits, demons—they haunted him like a
conversation heard through a thin wall.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Like maggots squirming through
his brain.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He lurched into motion. He had to
get off the wing, back to the staff quarters. He had to get away to
where he would not be seen.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A prisoner in his path was
shouldered aside and left sprawling, shouting obscenities. Willoby
was almost running.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He hit the bars and wire of the
catwalk door with a crash, and for a second a scream was gagging in
his throat, his eyes wide and white, the voices crawling across his
mind; incomprehensible, alien, impossible. He scrabbled frantically
at the bars, then remembered his keys. The voices were shouting now,
shrieking—and underlying the unknown words was the growing thunder
of hoofbeats. Galloping horses, a squadron of them coming up behind
him. He heard a high, aching whine, like that of a child, but never
thought of it as coming from his own, tightening throat.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His keys, his keys. He jabbed a
shaking hand into his pocket, dropped them to the length of their
chain, got them again, stabbed them clattering against the lock.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Open, open, Christ God. <i>Open
you bastard...</i>’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The hoofbeats were right at his
back. They were an earth-trembling roar.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The key turned, the door opened
and he fell through it, crawled forward and kicked it shut behind him
with a clang. Shutting them out.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Safe now. Safe here.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His cap was off, lying beside
him. His chest was easing. He felt as soaked and racked as a
sprinter. The voices were a final, whispering echo that died into
soothing silence. Nothing. Nothing there but the prison noises.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Oh my God, what is wrong with me?</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">‘<i>W</i><i>hat
have you</i><i> done to
him?’ the Prince asked curiously. ‘What was it you put into his
mind to make him act so?’</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘<i>What was it I asked you to
think of, sire?’</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘<i>Why, the—the manhunt, the
pursuit of the traitor Carberran. Is that then what he was seeing?’</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘<i>Partly. The link is tenuous
yet. This is a shadowed land we walk in, my Prince. Best we tread
slowly, and as softly as a cat’s footfall.’</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘<i>Indeed. It is a hideous
land also. This man, though, he interests me. We will stay with him.
He may suit our purpose.’</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">For
the first time in fourteen
years Willoby did not complete his shift, and the occasion was like a
mark of shame, following him as surely as the puzzled looks of his
colleagues. He had walked these corridors hung-over, bronchitic and
exhausted, but hitherto had always lasted out his eight or twelve
hours, even if it meant Howard covering for him whilst he groaned
over a toilet rim. Not this time. His ailment was different, and no
longer possible to ignore.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The prison receded. It was a cold
winter’s morning, the keen air spearing in through the open car
windows and watering his eyes, clearing the fug from his brain. He
had a few miles of open countryside to motor through before plunging
into the sprawl of the city where he had his home.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And he had time, time to play
with. The thought made him pause with his lighter halfway to his
mouth, the cigarette drooping and forgotten.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Why, then, was he hurrying?</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To get back to Jo? She was still
at work. Maria was at school. There was no one else.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The novelty of the situation
fascinated him. He slowed down, lit the cigarette, dragged deeply.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Open moorland, the end heights of
the western Pennines. It was all around him, a bleak, sombre bowl of
vast emptiness, populated only by sheep and stone walls. He stopped
the car, opened the door and laboured out.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cold, bloody cold. The wind
caressed his thinning hair, sped the glow of his cigarette into a
tiny, bright hell.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This is better. This is better
for the head, for everything.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The morning’s events slid to
the back of his mind. There was something about this country that
soothed him. The city scab was a distant blur on the horizon. Here
the fells swelled from streams and rivers to green slopes, then up to
tops purple-grey with heather and rock, desolate.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This feeds my soul, he thought,
and tossed away the cigarette, drew in a big lungful of the sharp
air.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Someone on a horse behind him.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He turned, <i>feeling</i>
the hoofbeats through his soles. They drew near, then faded again.
The chink of harness had been audible, and the animal’s breathing.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Except that there was nothing
there.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Strangely, he was not alarmed.
Nothing threatened him here. The noise was not burrowing into his
head in the same way it had in the prison.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ghosts? Poltergeists?
Hallucinations?</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Madness?</span></i></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And the calm broke. A car flew
past, the passenger’s face a white blur. Willoby felt the first
hard spots of rain.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Am I going mad?</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">No answer in the rain or the
flanks of the fells. He smiled; an expression that, unknown to him,
chilled prisoners and fellow warders alike.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Big Will, a basket case.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Visions of himself
strait-jacketed and drooling, banging his head against a padded wall.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The smile faded.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I need a drink. Several.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And then drive Maria home from
school? She’d love that, her dad smelling like a brewery. Fucking
teenagers. You give them the best days of your life but nothing is
ever enough.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘My daughter hates me,’ he
said aloud. The smile again. Several drinks. Several and several.
Maybe Jo would be in the mood tonight.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Quite suddenly, he ached to hold
his wife, be held by her. And he laughed, running his big fingers
over his face. I must be mad, he thought. When had he last screwed
his wife? No-</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">When did we last make <i>love?</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What was in his head, messing up
his thoughts like this? These stupid questions.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A vision of Jo as a fresh-faced
girl, dark, cropped hair and that upturned nose. The light in the
brown eyes, long ago. She was blonde now, for she had hated the grey
hairs. Blonde and tired, and she wore too much make-up.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He shook his head, a big mountain
of a man running to seed, standing baffled by the roadside with the
rain pelting down on him unheeded.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Get a grip, Willoby.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Just for an instant, he caught a
glimpse of some internal desolation, his mind’s skeleton parading
across a wide expanse of pallid years. The rain dripped into his eyes
and he knuckled them dry.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Wasting fucking time, here. Good
drinking time. He climbed back into the car, puffing slightly as he
fastened his seatbelt, and slammed the door.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">See a doctor?</span></i></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The rain pattered tinnily on the
roof, blurred the view beyond the windscreen. An odd sound came out
of Willoby’s throat, a strangled sob, a whimper. He choked it into
silence. His face as he started the car was that of a maniac.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; page-break-before: always; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Two</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cold
air ripping past my face.
I am on a horse, full gallop, the ground an undulating blur below the
stirrups, my ears full of hoofed thunder. In my right hand is a heavy
sword. I am pursuing something.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A man, stumbling among the
heather ahead.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Words shouted back over my
shoulder—unknown words full of exultation. I bend over in the
saddle, predatory, eager.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
—Swing the sword at the man’s
head and feel the jar and click of impact, the blade wrenching free
of the skull as I rein in, laughing.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Other riders—a crowd of tall
figures on champing horses, sun glittering off metal everywhere.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They dismount, hack at the body
and toss the bleeding chunks aside until there is nothing left—a
slick, broken place in the heather, the shine of entrails, the white
glint of bone.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And I laugh again, kiss my bloody
sword blade and taste the coppery shine of man’s-blood.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘<i>Tallimon!’ the others are
shouting. ‘Tallimon First Prince!’</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And
he was awake, open-eyed in
the darkness of the conjugal bed, I0 breathing softly with her back
to him.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He licked his lips, fully
expecting the butcher smear to be there still, but they were dry as
cotton.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Tallimon.</span></i></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The click and crunch of steel in
bone...</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jesus.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He sat up, pressed his fingers
into his eyes and watched the spangled lights dance in the darkness.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Bastard dreams,’ he said
softly. A solitary car whooshed past below the bedroom window. The
streetlights cast an amber rectangle into the room.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He got out of bed and padded out
of the door in his underpants, silent as a cat despite his size.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And paused on the dark landing,
suddenly fearful.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What was out there, in the
dark—what lurked I0 the lightless corners?</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Damn!</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The electric light banished the
shadows. He screwed up his eyes against it, cursing under his breath.
Another broken night—what he’d give for a blank night’s sleep:
ten hours of nothingness to restore the thinning fibre of his nerves.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">See a doctor?</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Yes—and get a bottle of pills
and a pat on the head, some medical gibberish about stress, or
insomnia. Bollocks, all of it.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It’s my <i>mind</i>,
he thought. Nothing belongs in there but me. My problem alone.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His throat rasped, parched as
cardboard.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What the hell time was it? Three,
four? Time to get up soon, get ready for another early shift.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And his spirits plummeted. Back
to that bloody madhouse. He grinned weakly at his mind’s choice of
words.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I could take the day off. Ring in
sick.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">See a doctor.</span></i></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Like hell.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">‘<i>W</i><i>ell</i><i>?’</i><i>
the old</i><i> man asked.</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘<i>Yes. He suits our purpose
admirably. There is that undercurrent of desperation in him. It will
see him through it. Such men do not greatly care whether they live or
die, so long as they can do something different to what they have
been doing.’</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘<i>Such men are dangerous,
unpredictable—this one at least is not easy to control. Can you be
so sure you will master him?’</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘<i>I am the King’s heir.’
Sneering. ‘Am I not fit for anything?’ ‘All the same, sire, he
troubles me, this man. He is like a mountain cat pacing a cage.’</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘<i>He is past his best. His
youth is gone, but he has enough strength for what we want.’</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘<i>He may yet surprise us with
his strength.’</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘<i>I may yet surprise you with
the finity of my patience. This is the man. He is mine.’</i></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Later
in the dark morning
Willoby did ring in sick, said he had caught a bug of some kind—even
held his nose as he spoke to the phone, like a schoolboy intent on
truancy. Howard would cover for him, he told the duty officer. Howard
was a good man.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Relief washed over him in a tepid
wave. A free day. It was what he needed to set him on his feet.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The winter sun had not yet risen
when he reJoined his wife in bed. He was freezing, his feet numb with
pacing the cold living room downstairs, and he pushed up against her
until her warmth oozed into him through the nightdress. She shifted
in her sleep at the cold under the duvet. A heavy sleeper, Jo—not a
morning person, whereas he had always been easy to wake, bright as
the sun in the mornings. In the beginning it had been a game of his,
to wake her with touches, caresses. He burrowed closer, until they
were lying like spoons in the big bed and her buttocks were pressing
against his groin. He felt the first stirring, and edged his hand
under the nightdress as furtively as an adolescent. Warm, smooth
skin, the curve of her hip, the spreading bulge of her belly with the
deepening navel.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She twitched like a horse with a
fly on it. ‘God’s sake,’ she mumbled, and pushed his
exploratory hand away, turning in on herself in the bed.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His erection faded as he drew
away, still cold. He felt the familiar surge of anger and sadness,
and lay flat on his back with his hard eyes fixed on the ceiling.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But she was awake now, and turned
to look at him.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘What time is it?’ Muzzily,
pale hair covering her forehead.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Just gone seven.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘You’re late. You’ve slept
in.’ She blinked, coming slowly to life.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘I’m not going. I called in
sick.’ And yesterday I left early.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She did not know that yet.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘What’s wrong with you—a
cold? Don’t give it to me, for God’s sake.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘I... just didn’t want to go
in this morning; he said lamely, on the defensive. Anger, irritation
at her questions.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She sat up, rubbing her eyes, and
asked what was wrong with him again.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I hear things that aren’t
there, he thought. I dream of killing people. I can’t ever sleep a
night through. And my wife will not let me touch her.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Nothing. I’ll get
breakfast.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">If
there was a thing he liked
about early shifts, it was the solitary breakfasts he made
himself—breakfast in his case being coffee strong enough to walk on
and at least two cigarettes. He loved the peace and silence of the
early hours, though it was better in summer when he could watch the
sun come up. At such times the city would be almost as quiet as a
country village.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But he had barely finished his
first cup when Jo came down in a pink dressing gown, yawning and
looking frowsty, sleepy. She shouted back up the stairs for Maria to
get up for school, and Willoby’s morning quiet died instantly. The
television was switched on and began its meaningless noise in a
corner. No one looked at it in the mornings; it was just a necessary
noise. Jo needed noise, voices, activity around her all the time. She
could not stay in a silent room without switching something on. Now
she was clattering with the teapot and the toaster, still yawning.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Maria came down. Willoby’s
daughter was a slim, pale girl with dark, straight hair she had
cropped short. She reminded Willoby of the wife he had married .
Fourteen—the worst age in life—she spoke to him rarely, and then
mostly in a mixture of wariness and defiance. Willoby was not sure if
it was entirely their fault, but there was a wall between his family
and himself. It had been growing silently for years, a little at a
time, and the little things that would have helped break it down had
been too much trouble. Now it was a high, massive, thing. He was no
longer sure there was a way through it. Worse, he was no longer sure
he cared.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Home sweet home,’ he said
quietly, draining his cup. No one heard him.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Maybe you should see a doctor.
You’ve not been sleeping lately,’ Jo said over her shoulder.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘You noticed, then.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Of course I noticed. You need
a pill or something, something to knock you out at nights.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His face darkened. ‘I don’t
need any fucking pills.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘You watch your language in
front of the child!’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Willoby looked at his daughter.
Maria was smiling into her cornflakes—the same smile, had he known
it, that he used himself. It was unpleasant on her young mouth.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘I don’t need a doctor, just
a—a rest for a while, that’s all.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘You’ll not get much of that
without a line from the GP.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘I know, I know.’ He stared
at her as she buttered her toast. His wife’s face was small, oval.
Without make-up the deep lines at the corners of her mouth were more
visible and her lips were thinner. She plucked her eyebrows, which he
hated. When they had met she had possessed thick, dark brows,
wonderfully expressive. She had looked like a cross between a pixie
and a witch.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘What’s wrong?’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Nothing.’ He poured himself
more coffee. No one else in the house drank it. Jo preferred tea and
Maria drank only milk and water—and cider, he suspected.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘What are you going to do all
day?’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He looked up, surprised. ‘I
don’t know. I never thought—‘</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘You can take Maria to school,
then. It’ll save me a journey, and you know I’ve never liked that
road in the mornings.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He nodded. By God, if the
prisoners could only see him now. Big hard Willoby bobbing his head
to this shrill woman as though he was a schoolboy. His fingers
tightened round the coffee cup.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Wind in my hair, cold and
fresh as spring—thundered hoofbeats—the sound of a cavalry
squadron at the canter; and a guidon cracking in the air. What is the
device upon it? A mountain?</span></i></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘John—John; are you listening
to me?’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He shook his head, baffled. ‘What
was that?’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘I said Maria’s got something
to tell you. Go on, love.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘It doesn’t matter—he
doesn’t care.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Of course he does, love.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Willoby collected his unravelling
wits with an effort. ‘What? Tell me, for God’s sake.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His daughter looked at him
sullenly. ‘I’ve been picked for the netball team, so I’m
staying on this evening for the training.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘There you are,’ Jo said
triumphantly, but Willoby stared closely at his daughter and she
dropped her eyes.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Netball is it? Mind if I watch
the game?’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Her eyes were huge, outraged. ‘No
you can’t—no one else’s parents will be there. It’s only a
try-out.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Willoby smiled at her. She lied
well, like himself. To his surprise he found that he did not care
about this, either. He leaned forward into his daughter’s face.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘I hope he’s <i>nice</i>.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Maria flushed crimson, and her
glare turned into an icy smile.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘I’ll be late for school.’
She swept out of the kitchen like a princess.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘I don’t know why you do it
to the girl,’ Jo complained, eating toast.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Willoby looked at her, full of
sardonic amusement. ‘Maria can take care of herself, I think.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘She’s only fourteen! And I
don’t like the crowd she hangs about with.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What parent ever did?</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘When I was her age all I
wanted was to be a soldier,’ Willoby said. Jo rolled her eyes with
a here-he-goes-again look.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Maybe it would have been easier
if he had had a son. Maybe not. Knowing Willoby’s luck his son
would have been a mincing little faggot. He laughed at the thought,
and the laugh turned into a churning cough. He swore.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘They’ll kill you yet, those
things,’ Jo told him, nodding at the cigarette.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Probably.’ He paused, and
asked, genuinely curious, ‘Would that make you happy?’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She blinked. ‘What?’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Me turning up my toes.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘My God, John! What a thing to
ask.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Just wondered, dear.’ He
leaned over the table and kissed her crumb-grained lips. She wiped
her mouth, staring at him. He grinned. There was an odd sense of
carelessness in him this morning. He truly didn’t give a monkey’s,
and he had a day of his own stretching out before him like a jewel in
the dark of a mine.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Don’t forget to take Maria
to school.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">See a doctor.</span></i></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘I won’t.’</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘What are you going to do all
day?’ This time she was genuinely curious.</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
‘Frankly my dear, I have no
idea.’ Thank Christ, he thought.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Riding the Unicorn</i> is out autumn 2014</span></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Pre-order: <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Riding-Unicorn-Paul-Kearney/dp/1781081905/" target="_blank">UK</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Riding-Unicorn-Paul-Kearney/dp/1781081913" target="_blank">US</a></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div align="JUSTIFY" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm; text-indent: 0.3cm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Netgalley reviewers: request a copy <a href="https://www.netgalley.com/catalog/show/id/53385" target="_blank">today</a></span></div>
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</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-33686373664609460552014-09-24T16:08:00.001+02:002014-09-24T16:09:46.981+02:00Nyctophobia launch with Christopher Fowler<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0RkWsHVwBsD7ggX3OzGomGRRapcanYntkEuGRkj8zMgCEa_XMjooCJsQYPOJwspeHmYZf8C3zuziyYzRskiBAW1EOTchptHDCroiWKkRLoGjbueZj6rkDhBWTXuIO0PtKy809QA/s1600/Nyctophobia+poster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0RkWsHVwBsD7ggX3OzGomGRRapcanYntkEuGRkj8zMgCEa_XMjooCJsQYPOJwspeHmYZf8C3zuziyYzRskiBAW1EOTchptHDCroiWKkRLoGjbueZj6rkDhBWTXuIO0PtKy809QA/s1600/Nyctophobia+poster.jpg" height="400" width="280" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">3-4pm, 11th October at Forbidden Planet London.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Find out more <a href="https://forbiddenplanet.com/events/2014/10/11/christopher-fowler-signing-nychtophobia/" target="_blank">here</a></span></div>
<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-28412174037102806832014-09-22T14:42:00.000+02:002014-09-22T14:42:36.498+02:00Cover reveal: Dangerous Games<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Roll the bones this December with the latest anthology from multi-award winning editor Jonathan Oliver (</span><i style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The End of the Line</i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">, </span><i style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">House of Fear, Magic, End of the Road</i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">).</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Introducing: </span><i style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Dangerous Games</i></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDswJtiPHz1NlUaxRsQqDo9ETj0Qtmy2oG9ci8wDkRkGP5PjX5KyvKGMvhP_2YYmck2CwuUqLDlYlK2YgbB1AY89gv7laoHlz6XEwMf0AeLYlXr1TL88aayDCTryQ7-v1WyEfCpA/s1600/DANGEROUS+GAMES+BIG.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDswJtiPHz1NlUaxRsQqDo9ETj0Qtmy2oG9ci8wDkRkGP5PjX5KyvKGMvhP_2YYmck2CwuUqLDlYlK2YgbB1AY89gv7laoHlz6XEwMf0AeLYlXr1TL88aayDCTryQ7-v1WyEfCpA/s1600/DANGEROUS+GAMES+BIG.jpg" height="640" width="409" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In a world ruled by chance, one rash decision could bring down the house, one roll of the dice could bring untold wealth, or the end of everything. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The players have gathered around the table, each to tell their story - often dark, always compelling. Within you will find tales of the players and the played, lives governed by games deadly, weird, or downright bizarre.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bringing together tales of the weird and the macabre, <i>Dangerous Games</i> is a diverse collection of voices, featuring incredible new fiction by Chuck Wendig, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Lavie Tidhar, Benjanun Sriduangkaew, Paul Kearney, Libby McGugan, Yoon Ha Lee, Gary Northfield, Melanie Tem, Hillary Monahan, Tade Thompson, Rebecca Levene, Ivo Stourton, Gary McMahon, Robert Shearman, Nik Vincent, Helen Marshall, and Pat Cadigan.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Dangerous Games</i> is out December 2014. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Pre-order it today: <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dangerous-Games-Jonathan-Oliver/dp/1781082650" target="_blank">UK</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Dangerous-Games-Anthology-Players-Played/dp/1781082685" target="_blank">US</a></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-10493345202849402212014-09-11T19:02:00.001+02:002014-09-11T19:02:42.282+02:00Introducing the debut novel from Silvia Moreno-Garcia<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Solaris Books are delighted to reveal the debut novel from the wonderfully talented Silvia Moreno-Garcia, <i>Signal to Noise, </i>will be out Spring 2015.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
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<i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdw9vyzylEWh-QO1J_VaN_JfgwhZzDzxdZoXNofGLg6I3HR_Dt_CrT5WpWgiWzcE08DA7sCPCQGMuwKGlbovCvXFSsh5NGueKAbHPDCOV3-fAMNAx-hV1PzzlN7G2NKjjmh-WnFw/s1600/9781781082997.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdw9vyzylEWh-QO1J_VaN_JfgwhZzDzxdZoXNofGLg6I3HR_Dt_CrT5WpWgiWzcE08DA7sCPCQGMuwKGlbovCvXFSsh5NGueKAbHPDCOV3-fAMNAx-hV1PzzlN7G2NKjjmh-WnFw/s1600/9781781082997.jpg" height="640" width="432" /></span></a></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mexico City, 1988: Long before iTunes or MP3s, you said “I love you” with a mixtape.</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Meche, awkward and fifteen, has two equally unhip friends – Sebastian and Daniela – and a whole lot of vinyl records to keep her company. When she discovers how to cast spells using music, the future looks brighter for the trio. The three friends will piece together their broken families, change their status as non-entities, and maybe even find love…</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> Mexico City, 2009: Two decades after abandoning the metropolis, Meche returns alone for her estranged father’s funeral.</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> It’s hard enough to cope with her family, but then she runs into Sebastian, reviving memories from a childhood she thought she buried a long time ago. What really happened back then? What precipitated the bitter falling out with her father? Is there any magic left?</span></i></div>
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<b style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">About the author:</b></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFqJSapDfdG9L8nLF8G7C_iCd9IzIZySrTx_WdDKfBEueS4u-tru6OuSi8oAyTs-vBVkJHectEvg7vgxsObupZdvciOZILchPVVNRvdxaKFS6eZ919cr4_oSbVUYm4U0faPYAS7A/s1600/1233050_10200510154423210_420818141_o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFqJSapDfdG9L8nLF8G7C_iCd9IzIZySrTx_WdDKfBEueS4u-tru6OuSi8oAyTs-vBVkJHectEvg7vgxsObupZdvciOZILchPVVNRvdxaKFS6eZ919cr4_oSbVUYm4U0faPYAS7A/s1600/1233050_10200510154423210_420818141_o.jpg" height="150" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mexican by birth, Canadian by inclination, Silvia Moreno-Garcia lives in beautiful British Columbia with her family and two cats. Her speculative fiction has been collected in This Strange Way of Dying. </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Signal to Noise</i></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> will be her debut novel.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Pre-order: </span><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Signal-Noise-Silvia-Moreno-Garcia/dp/1781082995" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">UK</a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> | </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Signal-Noise-Silvia-Moreno-Garcia/dp/1781082995" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">US</a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;">Author photo credit C.G. Cameron</span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-29751424171903059232014-09-08T13:47:00.003+02:002014-09-08T13:55:26.673+02:00British Fantasy Award win for Solaris Books Editor-in-Chief<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We are delighted to announce that <i>End of the Road</i>, edited by Solaris Books’ Editor-in-Chief Jonathan
Oliver, has won the British Fantasy Award 2014 for Best Anthology!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOGjOecf8FN4BAEOSOfxObl4HLtm88kNxaH8PlC8QDXDAh_CJnzK6NXlkgsBC77QAgkhHPGXcGRZRImQLTS4HEZLbZAYQfRYNQRzRNFDnp-qmIsOXaOhkEUbT-7AeP7VVInr-fIA/s1600/FC-BC+(END%2BOF%2BTHE%2BROAD%2BUK).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOGjOecf8FN4BAEOSOfxObl4HLtm88kNxaH8PlC8QDXDAh_CJnzK6NXlkgsBC77QAgkhHPGXcGRZRImQLTS4HEZLbZAYQfRYNQRzRNFDnp-qmIsOXaOhkEUbT-7AeP7VVInr-fIA/s1600/FC-BC+(END%2BOF%2BTHE%2BROAD%2BUK).jpg" height="400" width="256" /></a></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">An incredible anthology
of original short stories by an exciting list of writers including the
bestselling author Philip Reeve and the World Fantasy award-winning Lavie
Tidhar.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Each step will lead
you closer to your destination, but who, or what, can you expect to meet at journey’s
end? Here are stories of misfits, spectral hitch-hikers, nightmare travel tales
and the rogues, freaks and monsters to be found on the road. the critically
acclaimed editor of Magic, End of The Line and House of Fear has brought
together the contemporary masters and mistresses of the weird from around the
globe in an anthology of travel tales like no other. Strap on your seatbelt,
shoulder your backpack, or wait for that next ride... into darkness.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Praise for <i>End of
the Road:</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Jonathan Oliver has turned to the road story: a genre, as
he explains in his insightful introduction, widely mined in film and literature
alike… though the fifteen short fictions which follow show that the form has
much more to offer… the road, and the road story, goes ever on. Would that we
could go with it, for though it has its horrors, it’s replete with untold
wonders as well.” – Tor.com<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“An enriching and enjoyable example of the diversity and
inventiveness that a themed anthology can offer. This is one book not to be
missed” – This is Horror<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“A rich tapestry of mythology and landscape to the stories.
If you like weird stories or stories about change and discovery, then I’d
definitely recommend picking up <i>End
of the Road</i>.” – Fantastical Librarian <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“The collection also has the superb factor of being from
authors from across the globe. The variety and complexity is great, and I
highly recommend this to anyone who has never got into the idea of short
stories, as it would make an engrossing introduction.” – Nerds Feather<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“The road indeed "goes on forever"… which is fine,
because sometimes it's the remarkable journey that make the the <i>End of the Road
</i>worthwhile.” – Bob Milne, Beauty in Ruins<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“All of the stories are excellent in their various ways, and
taken together, they cover a wide range of time and a great diversity of
culture” – David Harris via Goodreads<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I was not prepared for how much this anthology would break
my heart so utterly.” - feux d'artifice<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Featured guest posts by Jonathan Oliver:</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/2014/07/5-questions-with-jonathan-oliver-on-end-of-the-road-and-the-shirley-jackson-award/#more-96640">5 Questions with Jonathan Oliver on SF Signal</a> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.shirleyjacksonawards.org/2014/07/18/charles-tan-interviews-jonathan-oliver">Charles Tan Interviews Jonathan Oliver for the Shirley JacksonAwards</a> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://www.risingshadow.net/articles/302-guest-post-the-beginning-of-the-end-by-jonathan-oliver"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Beginning of the End on Rising Shadow</span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://fantasticalimaginations.wordpress.com/2013/11/25/the-road-less-travelled-a-guest-post-by-jonathan-oliver/">The Road Less Travelled on Fantastical Imaginations</a> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Awards:</b><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">British Fantasy Awards: Best Anthology 2014 (winner)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Shirley Jackson Awards: Best Anthology 2014 (shortlisted)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">World Fantasy Awards: best Anthology 2014 (nominated –
winners announced November 2014)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>End of the Road,</i> edited by Jonathan Oliver, is available online and from all good bookstores:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">UK: <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/End-Road-Philip-Reeve/dp/1781081530/ref=tmm_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1410176493&sr=8-4">book</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/End-Road-Lavie-Tidhar-ebook/dp/B00GWQAORA/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=8-4&qid=1410176493">kindle</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">US: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/End-Road-Anthology-Original-Fiction/dp/1781081549/ref=tmm_mmp_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=&qid=">book</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.com/End-Road-Lavie-Tidhar-ebook/dp/B00GWQAORA/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=&qid=">kindle</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.rebellionstore.com/products/end_of_the_road">Get the eBook online today from The Rebellion Store.</a></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-54657063305864839352014-08-29T13:34:00.001+02:002014-08-29T13:45:09.089+02:00Ack Ack Macaque: The last stand commences January 2015<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ladies, gentlemen and primates gather round for we have the most joyous of joyful news: Ack Ack Macaque is back!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Coming to a bookshelf near you January 2015: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">Macaque Attack</span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2amIpukcIY7zUXuJuPh0QOh3-AdCP60DHPzM9Ii1gQuiQPbk7148EdjFgV2iYj58MIct6Y4-euA5RNtBfHWwIyBQvixbPUopZ0AD3qVfpzxYSTYwKtblS6cy5XNyz7x52a8_vXg/s1600/MACAQUE+ATTACK+COVER.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2amIpukcIY7zUXuJuPh0QOh3-AdCP60DHPzM9Ii1gQuiQPbk7148EdjFgV2iYj58MIct6Y4-euA5RNtBfHWwIyBQvixbPUopZ0AD3qVfpzxYSTYwKtblS6cy5XNyz7x52a8_vXg/s1600/MACAQUE+ATTACK+COVER.jpg" height="640" width="416" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Ack-Ack’s back - and this time he’s brought an army!</i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>He’s saved the world twice. Now, in the thrilling conclusion
to the award-winning Macaque Trilogy, the dangerous but charismatic Ack-Ack
Macaque finds himself leading a dimension-hopping troupe of angry monkeys,
facing an invading horde of implacable killer androids, and confronting the one
challenge for which he was never prepared: impending fatherhood!</i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Meanwhile, former journalist Victoria Valois finds herself
facing old enemies as she fights to save the electronic ghost of her dead
husband, and Merovech, King of the United Kingdoms of Great Britain and France,
receives a troubling message from the dead sands of Mars...</i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Ack-Ack is an inspired creation, a monkey with attitude, issues and a hole where his heart should be, and his latest deftly plotted adventure is riotous fun.” - The Guardian</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"Ridiculously readable, thoroughly entertaining, and packed full of ideas.” - SFFWorld</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“if you like William Gibson or Philip K. Dick, then Ack-Ack Macaque is a sometimes surreal, yet very worthy read.” - Fantasy Faction</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“More fun than a barrel of steampunk monkeys … It’s an over-the-top, verbally caffeinated adventure story with smart, nasty ideas and plenty of pulp.” - Milwaukee Journal Sentinel</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Macaque Attack is the concluding title in the Ack Ack trilogy.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Available January 2015</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Pre-order now: <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Macaque-Attack-Gareth-L-Powell/dp/1781082855">UK</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Macaque-Attack-Gareth-L-Powell/dp/1781082863/">US</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Gareth L Powell will be on a UK tour, check back for more details to follow.</span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-20978267006442490012014-08-22T12:34:00.001+02:002014-08-22T12:34:30.152+02:00The Fire Prince by Emily Gee - exclusive preview<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">The Fire Prince</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">By Emily Gee</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5Hi1fx2Sta_ECwZsgoWskxIan-5cWcKgPEb5EreeDXPKWjuGXw8nAYVqfIsuRT5Tcbrxm9YU2l56AVEqtWGqkXBuUnGCAo7igfeDvkaD60eiAA9KyjK_tCaKansgYi3N7gAT6Yw/s1600/FP1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5Hi1fx2Sta_ECwZsgoWskxIan-5cWcKgPEb5EreeDXPKWjuGXw8nAYVqfIsuRT5Tcbrxm9YU2l56AVEqtWGqkXBuUnGCAo7igfeDvkaD60eiAA9KyjK_tCaKansgYi3N7gAT6Yw/s1600/FP1.jpg" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">CHAPTER ONE</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jaumé rode a tough little pony with short legs and a bony spine. He used his folded blanket as a saddle. The one thing he knew he mustn’t do was complain. These men watched him, even Bennick watched, with a scant glance now and then, and they had ears for everything, without seeming to listen. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bennick gave a grin of approval when he saw the use Jaumé put his blanket to. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The other men didn’t grin, or wink at him the way Bennick sometimes did. They were neither friendly nor hostile. Jaumé knew they’d all been what he was—orphaned—but it was Bennick who’d found him. Bennick whose charge he was. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Before dusk, Nolt led his band away from the road. They followed a stream across the fields to a small copse.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jaumé let his pony drink, then rubbed her down, copying the actions of the men. He helped Bennick dig a firepit and ring it with stones, watching the other men unload the packhorses, seeing the way they worked together with the ease of long familiarity, hardly needing to speak. This was his second night on the road with them and he knew all their names now. Nolt. Old Maati and young Kimbel. Odil. Black-skinned Gant. Steadfast, called Stead by the others, and Ashandel, called Ash. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And Bennick.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The men were Brothers, and Bennick had said he could be one too, if he was quick and tough and brave enough.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">When the firepit was finished, Jaumé sat back on his heels and looked at Bennick.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Now what do we need?” Bennick asked.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Firewood,” Jaumé said promptly.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bennick laughed and ruffled Jaumé’s hair, the way Da used to do. “Good lad.” He crossed to the pile of unloaded equipment and fished out an axe. “Come on. Help me find some wood.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jaumé hurried after him.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Not far into the copse they found a fallen tree. The wood was as pale and dry as bone. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jaumé gathered the firewood Bennick chopped, stacking it in piles. After several minutes, Bennick stripped off his shirt. His chest was tanned, furred with red-blond hair. On his right bicep was a small mark, blue-black.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“What’s that?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“A tattoo. You never seen one?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jaumé shook his head. “Is it a picture?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“It’s a picture of this.” Bennick reached down to his waist, where a round pouch of dark leather was fastened. One moment his hand was empty, the next, he held a metal disk. No, not a disk, a knife with five blades.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“What is it?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“We call it a Star.” Bennick flicked it in the air with a flashing twirl of blades and caught it again. He held it out to Jaumé.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jaumé took the Star reverently. The metal was polished to a gleaming brightness, the blades as sharp as razors. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“The tattoo marks me for a Brother,” Bennick said. “We all have them. If you join us, you’ll have one too.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Will I have one of these?” Jaumé didn’t dare throw the Star as Bennick had done. Those blades would slice off his fingers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His imagination took flight, showing him his fingers spinning in the air, like thick pink worms, and scattering across the grass at their feet.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“You can have as many Stars as you want.” Bennick’s blue eyes smiled the way Da’s had used to. “Do you want that, lad?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Yes.” </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bennick held out his hand for the Star.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jaumé gave it back reluctantly. “Will you teach me to spin it, the way you did?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bennick laughed as he slipped the Star into the pouch again, showing a flash of white teeth. “You need to learn how to throw a knife first, lad. Once you’ve done that you can think about Stars.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Will you teach me how to throw a knife?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I have the one I made when I was your age. If I let you use it, you’ll have to look after it. Sharpen it. Oil the blade. You can only throw a knife when you know it well enough. But now, let’s shift this wood.”</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">That night, after they’d eaten, Bennick went to his pack and took out a small bundle wrapped in soft leather. He sat down by Jaumé and folded the leather back. Inside was a plain cowhide sheath, with a white bone handle poking out the top.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jaumé’s fingers went out, almost as if the bone handle pulled them towards it. “Can I...?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bennick nodded. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jaumé wrapped his hand round the handle. It was cold, but the shape seemed welcoming. He felt his fingers fit in the shallow grooves Bennick had cut for his own fingers long ago. He didn’t ask if he could pull the blade out; already, the knife was shifting from Bennick to him. He felt it. The bone seemed to take warmth from his skin and return it. He drew out the blade. It shone in the firelight.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“You made this?” he said with awe.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Made the handle, chose the blade, put the two together,” Bennick said. “That’ll be one of your first lessons when you reach Fith.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“How old were you?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Same as you. Eight.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jaumé felt a thrill of excitement. He wanted to make a knife like this.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“How does it feel?” Bennick asked.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Good. Is it...?” Mine? He glanced at Bennick, asked the question silently.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“You can use it. If it lets you.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“How?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Practice. Touch the blade. Careful, now.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jaumé put his finger on the sharp edge. At once he felt a sting of pain. He drew his finger back and saw a drop of blood form.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“It cut me.”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“No, you cut yourself. You went too fast. There’s no easy way. There’s only hard work. Can you do that?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Yes.” Jaumé turned the knife over in his hand. “Can I give it a name?”</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“No,” Bennick said. “It’s a knife.” He patted the pouch at his waist. “And these are Stars. They’re not for games. They’re tools. You learn what they can do, then you make them do it.” </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Jaumé nodded. A knife is a tool.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Carefully, he wiped the faint mark of his blood from the blade and fitted it back in the sheath. I’ll work hard. I want to be a Brother. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They crossed into Sault on the ninth day out of Cornas, moving through throngs of refugees. The soldiers manning the border post made no attempt to control the press of dusty, ragged people and carts piled high with household goods. Here was the same smell Jaumé had smelled in Cornas—sweat, with a sour undertone of fear. The curse seemed suddenly real again. He heard howling laughter, heard the crackle of flames. Rosa’s scream echoed in his head. The smell of Mam’s blood was in his nose.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Terror wrapped its fingers around his heart, squeezing.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And then he looked at Bennick, sitting easily on his horse, and the terror vanished. While he was with Bennick and the Brothers, he was safe.</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">CHAPTER TWO</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mid-afternoon they rode over the pass into Ankeny. Harkeld halted and looked back. Dry, rocky hills hid the Masse desert. The red sand and the ruined city, the catacombs, were ten days behind them. “Do you see something?” his armsman, Justen, asked. “Someone following?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld shook his head. The only people behind them were dead. Lundegaard’s soldiers in their fresh graves. The Fithian assassins lying where they’d fallen. The ancient desert dwellers crumbling in their tombs.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The long string of packhorses passed them. Ebril rode last, whistling, his red hair glinting in the sun. “All right?” he called.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld nodded. He unstoppered his waterskin and swallowed a mouthful of lukewarm water.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Justen wiped dust from his face. “Prince Tomas should be at the escarpment by now.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld grunted. In another week, Tomas would be at King Magnas’s castle. Telling the king I’m a witch.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Memory swept over him: fire igniting in his chest, flames bursting from his skin, an inferno roaring in his ears. With memory came a surge of panic. He’d not been able to control the fire, had been on the point of bursting into flames—</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld shoved the memory aside. He rammed the stopper into the waterskin.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“We’d best not get too far behind,” Justen said. “Those cursed assassins...”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The back of Harkeld’s neck tightened at the words. He nudged his horse forward. It picked its way between the rocks. Far to the north the sea glittered. Somewhere in that glitter was a port town called Stanic, and more witches sent to strengthen their numbers. The most powerful of the shapeshifters, Innis, had gone in search of them two days ago. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To the southeast were mountains, the long range called the Palisades that cut Ankeny off from the sea. The mountains marched into the distance, snowcapped. Ahead were forested highlands, a tufted green carpet that stretched east as far as he could see. Tomorrow they’d be down there, in among the trees. How long since he’d last stood beneath a tree? Three weeks? Four? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He yearned for green leaves and damp earth and cool shade, but that dense forest also made him uneasy. How many assassins did it hide? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They camped beside a riverbed. No water flowed, but in a deep hollow was a stagnant pool. They unloaded the packhorses, let them drink, fed them the grain carried from Lundegaard. Harkeld helped Justen pitch the tents, then fashioned a rough firepit and piled the last of their wood into it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cora, the most senior of the witches, crouched alongside him and snapped her fingers. Harkeld flinched as the branches flared alight. The memory of flames stung his skin.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He shook his head sharply, angry with himself, and glanced around. Had anyone noticed him flinch? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">No. Justen was laying out bedrolls and blankets in the tents and Ebril was rubbing down the horses. Of the other shapeshifters, there was no sign. They’d be somewhere in the gathering dusk, keeping watch for danger.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld looked back at Cora, with her plain, weary face and thick plait of graying sandy hair. “Cora?” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Yes?” She didn’t look up from unpacking the cooking pots.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Dareus said that Sentinels can strip witches of their magic.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cora stopped what she was doing. She looked at him. “If a mage misuses his magic, then yes, Sentinels will strip him of it.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Can you strip me of my mine?” Please.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cora surveyed him for several seconds. Had she heard the desperation in his voice? “Myself? No. Only healers can do it. Innis could do it.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Innis? He felt his face stiffen. Memory swooped back: the catacombs, a smoking torch, skeletal corpses jostling each other as they guarded the anchor stone. He heard Innis’s voice clearly in his head: I thought you were braver than this.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Not someone else?” Harkeld said. “Not Petrus?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cora shook her head and went back to unpacking the pots. “He’s not a strong enough healer. Some of the Sentinels who’re joining us should be. We asked for more healers.” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld watched her sort through the bundles of dried food. Her hands were brisk, competent, short-fingered. If no new healers come... </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He clenched his teeth together. If it had to be Innis, he’d do it. He’d get down on his knees and beg her. Anything to be rid of the fire inside him. “How is it done? Will I still be able to travel?” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cora laid down the bundles and met his gaze squarely. “Prince Harkeld, you’re an extremely strong fire mage. Stronger than I am, at a guess—”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I don’t want to be a witch.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Whether you want to or not is irrelevant. You are one.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He shook his head. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She looked at him for a long moment, as if weighing options. He saw a decision firm her mouth. “Once the third anchor stone is destroyed, we’ll strip you of your magic. But until then, you must use it.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“What?” He shook his head, pushed to his feet. “No!” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> “Your magic saved your life in the canyon. And from what Innis tells me, it saved you both in the catacombs.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He didn’t look at her, didn’t acknowledge her words. He stared at the sun sinking behind the horizon.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“We need every advantage we can get, sire. Surely you see that? If you die...”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">If I die, so could everyone on this continent. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Fire magic is frightening,” Cora said matter-of-factly. “And the more magic one has, the more frightening it is. Until one learns to control it.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He turned his head to look down at her.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Only a fool wouldn’t be afraid.” Cora held out a large iron pot. “Can you fill this with water, please?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld walked down to the stagnant pool, filled the pot, brought it back to the fire. Cora looked at the scum floating in it and wrinkled her nose. “We’ll strain it.” She took another pot and laid a strip of cloth over it. “You pour.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld hefted the heavy pot.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I’ll teach you to use your fire magic,” Cora said, as the dirty water splashed onto the cloth. “So you can use it to protect yourself. And once the curse is broken, one of the healers will strip you of it. If that’s what you wish.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Use it again? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He remembered the canyon, red cliffs towering over him, the assassin screaming as he burned. He remembered the catacombs, the ocean of fire, the deafening roar of flame.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Innis told me what happened in the catacombs,” Cora said as he lowered the empty pot. “She was right; fire was the only way through, but the risk... You’re lucky the two of you are still alive.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“What do you mean?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“If my guess is correct, you’re strong enough to set stone on fire. You could have burned everything. Not just the corpses, but the entire catacombs. There would have been nothing left. You and Innis...” She made a sharp gesture with one hand. “Incinerated. And then what would have happened? We wouldn’t even have had your body.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And the curse would never be broken. And everyone in the Seven Kingdoms would die.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cora hung the pot on an iron tripod over the fire. Harkeld’s eyes followed the movement of her hands, but his mind was back in Masse. He saw a gray dawn, a smoky battlefield, Dareus lying broken-necked. If you’d used your magic, you sniveling coward, he’d still be alive! The voice was Gerit’s, hoarse with rage and exhaustion. He’s dead because of you!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He’d felt the truth of the words then, and he felt them still. Dareus would be alive if he’d dared to use his magic.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“If... if I agree to learn...” The words were astonishingly difficult to utter; they clogged in his throat and stuck on his tongue. Harkeld swallowed. “If I agree—”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“If you agree, you have my word that one of our healers will strip your magic from you once the curse is destroyed.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The word of a witch. What was that worth?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He stared at Cora. She wasn’t Dareus, whom he’d grudgingly trusted, but Dareus was dead, buried beneath the desert sand, and Cora led them now. She was... perhaps not completely human, but not the monster he’d once thought witches were. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld took a deep breath, ignored the panic churning in his stomach, and nodded. “I agree.” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Good. Can you fill that pot again, please? We need to boil some water to drink.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">They strained a second pot of water and set it on the fire. Cora opened bundles of dried meat. “We’ll start small. Can you fetch a candle?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“What? Now?” Harkeld rocked back on his heels, alarmed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Why not?” She looked at him, her eyes reflecting the firelight. “You want to be able to control it, don’t you?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Uh... I should really help with the packhorses.” He gestured to where Ebril and Justen worked.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Prince Harkeld.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Her voice wasn’t scornful, as Innis’s had been. She sounded sympathetic, motherly. As if I’m a child, not a man of twenty-four.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld flushed. He pushed to his feet and went to fetch a candle. Fear built in his chest as he brought it back to the fire. The first pot was simmering. He watched Cora put in handfuls of dried meat, dried vegetables, a scattering of dried herbs; nearly the last of the supplies they’d brought from Lundegaard. She dusted her palms one against the other. “Sit down beside me.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He did, his legs stiff with reluctance.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“We’ll start with this.” Cora snapped her fingers. A single flame flared on one fingertip, and then went out. “Fire magic is inside me, in my blood, and I choose to release it. I could have it come out my nose if I wanted to, but this...”—she snapped her fingers again—“is simple and safe. My magic is focused on one point that I can see. I’m not going to accidentally burn myself or anyone else.” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She looked at him as if expecting a response. Harkeld nodded.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“When I was learning, I found it easiest to visualize a tinderbox. Flint strikes steel and you have a spark.” Cora snapped her fingers, the flame flared again for an instant. “You try. Concentrate on your hand. Try to feel the magic in your blood. Imagine that it’s warm and stings a little.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld took a deep breath. He looked at his right hand. His mind gave him images of what might happen: his hand engulfed in flames, becoming a blackened claw. “What if my hand catches fire?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I’ll put it out.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His gaze jerked to her face. “It can happen?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“It’s extremely rare for fire mages to burn themselves. It’s... how can I put it? The magic is in your blood, and your blood is in your body, and it’s as if the magic knows it shouldn’t burn itself. Does that make sense?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He nodded. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I saw someone make fire come out of his ears once,” Cora said. “A student fooling around. His hair caught alight. That’s the only time I’ve ever seen a mage hurt himself with his own fire.” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His mind shied away from the image her words conjured.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I doubt you’ll burn yourself, Prince Harkeld, but if you do, I’ll put it out.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld tried to swallow his fear, but it stuck in his throat, a choking lump. Stop being such a baby, he told himself. He gritted his teeth and stared at his right hand, trying to feel the magic in his blood. Warm and stinging, Cora had said.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The magic hadn’t been warm and stinging in the catacombs. It had been hot, a searing pain that had roared through him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In a rush, he felt it again: fire sizzling along his veins. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Can you feel it?”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld nodded, his jaw clenched. His hand felt so hot the skin should be blistering, smoking. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Now imagine your hand is a tinderbox and snap your fingers.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He was sweating, afraid. It was stupidly difficult to breathe. “You’ll put it out if...”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I’ll put it out.” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld gulped a breath, visualized a tinderbox—flint striking against steel—and snapped his fingers.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Flame roared high, white-hot, lighting up the campsite like a flash of lightning.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Panic burst in his chest. He rocked backwards, thrusting his hand away from himself. His mouth opened in a shout, but before it was uttered, Cora laid her hand over his, quenching the flame.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld stared at her, his mouth still open, his heart beating wildly. Behind Cora he saw Justen and Ebril turn their heads, startled. The horses moved uneasily, one half-rearing.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cora’s lips twitched in a smile. “I see I shall have to teach you how to dampen your magic.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He closed his mouth, found his voice. “Dampen?”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“You don’t need that much magic to light a candle. Just a tiny amount.” She released his hand. “Now, try again. Feel the magic in your blood.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I don’t want to. Harkeld took a deep breath. He looked at his hand again and tried to sense magic there. This time it came quickly, a painful flood of heat.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Is it hot?”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He nodded, gritting his teeth.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Dampen it.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“How?” His voice was tight with pain.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Tell it.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld snarled at the uselessness of this advice. Not so hot, he said in his head. Not so hot. But it didn’t make any difference. His skin felt like it was sizzling, his blood boiling. Panic rose in him. Any moment now his hand would burst into flames and—</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Not working?” Cora reached out and took his wrist. “Come with me.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld stumbled to his feet and followed her, down into the riverbed. Her fingers pinched his wrist, pinched back his panic. Curse it, but his hand burned—</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cora crouched, pulling him to his knees, and plunged his hand into the stagnant pool. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld hissed. He half expected to see steam rise.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Keep telling your magic that you don’t need all of it,” Cora said. “You only need enough to light a candle.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He did, over and over in his head. Not so hot. I only need a little. Just enough for a candle. The water helped. His hand began to cool. His panic trickled away, leaving him feeling foolish.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Better?”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld nodded. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cora released his wrist. He could barely see her in the dusk. “Now, try snapping your fingers again.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld lifted his hand from the water. He felt the magic in his blood, warm, pulsing in time to his heartbeat. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He shook off the drops and took a deep breath. Just enough for a candle. He imagined his hand was a tinderbox and snapped his fingers. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A flame appeared, steady and orange, dancing on the end of his forefinger. The light it cast showed him Cora’s face. She smiled. “See? You control your magic, Prince Harkeld. It doesn’t control you.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He nodded, too relieved to be able to speak.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“You have the candle?”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He fished in his pocket with his left hand. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Light it.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He did. It became even easier to see Cora’s face. “Well done,” she said.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He felt no sense of accomplishment. The flame burning quietly at the end of his finger, the lit candle—they weren’t things to be proud of; they were the first steps to becoming what he’d reviled all his life: a witch.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">No. It was the first step to having the magic stripped from his blood. The first step to not being a witch.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cora stood. “Let’s get back to the fire. I think the stew’s about to boil over.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The flame still burned on the end of Harkeld’s forefinger. “How do I put his out? Douse it in water?” </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Pinch your thumb and finger together and imagine you’re snuffing a candle.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He did. The flame vanished. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“You won’t always need to use imagery like that,” Cora said, as he followed her back to the fire. “But for now it’s easiest. Like the tinderbox.” She crouched and stirred the stew. “Put out that candle and try lighting it again.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“But the pool—“</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“You shouldn’t need water to dampen your magic, now that you know you can do it. That’s a lot of what magic’s about. Knowing what you can and can’t do. If you doubt yourself, if you’re afraid, it becomes a lot harder. Magic is in the blood, but our ability to use it comes from up here.” Cora tapped her forehead.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A black owl glided low over the camp and landed beside the tents.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Ah, Innis is back. She’ll need her clothes.” Cora gave him the wooden spoon. “Keep stirring. And once that drinking water’s boiled for five minutes, take it off.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld had just removed the water pot from the fire when Cora returned with Innis. The girl’s face was pale and tired beneath her tangled black curls. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“You must be starving, Innis.” Cora rummaged among the bundles of food. “Here, have these nuts.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His own stomach gave a quiet rumble, but Innis would be hungrier than he was; witches were forbidden to eat when they were in another shape, and she’d flown more than a hundred miles today. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“The water’s too hot to drink. Wait, I’ll fetch my waterskin.” Cora hurried off into the darkness.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Which left just him and Innis at the fire. Harkeld put all his concentration into stirring the stew, ignoring Innis sitting on the other side of the orange flames.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Sire?”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He kept his eyes on the pot for a moment, then glanced at her. It was the first time they’d been alone together since the anchor stone, when she’d shoved his cowardice in his face. She’d been fierce then, her gray eyes blazing at him. Now she looked fragile and exhausted. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I want to apologize for what I said to you in the catacombs.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He frowned. “What?”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I apologize,” Innis said. “I was trying to make you angry enough to use your magic.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld looked back at the stew. It was bubbling. Lumps of meat jostled one another, pieces of carrot, peas. “It worked,” he said flatly. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He tried not to remember, but it was impossible not to. Her words had been like slaps across his face: <i>I thought you were braver than this, sire. </i></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld stabbed the stew with the wooden spoon. She’d been right to call him a coward.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“What I said wasn’t true. I shouldn’t have said it.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">He lifted his head and glared at her. “It was true.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“What? No! How can you think that? I was there when your father said he’d cut out your tongue if you disobeyed him. Even when he said he’d take your hands and your head, you stood up to him! You did what was right.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld looked back at the pot. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“And in the Graytooth Mountains, at the pass, you came back to fight, even though Dareus told you not to.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld stirred the stew slowly.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“What I said in the catacombs—it was to make you angry, sire. And I apologize. It was badly done of me.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Innis meant what she said. He could hear it in her voice. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Harkeld looked up, met her eyes and nodded. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The apology shouldn’t matter—she was only a witch after all; what did he care about her opinion of him? But somehow it did. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Innis held the nuts in her hand, uneaten. She seemed thinner, as if she’d lost weight in the three days she’d been gone. “Eat,” Harkeld told her brusquely, and turned his attention to the pot again.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">---</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Innis had two bowls of stew, trying to eat slowly and not shovel it into her mouth. She was still hungry when she’d finished, but a glance at the pot told her it had been scraped clean. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Tell us about Stanic,” Cora said. “Who was there?”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Innis put down her bowl. The food was a pleasant warmth in her stomach. Her eyes caught movement overhead. A russet-breasted owl glided over the campsite, its feathers shimmering with shapeshifter’s magic. Ebril, keeping watch. He drifted out of sight into the darkness. “Five Sentinels.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Only five?” Gerit scowled, his beard bristling. “We need more’n that.” </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Who are they?” Cora asked.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Susa and Katlen. Hew. Rand and Frane.” A yawn caught her on the last name. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Don’t know most of ’em.” Gerit’s scowl deepened. “What are they?”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Frane’s a healer, Hew’s a shapeshifter, and Susa’s a fire mage. They’ve just finished their Journeys and taken their oaths. Rand’s a healer. He says he knows you and Cora. And Katlen’s a fire mage. She was an instructor at the Academy.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Only one shapeshifter.” Gerit spat into the fire. “Don’t they know we need more’n that? What with that bounty and those thrice-cursed assassins.” He scowled at Prince Harkeld, as if it was the prince’s fault he had a bounty on his head.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Prince Harkeld ignored him. Cora did too. “Two healers, two fire mages, and a shapeshifter?” she asked Innis.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Innis nodded. “Rand said the Council’s calling in all the Sentinels they can. More will join us after the second anchor stone.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Where?”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“At the delta, if a ship can get close enough. He said something about shallows making it dangerous. Otherwise, Krelinsk.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Dangerous?” Gerit snorted. “It’s not rutting shallows that are dangerous, it’s those Fithian bastards and their throwing stars.” He pushed to his feet and stamped off towards the tents. Across the fire, Justen—Petrus—rolled his eyes at her.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“So once they join us, we’ll be ten Sentinels,” Cora said, seemingly unruffled by Gerit’s bad temper. “Double what we are now. Good.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“I gave them the list of supplies we need.” Innis tried to smother another yawn. “They’ll meet us the day after tomorrow outside Hradik. I told them you’d like to avoid the town, because of the prince.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">She glanced at Prince Harkeld. He didn’t appear to be listening. His face was half turned away, shadowed. He looked like a peasant, unshaven, dark hair chopped roughly short, clothes travel-stained, but he didn’t hold himself like a peasant, didn’t move or ride like one, and his face—the square brow and jaw, the strong nose and cheekbones—was memorable. Someone might recognize him as Osgaard’s missing prince. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Rand said the Council think the curse will already be in Sault when we get there. They reckon we’ll need a lot of Sentinels for that.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“We will.” But Cora didn’t sound worried. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“They’re trying to find us a strong water mage.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Good. We’ll need one of those. Now get off to bed. You must be exhausted.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Shall I take a shift tonight?” Innis flicked a glance in Justen’s direction, trying to convey the silent question: Or be Justen?</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“No.” Cora stood. “I’ll take the second watch. You can share my tent.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Innis rose to her feet. Her muscles had stiffened while she sat. She followed Cora across the stony ground.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“You told Rand and the others about you shapeshifters being Justen?” Cora asked in a low whisper. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Yes.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“And?”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“They were shocked. Breaking a Primary Law...”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“But they understood why? The shapeshifter—Hew?—he’ll do it?”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Yes.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Good.” She heard relief in Cora’s voice. </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Innis glanced back at Justen and Prince Harkeld beside the fire. “Has Petrus been Justen all day? Do you need me to swap with him?” </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“He’s all right for now. Less tired than you, at any rate.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“And tomorrow?”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“You can go back to being Justen most of the time.” Cora held open a tent flap. “The bedroll on the left is yours.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Thanks.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“It’s good to have you back, Innis. We’ve been stretched without you.” Cora turned to go, then halted. “Oh... the prince and I have made a deal. If he learns to use his magic, we’ll strip him of it once the curse is destroyed.”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“What?” Her mouth fell open. “Learn to use his magic? He agreed?”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“He did.” </span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Innis shook her head. Impossible. “But he’s so afraid of it!”</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“With good reason. I’ve never seen a fire mage with more raw power. Until he learns to control it, he’s dangerous.” </span></div>
</div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Fire Prince by Emily Gee is out August 26th US and September 11th UK</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Pre order: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Fire-Prince-Cursed-Kingdoms-Trilogy/dp/1781082405">US</a> | </span><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Fire-Prince-Cursed-Kingdoms/dp/1781082391" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">UK</a></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-5910596560773389832014-08-05T13:58:00.000+02:002014-08-05T14:01:37.106+02:00Where on earth have team Solaris been?<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Greetings friends, Romans and other forms of sentient life - it's been awhile, hasn't it? It's been a busy few months at </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Solaris'</span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Secret HQ - and here are just a few of our personal highlights:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><b>Gail Z. Martin Storms the UK</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The wonderful Gail has been over on our shores signing copies of <i>Deadly Curiosities </i>around the country, as well as somehow finding time to put us all to shame by visiting what appears to be every single castle in the UK, Paris, The Doctor Who experience AND The Making of Harry Potter. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Because we're one big genre family Gail was naturally joined and supported by a whole gaggle of Solaris authors - check out some pictures of them all in action.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2pzUW2Z3V5Epb0NlHDb8Tx32ia0aP1ayLP4S75bKhyphenhyphen6LWHENWQ89PwWXzr-SiUcY0vgUsdNdzmLwJeEZCbNyv2cn0QkCOyosucclwsQuKyZIhFzByl7PtoiDARa-kZxvw1LkJoQ/s1600/5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2pzUW2Z3V5Epb0NlHDb8Tx32ia0aP1ayLP4S75bKhyphenhyphen6LWHENWQ89PwWXzr-SiUcY0vgUsdNdzmLwJeEZCbNyv2cn0QkCOyosucclwsQuKyZIhFzByl7PtoiDARa-kZxvw1LkJoQ/s1600/5.jpg" height="320" width="213" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">A night of SFF in Cardiff with Gareth<br />Powell, Lou Morgan & Gail Z Martin</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigXGg5gz8DWJP1Chjzlzgnf6Oz7B9CgwuuB7DwjmIFo15ZHoDgYvJXuWgtwwsvfH2AN_IiBen50e0rhlPk5s9r4mq_FTZ6MPTHzUnUjf5IEDVPDMF-vgxG2D9PsZZHC38uCo8yZA/s1600/4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigXGg5gz8DWJP1Chjzlzgnf6Oz7B9CgwuuB7DwjmIFo15ZHoDgYvJXuWgtwwsvfH2AN_IiBen50e0rhlPk5s9r4mq_FTZ6MPTHzUnUjf5IEDVPDMF-vgxG2D9PsZZHC38uCo8yZA/s1600/4.jpg" height="320" width="213" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Gail Z Martin Forbidden Planet launch<br />(with Gaie Sebold)</span></td></tr>
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<b style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Arianne 'Tex' Thompson officially achieves world domination of the internet</b><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>One Night in Sixes</i> released last month amidst a one woman mission by Arianne 'Tex' Thompson to be <i>everywhere</i> - and by gosh she pulled it off. In case you missed any of the 12 days of launchmaus here's a quick round up of our favourite links for you:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Day One: <a href="http://www.thekingdomsofevil.com/?p=3904" target="_blank">Creating Cultures with Tex Thompson on The Kingdoms of Evil Podcast</a> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Day Two: <a href="http://qwillery.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/interview-with-arianne-tex-thompson.html" target="_blank">An interview with The Qwillery</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Day Three: <a href="http://jkathleencheney.wordpress.com/2014/07/24/something-strange-happened-on-the-way-to-the-nyt-bestsellers-list-fantasy-author-arianne-tex-thompson/" target="_blank">Something Strange Happened on the Way to the NYT Bestsellers List: Fantasy Author Arianne “Tex” Thompson</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Day Four: <a href="http://www.erinmhartshorn.com/the-freshwater-fishmen-of-tucumcari-new-mexico/" target="_blank">The Freshwater Fishmen of Tucumcari, New Mexico via Erin M. Hartshorn</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Day Five: <a href="http://www.thetexfiles.com/2014/07/on-fifth-day-of-launchmas.html" target="_blank">Tex <span style="color: #360302; line-height: 19.600000381469727px;">was a panelist at ArmadilloCon</span></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Day Six: <a href="http://www.theauthorvisits.com/tours/author-visits-presents-tex-thompson-2/" target="_blank">The Author Visits presents Tex Thomspon</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Day Seven: <a href="http://dankoboldt.com/tex-thompson-finding-love-1-star-reviews/" target="_blank">Tex Thompson on Finding the Love in 1-Star Reviews via Dan Kobolt</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Day Eight: <a href="http://www.mybookishways.com/2014/07/interview-and-giveaway-arianne-tex-thompson-author-of-one-night-in-sixes.html" target="_blank">My Bookish Ways interviews Arianne 'Tex' Thompson</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Day Nine: <a href="http://whatever.scalzi.com/2014/07/30/the-big-idea-arianne-tex-thompson/" target="_blank">Arianne 'Tex' Thompson's Big Idea on John Scalzi's blog</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Day Ten: <a href="http://www.theauthorvisits.com/tours/author-visits-presents-tex-thompson-2/" target="_blank">Part Two of Arianne 'Tex' Thompson on The Author Visits</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Day Eleven: <a href="http://www.rhondaeudaly.com/2014/08/01/spotlight-post-arianne-tex-thompson/" target="_blank">Spotlight post on Rhona Eudaly</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Day Twelve: <a href="http://www.thetexfiles.com/2014/08/barnstorming-nobles.html" target="_blank">The Official Launch Party</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">You may not believe this, but Tex has been up to even more than just this; check out her website for more: <a href="http://www.thetexfiles.com/">www.thetexfiles.com</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><b>The Nine Worlds Forbidden Planet signing table schedule was released</b></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhq9IQA3YA9vAMTIjVe6h0qji62kAGOIGPdP_nWgpCVkurQ7de47jmJiKcjuaZAgt9NlOvGJCsbxwXf6YCHX6C9PjKyFlfgIo6NeQqn4TzQl_7w0sL-YBXVFV1rhO7_9opVGcvtoA/s1600/Copy+of+9W+signing+schedule+v4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhq9IQA3YA9vAMTIjVe6h0qji62kAGOIGPdP_nWgpCVkurQ7de47jmJiKcjuaZAgt9NlOvGJCsbxwXf6YCHX6C9PjKyFlfgIo6NeQqn4TzQl_7w0sL-YBXVFV1rhO7_9opVGcvtoA/s1600/Copy+of+9W+signing+schedule+v4.jpg" height="235" width="400" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #003040; font-family: sans-serif, Arial, Helvetica; line-height: 21px;">Nine Worlds takes place in the </span><span style="color: #003040; font-family: sans-serif, Arial, Helvetica; line-height: 21px;">Radisson Blu Edwardian convention hotel at Heathrow, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #003040; font-family: sans-serif, Arial, Helvetica; line-height: 21px;">London, from 8-10 August 2014. It’s about gaming, film, cosplay, fandom, literature, science, geek culture, meeting people and having a really big party - <a href="https://nineworlds.co.uk/about" target="_blank">find out more today</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #003040; font-family: sans-serif, Arial, Helvetica; line-height: 21px;"><b>We attended LFCC</b></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #003040; font-family: sans-serif, Arial, Helvetica; line-height: 21px;">London Film & Comic Con took place back in June at Earls Court and we gatecrashed our friends at Ravenstone Press and 2000 AD comics to join them on stand with a few of our authors. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLSGVGwxqxNT2nUs2RBm1JRD39Mi8701I6z73J2UhPcp4p_wmfSMm0VOsq1uAmbZFv9UCEsjGleqzmM_rVqwJw22ZReORNgMQUyH185GJ7YC4bmx6LTdZkGaVCbL-ovUhO2wXGlQ/s1600/3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLSGVGwxqxNT2nUs2RBm1JRD39Mi8701I6z73J2UhPcp4p_wmfSMm0VOsq1uAmbZFv9UCEsjGleqzmM_rVqwJw22ZReORNgMQUyH185GJ7YC4bmx6LTdZkGaVCbL-ovUhO2wXGlQ/s1600/3.jpg" height="320" width="212" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrQmE6BJP2z8583uI3yqwXQNgszPJDuQ3hY3g_g_I8BH70ja-cqRjqlbER2yhE88d2BBcGQJCr6kfgE4O82wI7zwCvrJ8wQL1e9ya7tQgeU7ojugS49e4EQuolsF1q3LJhPi_Uhw/s1600/2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrQmE6BJP2z8583uI3yqwXQNgszPJDuQ3hY3g_g_I8BH70ja-cqRjqlbER2yhE88d2BBcGQJCr6kfgE4O82wI7zwCvrJ8wQL1e9ya7tQgeU7ojugS49e4EQuolsF1q3LJhPi_Uhw/s1600/2.jpg" height="320" width="212" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5eTuoB3VT-fYoB-cTPYx43VW2QifyLe40aKoOFCeQZIhHpgET3OckyGxz87wpjq9i12TMf-SNQLTjEWTbsreZCc4wAWtS2d30o3ctW5fqoO8HPX3rplh7ssT9kw3zzgcUVl2ijQ/s1600/1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5eTuoB3VT-fYoB-cTPYx43VW2QifyLe40aKoOFCeQZIhHpgET3OckyGxz87wpjq9i12TMf-SNQLTjEWTbsreZCc4wAWtS2d30o3ctW5fqoO8HPX3rplh7ssT9kw3zzgcUVl2ijQ/s1600/1.jpg" height="320" width="212" /></a></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #003040; font-family: sans-serif, Arial, Helvetica; line-height: 21px;"><b>We had some new publishing!</b></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #003040; font-family: sans-serif, Arial, Helvetica; line-height: 21px;">Both <i>Jani and the Greater Game</i> and <i>One Night in Sixes</i> came out in July. Stay tuned for some more coverage of these shortly! </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4Ys_Z_G3W8y_YgvCC7QRHuQcVq7JDSUY8IW-g8b19DmYBGSFx07zdc0WB8n7Ky1KHZOr-yYXipjlrLzaZYUHZT4_5LvRDjnqBtMCurkZLu-QqkXyEvMfYewWXYvtxGQlQgwW4GA/s1600/JANI+AND+THE+GREATER+GAME+COVER.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4Ys_Z_G3W8y_YgvCC7QRHuQcVq7JDSUY8IW-g8b19DmYBGSFx07zdc0WB8n7Ky1KHZOr-yYXipjlrLzaZYUHZT4_5LvRDjnqBtMCurkZLu-QqkXyEvMfYewWXYvtxGQlQgwW4GA/s1600/JANI+AND+THE+GREATER+GAME+COVER.jpg" height="320" width="207" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Amazon: <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Jani-Greater-Game-Multiplicity-Brown/dp/1781082049/" target="_blank">UK</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Jani-Greater-Game-Eric-Brown/dp/1781082057" target="_blank">US</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRy1tty2xmjeRUBzRZ0qOWQO67BRW0GvIbZ7s4HoYKBXyGUD3fFpK-awU5mkSBMSQq3238uUSvJXW_ZdsSp64nS_G06FfMeRXKed9gtn7PgmY9LfevkBCvhXXnScIifbYtayUsvA/s1600/FC-BC+(ONE+NIGHT+IN+SIXES)+UK+B.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRy1tty2xmjeRUBzRZ0qOWQO67BRW0GvIbZ7s4HoYKBXyGUD3fFpK-awU5mkSBMSQq3238uUSvJXW_ZdsSp64nS_G06FfMeRXKed9gtn7PgmY9LfevkBCvhXXnScIifbYtayUsvA/s1600/FC-BC+(ONE+NIGHT+IN+SIXES)+UK+B.jpg" height="320" width="205" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Amazon: <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/One-Night-Sixes-Children-Drought/dp/1781082375" target="_blank">UK</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.com/One-Night-Sixes-Children-Drought/dp/1781082383/" target="_blank">US</a></td></tr>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #003040; font-family: sans-serif, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 16px; line-height: 21px;"><br /></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-13754883831468805472014-07-22T18:27:00.003+02:002014-07-22T19:08:30.174+02:00Introducing: Nyctophobia by Christopher Fowler<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">“It’s a strange thing, nyctophobia. You’re not born with it. It can start at any
time. It comes and goes, and it’s one of the only phobias you can transmit to
other people.”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Newly-married architect Callie and her wealthy husband Mateo
move to Hyperion House, a grand old home in southern Spain. It’s an eccentric
place built in front of a cliff: serene and beautiful, but eerily symmetrical,
and cunningly styled so that half the house is flooded with light, and half –
locked up and neglected – is shrouded in darkness. Unemployed and feeling
isolated in a foreign country, Callie determines to research the history of the
curious building.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">But the past is sometimes best left alone. Uncovering the
folklore of the house’s strange history, Callie is drawn into darkness and
delusion. As a teenager Callie was afraid of the dark, and now with her
adolescent nyctophobia returning she becomes convinced there’s someone in the
darkened rooms.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Somewhere in the darkness lies the truth about Hyperion
House.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUMvtPz2oIMZgRCXHeYyO5STLFT8_Ipldq6Bb2NJjn33bnBW2soGkzvfyKhLG86dl46WI4E2y0qmhaIcApfebqnuQUNdQmjWhUBso2agURrVAA7aQSVEiFsz-_7MUvCniISAoiNw/s1600/NYCTOPHOBIA+COVER+ART+UK.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUMvtPz2oIMZgRCXHeYyO5STLFT8_Ipldq6Bb2NJjn33bnBW2soGkzvfyKhLG86dl46WI4E2y0qmhaIcApfebqnuQUNdQmjWhUBso2agURrVAA7aQSVEiFsz-_7MUvCniISAoiNw/s1600/NYCTOPHOBIA+COVER+ART+UK.jpg" height="320" width="213" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">UK cover</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQImBFRFUm5QXn3AzoJPmfIr7pfWuAkipc5yauZmz590CSkZL7muWIaIn7seIrbaZL8b9hOZK0B0Q4s1CBPFWX3p89AaDvPRLVUgK4kqstK162-EIOIJSn82Xr622FCUtE58TsaA/s1600/NYCTOPHOBIA+COVER+ART+US.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQImBFRFUm5QXn3AzoJPmfIr7pfWuAkipc5yauZmz590CSkZL7muWIaIn7seIrbaZL8b9hOZK0B0Q4s1CBPFWX3p89AaDvPRLVUgK4kqstK162-EIOIJSn82Xr622FCUtE58TsaA/s1600/NYCTOPHOBIA+COVER+ART+US.jpg" height="320" width="213" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">US cover</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><i>Nychtophobia </i>is out in the UK October 9th and the US October 28th.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Pre-order today: <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nychtophobia-Christopher-Fowler/dp/1781082103/" target="_blank">UK</a> | <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1781082111/ref=s9_psimh_gw_p14_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-3&pf_rd_r=1CQHN7N6BTKH165YPJHV&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1688200382&pf_rd_i=507846" target="_blank">US</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">These beautiful covers were created by our incredibly talented artist Pye Parr. You can find out more about the process of making them over on his <a href="http://pyeparr.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/fear-of-dark.html" target="_blank">blog now</a>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"><a href="https://twitter.com/PyeParr" target="_blank">You can even follow him on twitter if such is your want</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Do you have a favourite of the two covers? Let us know in the comments or <a href="https://twitter.com/SolarisBooks" target="_blank">@solarisbooks</a>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Check back soon where some of the Rebellion team will be sharing their deepest, darkest fears in a cheap form of therapy masquerading under the disguise of marketing - feel free to send us yours too, if you dare...</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-65910812416547797582014-06-25T13:10:00.000+02:002014-06-25T15:56:48.243+02:00Deadly Curiosities Review Round-Up<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It's finally here! <i>Deadly Curiosities</i> is now available in all good book shops State-side, and of course on amazon in both <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Deadly-Curiosities-Gail-Z-Martin/dp/1781082332/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1403694333&sr=8-1&keywords=deadly+curiosities" target="_blank">print </a>and for the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Deadly-Curiosities-Gail-Z-Martin-ebook/dp/B00L89IWUC/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1403694361&sr=1-1&keywords=deadly+curiosities" target="_blank">kindle</a>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Deadly Curiosities</i> author Gail Z. Martin will be holding the launch party on Facebook today (June 25th) from 10:30 ET (that's 3:30pm for UK folks) - join her and host of fellow authors for some Q&A sessions, competitions and exclusive <i>Deadly Curiosities</i> downloadable freebies! <a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/234205456779152/" target="_blank">Head over and say hi</a>!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Want to know what all the hype is about? Check out just some of the lovely things people have been saying: </span></div>
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<b style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.publishersweekly.com/978-1-78108-233-1" target="_blank">Publishers Weekly</a>: </b><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Martin (the Ascendant Kingdoms saga) weaves
together fact, fiction, and the supernatural to create a realistic underworld
for modern Charleston, S.C”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://beauty-in-ruins.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/urban-fantasy-review-deadly-curiosities.html" target="_blank">Beauty in Ruins</a>:</b> “Familiar, accessible, and enjoyable, <i>Deadly
Curiosities</i> is the kind of book to have serious crossover appeal for urban
fantasy and horror readers alike.”</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://redstarreviews.com/2014/05/12/charlestons-ghosts-come-out-to-play-in-deadly-curiosities/" target="_blank">Red Star Reviews</a>: </b>“Let me start by saying this book was awesome! Very engrossing right from the start! I’ve enjoyed every Gail Z Martin book I’ve read and <i>Deadly Curiosities</i> is no exception to this!” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://www.bookreviewbycharlotte.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/deadly-curiosities-by-gail-z-martin.html" target="_blank">Book review by Charlotte</a>: </b>“This story is full of action. It kept me on the edge of my seat. I can see this story as a major motion picture full of action and adventure.”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://booksbonesbuffy.com/2014/06/20/spookies-and-sparklers-deadly-curiosities-by-gail-z-martin/" target="_blank">Books Boones & Buffy</a>:</b> “An atmospheric tale filled with fascinating historical details, a protagonist with a very cool ability, and lots of scary ghosts and shadowy corners."</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.fictionvortex.com/2014/06/book-review-deadly-curiosities-by-gail-z-martin/" target="_blank">Fiction Vortex</a>: </b><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Martin is clearly in her element when bringing the ghosts of Charleston to life. Cassidy’s investigation is peppered with the stories of pirates and smugglers whose deaths are tied to the evil threatening the city. I’ll admit, I’m a big fan of ghost stories and I loved the touch of character Martin gave to her haunts.”</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://sheheartsbooks7.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/book-review-deadly-curiosities-by-gail.html" target="_blank">She hearts books</a>:</b>
“This is one of those books you just
can't put down until you're finished reading.”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://thebookadventures.wordpress.com/2014/06/24/ghosts-demons-and-vampires-in-deadly-curiosities/" target="_blank">The Book Adventures</a>: </b>“The
world-building, the setting, the characters, the relationships have depths to
them that make this a complex and very interesting urban fantasy novel.”</span><b style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></b><br />
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<b style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.notyetread.com/2014/06/review-deadly-curiosities-gail-z-martin/" target="_blank">Not yet read</a>: </b><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“Gail Z. Martin does an excellent job painting vivid scenes, her suspense and fight scenes are amazing and her characters charming. I can’t wait for more!”</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJBqFSxwj_zzLYR0hxDGpS54MJIiwfXwsQZyafUZute9ysN4tjhZIJ7GZywIO59fdOoLryDhhOjbFcH6LmKU6EbnfLCiEioFaJWufmTagnqRerGap-seYrKSkLbFLuRxlvw7g9rg/s1600/DEADLY+CURIOSITIES.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJBqFSxwj_zzLYR0hxDGpS54MJIiwfXwsQZyafUZute9ysN4tjhZIJ7GZywIO59fdOoLryDhhOjbFcH6LmKU6EbnfLCiEioFaJWufmTagnqRerGap-seYrKSkLbFLuRxlvw7g9rg/s1600/DEADLY+CURIOSITIES.jpg" height="400" width="260" /></a><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://scififanletter.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/book-review-deadly-curiosities-by-gail.html" target="_blank">Sci-Fi Fan Letter</a>: </b>“a fun start to a new series”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://wickedscribes.wordpress.com/2014/06/23/new-series-review-deadly-curiosities/" target="_blank">Wicked Scribe</a>:</b> “The villains are delightfully evil, the
crimes are horrific and you get pulled into the motivation to find and stop
this paranormal killer before things get even worse.”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://www.ismellsheep.com/2014/06/book-review-arc-deadly-curiosities.html" target="_blank">I smell sheep</a>: </b>“The characters are wonderful making me want
to get to know them and kept me turning the pages to find out just what was
happening and where it would all end up.”</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://muchlovedbooks.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/review-deadly-curiosities-by-gail-z.html" target="_blank">Much loved books</a>: </b>“I found myself emotionally invested in the
outcome of each one, even the dog, and when they were facing the badest,
strongest, entity, I was so nervous, I had butterflies in my stomach worried
over what would happen to them. Deadly Curiosities is a great combination of
paranormal and mystery…”</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://gizmosreviews.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/gizmos-book-reviews-deadly-curiosities.html" target="_blank">Gizmo’s Reviews</a>: </b>“If you like kick ass action at every turn,
and the unknown whether the characters will all survive or not, then please
read <i>Deadly Curiosities</i> and give the finger to publishers who say that UF is
dead and gone.”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://bibliophilesreverie.com/2014/05/13/dani-hoots-review-of-deadly-curiosities-by-gail-z-martin/" target="_blank">A Bibliophile’s Reverie</a>:
</b>“This novel felt like a shiny twist
between Warehouse 13 and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” 4/5 stars<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://fantasyismorefun.com/2014/06/deadly-curiosities-gail-z-martin-book-review.html" target="_blank">Love Fantasy More</a>: </b>“If you’re looking for a nice summer ghost
mystery, <i>Deadly Curiosities</i> is a great book for you. And if you like procedural
type books, you may even love it more than I did!”</span><b style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></b><br />
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<b style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://elderparkbookreviews.wordpress.com/2014/05/19/review-deadly-curiosities-by-gail-z-martin/" target="_blank">Elder Park BookReviews</a>: </b><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">“the characters were rich and fleshed out and [there was] plenty of new takes on supernatural powers to keep this novel innovative.”</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://caffeinatedbookreviewer.com/2014/06/deadly-curiosities-gail-z-martin.html" target="_blank">Caffeinated BookReviewer</a>: </b>“An old school urban
fantasy with a Warehouse 13 vibe, this tale was action packed. Filled with
magic, supernatural creatures and possessed objects. I quickly consumed this
and look forward to reading more.”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://bibliosanctum.com/2014/06/17/book-review-deadly-curiosities-by-gail-z-martin/" target="_blank">Bibliosanctum:</a> </b>“I do hope she has plans to continue
expanding Cassidy’s story as well, because this was a lot of fun. I would
return to Charleston and Trifles & Folly in a heartbeat.”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://thebookadventures.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">The Book Adventures</a>: </b>“A fast-paced, suspenseful and sometimes
creepy story, this book brings paranormal closer to horror and further from
fantasy, and was a welcome change from the tropes that pervade the sub-genre.”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://missingvolume.livejournal.com/256767.html" target="_blank">Missing Volume</a>: </b>“Good world building and the huge plus for
me is there is no romance building the background between the characters. I'll be looking for more books in this
series.”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://ponderingsofpsyche.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/arc-review-deadly-curiosities-by-gail-z.html" target="_blank">Ponderings of Psyche</a></b>:
“<i>Dark Curiosities</i> brought up fresh ideas
and mixed it with the old ones, making a perfect blend of read that will
certainly not fail the expectations of the readers of urban fantasy.”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://dabofdarkness.com/2014/06/14/deadly-curiosities-by-gail-z-martin/" target="_blank">Dab of Darkness</a>: </b>“This was a fast-paced urban fantasy with a
twist: antiques. So, lots of history was tossed into the mix, and I loved it.”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://mixedbookbag.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/deadly-curiosities-by-gail-z-marti.html" target="_blank">Mixed Book Bag</a>: </b>“<i>Deadly Curiosities</i> has just the right blend
of paranormal and mystery and a great start to a new series.”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://doctorsnotes-shy.com/2014/06/deadly-curiosities.html" target="_blank">Doctor’s Notes</a>:</b> “The book was fast paced so I flew through
it with ease and was fully invested in it.”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><a href="http://tometender.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/deadly-curiosities-by-gail-z-martin.html?zx=3576f577ac70d725" target="_blank">Tome Tender</a>: </b>“<i>Deadly Curiosities</i> is a fun, unique and
interesting story with marvellous possibilities for what might come next.”<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Are you a reviewer or blogger interested in Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror or Alternative YA & Children's Fiction? If you'd like to receive advance title information and review copies, as well as opportunities for guest blogs and interviews with our authors contact us at <a href="mailto:press@rebellion.co.uk">press@rebellion.co.uk</a>. Please include information about the site or publication you review for, any genre preferences and your preferred contact name and email. </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>You can also check out our current list of eARCs available via <a href="http://bit.ly/1vtDfDh" target="_blank">netgalley now</a>. </i></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-65386469908137161932014-06-23T17:51:00.000+02:002014-06-23T18:09:11.956+02:00Rebellion Publishing: DRM Free Since 2006<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7xCG5cYGPZRTQnqCf3U98jFfk_WWZ6vms1LiOrpEiA6Jw9VbRZpwW7dQuxUSq0cWKdb5GGzgCm8pV6eFSiTvQmKI0J_G1igrr2fPBBbDLyYzLamcfvcXubp0k5w9xvS9cA1WvJA/s1600/rebellion+pub+banner+blog.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7xCG5cYGPZRTQnqCf3U98jFfk_WWZ6vms1LiOrpEiA6Jw9VbRZpwW7dQuxUSq0cWKdb5GGzgCm8pV6eFSiTvQmKI0J_G1igrr2fPBBbDLyYzLamcfvcXubp0k5w9xvS9cA1WvJA/s1600/rebellion+pub+banner+blog.jpg" height="104" width="640" /></a></div>
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<b style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">‘DRM Free since 2006!’</b><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> It falls some way short of being a sexy headline, but how do you compete with other publishers apparently news-worthy headlines about going DRM-free in 2014, when it’s been 8 years since Rebellion took that decision?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Rebellion Publishing</b> may not be one of the instantly recognisable names in the UK book trade, but for fifteen years we've been the home of the British institution <a href="http://www.2000adonline.com/" target="_blank">2000 AD</a>, and first published our perennially bestselling graphic novel collection, <i>Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files 01</i> back in 2005 (we publish volume 23 this summer). The following year we founded our first fiction imprint <a href="http://www.abaddonbooks.com/" target="_blank">Abaddon Books</a>. And in those pre-Kindle, pre-Twitter days, when digital rights management was something most publishers assumed was a music industry issue, Rebellion also started selling digital files for download with no DRM.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">How was it that we took the step that most digitally-savvy publishers came to many years later? We had one big advantage, <a href="http://www.rebellion.co.uk/" target="_blank">Rebellion is also a tech company</a>, one of the leading computer games developers and publishers in the UK (our latest, <a href="http://www.rebellion.co.uk/games/sniper-elite-3" target="_blank">Sniper Elite III</a>, is out at the end of June). Our founders and owners <a href="https://twitter.com/RebellionJason" target="_blank">Jason</a> and Chris Kingsley understood how important ownership was for a digital consumer, how being able to buy something and keep it was a vital part of the trust relationship between publisher and reader, and gamer. You bought the digital copy? Well that’s yours to keep forever, and not just until you change device or operating system. It can be put like this: we value the support of legitimate customers more than we hate the activity of people who steal from us.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In the years since 2006 we've acquired the SF imprint <a href="http://solarisbooks.com/" target="_blank">Solaris books</a>; begun simultaneous publishing in the UK and North America; launched the children’s and YA literature imprint <a href="http://www.ravenstone.com/" target="_blank">Ravenstone</a>; started our standalone ebook shop <a href="http://rebellionstore.com/">rebellionstore.com</a> to go alongside <a href="http://2000adonline.com/">2000adonline.com</a>; and have seen our books feature on the best-seller lists time and time again.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So, as a leading publisher of comics and genre fiction in the UK it’s great to have had Tor and others join us in the DRM-free world. The others will be along soon, we're sure.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.rebellionstore.com/">www.rebellionstore.com</a></span></b><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33102309.post-67918105398977218252014-06-19T16:28:00.000+02:002014-06-19T16:31:59.508+02:00Gail Z. Martin UK signing schedule<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVohP3FduWr6Mrlb8nOUWJ4EBdGzSu2_-s3ZNDC5AWu15JQf7oD-MCcsU4Q6It3Is7_pDKW7SdD8HalASek4lor-wuNGZ8w076HcjuSuwIckYgIb4Dk64IBjNKtcOs5Ny3H7JtHw/s1600/image.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVohP3FduWr6Mrlb8nOUWJ4EBdGzSu2_-s3ZNDC5AWu15JQf7oD-MCcsU4Q6It3Is7_pDKW7SdD8HalASek4lor-wuNGZ8w076HcjuSuwIckYgIb4Dk64IBjNKtcOs5Ny3H7JtHw/s1600/image.jpeg" height="200" width="150" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #999999; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Gail at BEA 2014</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Gail Z. Martin will be joining team Solaris this summer for a whirlwind tour of our fair Isles, and because we were bought up properly we'd like to share the good times with you... So please do check out the below and add a date (or two) to your diary and come along to get your copy of <a href="http://solarisbooks.com/titles/title_details/deadly_curiosities" target="_blank"><i>Deadly Curiosities</i> </a>signed.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">JULY</span></b><br />
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<b style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">23rd (Weds) </b><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">- </span><a href="https://forbiddenplanet.com/events/2014/07/23/gail-z-martin-signing-deadly-curiosities/" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;" target="_blank">Forbidden Planet, London HQ</a><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Deadly Curiosities </i>Launch Party!</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Gail will be meeting, greeting and signing copies of <i>Deadly Curiosities </i>from 6 - 7pm </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">(keep an eye on the Solaris twitter feed for details of a post-signing meet up nearby too)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>31st (Thur)</b> - <a href="http://www.waterstones.com/waterstonesweb/displayDetailEvent.do?searchType=2&store=56%7CWATERSTONE%27S+CARDIFF+THE+HAYES&sFilter=1" target="_blank">Waterstones, Cardiff the Haye</a>s</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Bumper author party!</b> Gail will be joining <i>Ack Ack Macaque</i> author <a href="http://solarisbooks.com/authors/author_details/gareth_l._powell" target="_blank">Gareth Powell</a> and <i>Blood and Feathers</i> author <a href="http://solarisbooks.com/authors/author_details/louisemorgan" target="_blank">Lou Morgan</a> for mega-signathon:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Gareth and Lou will be signing from 5:30pm and Gail from 6:30pm</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">AUGUST</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>1st (Fri) </b>- Waterstones, Edinburgh</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Gail will be doing a stock signing, watch out on the twitter feed for updates on when you can catch her in action closer to the day.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Plus, because we don't like to leave anyone out you can virtually hang out with Gail (as well as plethora of other lovely authors) on US launch day! Join Gail and co at the<a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/234205456779152/?context=create&source=49" target="_blank"> Facebook launch party</a> on Wednesday 25th June from 10:30 am to 10:30pm EST (those outside of EST can find out your local time <a href="http://www.timebie.com/timezone/easternlondon.php" target="_blank">here</a>) where she will be answering questions, giving away free goodies and offering you the chance to win e-copies of <i>Deadly Curiosities</i>. There are rumours the party may spill out across reddit and goodreads, and with a line up like the one below we think those rumours will probably be true:</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiU40xdwKs1LuJ32nJqGebRLe5ShofWB6omNaExM-UA6ShFXw1EWdLhSIf2xZ6EWKi_xm9HqZR7E0kcOWAxLDhIJuoDgqtvPu2MHRCqG67zIdfDv8LKP09cyABQ6Qh80G7OrQDd4A/s1600/DEADLY+CURIOSITIES.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiU40xdwKs1LuJ32nJqGebRLe5ShofWB6omNaExM-UA6ShFXw1EWdLhSIf2xZ6EWKi_xm9HqZR7E0kcOWAxLDhIJuoDgqtvPu2MHRCqG67zIdfDv8LKP09cyABQ6Qh80G7OrQDd4A/s1600/DEADLY+CURIOSITIES.jpg" height="320" width="208" /></a><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">10:30 – 11 </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">Gail Z. Martin</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">11 – 11:30 Pip Ballantine</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">11:30 – Noon Chris Verstrate</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">Noon – 12:30 Trisha Wooldridge</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">12:30 – 1 John Hartness</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">1-1:30 Leona Wisoker</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">1:30 – 2 Keith DeCandido</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">2-2:30 Cynthia Ward</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">2:30 – 3 Jim Lavene</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">3 – 3:30 </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">Gail Z. Martin</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">3:30 – 4 Jennifer Brozek</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">4-4:30 Joshua Palmatier/Benjamin Tate</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">4:30 – 5 Tricia Barr</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">4-5:30 Clockwork Universe</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">5:30 – 6 Athena’s Daughters </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">5:50—</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">Gail Z. Martin</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">—giveaway announcement</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">6-6:30 TBC</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">6:30 – 7 Kim Richardson</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">7-7:30 Tera Fulbright</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">7:30 – 8 Danielle Ackley-McPhail</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">8-8:30 Stuart Jaffe</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">8:30 – 9 James Maxey</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">9-9:30 Natasha Rhodes</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #141823; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">9:30 – 10:30 Gail Z. Martin</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #141823; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 19.31999969482422px;"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/234205456779152/?context=create&source=49" target="_blank">Add it to your Facebook calendar now.</a></span></span></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01695987225829285054noreply@blogger.com0