Easter is here for another year. I like to celebrate this time of year with bacon (for peace) and chocolate eggs and bunnies. Actually, interesting fact, the reason we celebrate Easter with eggs and bunnies is because they were fertility and sex symbols of the goddess Ishtar (pronounced Easter). In honour of the event, we clearly need the chocolate eggs and bunnies to keep us fuelled up for the fertility long weekend. In some of the spare hours, it might be worth reading a good book.
So, have you read any of Lee’s favourite books and will you be reading any of them this long chocolate fueled sex weekend?
1 To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
“The greatest legal thriller ever written.”
2 Revolution in the Head by Ian MacDonald
“If you were there, you can’t remember – so read this.”
3 Roots by Alex Haley
“A tragic story we should all know.”
4 Sophie’s Choice by William Styron
“If you read only 10 novels in your life, make this one.”
5 Catch 22 by Joseph Heller
“Started a brief but glorious period of dissent in the United States.”
6 The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham
“The best what-if sci-fi ever.”
7 Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
“An elegant saga and a double love story.”
8 The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
“A novel that described and defined an era.”
9 Nice Work by David Lodge
“Social realism from a recent but almost forgotten era.”
10 Goldfinger by Ian Fleming
“Iconic, for a reason.”
11 Ragtime by EL Doctorow
“What great novels used to be – and could be again.”
12 The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler
“The best of the US golden age of crime writing.”
13 Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare
“The finest writing EVER.”
14 The Road to Wigan Pier by George Orwell
“How we used to live, think and write.”
15 Churchill by Roy Jenkins
“The best one-volume biography ever.”
16 The Dam Busters by Paul Brickhill
“Guys my age grew up on stuff like this.”
17 Gorky Park by Martin Cruz Smith
“A Californian writing about Russia in a Scandinavian way.”
18 Los Alamos by Joseph Kanon
“My current favourite writer’s debut – excellent.”
19 Postmortem by Patricia Cornwell
“There’s a reason she became so popular – and this is it.”
20 Sleepyhead by Mark Billingham
“An amazing debut with an early ‘reveal’ that will shock you.”
21 The Glittering Prizes by Frederic Raphael
“A time, a place – how we used to live, who we used to be.”
22 Maisie Dobbs by Jacqueline Winspear
“The first in an amazing new series.”
23 The Little Drummer Girl by John le Carré
“The unfairly neglected jewel in le Carré’s crown.”
24 City of Thieves by David Benioff
“Powerful, entrancing, tough, wonderfully imagined.”
25 Have His Carcase by Dorothy L Sayers
“The best of ‘golden age’ mystery fiction.”
26 The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King
“An example of King’s genius – he can make a story out of the simplest premise.”
27 A Place of Execution by Val McDermid
“Everything plus that vital x-factor that makes you cross when you have to stop.”
28 The Lost by Daniel Mendelsohn
“A heartbreaking work of personal history that reads like a thriller.”
29 Debt of Honour by Tom Clancy
“The best from the man who dominated the genre for a decade.”
30 The Golden Rendezvous by Alistair MacLean
“His first dozen books are all great – why not start here?”
31 The Female Eunoch by Germaine Greer
“That rare thing – a book that changed the world.”
32 Dreams From My Father by Barack Obama
“I read this 7 years ago and wanted him for president right then.”
33 The Power of the Dog by Don Winslow
“A huge multi-generational crime saga – a book of the decade.”
34 The Day of the Jackal by Frederick Forsyth
“ ‘Book Zero’ in terms of recent thriller evolution.”
35 Green River Rising by Tim Willocks
“Maybe the best-ever prison novel – terrific suspense.”
36 The Runaway Jury by John Grisham
“Much more than it seems – a masterclass in narrative drive.”
37 Brilliant Orange by David Winner
“My favourite sport explains one of my favourite cultures.”
38 Night Sky by Clare Francis
“The multitalented Ms Francis unleashes terrific suspense and a great ‘OMG’ moment.”
39 On the Beach by Nevil Shute
“The best of 1950s style – with 1950s concerns.”
40 The Given Day by Dennis Lehane
“A big meaty epic, sprawling and inclusive – like novels use to be.”
As much as I love America, does every crime and thriller novel written have to be set there? Wouldn’t it be great if more stories chose some other locations?
Before anyone jumps on me, yes, I know, there are plenty of stories set in diverse locations. My comment is more about the way writers are so often told that people only want to read stories set in the US, that it has to appeal to the US market. I think we all know that this is a presumption on behalf of the industry for us readers. Let’s try and push for the more challenging locations in the stories we read.
Another year has come and gone for my local writers’ festival. Once again I joined my fellow reading nerds and aspiring authors to descend upon the grounds of UWA. This year there were 30,000 of us who felt the need to spend three days of lovely weather discussing books.
This year I spent a lot of the three day in writing workshops and less time at discussion/interview sessions. There is always room for improvement in writing, so what better way than sitting down with an expert and two dozen peers to discuss and practice. I’d like to thank the various experts who all had some interesting insights and tips: Susan Midalia (short stories – literary focus), Belinda Castles (finding your voice and turning that story into reality), LA Larkin (thriller writing, great tips and she is also running a longer course with the Sydney Writers Centre) and Parker Bilal (crime writing, developing the characters and structure).
This isn’t to say that I didn’t get the chance to see any talks. The discussion of Antarctica was fascinating and puts it on the list of places I’d like to visit before climate change has its wicked way with it. The discussion with Major General John Cantwell and former WA premier Geoff Gallop about why it is necessary to help remove the stigma around mental illness was fantastic. John managed to pretend he wasn’t suffering PTSD for 20 years, which is just amazing considering some of the the ramifications it was having on him. Another great session was with David Petrarca, Sue Masters and James Bradley discussing how TV storytelling now rivals cinema and literature. It is quite clear that subscription TV and services like Netflix are changing the game for production of TV, which is why we are seeing great writing, great acting and decent budgets to give us programming I actually want to watch. James Bradley made a very poiniant comment: we have to stop ragging on Master Chef and other boring and mindless TV shows, their popularity allows decent TV to be funded. Finally, on Sunday I was introduced to two new (for me) authors in the panel discussion on thrillers with Andrew Croome, LA Larkin and Steve Worland. I’m looking forward to reading Andrew and Steve’s books, and of course Louisa’s new novel Thirst.
But, now the festival is over for another year. This picture sums up the take home message for me from this year’s Perth Writers’ Festival:
Arctic Floor by Mark Aitken
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
There is nothing quite like a marketing executive, especially when they work in publishing. These are the people who come up with the fantastic ideas like: dog on the cover because dogs sell books, no dogs in the book; bright and cheery cover art, book about a serial killer; quotes recommending the book by famous authors, authors that have the same publisher. In this case the marketing department came up with a brilliant idea: Matthew Reilly is an Australian author who sells a lot of books, let’s mention him on the cover, despite the fact that the two authors write in a completely different style.
I grabbed Mark’s book from my local library because I saw he had a new book out, the third in a series, and I hadn’t heard of him previously. A fellow Aussie author, with a comparison to Matthew Reilly on the cover: this should be gold. Needless to say, the marketing people drew me in with false advertising. Mark’s book is a thriller and was a decent read, but he was more Cussler or Archer than Reilly. In fact, I was more reminded of Sahara (swap baking temperatures for freezing cold) than I was of Ice Station.
False advertising aside, this is quite a decent thriller. Worth a read, if you are after a James Rollins or Clive Cussler style novel. I’d expect later books in this series will probably “grab” the reader more, so maybe check out Mark’s new one.
Last year I instituted my best reads of the year, The Awesomes. I’ve read a few books this year (+90) and have decided that I needed to talk about my favourites of 2012 and award this year’s Awesome™.
As you will have noticed, my reviews of books are more about my impressions of the book and talking about how much I liked the book, rather than a recap of the plot, etc. My reasoning behind this is simple, I want to say “read this book” to people rather than fall into my bad habit of spoiling the ending, or being a bitch about books I didn’t enjoy. My list is based upon what I have read this year, so obviously, some great books have missed out due to lack of reading hours in the year. Also, my read list does include some books that were published prior to 2012. There were some categories that were sadly under-represented and some that had some very intense competition. Also, the fact that I finished a book shows that it was worth reading. I have my reading rules that stop me wasting valuable reading time on books I’m not enjoying. This means that any books on my read list are entertaining (well, unless I was particularly disgusted with the crappiness of the book in question).
Awesome of 2012
Nathaniel Cade series – Christopher Farnsworth
Night Angel Trilogy – Brent Weeks
Blasphemy – Douglas Preston
Temple of the Gods – Andy McDermott
Temple – Matthew Reilly
McGrave – Lee Goldberg
And the winner? Blasphemy by Douglas Preston.
There were no nominees in this category this year. Better luck next year.
Awesome Mystery & Thriller
Temple – Matthew Reilly
King City and McGrave- Lee Goldberg
First Drop – Zoe Sharp
Blasphemy – Douglas Preston
Temple of the Gods – Andy McDermott
Relic – Preston and Child
Nathaniel Cade series – Christopher Farnsworth
Tough category, but always hard to go past Matthew Reilly.
Awesome Crime
Assassin – Tara Moss
Vodka Doesn’t Freeze – Leah Giarrantano
Black Echo – Michael Connelly
Sunset Express – Robert Crais
Thirteen Hours – Deon Meyer
Another tough category this year. I’m going to have to give this one to Leah, with Tara, Michael and Robert close seconds.
Awesome Fantasy
Night Angel Trilogy – Brent Weeks
Awesome Paranormal Fantasy
Nathaniel Case series – Christopher Farnsworth
Awesome Science Fiction
There were no nominees in this category this year. Better luck next year.
Awesome Horror
Nathaniel Cade series – Christopher Farnsworth
The Kult – Shaun Jeffery
And the winner? Nathaniel Cade kicked arse!
There were no nominees in this category this year. Better luck next year.
Awesome Humor
Right What You No – Tyson Adams’ blog
I’m allowed to be self-congratulatory. Plus I didn’t read any funny books this year.
Awesome Nonfiction
This is an oxymoron, so it is invalidated as a category.
Awesome Graphic Novels & Comics
I didn’t read any 5 star graphic novels this year, but two series came to an end that were worth a mention: The Boys by Garth Ennis and Irredeemable/Incorruptible by Mark Waid. Both series were very strong and explored interesting aspects of the superhero genre.
Awesome Indie
King City – Lee Goldberg
Awesome Poetry
I still try to avoid poetry as much as possible, mainly because of ee cummings.
That’s right. I decided that there was no better way to learn how to publish my novellas than to practice with two of my short stories. I’m now prepared for the task of crossing the threshold into “professional author” territory, letting my creations escape the confines of my head and harddrive. I’ve priced both short stories at the Amazon standard $0.99, which is about what I think short stories should go for – novellas $2.99, novels somewhere between $7 and $10.
So if you would like to read some short stories, may I suggest you download mine from Amazon. Running the Cross is “A test of mind and body, running the cross is the ultimate test. A dozen rail lines, thousands of tonnes of freight trains travelling at high speed, a race across the tracks to prove yourself. Will you survive?” Rum and Roses “The police don’t like ‘Skinny’ McAfree, but they do like him for the disappearance and possible murder of his next door neighbour.”
I really enjoyed writing both of these, especially Running the Cross, and hope you enjoy reading them.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00B3WP0OK – Running the Cross
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00B3XTKFO – Rum and Roses
Hot off of the presses we have two new American reading surveys: Reading Habits in Different Communities and E-book Reading Jumps; Print Book Reading Declines.
Actually, the phrase “hot off of the presses” is rather antiquated now. News stories that are breaking generally hit electronic mediums, or in some cases, such as celebrity gossip, they hit the TV and radio mediums. Interesting research or data is normally promoted virally via Twitter and the like. Should we have a new phrase like “just blogged” or “trending tweet” instead?
Back to the survey. While not all of us live in the USA, despite what some American congress-people might say, their trends in reading can be seen as indicative of what is happening elsewhere or is likely to happen elsewhere. The Pew Institute have done a pretty decent survey, it would be great if a few others were done for other countries.
What I found interesting was the growth in e-books and e-readers. There are further breakdowns in the full reports about why the change is happening, but suffice to say, e-books have many advantages over paper, despite paper books still being the most popular reading format.
We can see a growth of 9% in people reading e-books during 2012, up from 21% to 30%. In terms of age demographics we can see that most age groups are taking up e-books, although the big growth is still in the middle age (30-49) group.
The next point of interest was who the readers were and how much they read. We can see that there is still a sizeable chunk of the community that don’t read and another chunk that pretend to read. I’d hazard a guess that light readers read non-fiction and the latest talked about bestseller only. Because they never really read good books it takes them ages to read one book and thus don’t read often.
Among those ages 16 and older who had read a book in the past 12 months:
And my final comment, women are still the readers. They make up a bigger proportion of book readers and they read more books. I have my own hypotheses as to why this is: boys are expected to like sport and reading is the opposite of sport; and reading doesn’t make you look as sexy as playing sport, so boys think you are less likely to get laid if you read. The big change I’d like to see, and this seems to be the case with e-readers and e-books, is for the average reader to read more books in a year, even if it is only so that people read the book before they make the movie of it.
I seem to be finding a bunch of cool infographics recently, they are the future of communication (warning, sarcasm may be in affect here). It is always interesting to see what the status of sales, especially e-book sales. Personally, I see the e-book becoming the new paperback within a few years, and I also think that backlists will be all e-books. What will be really interesting is whether authors will be the one controlling their backlists or whether publishing houses will want to grab hold of those. Then it becomes a case of what rates are paid on backlist, because the sunk costs are a frontlist issue, so you would expect a greater author share of sales (although it could be argued that sunk costs are sunk, thus trying to recoup those costs as part of the sale price is bad economics).
I’ve never really thought of myself as a bookworm, given the lack of exoskeleton, and my functioning vertebrae and CNS. There is no doubting that my wife and I are readers though, since we average at least a book a week, usually closer to two a week. We’re hoping our son will become a reader as well, but at the moment he is more entertained with pooping his diaper.
Anyway, in my internet trolling this week, I came across this infographic from a survey of a graphic design class. We all know that infographics must be accurate and representative, so let’s see what a Bookworm’s characteristics are.
First Drop by Zoë Sharp
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
As a new dad, there are a few sentiments expressed by Charlie Fox – the hero – about kids that feel spot on. There is nothing more annoying than a baby interrupting you reading a good book, especially during the final 50 pages! The annoying kid Charlie was protecting rang a little too true for me.
Zoe has certainly got all the right thriller ingredients. But she has also managed to mix them together into a great blend that is interesting and exciting. From go to arrhythmia, there is no let up, with Charlie trying to stay alive and figure out who isn’t trying to kill her. If I had one quibble, it was with a chance encounter that was rather important to the plot, I would have preferred it to be done a little different. But then again, I forgive this in Lee Child, Zoe is no less a writer, so it is an easily overlooked point.
If you haven’t read any of the Charlie Fox thrillers, do so soon.
NB: This review was written whilst trying to calm a baby who hadn’t slept all day and was having the grumps.
Assassin by Tara Moss
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Trying to read with a newborn in your arms is tricky. You try to get them to sleep and then realise you haven’t been reading all of that time. You try to feed them and realise that Zaphoid was right, a third arm does come in handy. This all adds up to making it hard to enjoy a good book.
The fact that I did enjoy this book shows just how good it was, because my reading has been very interrupted. Mak is back in what appears to be the finale in the Vanderwall series. Since the last book, Mak has been hiding out in Spain, but it isn’t long before assassins get wind of her location and she is headed back to Australia.
If this is the end of the series (I’m going by the novel, I haven’t heard Tara mention anything on this) then I think it ended appropriately. Some authors, TV shows and musicians drag out a series for too long. Tara has avoided that nicely. Now the only question is, will she continue in the crime genre, or will her paranormal novels be the focus now?
NB: This was a signed copy. Book fans may appreciate that detail.
At the moment I have three projects on the go. The first is the rewrites of my first novel, which I’m hoping to finish and try to find a publisher for sometime after Xmas. The second project is a sequel to the first novel. I never intended to make a series, but during the writing of the first novel I had several ideas that just needed to be written as well. The third project is a different tale entirely, not least of which is my choice of third person narrative, unlike the predominantly first person narrative of the other two. For a synopsis of my works in progress, click here.
Fallen by Karin Slaughter
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Unbelievably this is the first Karin Slaughter novel I have read. I have read one of her short stories before, which made me pick up this novel, so it wasn’t like I didn’t know that Slaughter had the goods in crime thrillers.
I quite enjoyed the slightly different take that Karin has on the crime thriller. Front and centre are a mix of slightly dysfunctional characters that somehow manage to not only work with one another, but are actually interesting to read about. You know how crime novels often have that self-loathing, alcoholic, dark and depressing lead character? Well this novel doesn’t have that – thank his noodliness.
You can see why Karin is a bestselling author, so the only question is which of her novels I’ll read next.
Long Lost by Harlan Coben
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
This is my first Harlan Coben book and I’m not sure what to think. Well, I know what to think, how to think and thinking is something I like to do to keep me from watching reality TV. My opinion of this book, however, is rather undecided.
Myron seems like an interesting enough character, the character of Win is a scene stealer, and the mystery is interesting enough. About half-way through the book, the pace picks up and things change around a bit. Even so, I’m still left unsure as to whether I enjoyed the book or not.
I think this may be that this book is number nine in the series and is written with Myron fans in mind, rather than fresh readers. As such, the Myron character feels a little flat and sappy. It might also be that the plot twist is a little improbable and pointless – as another reviewer pointed out, using an expensive procedure rather than just kidnapping is a bit silly.
Might have to try one of the earlier Myron Bolitar novels to see if I enjoy Harlan’s work.
The Seventh by Richard Stark
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Parker is not a man to be messed with. When it comes to setting the record straight, Parker does it. That is pretty much the plot and action from this great book. Also, this may be the earliest mention I have noted of gay characters in a novel. I’m sure I’ve read earlier examples, but I couldn’t bring any to mind. So despite the criticisms of Eastlake’s Parker series for misogyny, he may have actually been ahead of the times with some issues.
Stalking The Angel by Robert Crais
My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars
A good book shouldn’t take any effort to read. The second Elvis Cole adventure is definitely an effortless read. The wit and plot flow seamlessly and make it easy to forget lunch.
The only thing I really have to say about this book is that I’m looking forward to reading the next instalment in the series.
Tyson Adams 