TV and Books

The other day as I lay at home doing the seasonal thing of snuffling and sneezing I saw my first Richard and Judy Book Club episode in I don’t know how many years. They were discussing Orion’s The Rose of Sebastopol with Samuel West and Charity Wakefield. Considering the ho-ha that Richard and Judy generates in publishing and bookselling I was mildly surprised at how short the segment really was. A filmed portion with the author Katherine McMahon; a pithy summing up of the general plot and character progression and some anecdotal ‘I loved this bit’ etc. I’ve only read one of R&J’s choices so far, Lloyd Jones’ Mister Pip, and can’t help but think that the format will not do it anything like the justice it deserves. I’m not knocking Richard & Judy as such, but I know I’ve enjoyed The Book Show with Mariella Frostrop far, far more. I particularly love the section they do where authors discuss the books that they wished they had written – a real booky treat.

And lo, just the other day there was the news in The Bookseller that there will be an apprentice-style-celebrity-crime-novel programme coming to the BBC soon called ‘Murder Most Famous’. Should be interesting how Minette Walters is going to put the likes of gardener Diarmuid Gavin through a crime boot-camp… Ah well, it's all for charity.

Backlist gems

At Allison & Busby we have a backlist packed full of fantastic books and we are always trying to come up with a tasty new way of selling/promoting them. This month, we've been hugely helped by those lovely Borders people who have put Anchee Min's stunning novel Becoming Madame Mao, into their historical fiction promo. Min has written a number of novels but is perhaps best known for her Richard & Judy pick Empress Orchid, which we shamelessly plug on Madame Mao, of course.

More backlist gems coming up this year include On the Waterfront (altogether now .. "I coulda bin a contender" said in a gruff, Brando-esque manner) with a stunning new cover courtesy of our in-house design supremo Christina. And we've got two of Manette Ansay's novels, Sister and River Angel scheduled in the summer - I'll post about her another time as she really warrants undivided attention. Oh, and a new look for Richard Stark's classic Point Blank which we'll have out shortly. We're working that backlist ... any thoughts/tips/advice gladly received.

Books for Dummies

While reading an article on the BBC website today I made a shock discovery. Apparently you don’t need to read books to be clever. Of course you don’t, intelligence can’t be settled by having ticked off a list of approved reading, and if you believe some of the recent controversy about the ‘dumbed down’ state of our bestseller lists, we’re all headed for Dumbsville.

But that wasn’t actually the fact that struck me. Three quarters of the way through the article Denise Winterman writes about books having lost their ‘chic’ and quotes Professor John Sutherland as saying "If you try and sell your house, estate agents will tell you to get rid of the books, they are viewed as tired and middle aged". Huh? Now in my ongoing house hunting quest I’ve met some odd estate agents (particularly that lovely lady who said I was asking her the ‘wrong’ questions – aha blog revenge!) but surely books are part of that aspirational lifestyle that people are drawn to when viewing a house – aren’t they? The idea that you may have the time and inclination to read gorgeously produced literature – doesn’t that cast a better light on the mod cons and double glazing? Or has the rise of Tesco et al in the bookselling stakes put a permanent kibosh on this?

The quest continues by the way…

New Years Resolutions - blown 'em already

I absolutely faithfully promised to do three things in the New Year:

1) go to the gym ... ha ha

2) read more books and watch less telly ... can't do until I've finished the final series of The Sopranos which Santa gave me for Christmas

3) blog each and every day ... oops

So let's pretend last week never happened, and start from NOW.

Happy New Year!

What did you read over the festive period? I was pathetic and managed just two books but I did have the excuse that I was cruising down the Nile and it would have been rude to sit with my nose in a book rather than ooh and aah at the passing sites. Edfu temple was amazing, as was the city of Luxor, The Valley of the Kings (seen from a hot air balloon at 6am) and the Aswan dam. The books that I did manage to read were Reginald Hill's new Dalziel & Pascoe, The Death of Dalziel, and Diane Setterfield's The Thirteenth Tale. Mr Hill is my crime God. I think he's utterly brilliant and in almost 20 years, I have never read a book of his that I haven't adored.

I'm about 50 pages from the end of The Thirteenth Tale and must confess I can't wait to get home and finish it. I knew I'd love it as Jane Eyre is one of my favourite books, and I am completely hooked. Oh, look, 5.31pm. Time to go home and get reading.

We're back!

I must have been a good girl in 2007 as Father Christmas didn’t fill my stocking with coal and I was able to enjoy quite a peaceful yuletide. Furthermore I was pleased this Christmas because (for once) I was a realist on the book-reading front. I didn’t put a pile of books on my wish list that would take me until the August bank holiday to read and I didn’t have to trail a mobile library along with me on the train from the deepest, darkest British countryside. I read one non-A&B book – Perfume by Patrick Suskind, which reinforced how rubbish I am at distinguishing scent and taste – and one forthcoming A&B book: Ill Wind by Rachel Caine. This is the first in the Weather Warden series (see Susie’s mention of it in our very first blog post here) and, following my reading of The Dead Girls’ Dance in the autumn, it’s the second book by Rachel Caine that I’ve read. In both cases I would recommend them as fantastic holiday reading, there’s never a dull moment because either a powerful (literal or figurative) storm is kicking off in one or a nightmarish scene is unfolding in the other. Finally, there are very intelligent, sassy heroines in both series. We’ve gotten the artwork which will be on Ill Wind from artist David Seeley and I'm showing it off here - moody eh?

A short goodbye till 2008!

This is the last day of blogging for 2007. Our offices will be closed now till the 2nd of January as we enjoy the Christmas festivities. But fret not! We will be back, fresh and inspired, with more blogging stories in the New Year.

I, unsurprisingly, have yet to finish my Christmas shopping, and I wonder how many of you out there are like me, who every year vow to have their presents wrapped and ready by December 1st, and yet never seem to get round to it until the panic sets in - around about now. So, in case you too are looking for last-minute inspiration, don't forget to check out our list of Books for Christmas on the A&B website - there's bound to be something there to suit the taste of Whoever-It-Is-You-Are-Buying-For.

If you've turned into an angry shopper after too many hours spent trudging along the high-street stores, here's a picture my aunt sent me today, of her house in Camden, Maine (USA). Something to remind you of the simplicity and beauty of the Christmas season. I have a mind to put it on next year's Christmas card(which, of course, I intend to send out by December 1st...).

And with that, we will love you and leave you now, but do keep up the reading over the holidays and a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all!

All I want for Christmas....is to buy it all!

Today I decided to use my lunch-break for some more last-minute Christmas shopping - Destination HMV. I walked in full of purpose - one new James Blunt album for my sister, that's all I need, In-Out, 5 minutes max. But there I was on my way to row "B" in the Rock/Pop section, battling through the hoardes of shoppers, adrenalin rising, when I got sucked in - suddenly corralled by the "Gift" section. Next thing I know I'm pondering whether to buy some album involving Celine Dion singing Christmas carols for my mum. At no other time would I consider this. I'm even bopping to the music belting out over the overhead speakers wondering if I should find out who the artist is. The potential for gift buying is overwhelming. The same thing happened at Borders two days ago. They were offering 50% off all book purchases that day and the queue was literally pouring into the streets ,which meant you were forced to take in all the wonderful books on display as you snaked, at a snail's pace, to the cashier. I had to physically clamp my hands round my copy of Letters of Noel Coward (luckily a hefty tome enouraging a two-handed grip) to avoid undulging in another coffee-table book, stocking-filler, cookbook... But back to HMV - I think I would have lost myself in The Overpowering Buzz of The Xmas Impulse-buy had I not suddenly spotted one of our books right by the door. There it was: The Ultimate Book of British Comics - beautifully displayed, a familiar and calming sight in the midsts of the mayhem, and a reminder that there are some things worth buying spur of the moment, and others not. I gently placed the Celine-Dion-Sings-Carols album back on the shelf and went on my merry way. (After purchasing the intended James Blunt CD of course.)