2012…

What am I working on? A couple new series. One is specifically for teens – though everyone seems to be reading teen fiction these days. Here’s my bad iPhone pic of an early mock-up cover from my local publishers:

The other project is a new high concept thriller series.

Also, check out regular posts at Twitter and WhoSay.

2011 in review

2011.

Re-wrote my novels SURVIVOR and QUARANTINE, both released in English this year, US and translations next year.

Spent Jan in China, where I met my lovely Chinese lit agents, ate mysterious food, observed how the top military in communist countries sure get paid well, and noticed a lot of weirdos driving around in grey vans – snatching people off streets. Fun times. Oh, and polluted much?

Wrote my next adult thriller. Finished PhD. Wrote the first six books of a new teen series. Re-worked some screenplays. Read some good books, started some appalling ones (Tom Clancy, really? Your last piece of co-written crap damages our genre and cheats readers), and noticed an increasing amount of unreadable fiction being published.

Saddened we lost Jobs, Hitch, Havel, my grandpa Tas (dedicated RED ICE to him), and my good friend Woody (dedicated QUARANTINE to him).

Glad we lost Bin Laden, Gaddafi, and that Nth Korean shit-bag. There’s a few more still out there, from Cambodia and Indonesia to Syria and Iran and a few places between, who have been sucking up our air for too long. Makes you wish there was a permanent tribunal that can prosecute individuals for genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes – kinda like the ICC with a sense of urgency. Can’t we have a Grey Man-type group out there cleaning things up? Perhaps some ex-Blackwater types who are skilled up, cashed up, and looking for a little adventure? Alas, only in fiction…

Happy to see troops out of Iraq. Afghanistan’s a nightmare. Timor’s still forgotten. Makes you wonder if liberators think about consequences before they act. Or what things would be like if election terms were longer and if that would lead to more accountability. If only we were all wiser.

Arab Spring: bitter sweet. That it still, in 2011, costs so many lives and liberties of women and children to get rid of corrupt fat-cats is beyond disappointing. I understand freedom from tyranny has a price, but tyranny from violent men should be borne by violent men. And it’s frustrating that such greedy scumbags continue to go unchecked in this day and age of precision weaponry. Maybe Palin would be a good president for a little bit: kill a moose, kill a despot. Better yet, give her an M110 and send her to the front lines. Or maybe not.

Banking crisis… well, it’s nice to see that we keep throwing money at them, that should fix the problem. Whatever happened to free markets, where if you’re shit, you fail – then you learn and try better next time or you don’t so pack up and go home. And whatever happened to elected governments making laws to make our lives better? Regulate much?

Australian politics predicable as ever: we’re digging deeper, learning less, doing little of any worth given the potential we have to do so much. Nice to see that human traffickers of asylum seekers are turning a profit; there’s a word for such guys, which I’ll leave to your imagination. Amazing to hear politicians waste vast amounts of precious time debating whether or not we’re polluting our habitat. We continue to waste expenditure on a vast scale. And ’round and ’round we go…

So, 2012 looms and it seems like a fun year head. I’m writing like mad until April, so that I’ll be 14 books ahead, with 2012 and 2013 publications sorted. Plenty of travel and book touring to do, aiming for more time spent with family and friends, and planning to relax on a quiet beach somewhere.

Happy reading.

jp.

The ALONE trilogy ends here…

This month sees the publication of the final installment of the ALONE trilogy, QUARANTINE, in Australia, UK, and most the world (in English).
The USA and Canada, as well as several foreign languages, get all three books next year.
I miss the character of Jesse, and although I’m well into my next projects, I can’t help but wonder What is he up to?
Hope you enjoy the read.

Want a free Lachlan Fox story?

Well go visit GET READING’s site for details and look out for this book…

Where I’m at…

It’s been a busy year! The ALONE trilogy is done and dusted, of which more below. A new adult thriller in the works, and a new teen series. Add to that a thousand and one public appearances at schools and festivals = one tired author.

A couple weeks ago I caught up with my mate Jeffery Deaver when he was in my home town of Melbourne to promote his James Bond novel, CARTE BLANCHE. It’s a cracking read and his fans and mine, as well as those of the Bond books and films, will love it. I told Deaver about my new secret thriller (another thriller writer, Michael Robotham, sewed the seed that become this storyline, when, a few years ago when we were in New York, he told me about a true story… that in turn went on to give me the book idea via a NIGHTMARE. Beat for beat, I dreamed the outline of the book, and now, finally, I’m writing it – I hope in getting it down it will leave me alone…) and he loved it, which is a good sign that the idea is working (my agents and publishers love the outline too, but it’s those who are really in the trenches – fellow novelists – who I most trust for such feedback). While we were talking about our mutual respect and appreciation for Ian Fleming and Bond, I recalled that ages back I’d got my hands on a mind-condish copy of Fleming’s travel book, THRILLING CITIES. Given the recent riots in London I was specifically reminded of a section in the book when Fleming is in Los Angeles; he spends some time talking with his friend Captain James Hamilton, head of intelligence of the LAPD. What Hamilton had to say about crime, particularly juvenile, has a lot of relevance over 50 years on:

“Crime among youth is encouraged and nurtured by:
1. The decline and fall of mid-Victorian values in Anglo-American civilisation, leaving the individual to mature in a society that fails to establish a clear moral definition of right and wrong.
2. The direct influence of adult criminality or, in other cases, by a passive contempt by a large section of our adult population for law and order.
3. The increasing emphasis of our society upon not only materialism, but upon ‘materialism without effort’.
4. A cultural imbalance between man’s advancement in technology and a commensurate level of conduct. Thus we are attempting to substitute scientific proficiency for social responsibility.”

What else am I reading? Re-read an old favourite, HAM ON RYE BY Charles Bukowski. Soooo funny. A few other non-fiction books, mainly about literary theory for my PhD work. Most recent fiction is my friend http://www.nickearls.com/ THE FIX, a well-written thriller which I highly recommend, Adrian McKinty’s 50 GRAND, and my mate JJ DeCeglie’s unpublished crime novel.

I will be at the Brisbane Writer’s Festival from Sept 6th-10th, talking to masses of school groups and a couple sessions open to the gen pop, as well as participating in their online festival and conducting a thriller-writing workshop. Check their site for details.

In prep I’m reading some fellow novelist’s work, such Emily Rodda’s THE GOLDEN DOOR, who I’m on a panel at the Brisbane Writer’s Festival titled:
Saturday, 10 September
38 Writing for Children
Successful children’s writers Emily Rodda, James Roy and James Phelan discuss the tricks of the trade and the joys of writing for children.

As with DELTORA QUEST, my buddy Marc McBride did the illustrations on this book.

Another panel I’m involved with at the Brisbane Writer’s Festival titled: ‘War games: Fact and Fiction’ Peter Stanley is a prolific author and the Head of the Centre for Historical Research at the National Museum of Australia. I look forward to reading his book Simpson’s Donkey: A wartime journey to Gallipoli and beyond – the story of John Simpson’s donkey before and after Simpson’s death.

Oh, and as I’m forever re-reading Hunter S Thompson, I found this relevant piece in his collection of writing, KINGDOM OF FEAR, from which I quote:

“My opposition to war is not based upon pacifist or non-resistant principles. It may be that the present state of civilization is such that certain international questions cannot be discussed; it may be that they have to be fought out. But the fighting never settles the question. It only gets the participants around to a frame of mind where they will agree to discuss what they were fighting about. We ought not to forget that wars are a purely manufactured evil and are made according to a very definite technique. A campaign for war is made upon as definite lines as a campaign for any other purpose. First, the people are worked upon. By clever tales, the people’s suspicions are aroused toward the nation against whom war is desired.
Make the nation suspicious, make the other nation suspicious. All you need for this is a few agents with some cleverness and no conscience and a press whose interest is looked upon with the interests that will be benefitted by war. Then the “overt act” will soon appear. It is no trick at all to get an “overt act” once you work the hatred of two nations up to the proper pitch.”
- Henry Ford

Meantime, I’m writing away on my next projects, have a busy Book Week where I’ll talk to a few thousand kids (did a quick calculation the other day, over 20,000 students spoken to at schools and universities so far this year… I hope they’re all buying my novels!), and am looking forward to the upcoming world-wide publication of ALONE: Quarantine. It’s first out in Australia and UK/Commonwealth countries this October, US/Canada and some translation languages next year.

JP

ALONE 2 and beyond…

Here’s the UK and Australian editions of ALONE 1 & 2. Book 3 is out this October.

Plenty of emails lately asking if there’ll be a Lachlan Fox thriller this year… no, there won’t be a novel, but there will be a Fox short story published in the Get Reading! anthology – free this September (see their site for details).
I wanted a short break from Fox, since his life has been intwined with mine for the last five years, and so next year I have a NEW thriller appearing around September – introducing a new character and style. Also next year, you’ll see the first installment in a secret 13-part project I’ve been working on – will write more about each soon. Right now I’m headed to sunny Cairns for my 2nd last Lit Fest of the year.
Happy reading,
JP

Where I’m at July 2011

Working like mad on the final weeks of my PhD, the last edits bits for ALONE 3, my secret new adult thriller out next year, AND another super secret new YA project appearing late next year. So not doing much really.

Hope you’re all reading ALONE 1 & 2! Thanks to all who’ve emailed their feedback, especially the recent stuff here re SURVIVOR, and OS re CHASERS. I promise ALONE: QUARANTINE will be worth the wait…

Anyway, back to it. Oh, and this is me having a cigar in a bar in Shanghai. Hilarious – maybe it should be my new author pic? And while smoking is not at all cool, smoking a cigar is a little bit cool. My thanks to Sam for taking the pic

update

I’ve been running around giving talks and now am in the final days of editing ALONE 3. Here’s a few pages…

The ALONE trilogy – it starts here for some, continues for others…

WHAT IF YOU WERE ALONE IN A POST-APOCALYPTIC NEW YORK CITY? That’s where the idea started, and the ALONE trilogy is my exploration of that. Thanks to all the readers here in Australia and New Zealand who have given me feedback – I hope that you enjoy books 2 and 3 just as much.

The UK edition arrived at my place the the day… it’s out NOW in most countries, published by the good folk at ATOM:

And in Australia and NZ, the wait is almost over…

2011…

Busy year ahead, so here’s a quick update -

First, here’s an iPhone pic from my China trip, of a lunch-time street in Guangzhou:

Guangzhou

Soon, I’ll put up some pics from the Park Hyatt Shanghai, where the 3rd Act of my Lachlan Fox thriller RED ICE is set.

This is me doing the final edit of ALONE 2:

On deadline, more soon