UK Cover for Book 2

Here is the front cover of the UK Edition of Lamplighter. Lovely, lovely, lovely; I am liking it a whole lot - it has a wonderful flavour all of its own. Your thoughts?

Go here to see the US and ANZ covers if you have not glimpsed them before or just want a refresher.

And please keep the answers to these questions coming - I cannot enthuse enough about how great the answers have been . If you want to read other people's most excellent ideas, for now check the comments here, here and here.

SA Great 2007 Rising Stars

Not too long ago I was honoured with an inclusion in the SA (South Australia) Great 2007 Rising Stars program. It included a whole range of younger folks: business people, scienticians, athletes, teachers, inventors and other clever clogs all from this home state of mine. It was truly an honour to be included, though I felt inferior to the rest - but whatever.

They produced a magazine to go with the award and here is my interview therein - just for those who might be interested. The kinds of questions asked made for slightly different answers from some of the other interviews already linked. Check it out if you dare.

On an unusual note, there was a birthdate cutoff to be eligible to be a Rising Star and this little duck only made it by about two weeks. Phew! Not as young as I look it seems.

Probably a bit too much of my-own-trumpet-tooting going on here - I will get to Lawrence's question soon... honest!

Speaking of which, please keep the answers to these questions coming - I cannot enthuse enough about how great the answers have been . (If you want to read other people's most excellent ideas, for now check the comments here, here and here. Should I stop this project now? Am I flogging it too much perhaps?)

The origin of a word

I received an email query recently from a certain Beverley McKay:

"I have just finished reading Monster Blood Tattoo and have a question I was hoping you could answer for me… Could you tell me from where you derived the name you gave to the Imperial language?"
I can certainly answer that question for you. It was a few years ago now but the word was derived from two things: firstly, that I like the sound - the "vibe" if you like - of the word Latin and wanted to keep this intact some how; secondly the people who speak this language (a conglomeration of the Patris and Dido's faithful followers) style themselves the Tutelarchs (loosely the "teacher-rulers"). Consequently, I simply joined the "tut" (said 'tyoot') of Tutelarch and the "in" of Latin and so was formed Tutin. (This was my emailed reply, actually)

So, now both she and you know.

Also, regarding giantfan's inquiry into those who study the weather in the Half-Continent. Well, they are not particular folks like we have meteorologists in our own world, though certainly some natural philosophers have more than a passing interest in the movements of winds and rains. Barometers exist too, of course, for telling whether conditions are remaining fair or turning foul.

I will get to Lawrence's question about the auto-biographical nature of MBT soon.

Speaking of Lawrence, you should head on over to Lil' Chief Records and have a listen to the tunes on his jukebox. After that you need to go check out Coz's tunes, Rabbit Weather.

And while you listening to the sweet music, please please try your hand at answering these questions. I tell you truly, my sense of the H-c is so expanding just knowing and thinking of these independent lives moving about it, characters of other people's imagination dwelling therein - it is almost like these inventions of yours have become autonomous entities in my imaginings.

Totally unexpected and so very very "cool"!

A galley - I have the proof.

Yesterday I received from Tim Travaglini - my US publisher-man - what in the US publishing industry is called a galley (here in Oz we called them ubers, or somesuch - not sure why, probably an acronym) of Book 2, Lamplighter. This galley is what most folks would call an uncorrected proof. Indeed, that is what it says clearly on the front: "UNCORRECTED PROOF NOT FOR RESALE"... and uncorrected it is: I am still working with Mr Travaglini to make the final adjustments for the US edition.

But the best bit is that a galley is actually an early, paperback version of the book! Yipee! It looks very nifty, I near took it to bed with me as some kind of blankey... and talk about thick! Now I reckon it is not seemly to judge a book by its weight, but deep inside some part of me cannot help but go "HURRAH! Look how dense it is! " - 730 odd pages with all things included. "Did I write that? It looks just like a bought one," I marvel to myself much more than I did with Foundling, but too much self-congratulation is not a good thing so I stop.

Just to note, there is a little treat in Book 2 for many of the brave souls who have contributed to this blog with their comments. Speaking of which, thank you very much to those who dared to answer my questions last post, your entries were brilliant. In fact they have helped greatly in expanding my sense of people moving about independently in the Half-Continent, doing their thing apart from any narrative. It would be great if others would give them a go too.

And as requested today for breakfast I had Apricot Fruity Bix[TM].

So who in the Half-Continent would you be?

It occurred to me that it might be really rather interesting to know that if folks were citizens of the Half-Continent what type of person they might be?

• What would be your name?
• What part of the Half-Continent would you live in?
• What would be your social station?
• What profession might you choose?
• Would you be a sedorner (monster-lover) or invidist (monster-hater) or somewhere in between?
• What would you look like?
• Would you have spoors or cruorpunxis?
• What else would be interesting about you?

I am thinking I could perhaps do a little profile of each response in the side bar, a new one for each month - and "Introducing..." kind of thing. Please, answer one, some or all of these as you feel, let the world (and me) know - I reckon this might be a tad fun.

Oh - and Happy Thanksgiving to those for whom it is relevant!

(I am also wondering where random missfitt has got to... hello, are you there, sir?)

Folding-money & more

This is a replica of the 10 sou folding-money note (sometimes called a folder) that Rossamünd received from Europe just before he departs for Winstermill - actual size is about A5.

The red stamp in the top left corner is the Imperial Sigil made as deep-dye mark. Pressed into the bottom right corner is the Sovereign Marque - made using a form, a metal rod cast with a state's sigil - or marque - which is placed on the paper and hammered once and firmly with a small mallet to leave an imprint in the paper. Such forms are highly valuable items - I can see certain insalubrious folk plotting how they might steal one to further their own nefarious causes. The sign "A.V" in the marque stands for "Arius Vigilans" - the Vigilant Ram of Hergoatenbosch.

I thought some folks might be interested in knowing what folding-money looks like. I have been spending some of my inbetween-books time (that being Book 2 Lamplighter - now with the printers - and Book 3 - still no official title yet) figuring out the convoluted systems and industries surrounding the production, issuing and redemption of the humble folding bill.

Such periods of pointed and concerted invention are enriching, giving me an continually expanded view of just what makes the Half-Continent work; all those folks bustling about: the printers and their secret-vault presses, the guarded trucks taking the bills to banks and other authorised issuers, the halls of clerks keeping track of the movements and uses of the bills through an unwieldy system of logs and ledgers, the revisionists sent out to investigate frauds and forgeries. Fun, fun, fun.

Also, I have at last coined Half-Continent terms for the words mooseguy kindly challenged me with. So here goes once more, Half-Continent synonyms for real-world terms #011:

mobile phone = in full these would be called eloquiproculogue, sometimes shortened to proculogue, or voxeproculogue, though everyday folks would call them ablongs ("from afar")

internet = technically it would alternatively be known as the astrapemethodologue or fulgurcoetre ("electrical gathering") shortened to the fulgurcot, though once more the vernacular would be the somewhat simpler epistulane, with emails being commonly called epistles (a briefer form of fulgepistulës) or coets.

democracy = well, technically I could simply use the word "democracy" and be done, but where would the fun be in that?! So the Gotts for example, have two terms for it, stimmanteil ("voice-sharing") used in a positive sense, and lumpelämend ("rascal-noise") used pejoratively. Given that the Gottish political system is essentially an imperial dictatorship, lumpelämend is the more common in current times. In the Haacobin capital, Clementine, the term vox paritas ("equal voice") is being thrown about more and more frequently, it detractors deriding it as glaucaloquia ("sweet-talking") - a whole lot of frothy nonsense: the Empire will not stand - and therefore the dominion of men against the monsters - (so they say) if power is shared about to any old person just because they feel they would like to have a go a running things.

Keep the challenges coming, please.

Also, would you keep Jay (I introduced you to him last post) in your thoughts: he is going through very tough times at the moment.

Introducing Jay

Today, I would like to introduce a fine fellow I have met in email-land, via his mum (the stellar Rita Faye):

Jay, from Cocoa, Florida.

Howdy, sir, how are you doing? I hope better today.

Now Jay was doing a report on Monster-blood Tattoo for school, which went basically:

"*Research and write a report about the author of the novel. Include information about their life and books they have written. Also include a photo of the author.*"

So, via his mum Rita, he asked me some questions about writing and the book and myself, did a whole lot of hard work and handed in the report early. Better yet, when he got his grade back he had achieved 120 for it! Woo-stinkin'-hoo! Well done, Jay!

Given he had asked me some questions I thought I would ask him some of my own:

Favorite character from MBT?
"Europe, because she can shoot lightning."

Favorite books? (in order...)
"Artemis Fowl series (Eoin Colfer), Monster Blood Tattoo (DM Cornish), Rock Star Superstar (Blake Nelson), Eclipse (Stephanie Meyer), The Supernaturalist (Eoin Colfer)" (How sweet is that - I'm on someone's favourite list!)

Do you like comics?
"Yes, I like comics. For example, I like Spider-Man, Ultimate X-Men, Ultimate Spider-Man, The Punisher, manga, and just about everything else." (Makes me think I need to get a graphic novel of MBT happening some day - or better yet some other story from the Half-Continent.)

Now, from what I understand, Jay has a blood and marrow condition which doctors are currently investigating (Rita said I could say this - I hope Jay does not mind) so please have him in your good thoughts, prayers or whatever other positive processes you have. That is kind of why I am introducing to you all - to make his day (I hope) in the midst of tough times. Maybe you could send him a howdy in the comments and answer the questions I asked him (for the illumination of both him and I):

Favorite character from MBT?
Favorite books? (in order... or not)
Do you like comics? (I include graphic novels in this)

The next book for Jay's project is called The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. Rita says, "Jay likes it for one of the same reasons he likes MBT; the hero is a young boy that he can identify with. We shall see how he goes." We shall indeed. May you get equally high marks for this, too, Jay!