Checking the books

My rather unscientific mode of tracking how my books are going no doubt leaves a lot to be desired. I get reports (and sometimes photographs) from family and friends who lurk in bookshops, turning the books cover out when the shop assistants aren't looking (they're a loyal bunch, and I guess the family has a material interest). Anyway, I heard two bookshop reports which pleased me very much this week.

I was totally delighted when I heard that my new collection of poems, Theatre, was in the front window of the Paperback Bookshop in Bourke St, Melbourne. Poems? In the window? Now that is cool, even if poetry is never going to pay the rent. And then I heard that The Singing was spotted in the Best Seller shelves at Borders. That must mean I can officially call myself a Best Selling Author. I've ordered the badge...

Life otherwise has been, to say the least, chaotic. I feel like I'm running like a loon just to stay in the same spot. Despite this, I really have started a new novel. It's a fantasy novel, but it's very different from the Pellinor books. Shorter, for a start. It's written in the first person, which I am enjoying, and it's set in a world and time very like ours. It's not quite what I expected I would be doing, which I take as a good sign, and I have no idea if those who like the Pellinor books would go for this one. But this character has taken hold and is demanding to be written. It's coming slowly but steadily. Writing is very mysterious sometimes...

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Bestseller at last?

I've always been a little confused as to what constitutes "best seller" status. Aside from phenomena like Dan Brown and JK Rowling, I mean. How do you tell? When people say "best seller", does it mean the top ten of all books? Or just some top tens? Or what?

Anyway, now I might be able to claim that I am an international best seller author. The Singing has made it to No 2 in the fantasy and science fiction categories on amazon.co.uk, and is also No 2 on children's SFF. And is at No. 31 overall. I've no idea how amazon reflects general book sales, but in this list I'm currently beating Pratchett, Rowling and Pullman, with only Christopher Paolini beating me to No. 1. (So not quite a No. 1 Bestseller! But I'll settle for No.2.) I doubt this will ever happen again, so I might as well enjoy it. Just to prove it, I took a screen shot (click the image for a clearer version):

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Author! Author!

Just to prove I really am an Author - moreover, an Author Of The Month - a friend of my son's (thanks, Mel!) sent me this picture of a display in Borders.

Meanwhile, I've finished my first week travelling around with the Books Alive! campaign. Except for Tuesday, I've been in tandem with the charming Toni Jordan, and it's been a hoot (Tuesday was a hard gig, and I am very grateful to Pellinor enthusiast Ann for providing a friendly face in the audience, lugging 15 kilos of books into Fitzroy for me to sign, and for laughing at my jokes...) I met another fan, Patrick, on Wednesday, and that was charming too. The real pleasure of this is the chance to meet readers.

Last night we were in Warrnambool, at the local library, and that was enormous fun. Despite Penguin sending the bookshop 15 copies of Book 3 - instead of the more immediately useful Book 1 - people bought it and asked me to sign it, promising they would buy the first two books. They even (yes) laughed at my jokes, and paid attention, and were all-round a friendly and warm audience. Toni has been on the author trail since February, and is a trooper - two weeks is, I suspect, my personal limit. I must be a delicate flower: it's very hard work doing this stuff! But the Books Alive people - on the Warnambool trip it was Fiona Lange - make sure we're well looked after and very well fed. Last night's treat was a dinner at a wonderful Italian restaurant, just down the road from the Warnambool Library. I consumed with great pleasure a chicken breast stuffed with chestnut and a rocket and pear salad, rounded off with some roquefort washed down with a botrytis wine. If being an Author means this kind of thing, I'm all for it...

Update: the Sydney date on Monday night has been cancelled (see comments) - my apologies to those Sydney readers who might have been there - maybe we'll catch up next time!

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Tour dates

August is going to be a very busy month for one Ms Croggon. This is because The Gift has been chosen as one of the Books Alive 50 Books You Can't Put Down. Which is very cool. Books Alive is a huge annual reading campaign involving lots of authors, and which is launched officially this Sunday; but I'll wickedly leak some details here, exclusively for Pellinor readers. Especially because I hope people turn up. You can catch me being a fantasy author here:

August 11, 6.30pm: Diamond Valley Library, Civic Drive, Greensborough, VIC FREE

August 12, 1.30pm: Fitzroy Library, 128 Moor Street, Fitzroy, VIC FREE

August 13, 1.30pm: Lilydale Library Anderson St, Lilydale, VIC FREE

August 14, 6.30pm: Brunswick Library, cnr Sydney Rd and Dawson St, Brunswick, VIC FREE

August 15, 6pm: Warrnambool Library, 25 Liebig St, Warrnambool, VIC FREE

August 25, 7pm: Mosman Library, Reference Library, 605 Military Road, Mosman, NSW $8.80/$6.60 conc

August 27, 6.30pm: East Melbourne Library, 122 George Street, East Melbourne FREE

It seems a bit hard that Sydneysiders have to pay... Meanwhile, my Melbourne Writers Festival sessions, which cover some other writerly hats, are threaded sometimes rather hectically through these ones...I'll certainly be running from Federation Square to the East Melbourne Library one busy Friday. For the record, diehard Croggon fans can also catch me at these sessions, at Federation Square in Melbourne:

August 28, 5.30pm: ACMI 2 - Poetry now
Where are we? What’s the next big thing? Chris Wallace-Crabbe, Justin Clemens, Alison Croggon and Robert Gray will name check the movers and the stayers in Australian poetry.

August 29, 2.30pm: ACMI 1 - Legacy or burden?
Melbourne's APG and Sydney's Nimrod were the hippest places to be in the ‘70s. Their impact on future theatre generations is discussed by Gabrielle Wolf, Julian Meyrick and Alison Croggon.

August 29, 4pm: BMW Edge - One not used to happiness – Anna Akhmatova
Before the Soviet nightmare changed her song, Anna Akhmatova wrote some of Russia’s finest love poetry. Orlando Figes, Alison Croggon and Ellen Koshland discuss the life and work of the magnificient Anna Akhmatova.

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And who is that bearded bloke?

Amazon Germany tells me that the Pellinor books are doing nicely over there (many thanks, Bastei-Lübbe: you've done me proud). They've just bought The Singing, which is apparently due out there in March next year, hot on the heels of the US edition. No one can say the Germans are not efficient.

But the cover image suggests that the designer is yet to read the book. At least, who is that bearded Bard looking all, well, wizardly on the cover of Das Baumlied? Any suggestions gratefully received...

Meanwhile, Pellinor's plot to take over the world continues with the purchase by a Portuguese publisher of The Gift and The Riddle...

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Who says fantasy is mediaeval?

I have always said my characters have a life of their own. And they just proved it - they have their own Facebook pages! Imagine my surprise when one Cadvan Lirigon, looking rather more ruggedly handsome than I anticipated, asked to be my friend. He's a "Dark ass-kicker" who enjoys "a good game of pool". Hem and Dernhil (who seems to have generated his own little fanclub) have their own pages too. They're all loyal viewers of a tv show called Days of Our Bards (wot, no Dr Who?) Wow. I look forward keenly to further revelations...

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Back home

...after a month long trip to England, where I was mostly being a poet and sometimes having a holiday. It was a totally brilliant time, and I've come back to the chaos of my desk deeply refreshed, if also deeply jetlagged - for those who haven't done it, Melbourne is a very long way away from Europe, and you never feel it more than when the plane seems to be poised endlessly over Central Asia... There's no getting away from the fact that it's a horror flight.

I had lunch with Walker, my English publishers, always a pleasant thing to do, and kept bumping into Pellinor fans even though I wasn't doing Pellinorish things, including the enterprising Lsle (did I get that right?) in Norwich, who hunted me down at the New Writing Worlds festival, even though I wasn't reading, with a much-thumbed copy of The Gift. That was lovely, and also unexpected. My editor wants me to write a book of short stories, along the lines of Ursula Le Guin's Tales of Earthsea, and I have to say that idea has its charm - I reread the short story I wrote last year, Two Friends, while I was away (my editor also, oh horror, made me do some work and edit it) and was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. I'll keep you updated on when that will appear... I couldn't face writing another novel of Edil-Amarandh, but some short tales might be a really fun thing to do.

Also, (I confess, to my considerable astonishment), Penguin is organising an Australian tour. The initial dates unfortunately clashed with some dates I already have at the Melbourne Writers Festival, but they are on the case with Books Alive! and if they can reschedule I'll be popping up in Melbourne, Brisbane, Sydney and... Warnambool. So any Warnambool fans take note. Are there any? Please come if there are.

And a story that warmed the cockles of my heart. My son Josh was book browsing in town yesterday, checking out The Singing and loyally contemplating turning the covers face-out (all my family and friends seem to do this), when an excited young man with a back pack rushed up behind him, grabbed The Singing with a whoop, and rushed off to the counter. Now, that makes an author excited!

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