World Book Day 2011 - St Barts, Newbury

So we come to the final post of the Dark Parallel Reverse Diaries wherein by a time paradox I revisit the early days of the launch of the fourth Joshua book and jump back to weeks before all the last few entries. In fact in chronological order this post fits between Author Visits 2011. C’mon in, sit a spell and Return to Eggli Mountain.

Weeks before the launch of Dark Parallel, I’d managed to get my hands on a bunch of ARCs (Advance Review Copies) as well as a very small number of finished copies. With these in my suitcase, I set off across the land, well across Oxfordshire and Berkshire. Kids were pretty excited to have a chance to win one of these rare ARCs and early copies of the fourth book. Winners won their copies by winning a badge-guessing contest about authors, or a quiz about Joshua Files, or by designing an alternative cover of on of the Booked-Up listed titles.

Yr 7 student's design for Invisible City

I showed the new trailer for Dark Parallel to audiences of hundreds, and was relieved to see that the young actor playing Josh still looks good when his face is blown up to cinema-screen size! Kids were also treated to some of the behind-the-scenes footage from the brief filming session.

After a full week of visits, I was off to Switzerland for the two-day visit to College Du Leman, Geneva. (This is where the weekend of relaxing at the Eggli Mountain blog post fits in…)

Visiting CDL was a hugely fun experience, although a bit daunting – five sessions each with around 200 students. And one session en francais! I’d had massive help from the French publishers of Joshua, who had translated a transcript of the talk I’d prepared. But as I looked over the notes in the hotel the night before, I realised that I hadn’t spoken French for any length of time for 25 years. Even reading it aloud – was I going to be comprehensible? Well I won’t lie – I practiced a bit, and crossed my fingers that the kids would be able to understand my lazy English accent.

First ever signing of "Operation Joshua"

It was fascinating to observe the differences between schools in England, the English-language side of CDL and the French-speaking side. In England, especially in state schools, students were expected to be quiet whilst waiting to hear the talk, and were occasionally reminded. Afterwards they were allowed to show their excitement, queuing for autographs and photos.

In the English-speaking strand of CDL the corridors looked like US high-schools with casual hanging around lockers. Once in the hall, the students chatted quietly but weren’t expected to be silent while waiting. The French-speaking strand of CDL, a classical Lycee type education, were used to much stricter teaching conditions, absolute silence in class, for example. But for a more entertaining session like an author visit, these same kids kicked back and relaxed, and the teachers were fine with that.

In fact the French-speaking grades 5&6 were the most energetic and excited group I had ever visited! They clapped along with the music in the videos, they whooped and cheered, they clamoured to ask questions at the end.

Three different styles of behaviour management, but all worked out pretty well with the kids seeming happy and relaxed. It was a pleasure to meet everyone and I’m delighted that quite a few young people added me on Facebook in the following days and weeks.

Thanks so much to all the wonderful school librarians and teachers who invited me into school, as well as to Krysia Rodak and all the brilliant Parent Faculty Association of College Du Leman for such a wonderful visit to Geneva!

MG at College Du Leman

Joshua readers at College Du Leman

Pyjamas, Crazy Hair and Joshua Files

Yeah! First time showing DARK PARALLEL in Australia, Melbourne to be precise, St John’s Primary School, Clifton Hill. My good pal, Professor Magda Plebanski (already known to this parish…) is a resident of those parts and kindly arranged for me to visit the school during my brief but lovely stay with Magda and her family.

(Photo kindly taken by Little Daughter on my BlackBerry!)

The reason for such a wonderful opportunity to spend time in Australia was the wedding of my baby sister Adriana to Shay. That’s two of my sisters married to Australian men!

As luck would have it, Adriana and Shay also live in Melbourne, which gave me the extra excuse for a long-overdue catch-up with Magda.

(Also known to this parish in another, more secret capacity…as the alter ego of Dr Magda Poborsky. Leave a comment if you understand the cryptic reference…I like to keep tabs on the ARGers…)

Adriana and Shay get married

Adriana and Shay were married in a Persian ceremony at a Victoria State heritage property, the Boyd-Baker House.

It was my first time meeting Shay, who is a lovely guy, just what you would love in a brother-in-law. Also my first time meeting my sister Grace’s partner, Lance, a former WWF wrestler of the Von Erich wrestling family!

Honestly, the people you meet in the Caribbean, you wouldn’t believe it.

My sister Grace and the still-fabulous Lance.

The weird thing was that I was meeting all these Mexican family and friends (Magda) in Australia! Adriana’s childhood friends joined Shay’s friends and family (many from Iran) to dance the night away. I went to bed early but may or may not have walked back through the woods in full moonlight – the ‘Super’ moon to get cake at 3.30am….

And it was pretty strange, to be having that experience, so far away from where we all started out.

Australia! It’s a heck of a long way away but you can’t forget it!

I say ‘events moving so rapidly’ but mainly it’s down to one thing: naughty me, I still haven’t finished Joshua 5! My deadline is mid-May. My stretch-deadline is end of May. Cue a bunch of writerly excuses worthy of Ed Reardon himself. But basically, that’s the deal. If I’m going to avoid a late delivery then I need to write, write, write like the wind!

But, my dear blog readers, all blessed six of you, you all still want to hear about DARK PARALLEL, don’t you?

So watch out for the Dark Parallel Reverse Diaries! They start with the launch party and end with the very first time I showed off a shiny new copy of Dark Parallel in a school. College Du Leman, your photos will soon be here…

You can find photos of the Dark Parallel launch party on Flickr. Thanks to everyone who attended, I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did! The focus this year was on the friends and readers who helped me to make the live action sequence that appears in the Dark Parallel book trailer. We watched the ‘making of Dark Parallel’ film and oh, we did chortle. We also ate cake. There was an after-party at the pub, we sat outdoors!

April is a great month in which to release a book. Thanks to all at Scholastic for another great job with a shiny new book!

Mark Robson and MG Harris

The DARK PARALLEL launch season began with a lovely event at Waterstone’s Milton Keynes, where I was joined by the dashing former RAF pilot, YA author Mark Robson.

We swapped books and decided to interview each other about our latest offerings. Mark’s latest is a VERY shiny new exciting thing, a book about an adventure in the Bermuda Triangle! Massive coolness. I’ll be telling you about it in a few days. But for now – the interview swap. you remember how this works from my recent swap with Katherine Langrish. Interview with MG Harris about DARK PARALLEL over at Mark’s place – Trapped by Monsters. Interview with Mark Robson about THE DEVIL’S TRIANGLE here at The MG Harris Blog.

Mark, you’ve been a regular on the children’s and YA literature scene for a few years now and are something of an expert when it comes to school visits! But for readers who may not have met you in their school or read your books, can you summarize your writing career and the fictional worlds you create?

Firstly, I never intended to be a writer.  I was a pilot in the RAF and loving it, but whilst on detachment in the Falkland Islands, I got bored and irritable – so much so that my navigator uttered the life changing words ‘For goodness sake, Mark!  Do something useful.  Go write a book, or something!’  I took this as a challenge and have been writing ever since.

My first series of books were very much inspired by Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. I wanted to write something that had a similar story arc, but that was more action driven and that utilised my military background.  The Darkweaver Legacy was the result, out of which evolved my second series – The Imperial Trilogy – the story of a nineteen year old female spy who makes an enemy of a top assassin.  By now I was no longer in the RAF, as I’d turned full time as a writer, so I felt the time was ripe to write a flying story.  Dragon Orb a series of four high action dragon stories bring dragons from a fantasy world into World War I France, where they fly in secret with the Royal Flying Corps against the Red Baron!  It was an unusual idea – sort of like Biggles meets dragons.  The Devil’s Triangle, my latest labour of love, is my twelfth novel.

Would you say your influences are literary or screen? What are the big inputs into Devil’s Triangle?

I would say my influences are widespread.  I’ve always read prolifically, so there are many influences there, some of which I’m probably not even consciously aware.  Although I’m not a great cinema goer, or film buff, I’ve seen a good number over the years and yes, they most certainly influence me as well.  I would say there is a good dash of Planet of the Apes, Jurassic Park (book and film) and The Land that Time Forgot in this new series.  Now that I think of it, there are some interesting parallels with a series by Julian May that I read and enjoyed in my teens that began with a book called The Many Coloured Land.  It was set in the future where a one way time portal is opened to the Pliocene era and many of society’s misfits undergo sterilisation and then pass through the portal to escape from modern society.

Highly-evolved lizards have been in vogue ever since the original V-the Visitors series about a covert invasion of Earth by reptilian aliens. Do you think there is something in our obsession with reptiles as the enemy?

I think there is something inherently scary about reptiles.  I have a fear (I wouldn’t say phobia, as I believe this to be a perfectly rational fear) of poisonous snakes.  I’m OK with handling pythons and grass snakes, but I’m terrified of their poisonous cousins.  Over the years I’ve stumbled across quite a few in different parts of the world, and although I’ve never been bitten, these incidents have only served to strengthen my fear.

In many of the stories I wrote as a young child, snakes were the bad guys.  The very earliest story I still have from my childhood (I would guess I was about 6 when I wrote it) is called ‘The Friendly Crocodile’ and guess what… the bad guy is a snake.  OK, so the hero was also a reptile in that story, as is Nipper in my new story, but I can’t help thinking there is something untrustworthy about reptiles that goes right back to the earliest times.  Satan is even depicted as a snake in Genesis.  No wonder we fear them.

This is the first time you’re writing in a ‘realistic’ contemporary setting, after a series of bestselling stories involving swords, sorcery and dragons. How different was it as a writer? And are you now converted to blending fact with fiction?

Oh wow!  ‘Different’ doesn’t begin to describe it, MG! For me it was like learning to write all over again.  I found it incredibly difficult to begin with, as I guess I’d become used to being able to just create my worlds the way I wanted them to be.  The constraints of a real world story make the research of even the smallest details mandatory, and I found having to constantly stop writing in order to check out trivia incredibly frustrating to begin with.Now that I’ve written one story in this way, I must admit that the results are interesting, and more than a little pleasing.  I think readers will identify with my characters more easily in this sort of story and I’m sure that I’ll continue to improve my storylines the more I write this way.  I’m not sure that ‘converted’ is the right word, but I think you’ll be seeing more of this sort of story from me in the future.

The ‘Bermuda Triangle’ phenomenon has been rather neglected of late, and may I say what a genius idea it was to resurrect it! Is there a reason things have gone quiet? has the mystery been quietly solved, do you think?

I think there will always be those who will be believers and those who will dismiss the mysteries as a load of bunkum!  Has the region gone quiet?  That depends on what you read, but in terms of media coverage, I suppose you would have to conclude that it has.  The most recent book I came across during my research was by an American author called Gian Quasar, published in 2004.  He claimed in the book that there had been over 1000 unusual incidents recorded in region during the 25 years running up to the publication of his book.  (This will obviously not include the famous incidents like Flight 19 and the USS Cyclops that were long before this.)  How accurate his stats are, I don’t know, but the book was certainly an interesting read and there are dozens of websites dedicated to the ‘ongoing’ mystery.

The quiet undercurrent of public interest is still there, but no one seems to have used the mystery as the focus of a fictional story for a long time.  I’m finding it fun to play with some of the reported phenomena of the region and use them as a vehicle for creating a science fiction/fantasy story.

Part of the realistic setting is that it requires an author to construct very credible family relationships within familiar constraints. I was impressed at how well you did this, how much time you were willing to give to the emotional impact of the disappearance of Clare (the missing mother). Was domestic drama an aspect that you relished writing? Did you get any inspiration for the relationships from your own family or extended family?

I’m not sure that I ever ‘relished’ the idea of writing domestic drama, but I do recognise that people like it.  Look at what the writers of Dr Who did with the families of the Doctor’s various assistants over the past few series and it’s easy to see that family drama is a theme that crops up again and again.  The popularity of soap operas seems never ending, so having an element of this in my ‘real world’ side of the story seemed essential if I was to give it broad appeal.

As for drawing aspects of the relationships from my own family – no, not really.  Though I did steal the names of the characters from members of my family!  My youngest sister is Clare, her husband is Matt, and their children are called Sam and Neve.  I changed the spellings of their names a little in the story and made the children twins, which the real Sam and Neve aren’t.  I did ask them first if they were happy for me to do this, of course.  Fortunately they thought it would be fun to have a special part in the story.  It has sort of made it their story, though none of the characteristics of the fictional characters are even close to the real people.

Parallel evolution is a fascinating topic! I will admit that a teeny part of me – the biochemist – did wonder why velociraptors would evolve to become human-like in the past 65 million years, when they had failed to go anywhere close to that in the previous 150 million. Evolution, as I understand it, happens because of external pressue. Organisms evolve out of a death-trap (by acquiring camouflage, for example) or they adapt to a lack of food. Velociraptors were already efficient predators, as far as we know, and likely at the top of the food chain or good as. So in the parallel universe, what might have happened to force them to evolve opposable thumbs and human-like intelligence? Is this a mystery that will be addressed in future stories?

I’m sure I read somewhere that had velociraptors been given enough time to continue to evolve, the projections were that they would have become more humanoid, and possibly even warm-blooded.  I couldn’t quote the source now.  It’s something I read sometime in the dim and distant past.   I wouldn’t claim to be an expert in this, but this article was in the back of my mind as I developed my ideas for the parallel earth.  I think the combination of this idea and the cunning and adaptability of the raptors in the film Jurassic Park combined in my mind to evolve the raptors in the way I have.  I don’t anticipate exploring the evolution process in future books, as the action will very much centre on the current political and social evolution (and revolution) that is about to shake the raptor world.  There will, however, be more on some of the historical events in our world that have created the Bermuda Triangle legend into the phenomenon it is today.

Devil’s Triangle is actually a clever, subtle satire on contemporary energy and pollution issues. Did you plan this political angle? Personally I love a good political/religious undercurrent in children’s books, but find that it can become wearing if it is too preachy. Devil’s Triangle gets the balance absolutely right!

Yes, the energy and environmental issues were very much planned.  The way the High Council in my alternate Earth seem set on covering up the true impact and ramifications of their global environmental problems from the wider raptor society was always intended to be a none too subtle parody.  However, I detest books that obviously set out to preach on political or religious issues, so whilst the problems are ever-present in the story, I try to keep the focus on the characters.  I’m delighted you feel I have the right balance.

At the end of Devil’s Triangle you’ve taken two characters to a horribly dangerous world from which it appears there is no return, with another character hell-bent on reaching the same destination. What is next for Sam, Niamh and Callum?

Things are set to change fast in Eye of the Storm.  Sam and Callum discover that someone (Amelia Earhart’s grandson as it happens) has been developing flying machines in the alternate world.  Callum instantly starts thinking this might offer them a way home, whilst Sam’s mum and her band of rebels are more set on stopping the raptors from gaining the power that flight brings.  Sam and Callum are therefore set to take part in a ‘Mission Impossible’ style kidnapping at the start of book two.  As for Niamh, well she manages to slip through the fingers of the police and goes back on the run… will she find a way to catch up with the boys?  I’m not saying.  What I will say is there is plenty of action ahead for all of them.

Dark Parallel meets Devils Triangle

Wow – what fascinating answers. I could have chatted all day long with Mark, but we kept having to sign our books and meet readers!

Hope you’ve enjoyed that as much as I did! If you still haven’t read my own interview by Mark, hop over to Trapped By Monsters, or Mark Robson’s blog – where you can find out more about Mark Robson and his books.

Josh and Ixchel have travelled back in time, but it might not be so easy to get home again. They’ve landed in the Mayan era, when the prophecy about the world ending in 2012 was first foretold. And they cannot believe who they have found there. Clearly Josh isn’t the only person to have cracked the secret of time travel. But a bigger surprise awaits the pair when they return to the 21st century. Nothing is quite as they remember it – and it’s up to them to work out why.

Thanks to Jamie McIntyre and Paty Simon for the live action sequence, to Dan O’Neill and Jonny Vegas for photography and to Joshua Insider Josh Balfour for help with the editing!

The Joshua Files - Dark Parallel proofs

I know, the New Year ’round-up’ should refer to the previous year. But I’m exhausted just thinking about it. In general, I’m starting the year tired. “Why do we have New Year?” my Teenage Daughter asked me. “How is it a ‘new beginning’? If you commit a crime on Dec 31st 2010, you’d still be punished in 2011.”

So it is with seasonal illness. If you spend the Christmas/New Year period suffering repeated attacks from viruses and secondary sinus infections, you start the year exhausted.

Lots happened last year and mostly very good, luckily for me. But with a diary that is getting packed out, I’d rather look ahead. So here are my forward-looking highlights of 2011.

1. My sister’s wedding. Little Sister is getting married in Melbourne, Australia, giving me a lovely excuse to visit.
2. First ever visit to school in Europe (outside of UK). Looking forward to meeting the students of College Leman in Geneva!
3. Publication of Joshua Files book 4 – DARK PARALLEL. The photo shows the stack I’ll be sending off today to winners of the New year’s prize draw and to some book bloggers who have expressed special enthusiam for Joshua.
4. A decision about After Joshua, What Next? If you follow this blog you may have heard me refer to Ultra Secret New Project. Well, New Editor has now read the manuscript and given me some pointers about how to improve it. So it won’t be much longer before I find out… (AL Kennedy saved me the bother of writing about what it’s like waiting for an editorial report over Christmas in her blog post Waiting for book ‘go’… Basically – what she said.)
5. Teenage Daughter’s UCAS application is in. Will there be offers? Will she get the grades? Is this the year when my Firstborn Leaves Home?
6. My first London Book Fair. Big trade fairs make me dizzy, as I learned when running an IT business. Without a stand to focus on or a conference speech to make, I get terribly baffled and have to go and lie down. So I’d foresworn never to attend a Book Fair unless invited as a speaker. I’ll be talking alongside Francesca Simon (author of Horrid Henry) about school libraries, in an event run by the School Libraries Association.
7. Book deals! My fingers are tightly crossed for two ridiculously talented friends of mine from very long ago. Sarah Hilary (crime writer) and Christian David (author of a rollicking historical biography-fiction) are both writers who secured literary agents last year. They are now working on edits prior to the big submission process – to editors! I won’t be happy until they are recognized for the huge literary talents that they are.

It’s a particularly lovely set of events. No lurking gremlins as yet. However, I find it easier not to look too far into the future. The plots of my own stories almost always involve calamity striking the minute everything seems to have gone calm. Not that I enjoy such a rollercoaster in my own life. I try to make lemonade when served lemons. Nevertheless, it gets increasingly tiring, all that lemonade-making. That’s what they don’t tell you about getting older. Yes, you get wiser and more experienced, so lots of things are easier. But your energy levels diminish.

No wonder people turn to magic beans and nutrional supplements and exotic exercise regimes. If only all it took was Berocca.

However, I am still aching pleasantly from the weights I did at the gym a few days ago. I will change nothing! Maybe lose a little weight to look good in the Diane Von Furstenberg dresses.

Happy New Year!

If you haven’t seen it yet – here’s the draw for the advance review copies of DARK PARALLEL. Once again I’m assisted by Matt Barnard from Summertown Starbucks.

Here’s the summer Joshua Files news:

1. Mere DAYS remain for the big contest to DESIGN A MAP OF EK NAAB – the ‘invisible city’.
The contest closes on 31st July. Great prizes for runners-up, plus the winner gets their design printed in DARK PARALLEL – Joshua #4.

For HINTS and TIPS read this post on the BookBabbler’s website:
http://bookbabblers.co.uk/2010/07/the-joshua-files-mg-harris/

2. Joshua book and goodie-bag giveaway on BOOKBABBLERS.
There’s an easy contest running on BookBabblers, winner gets a set of Joshua books and a goodie bag of Joshua stuff.
http://bookbabblers.co.uk/2010/07/the-joshua-files-mg-harris/

3. The Joshua Insiders exclusive group of dedicated fans is growing. Still a few places left!
How to join the Joshua Insiders.

4. I have finally finished DARK PARALLEL!
Now Scholastic Children’s Books are deciding how to give the book a really cool, dark cover…

5. INVISIBLE CITY finally published in the USA by Walker Books for Young Readers.

Also in Turkish! It’s always great to see a foreign editions of Joshua. But with another in English, hopefully we’ll soon be able to welcome a bunch of new members from the USA and Canada.

YOU CAN HELP INVISIBLE CITY SUCCEED IN THE USA!

Why not tell your friends and relatives in the USA about Joshua Files via Twitter and FaceBook?

OK everyone, have a great summer, and if you haven’t already I hope you get a chance to read Josh’s latest adventure over your summer holidays. Meanwhile I will get on with Ultra Secret New Project…

very best wishes,
MG
x

River Song, the Time Traveler’s Wife, Borges and The Joshua Files.

Yeah that’s right. I can use all those things in a sentence. Because all four have used one very lovely device of the time-traveling story genre:

Two time-traveling characters who meet up with each other across different time-streams.

The earliest story that does this than Richard Matheson’s Bid Time Return, which was the basis for the adorable time-travel romance starring Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour; Somewhere In Time. (You haven’t seen it? Rent it now! For more about Richard Matheson and time-travel romances, see the comments below.)

The Time-Traveler’s Wife takes the concept further, criss-crossing ages and stages of the characters as they share a sort of life together across decades. I watched the amazing Doctor Who episode Silence In the Library for the first time last week – and finally saw the story which introduces Professor River Song. Is she our own time-traveler’s wife?

Yeah…maybe! But was she always his friend? Maybe not. Maybe when she first meets the Doctor, they are enemies.

Because he has an inkling of who she’ll become, it’s more interesting.

Anyway, we’ll see. I’m just guessing.

Jorge Luis Borges wrote a short story where a young Borges finds himself next to an old Borges, asking the older one about life. They don’t understand each other too well.

And in The Joshua Files?

Well, by the end of Joshua Files #3, Zero Moment, lovers and time-travelers have already crossed paths. There’s more to come in Joshua #4, Dark Parallel. Beady-eyed readers might have guessed it was happening.

Everyone else will have to wait until 2012 and Joshua #5 to know for sure…

As River Song would say…Spoilers!

Delivery Cupcakes for Joshua Files 4
You can tinker with a manuscript forever, but eventually you have to let go, let that first person read it. In my case it’s my husband and then my editor. And so far, for a good 9 months after I’ve delivered the ms, no-one else.

It’s kind of nice, actually. As an author, you totally own the story until people start reading it. It exists only in your mind. And eventually, to be read (hopefully, if you’re lucky!) Most of us write to be read, so that’s a really exciting point too. It will certainly improve with editing, will become more readable and more people will be able to enjoy it. But there’s also something special about the time during which the story is belongs only to the author.

To celebrate sending off the manuscript for Joshua 4, I made Red Velvet cupcakes from a recipe in my new Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook (from the famous Hummingbird American bakery on Portbobello Road in London). Amazing! So little butter and eggs! Such a lot of icing sugar! And I can haz incredible cupcakes freshly baked in my own home!

Now for the quick-witted among you I am going to give some Joshua 4 spoilers.

And tomorrow I will remove them right after my shower!

Google’s cache will still have it for a while but by the time anyone looks for Joshua 4 spoilers near to 2011, it will be long gone…

BIG SPOILERS WERE HERE UNTIL 10AM ON 1ST SEP BUT NOW ARE GONE!

Now – forget everything you just read!!!

MG Harris

Emailed from my BlackBerry®

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:

• Frank’s happy day of receiving a finished copy of ICE SHOCK in German.
• My dear friend Martin Bonfil’s popular science blog La Ciencia por Gusto  (in English it’s Science for Pleasure)
• Tracey Anne Baines kidlit blog Tall Tales and Short Stories fetauring interviews with literary agents (including my own agent Peter Cox) and children’s and YA authors (including me!)
• Liz de Jager’s awesome YA book review blog My Favourite Books
• Looking forward to The Spectator’s new Cappuccino Culture – The Arts Blog on Monday

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…