LJ asked me to go on the show to talk about the emerging phenomenon of self-publishing, mainly fueled by the print-on-demand revolution. You can see what  I thought two years ago. My how things have changed, in only two years. Note how little we talk about ebooks! That’s where the action is nowadays.

Maybe I should go on Click again to update LJ on my opinion now… because as some beady-eyed members of the Joshua Files Facebook group may have spotted, I myself will be testing the waters in the brave new world of publishing and putting out an indie-published techno-thriller for older readers, set in the fictional world of The Joshua Files around May 2012…

LJ meanwhile has been developing her talents as a musician. Her latest album features her own gorgeous arrangements of traditional Christmas music, performed by LJ herself. Very tasteful and classically inspired, with a touch of gospel. I think my favourite is “I Saw Three Ships”. Perfect background music for a Christmas drinks party or the long drive to visit family, I’d say.

You can preview or download here at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/ljrich3

Thanks to staff and students at Oxford High School and St Gregory the Great, Oxford, especially librarians Elizabeth Sloan and Hilja Bassett, to staff at Blackwell’s Bookshop Oxford especially Natalia de la Ossa, to my publicist at Scholastic, Alex Richardson for supporting all these launch events and persuading the Oxford Mail and BBC Southeast News to cover the event at St Greg’s.

And to everyone who came along to all these events – over 600 people in total! I hope everyone had as much fun as I did.

Now…go out and buy ICE SHOCK and tell the world! Every little bit helps, honestly. Word of mouth is KEY.

Gorgeous party at Blackwell’s last night to celebrate the publication of ICE SHOCK. Children and adult friends, librarians and publishers my agent and fellow Litopian Richard Howse and the force of nature that is Bill Heine joined me and some wonderfully generous staff at Blackwell’s, Oxford to party.

Regular blog readers, FaceBook and Twitter friends will already be aware of my cake-fixation, so shouldn’t be surprised to see that I took the opportunity for a major baking session. Cup cakes and the biggest, fattest chocolate cake that I know how to make. With a filling made from melting Dairy Milk and Bourneville bars with a bar of unsalted Normandy butter. I had a piece this morning. Damn, it was good! That is the best recipe ever, ever, from a book that deserves its title: The Cake Bible.

Photos are now on Flickr.

Tomorrow, the Official Launch on World Book Day at St Gregory the Great School, Oxford. Where for the first time ever, I will read aloud from ICE SHOCK.

To my surprise I noticed that apparently this Website contains advice to writers. Hmm…well once in a while maybe. Mainly I direct serious aspiring authors to join an online community for more in-depth info and support.

But I thought I’d make a bit of an effort just for once. Over on the Writers And Artists Yearbook website is a regular feature called ‘Inside Publishing’. There are monthly interviews with famous novelists. That old chestnut comes up in most interviews: What advice would you give to aspiring novelists?

I compiled some replies:

Kate Mosse
“To write! Five minutes of writing a day is better than no minutes. Too many new writers think that unless they have plenty of time, it’s not worth booting up the computer or sharpening that pencil. But think of it, instead, like practising scales on the piano before tackling that Beethoven Concerto or like warming-up in the gym – the more you prepare for writing, the better shape you’ll be in once you have time to really concentrate. ”

Justine Picardie
“Write about the thing that really obsesses you — you need to feel possessed to get through the long, hard journey of writing a book. And don’t give up when it gets hard in the middle. The middle always feels impossible, as if you’ll never finish.”

Alexander McCall-Smith
“I think that many novelists at the beginning of their careers spend far too much time writing and then tinkering with their first book. My advice is to write a book and then immediately go on to the next one and to the one after that. In other words, the more you write, the better you will become.”

Maeve Binchy
“Seriously, it’s very boring, but you must write at least 10 pages a week otherwise you’re not writing, you’re only playing around. I got very good advice early on about having a plan, writing a sort of scaffolding out of your 15 chapters – and writing the last line of each chapter in now. That’s meant to stop you rambling on and on and gets some pace into the book.”

Iain Rankin
“Have have faith in your abilities, and the confidence that you have a story worth telling. But be open to advice and criticism. You need perseverence and a thick skin, and you also need a measure of luck. I’d been getting published for over 10 years before I ‘made it’.”

All terrific advice. As for me I’m still working on it. I tell children who ask this that they should read widely, with equal respect for literature and commercial novels, comics etc. (Unless you respect the genre you can never hope to write in it).

To that I think I’d add the basic advice to just write. Write stories if you’re ready. If you aren’t ready to invent stuff, don’t worry that will come. Write letters instead, or emails, or keep a blog. Your ordinary life is a story.

I wrote many letters when I was a child, to my father in Mexico, telling him about my life in England, my friends etc. He loved getting them, and it made us stay very close even though we only saw each other every other year and rarely spoke by phone. (And he wrote me, like four letters EVER. It was a one-way conversation, but deeply appreciated, I know.)

But it also, I think, provided a regular outlet for developing my writing, from the age of 7 and right until he died when I was 20.

Obvious, really. Yet I hadn’t connected the letter-writing with any burgeoning writing talent, maybe until just now…

A brilliant end to a wonderful week, which began on Monday with some wonderful news from my agent re JAGUAR’S REALM…can’t be more specific just yet. And a totally cool party at the London Transport Museum to launch the WOW 366 book. Have you bought it yet? Go and buy it, it’s terrific bedtime story material! My daughter and I are reading three per night. My fellow writer, our lead developer for the Alternate Reality Game we are making for  ICE SHOCK and Litopian, Richard Howse was there and blogged about the evening, including a nice photo of my agent, me and Rich.

After the party I went off to the Afro-Cuban Lounge at Buffalo Bar. Word on the street is that this is no longer the top Cuban club night in London (and therefore the UK) – rumour has it that there’s a place on Wednesdays that’s better. But I’m telling ya, this Monday night the Buffalo Bar was swinging. Lots of hunky guys and sexy latino women, all terrific dancers, a friendly buzz. I was even invited to join a rueda. God, how I love salsa.

Then on Tuesday, St Giles Fair – it being the first Monday and Tuesday following St Giles’ Day. I was feeling queazy,  a bit hung-over after my night of drinking and dancing in London until the small hours. So I had to say no to the Waltzer, usually the highlight of the fair for my little girl. Still managed the barbequed corn-on-the-cob at the Jamaican food stand, the fresh cotton candy and hot donuts… And I stood for a few minutes letting the atmosphere of the fair wash over me. Some years it has struck me as grubby, crass, loud and mercenary. This year, however, I felt nothing but the lurve; for carnie folk and good times, memories of being there as a student, with my first daughter and now my second.

Tradition. You can’t beat it.

Then I dropped by the office of our IT company and met no less than five new employees who have joined since I last happened by…wow! See how well they’re doing without me? Also had a good morning talking to Rich about the ARG, putting together a project plan and coming up with neat ideas. This game…is going to be so fun.

Hung out with Susie Day and talked about Blake’s 7, one of the great loves of my life, and probably something to which I owe my writing career, since that’s how I got started – writing Blake’s 7 fan fiction. Hung out with Julia Golding and talked about writing crime fiction for kids. Muhahaha. More on that anon…

This is what I have always enjoyed about work. Hanging out with top practioners and talking about how to get better. In the end it doesn’t matter if the work is science, business or writing. So long as you work with the best in the world, work is heaven. You can’t ask for more.

Went to sleep last night listening to stuff about the Large Hadron Collider, for which, major kudos!

MG and EditorOriginally uploaded by mgharris

Here she is, Elv Moody of Scholastic, editor of INVISIBLE CITY and ICE SHOCK.

We’re in the bookshop tent at the Edinburgh book festival, a little while after my event. Hopefully I’ll receive copies of photos taken at the signing by Don the Headteacher at the Aberdeen-based International school whose pupils queued so politely.

I don’t think we look too bad considering that I was tired and hung-over from the partying of the night before. And Elv had a poorly eye.

Anywho. I enjoyed Edinburgh so much, esp hanging out with the Scholastic crew.

Ooh and I was able to tell the audience that finally, the title of Joshua 2 is indeed ICE SHOCK (sorry Es, but it will make sense when you read it and it’s inspired by a famous Doctor Who adventure – EARTHSHOCK).

And the glowy slipcover will be neon yellow…!
Emailed from my BlackBerry®

I’ve been waiting with great excitement to let you all see the coolness that is in store from the German publisher of “Joshua Files” – Cecile Dressler Verlag.

Number one is this awesome Webplayer for “Geheimakte Joshua“. Btw the German title is actually cooler than the English one – because ‘Geheimakte’ translates as ‘secret files’ not just ‘files’. Oooh, mysterious – good choice, Frank! See the advantages of a fusional language?

The ‘Geheimakte Joshua’ webplayer features an interview with me – dubbed by me auf Deutsch (someone else translated the words), a sample chapter and a terrific little book trailer. I show this to kids when I do book visits – they love it!

The second thing is a lovely little online tool you can use to customise a bookmark of ‘Geheimakte Joshua’ and print it out!

Here’s a bookmark I made earlier - with a little message from me and the Ek Naab hieroglyph stamp.

Finally, if you are seriously keen – the Dressler autumn 2008 catalogue, Joshua themed and with four pages devoted to our little book.

Crumbs I’m excited.

We (Kirstie from Scholastic and I) visited Borders Milton Keynes, which is a beast of a store – huge! You could spend hours there. Very interesting, intelligent questions from students at four different secondary schools in the MK area. Including two I’ve never been asked before – “How did you set about writing about Josh losing his dad?” and “Are you going to be a series writer.” (I thought for a moment the questioner had said ‘Are you going to be a serious writer?’ – a question which I’d have had no idea how to answer!

Some tour stats – 9 towns/cities, 9 bookstores, children from 23 schools, over 1000 school children…phew. Including my old primary school Beaver Road in Didsbury, Manchester. Thanks to the teachers, librarians, booksellers and children who made it all possible. Thanks also to the publicity department at Scholastic Children’s Books!

Thank goodness it was spread out…I’m a teeny bit tired now. Tomorrow it’s back to the manuscripts. Two now…the second draft of Book 2 (with helpful notes from Editor) and beginning Act 2 of Book 3.

Next stop Edinburgh Book Festival at the end of August. No rest for the wicked and luckily I’m a workaholic so I’m bloody mad for it, like.

Author Tour Report 3: Gorgeous Thing – the cover of ‘Invisible City’Originally uploaded by mgharris
My editor Elv said it best, I believe…it is a gorgeous thing. And nothing to do with me…except very indirectly as the author of the story which inspired this artistic vision of Andrew Briscombe from Scholastic.I’ve visited a school every day for the past three days of my author tour…photos to follow when I get home. A big talking point is always the cover, which the young readers adore, but also teachers including one Headteacher and an award-winning librarian…Now a couple of reviewers have been a bit sniffy about the cover, whilst being perfectly lovely about the novel itself. That’s okay…its success in attracting readers might lend the impression that it’s what such reviewers have decided is simply a ‘marketing gimmick’. Not that there’s anything wrong with that…to quote a famous Seinfeld episode…

But in fact, as I’ve discussed with almost 400 school students in the past three days…the jacket of Joshua Files is a genius tactile intrepretation of some key facets of the story.

Allow me, Umberto Eco-like, to offer a semiotic analysis of this remarkable piece of packaging:

1. ‘Invisible City’ features a mysterious ancient Mayan book whose cover is deadly to touch…hence the removable cover in dangerous-looking neon orange.
2. The J symbol denotes the Maya…in a highly subtle way. Mayan ruins impress immediately with their terraced temples of stone rising from the jungle…the parallel lines of architecture. Hence the lines of the J symbol. And when you slide the slipcover across the J, white lines appear next to the black ones…steps in shade and light.
3. The J also represents hieroglyphic writing. It is in fact a glyph – symbolizing Josh.
Umberto would have had said something much cleverer and brought in some eclectic references from art history and maybe quoted Deleuze…but, yanno.

At a school in Romiley, Stockport today, a year 11 boy showed me up for the slow-witted, former Rubiks wannabe I am. He finished the cube 60 seconds before me, in true Rubiks-kid fashion, hardly even glancing at the cube as he whooshed the pieces into place. By comparison I was staring at the cube, slowly turning it much as a caveman might handle a one-for-all TV remote.

Nice going pal, but as we say in Mexico…’Como me ves, te veras.’ (as I am, you one day will be)
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Author Tour Report 2: School VisitsOriginally uploaded by mgharris

Copies of “Invisible City” on display in a school in Dulwich. Check out the groovy Mexican masks on the wall behind!

I’ve been doing school visits in Dulwich Hamlet Primary, St Joseph’s Primary in Headington and later today, Manchester. Before I spoke to any audiences of young readers, I wondered how I was going to modify my speaking style. Years of addressing scientists and business people might not be ideal preparation, after all. The BBC staff at go4it were really great with the kids, had them laughing and joking. And I’m conscious of the fact that I’m used to bring rather direct and serious…

I used to try to get a laugh from scientists etc. At least one, to get things going. Science humour, yanno… So anyway, I decided basically to talk to the kids as I did the scientists but without the jokes and with a bit of gentle quizzing.

Yes that’s probably a bit teacherish but they sure seem to enjoy getting the answers right and BOY are they smart. The mix of archaeology, personal journey and 2012 eschatology does seem to fascinate them, thank goodness. And out of over 500 kids seen to date, no-one has ever asked me the one question that everybody said I’d be asked…how much money do I make?

I think it’s brilliant that they aren’t asking. Not that there’s anything wrong with the question but if young people are interested in making money I’d rather point them in a stack of other directions…like starting a business.

This emailed from a train passing through Stoke-on-Trent.

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