The MG Harris Blog

Archive for August, 2009


Posted on August 28, 2009 - by

Cake Frenzy in the Birthday Week

Cake Frenzy in the Birthday Week

Originally uploaded by mgharris

It’s a week of birthdays in my brother’s family. Michael, his wife and twin children all have birthdays in the last week of August.
And me too!
It’s been a week of cake. If you read this blog you’ll know how fond I am of me cake.
I type this on my BlackBerry with delicious red nails, fresh from a birthday manicure. One gift was a recipe book from the Hummingbird Bakery, source of London’s finest cup cakes.
Between trampolining sessions (see above) mountain strolls, and multiple birthday celebrations I have found a few minutes to spend alone with the ms of Joshua 4. And now I think I really am ready to hand it over to someone to read.
I know I’ve said this before but this time I think I mean it…
Meanwhile we continue to tweak the jacket of Zero Moment. Sneak preview soon I promise!
With Joshua 4 handed over, ZM in its very final form, could it finally be time to turn my attention to Quite Secret New Thing…?

MG Harris

Emailed from my BlackBerry®


Posted on August 24, 2009 - by

Open shark house

Open shark house
It’s a landmark of Headington, the cause of tut-tutting as well as mini-thrills on the bus route as you pass the street that houses this extraordinary sculpture by John Buckley. Bill Heine’s shark house!
This weekend Bill opened up the recently refurbished house as an exhibition centre for local artists including renowned children’s illustrator Korky Paul. I’d just bought ‘The Dog Who Could Dig for my nephew and niece’s birthday. What fun to find one of Korky’s original illustrations from that book as well as Winnie the Witch on display!
Well anyway, meanwhile we’re in Switzerland for the birthday week…mine,my brothers, sister-in-law, nephew and niece. I have just suggested cocktails and chocolate fondue for my birthday. Oh. My. Goodness.
MG Harris

Originally uploaded by mgharris

Emailed from my BlackBerry®


Posted on August 21, 2009 - by

My bloggy friends

Oh the pressure of finding a photo for a blog post.

This is a photo of the volcano Popocatepetl, taken from the balcony of my uncle Xavier’s late lamented Tocame bar in Atlixco. It was a fine thing, that bar. Great views of the volcano, too. Known to locals as Don Goyo, the mountain smoulders away, threatening to get pyroclastic on everyone, never actually doing it.

Why a smoking volcano. Well, because while finishing Joshua 4, smoking volcanos were on my mind a fair bit…

Anyway. My blog-buddy and German translator of Joshua, Frank Boehmert recently mentioned on his blog that I don’t update as much as I used to. He rightly guessed that business and Twitter are why I’m not so active here any longer.

It’s also because I’ve started spending free moments (when I’m not busy with Twitter and Facebook) reading other blogs. Here’s some recent faves:

Meanwhile I’m off to Switzerland for the birthday week, from Sunday. Mountains and walks, and birthday cake almost every day! A great environment in which to complete the polish on Joshua 4 in time to hand it over to Editor Polly by September.

ZERO MOMENT is coming along very nicely. I’ve seen a colour mockup of the cover and Polly and I have been working on the jacket copy. Will post both on themgharris.com as soon as blurb is finalised…


Posted on August 7, 2009 - by

Interviewed!

Bill Heine talks to MG at the Ice Shock launch party

Bill Heine talks to MG at the Ice Shock launch party

I’ve finally gotten around to editing some of the audio and video files I’ve had on the hard drive for months.

There’s now a page of collected MG Harris interviews, audio and written, from BBC radio as well as a podcast, book blogs, writers’ blogs and The Oxford Times.

It’s strange being interviewed. I’m clearly vain enough to enjoy it. Most of all though I like talking about the books themselves. Even more vain! Me and some other person or people talking about a story wot I made up!

Crazy, hey? I used to be a scientist contributing to Important Work on cell biology and vaccines and stuff.  Never got interviewed then. Now I make up stories and people want to talk to me about them.

It may be topsy turvy but you know what? I LOVE IT!


Posted on August 2, 2009 - by

Joshua 4 finished…! (well, a draft)

Where in the world is Josh Garcia?

Yeahhh! I finished the last page of Joshua 4 on Friday. Just in time to take August off for holidays and researching Quite Secret New Project.

I’d hoped to post a photo of the proof pages for ZERO MOMENT with the laptop with Joshua 4 in the background…

But I’ve finished Joshua 4 a little early, to give myself time to work on Quite Secret Project. It’s not top secret or anything, if you’ve been following me on Twitter or if you’re my FaceBook friend (and if you don’t and aren’t, hey, c’mon & join in!) then you might have an inkling of what I’ve got planned,

I even asked 20 young readers who are FaceBook friends to help me come up with a name for my new hero…I might post a poll here, when I’m ready to let you know more.

Anyway, because Joshua 4 isn’t out until 2011, I don’t want to tease too much about the plot. Sheesh, you don’t even know what ZERO MOMENT is about yet…more on that when the proofs are ready and checked. I’ll see about getting an excerpt online.

Let’s just say that in Joshua 4 the Bracelet of Itzamna is finally going to be put to the use for which it was originally intended…

Title – I have one. But I’m NOT TELLING! Ha! Only people who turn up at my events and wheedle at me. Then I’ll probably ‘fess up good ‘n fast. I tried to resist telling a bunch of young readers at a Quest Seekers event in Stoke Newington library last week. In the end, I totally caved.

The only hint I’m giving to what happens in Joshua 4 is the photo above. Who can tell me where it is?

Meanwhile I’m hatching a plan to make some Joshua Files-themed giveaways to specially keen fans on themgharris.com Drawstring bags, pencil cases and a groovy pen-torch, probably.

What kind of things should I award them for?