Tag: Book Blasts

Review | Robinson and An Overcoat, both by Jack Robinson a.k.a. Charles Boyle

Written in the aftermath of the 2016 referendum when the UK voted to leave the EU, Robinson is essential and entertaining reading. By the end of the 19th century there were over 700 spin-off versions of Robinson Crusoe: the novel is brilliantly and succinctly revisited by Charles Boyle a.k.a. Jack Robinson in a modern-day setting. 

Random thoughts from an offshore island

“James Joyce considered Robinson’s grandfather to be ‘the true prototype of the English colonist . . . The whole Anglo Saxon spirit is in Crusoe: the manly independence; the unconscious cruelty; the persistence; the slow yet efficient intelligence; the sexual apathy; the practical, well-balanced religiousness; the calculating taciturnity.’ Crusoe – the eponymous hero of the book by Daniel Defoe that is often considered to be the first English novel.” Continue reading Review | Robinson and An Overcoat, both by Jack Robinson a.k.a. Charles Boyle

News | The BookBlast® 10×10 Tour 2018 Kickstarter Campaign Launched

The BookBlast® celebration of independent publishing was kicked off in 2016 via online journal The BookBlast® Diary, idea being to showcase daring, risk-taking small publishers who fill a unique niche discovering talent, publishing authentic and offbeat books which add value to the cultural landscape.

bookblast 10x10 tour book covers mosaic

We are now going offline and into the 9 regions of England this Autumn with THE BOOKBLAST® 10×10 TOUR 2018 in association with Waterstones.

Why not show your support for small independent publishers, writers and translators? Please spread the word and support our KICKSTARTER campaign: you can pledge, enjoy and spread the word HERE…

Come to the first tour event on 11 September at 6.30pm in Waterstones, Gower Street, or to  one of the 9 regional talks! We have lots of goodies and tickets to #giveaway so visit us and let everyone know how much you love to support #crowdfunding great new writing and ideas.

The BookBlast® 10×10 Tour is about extraordinary writing inspiring readers to explore what’s happening in the world now. Audiences will encounter writers from the Middle East, Europe, Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, up-and-coming British talent.

Waterstones may be a nationwide chain, but is clearly awake to the potential of small independent publishers and showcasing them to a high-street audience.

The tour connects London and the regions and showcases some of the finest independent-spirited literature and poetry being published today.

I look forward to seeing you all on the campaign trail and at a 10×10 Tour event in the Autumn. Ciao for now! G@BB

The BookBlast® 10×10 Tour catalogue is available for download or viewing online HERE

News | THE BOOKBLAST® 10×10 TOUR 2018 CATALOGUE now available

Here at BookBlast® we have worked over the past year on an exciting tour happening this Autumn: 10 small independent trade publishers will host author/translator talks in 10 cities over 9 weeks, one in each city (11 September-15 November).

A tour of this kind has not been done before. It is all about celebrating risk-takers in publishing and giving them greater visibility, as well as connecting London and the regions.

The BookBlast® 10×10 Tour catalogue is available for viewing or download HERE

We  look forward to seeing you at one of the events! Georgia @bookblast

 

 

Interview | Quinton Skinner, author

The publication of Amnesia Nights in the UK is a first for Quinton Skinner, the critically-acclaimed author of three novels and non-fiction books on fatherhood and rock ‘n’ roll. A former critic and magazine editor, he has written for publications including Minneapolis Star Tribune, Huffington Post, Variety, Glamour and Literary Hub. He lives in Minneapolis, USA.

Where were you born, and where did you grow up?
I was born and grew up in a working-class area of Columbus, a university city and the capital of Ohio in the U.S.

What sorts of books were in your family home?
There were quite a few. I remember The Ascent of Man, based on the BBC Series of the same name, because it captured my imagination conceptually. My father had a lovely bound series of all the Sherlock Holmes stories. I was preoccupied with an astronomy book in the home and spent a good deal of time as well with the encyclopedia and the world atlas. I also read mountains of age-appropriate stuff from the library down the street. I was the child always with his head down in some kind of printed matter.

Who were early formative influences as a writer?
Virginia Woolf for her vivid interiority. Saul Bellow for compassion and ambition. Denis Johnson for the dark alleys and the byways. Martin Amis for materialism and humor. Of course the first was Dr. Seuss, who obsessed me with his knack for the sideways hidden dimensions both in language and the visual world, a sense of the uncanny that I recognized as familiar to me, and essential to the way I saw (and heard, and spoke) things. There was also a series of crime-solving books revolving around a character called Encyclopedia Brown, which may not be read anymore but which were essential crime procedurals for the under-10 set. Continue reading Interview | Quinton Skinner, author

Interview | TAHAR BEN JELLOUN: I am exiled in terms of language | BANIPAL magazine 2009

Moroccan writer Tahar Ben Jelloun, winner of the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award and the Prix Goncourt among many others, and short-listed for the Nobel Prize in Literature, talks to Georgia de Chamberet about writing in French, immigration, exile, language, and fighting injustice.

An extract from the interview is reproduced below; the full interview was published in Banipal magazine No. 35 in 2009 and is available at banipal.co.uk

Banipal magazine is an independent literary magazine. It was begun in 1998 by two individuals who loved Arab literature and believed in promoting dialogue between different cultures by bringing this literature with the world through translation into English.

The Banipal Trust / Saif Ghobash Banipal Prize for Arabic Literary Translation prize administered by the Translators Association 2018 judging panel is Pete Ayrton, Georgia de Chamberet, Fadia Faqir, Sophia Vasalou. 

oOo

How many hours a day do you write?
I write in the morning, on average for three hours, although I sometimes stay at my desk all that time and just write one phrase, it depends. The principle is that it’s a discipline and whatever happens I must stay in front of the page, or computer, and not give up. It’s a practice I have followed for 30 years.

Is the actual process of writing pleasurable – or is it a need?
Both. When I write novels and poetry it’s a pleasure naturally, but also a worry as I don’t know how it will turn out. And it’s a necessity since if I don’t write, I feel useless. Continue reading Interview | TAHAR BEN JELLOUN: I am exiled in terms of language | BANIPAL magazine 2009

Review | Vernon Subutex 2, Virginie Despentes | ‏Maclehose Press

“He is off his head. He has episodes when he zones out. It is not unpleasant. From time to time, he tries to reason with himself: he cannot stay here indefinitely, it has been a cold summer, he will catch another bout of flu, he needs to take care of himself, he needs to go back down into the city, find some clean clothes, do something [ . . .] Painfully, he climbs over the railings separating the communal garden from the property where he has taken to sleeping. He grips the branches and hoists his body up almost falling flat on his face on the other side. He ends up kneeling on the ground. He wishes he could feel sorry for himself, or disgust. Anything. But no, nothing. Nothing but this absurd calm.”

Look who’s back . . . and sleeping rough now that sofa surfing is a thing of the past: Vernon, Mr. Superstar D.J. and former owner of cult record shop ‘Revolver’. At the end of Vernon Subutex 1 he was beaten up by a gang of neo-Nazis – along with his TV screenwriter friend, Xavier, who was trying to rescue him but ended up comatose in hospital instead. Continue reading Review | Vernon Subutex 2, Virginie Despentes | ‏Maclehose Press

Blogosphere Interview | Jackie Law, Never Imitate, @followthehens

Where were you born, and where did you grow up?
I was born and raised in Belfast during The Troubles. My parents grew up in working class families and were determined to ‘better themselves’. When my older brother was eight they bought a newly built, three bed semi-detached house and moved from the central area of the city to what was then its outskirts. They still live there today.
My sister and I were born after this move. My brother left home when I was six so I never really got to know him – he now lives in Australia. My sister and I both passed the 11+ exam and attended an all girl state run grammar school before going up to the local university. We continued to live with my parents, although I did move into student digs for around six months after yet another row about my behaviour – aged twenty I was staying out beyond my curfew and drinking alcohol. I suspect we all wish I could have afforded to stay away, but my part time job wouldn’t cover the rent longer term.
Belfast felt parochial, cut off from what we referred to as the mainland due to the violence. We were expected to attend church and conform to a code of conduct that demanded we put on a front to the world of chastity and sobriety. It always felt that what I was seen to be mattered more to my parents than what I was or aspired to.
Despite this I look back on a largely happy childhood. Certainly at the time I felt loved. My determination to leave Belfast and to be myself stems from the frustration of being guilt tripped into conforming to a wide range of strictures I didn’t agree with. Continue reading Blogosphere Interview | Jackie Law, Never Imitate, @followthehens

BookBlasts® | Full Tour Listings: The BookBlast® 10×10 Tour in association with Waterstones

THE BOOKBLAST® 10×10 TOUR
A CELEBRATION OF INDEPENDENT PUBLISHING
11 SEPTEMBER – 15 NOVEMBER 2018
A Nationwide Festival of Independent Publishing!

A carnival of authors, poets, translators and publishers, under the banner of trailblazing agency BOOKBLAST® created by Georgia de Chamberet, will be travelling to major cities across England, showcasing some of the finest independent-spirited literature and poetry being published today. With these events, BookBlast® aims to unite people in the spirit of friendship and exchange.

on the road bookblast 10x10 tourTHE BOOKBLAST® 10×10 TOUR, in association with Waterstones, will visit nine regions of England, celebrating risk-taking publishers who fill a unique niche in discovering talent. The tour connects London and the regions.

Read the full Media Release here . . .

THE BOOKBLAST® 10×10 TOUR launches in Waterstones Gower Street, located in the heart of Bloomsbury, London, followed by a series of themed talks, each one chaired by a small independent publisher, held in flagship regional branches of Waterstones over 9 weeks. It promises to be a hugely exhilarating celebration of the most electrifying prose and poetry being created today. Continue reading BookBlasts® | Full Tour Listings: The BookBlast® 10×10 Tour in association with Waterstones

Review | The Art of White Roses, Viviana Prado-Núñez | Book of the Week

“When has anyone official in this country ever told the truth? I’ve been alive for nearly eighty years and I’ve never seen it. Not once. There are people missing . . .”

We know about how Fidel and Raúl Castro Ruz overthrew the dictator Fulgencio Batista during the 1953–59 Cuban Revolution, and that Cuba became a communist thorn in the side of America under the leadership of Fidel Castro, Moscow’s communist ally in the United States’ back yard. But what was it like living day-by-day through the revolution, that moment in time when history altered its course?

Continue reading Review | The Art of White Roses, Viviana Prado-Núñez | Book of the Week

Review | What Happened to Us, Ian Holding | Book of the Week

The bleakness and violence of life in modern Zimbabwe underpin this powerful coming-of-age tale, as thirteen-year-old Danny comes to understand critical truths about himself, his family and their milieu – and his country. His social observations and attempts to put to rest some of the painful questions surrounding the brutal event which lies at the heart of the novel offer an eye-opening look at life in another culture, and the tensions that lie behind the news headlines.

“I think what happened to us started the day I as out playing on the streets of our neighbourhood and accidentally pissed on the President’s face. I was a thirteen year old kid, skinny, lean-boned, full of shit.”

Continue reading Review | What Happened to Us, Ian Holding | Book of the Week