Results tagged “china mieville”

September is here.

Summer is coming to a close in some parts of the United States and Seattle is no exception. I can feel it in the air. The leaves, once so vibrant green, are becoming dull. The Seattle mornings possess a misty gloom before eventually burning off to temperate afternoons. And the sunsets, while colorful and beautiful, are occurring earlier and earlier. Soon the leaves will be dropping off, the morning chill will give way to all-day rainy cold, and the days will shorten to almost non-existence.

My favorite season, fall, is right around the corner.

It is my favorite season for many reasons, but first and foremost is the transition from doing outdoor activities to those indoor in nature. Reading is on top of that list. I spend more money and time on books in the fall and winter than the other two seasons, which means I get to enjoy some great tales by some of the best the genre has to offer!

I’m happy to note that the Free Library will be helping me out some financially, especially with one of the books just published as a free eBook today!

Everyone else is at San Diego Comic Con, having a wondrous time, meeting all sorts of amazing folks, and generally enjoying themselves while I and a few hardy compatriots hold down the fort back home. But I’m not the only one who wants to go to the ball…

…THE SQUIDS ARE COMING TOO.

According to a recent New York Times article, just as comics fans are flocking to San Diego, so too are legions upon legions of jumbo flying squid:

“Thousands of jumbo flying squid, aggressive 5-foot-long sea monsters with razor-sharp beaks and toothy tentacles, have invaded the shallow waters off San Diego, spooking scuba divers and washing up dead on beaches,” the article says, adding, “Scientists are not sure why the squid are swarming off the Southern California coast, but they are concerned.”

No doubt they’re excited to see the stars of Farscape and Caprica. Perhaps next year they’ll come back for the release of China Miéville’s new book, Kraken (to see if anyone they know is in it, obviously).

Photo: Marine biologist John Hyde holds a jumbo flying squid. © National Marine Fisheries Service, 2005.

China Mieville, author of The City & the City and all around great guy, spent last week discussing Tolkien, Lovecraft, the melancholy of having so many ideas he will never write, and the history of the genre on the Amazon website Omnivoracious.

This week, China has crossed the online bookstore border!

Borders Sci-Fi Babel Clash welcomes China today for a two week foray of multiple conversations. The premise? Once a day Monday through Friday for two weeks, China will post a 140-character tweeted conversation starter that—hopefully—will lead to a series of great discussions.

Here is the one China posted today:

Does micro blogging have something to offer SF/F/H? Twitter fiction?

Visit Babel Clash for the next two weeks and take advantage of having one of the best science fiction and fantasy minds in the business leading discussions!

Should be great fun!

No, I don’t mean China is a six-foot female warrior ala Wonder Woman.

Although he’d surely get a kick out of that!

This week, China is blogging on Omnivoracious, the Amazon blogging website. Jeff VanderMeer, no slouch himself in the realms of science fiction and fantasy, has interviewed China HERE and for the rest of the week China will blog about various other things—his thoughts on Tolkien being his first POST today.

And if you haven’t picked up The City & the City, do it! I’m deep into it and it is, quite simply, a marvelous work.

Definitely visit Omnivoracious this week and every week, as it always has great interviews, reviews and thoughts on the publishing business.

And go out and try a book written by China if you haven’t.

You won’t be disappointed!

I hope you enjoyed our first ever live chat. For my part, I was scurrying back and forth between my desk (where China chatted - w00t w00t!) and Chris’s location while trying to keep track of the conversation. It was without a doubt a cool way to spend an hour.

If you didn’t get a chance to read it live, don’t worry. You can read through the chat anytime you like on China’s author chat page: China Miéville Author Chat.

But sometimes you don’t just want to read it, you want to blog about it. Well, I shouldn’t be so presumptuous, let me go back and say, “perhaps you’d like to blog about the chat and/or include it.” That still doesn’t sound right.

Let’s try this: Do you want to embed China’s chat on your site? We’re all about sharing and you’re welcome to the whole thing. Below you’ll see options for either embedding the chat window or obtaining the HTML output. It’s up to you.

Or you could hang out with us here on Suvudu. You know, whatever you want to do.

HTML and Text files: China_chat.zip (.zip file, 29 KB)

Embed Code:

So there you have it, three ways to view, two ways to take it and run, one great author chat.

But back to the chat. There was a lot to take in. Below I’ve pulled out just a couple of lines from China’s answers, but you’d do well to read the whole thing - there’s a lot there that makes for a fun read.

At 2pm EST today Suvudu will launch our first ever live author chat with bestselling author and all around cool dude, China Miéville! And there’s so much to talk about before we start talking!

What’s it going to be like? Well, check out the picture below for an idea:

It’ll be just like that! Except without the band, or the cozy chairs, and the spotlights…but otherwise, just like that! China has warned us that it could get interesting, there was talk of a potty mouth translating to potty fingers. We make no guarantees or promises.

Oh - and we’re sweetening the pot even further. Not only do you get to talk to China live, but if you submit a question to info@suvudu before the chat starts (so before 2pm EST), you’ll be entered to win a limited edition printing of The City & The City (check it out here: The City & The City, Limited Edition ). So send them on in and then swing by for the live chat.

Look for the chat post OR bookmark this page: http://www.suvudu.com/author-chat/china-mieville/

See you all at 2pm EST!

Carry on the discussion here: China Miéville Live Author Chat Forum

Bestselling author China Miéville will be touring the US beginning next week to promote his new novel The City & the City. Check out his tour schedule below. And don’t forget to join us here on Suvudu at 2:00pm EST Thursday, May 28 for a chat with China and Del Rey editor Chris Schluep.

NEW YORK, NY
Tuesday, May 26
Time: 7:00pm
Barnes & Noble, Union Square
33 E. 17th Street
Talk, Signing, & Musical Performance by Japanther

BOSTON, MA
Wednesday, June 3
Time: 7:00pm
American Repertory Theater - The Meeting Room
2 Arrow Street, Cambridge
Talk, Q&A, Signing

SEATTLE, WA
Friday, June 5
Time: 6:30pm
Third Place Books
17171 Bothell Way NE, Lake Forest Park
Talk, Q&A, Signing

PORTLAND, OR
Sunday, June 7
Time: 7:30pm
Powell’s Books
2720 NW 29th Ave.
Talk, Q&A, Signing

BERKELEY, CA
Monday, June 8
Time: 7:30pm
Moe’s Books
2476 Telegraph Ave.
Talk, Q&A, Signing

SAN DIEGO, CA
Tuesday, June 9
Time: 7:00pm
Mysterious Galaxy
7051 Clairemont Mesa Blvd.
Talk, Q&A, Signing

China Miéville will be chatting with Del Rey editor Chris Schluep to discuss his new novel The City & the City right here on Suvudu. You can send your questions for China in advance to info@suvudu.com, or show up in chat live.

China Miéville’s The City & The City. It’s easily one of the most exciting and anticipated titles heading down the pipe this summer. It’s been an exciting title around here since it arrived on Chris Schleup’s desk* and now the publication date is drawing nigh.

So, uh, you want it for free?

That’s right, free. And maybe a little early. We’re giving away 7 advanced readers’ copies of The City & The City for our “Monster Free China” sweepstakes!

Here’s how it works: You send us an email with your name, address (so we know where to send the book, if you win), and your favorite “genre-bending” story (that is, your favorite story that seems to exist in two or more genres at the same time or, perhaps, that defies the notion of genre entirely). You do that and you’ll be entered into a drawing where we’ll pick 7 winners at random to receive the book. But hurry! You’ve got until the stroke of midnight on Thursday, May 21 (PST**), to send in your stuff!

As always, you can view the legal here: Official Rules.

Good luck!

How excited are you for THE CITY & THE CITY? Only two more weeks… in the meantime, whet your appetite with this video of China discussing the book.

I shouldn’t admit this, but I am always a little surprised when an author meets a due date. Being a good writer requires a lot of thinking and planning, and those acts are often indistinguishable from their unruly stepcousin procrastination. So it should be no surprise that writers are late with their work sometimes.

When China Miéville delivered the manuscript to his newest novel, entitled The City & The City, I was much more than a little surprised. In fact, I was flabbergasted. First of all, I had no idea that he had been writing it. And secondly, he had just delivered a different manuscript—the one I had been expecting—the day before.

His reasons for doing so were simple, and they had nothing to do with proving that he was superhuman. China’s mother, who was terminally ill at the time, had always loved police procedurals—so China set out to write one as a kind of gift to her. But knowing that his reputation is as a fantasy writer, he wasn’t sure what his publishers or his audience would make of his attempt. He studied up by reading as much as he could in the mystery and thriller genre, and then he wrote the book during breaks from writing the fantasy that I was expecting from him. It’s an amazing feat by anyone’s standards.

Bookseller Molly Bolden, author Cherry Adair and I did a critique of manuscript first pages at the Jubilee Jambalaya Writers Conference last weekend in picturesque Houma, Louisiana. Participants (anonymously) handed in the first page of whatever work they had in progress, and American Idol-like we took turns commenting on what was good and bad about each one. Hopes were raised, dreams may have been crushed, but I believe that most attendees gained by listening to others’ work and applying our comments to their own.

“You need a stunning first sentence, or an editor is just going to set your manuscript aside,” seems to be the common wisdom right now among aspiring writers. That’s not necessarily so; it’s also possible, by using an overtly provocative sentence, to come across as trying too hard. In another session at the same conference I spoke about the importance of a strong opening more in terms of the first scene and first chapter, after which one is not allowed to slump, of course, but must continue to hold the reader’s attention as the story continues. As a general rule, I do not care to hear about the prevailing weather conditions as the story begins. If there’s a tornado a block away and the protagonist is heading for the basement stairs, that’s relevant. Otherwise, start with something more revelatory about the characters and their situation.

So what does make a strong opening sentence? Let us look to the work of the masters. Here’s a little quiz to see if you can match the first sentences of these popular Del Rey authors to their prize-winning/bestselling novels. (Answers after the jump.)

1. There was no doubt about it: there was a fox behind the climbing frame. And it was watching.

2. For numberless years a myna had astounded travelers to the caravansary with its ability to spew indecencies in ten languages, and before the fight broke out everyone assumed the old blue-tongued devil on its perch by the fireplace was the one who maligned the giant African with such foulness and verve.

3. This is my favorite book in all the world, though I have never read it.

4. “Send up another, damn you, send them all up, at once if you have to,” Laurence said savagely to poor Calloway, who did not deserve to be sworn at: the gunner was firing off the flares so quickly his hands were scorched black, skin cracking and peeling to bright red where some powder had spilled onto his fingers; he was not stopping to wipe them clean before setting each flare to the match.

5. Questions, always questions. They didn’t wait for the answers, either.

6. Brigadier General Clarence Potter crouched in a muddy trench north of Atlanta. Overhead, U.S. bombers flew through what looked like flak thick enough to walk on.

THE CHOICES
a. Elizabeth Moon, The Speed of Dark
b. Harry Turtledove, In at the Death
c. China Miéville, Un Lun Dun
d. William Goldman, The Princess Bride
e. Naomi Novik, Empire of Ivory
f. Michael Chabon, Gentlemen of the Road

China Mieville is, put quite simply, an amazing writer. To me he is right up there with Neil Gaiman in sheer storytelling genius and writing talent. Huge praise, I know, but it is true. The literary tales he weaves is only matched by his ability to string words together in beautiful prose. From the moment I read Perdido Street Station I was hooked.

US Del Rey Cover

UK Macmillan Cover

I also hate China. He is one of those writers who makes me want to quit writing because how on Earth can I write anything comparable and worthy?

Okay, okay, I don’t hate China. He also happens to be one of the coolest and nicest guys you’ll ever meet. But you get the idea.

Well, he has a new book coming out this year and I want to start talking about it early. For all of his talent, China really hasn’t garnered a huge reading audience and I think that is one of the travesties in this genre. The City & the City will be released this May 2009. I hope many of you will be reading it with me!

I posted both the US and the UK covers above. This time I like how clean the US cover is despite Del Rey and Macmillan using the same cover artwork. Goes to show how color can really change the feel of a book. Kudos to the Del Rey art department on this one!

So, anyone else out there love China? Looking forward to the new book?