All posts by Jonathan Strahan

On Rowling….

Over the weekend it was announced that J.K. Rowling, the almost ridiculously well-known author of the Harry Potter series of children’s fantasy novels and one adult mainstream novel, earlier this year published a crime novel under a male pseudonym.

In the period between the publication of her fantasy series and her mainstream novel, Rowling had mentioned she’d been working on a crime novel. That novel, The Cuckoo’s Calling, published as by Robert Galbraith, was published in April of this year to strong reviews and, if the reports I saw online are accurate, modest sales.

On hearing the news I said on Twitter that “So J.K. Rowling put out new crime novel under pseudonym. Sells poorly, but great reviews. Says lots about publishing, little about the book”. This fairly innocuous note was retweeted quite a bit, and led to a lot of comment.

While comment is always welcome, I thought I’d clarify what I meant. Rowling is famous. She wanted to see how a book of hers would be received if it didn’t come out as by her. She got positive affirmation that she can write terrifically well, but as often happens in the world, sometimes good books don’t sell.

It’s terrifically hard to get a book to market, to connect it to an audience, and to do all of the things that make it sell in large numbers (this is why authors want a good publisher). Writing a good book is a great thing, but in and of itself it doesn’t guarantee sales. That’s what I meant.

And yes, while I am pretty confident this was not a marketing ploy, the novel is now #1 on Amazon and likely to be a world-wide bestseller.

Episode 150: Live with John Crowley and Peter Straub!

This week the Coode Street Podcast, or part of it, is on the move! With  Readercon 24  in full swing, Gary has travelled to Burlington, Massachusetts and has corralled award-winning author of  Little Big  and the  Aegypt  sequence, John Crowley, and long-time friend of the podcast Peter Straub to take part in a fascinating discussion of genre and other things. As always, we hope you enjoy the podcast!

00:00  Introduction (flawed)

02:00  Discussion of reading and being influenced by early science fiction from the ’50s and ’60s, and the path from there to reading literature.

12:40  On how genre works and what makes the SF ideational space function. Mention of Bob Shaw’s classic “Light of Other Days”.

19:00  Peter discusses writing about fear, reading Ballard, and other influences.

30:00  On reading work as science fiction, including mention of John’s novel  The Translator.

35:00  On how writing SF/F is accepted to day in a way that it was not before.

40:00  Peter discusses his novel  In the Night Room.

43:00  Story McGuffins and the death of the author.

50:00  Sequels, Lin Carter, book signings.

58:00  A brief discussion of what’s next from Peter and John.

As discussed in the podcast, you can  order the 25th Anniversary Edition  of  Little Big,  or just check it out.

Lately….

It’s July and I’ve not been blogging. I know why I haven’t been blogging. Mostly because I have Twitter, and because of the semi-shambles that the first half of 2013 has left everything in round here. I’ve not blogged much about all sorts of small, recurring problems – mostly medical ones like hearing and blurry eyes and so on – which haven’t been life-threatening, but have kept me from feeling like blogging or doing much.

What have I been doing? Well, since getting back from Canberra and the Australian Natcon I’ve watched a lot of TV – four seasons of Justified, a season of Nashville, a season of The Americans, two seasons of Switched at Birth, and so on. I’ve read a small handful of novels, most of which I’ve discussed on the Coode Street Podcast with Gary K. Wolfe. I’ve also recorded a couple episodes of the Last Short Story podcast, read some excellent short fiction, started work on The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year: Volume 8,  bought the first story for Reach for Infinity, seen the cover art for the follow-up to Fearsome Journeys, bought the central story for my special issue of Subterranean Magazine, and outlined a couple of other projects.  I’m pretty sure there was also a 13th birthday party for my daughter in there, a 75th birthday for my mother, and some travel and other planning.

What lies ahead in the second half of 2013? Well, without indulging too much in repeating myself, I have some Locus editing to do, taxes to get submitted, the above-mentioned anthology and editing projects to finish and deliver, and a trip to London and Brighton for World Fantasy Convention to plan. I’m very excited about the latter. I’ll be doing some touristy stuff before WFC with Ellen Klages and Gary Wolfe, as well as trying to pack some UK-focussed podcasting into things, and then down to Brighton. Every year I take a tuxedo with me for my brilliant agent Howard Morhaim’s big annual shindig, but this year I’m hoping to just take a normal suit. See if I can get away with that.  I also have a few birthdays to help celebrate before Christmas, and then my own 50th in January (no idea what to do about/for that). I mega-ton of reading. I really want to finish the best of the year before Brighton as much as possible, and all sorts of other things. And all that on top of a day job.

It should, all in all, be a busy time. I’ll try to record more of it here, but we shall see how that goes. Tonight: Locus editing, business paperwork and day 2 of the 1st Ashes Test.

 

Episode 149: Awards, Matheson and the Year to Date

In what is definitely the latest official instalment of the Coode Street Podcast, Gary and Jonathan sneak past the Jerome Kern Memorial Habachi Stand and settle down just near the Richard Rogers Habachi Grill to discuss many things. In an incredible development, this time the Production Gnomes of Coode Street have been able to produce a rough running schedule for the episode. Rejoice!

00:00   Introduction
05:00 Discussion of Kim Stanley Robinson’s new novel Shaman, Werner Herzog’s film Cave of Forgotten Dreams and prehistoric fiction. (This bit’s shorter than you’d think it would be).
13:00:  Locus Awards winners, and Gary drops names.
30:00   Richard Matheson.
38:00   The Year in Fiction to Date (including our favorites and must reads of the year so far [though not really “must”, just “we like it a lot and you might too”]
1:13:00 End
Please let us know in comments about your favorite books of the year too! Next week we hope to be reporting in from Readercon. Until then, as always, we hope you enjoy the podcast!