Bona Fide: Weekly Roundup #40

Hello and welcome to a new issue of my Weekly Roundup. Beginning with this issue you will discover a few slight improvements. In order more easily identify different Roundups, I have introduced a numbering system; the calender week will be added to the title of the post.
The next change is structural, the introduction of a table of contents for the post. This means that from now on, you will be able to scan the top of the post and know what to expect. I hope you like the changes. Changes aside, I am looking forward to end of October where I have a few days off, which means more time for reading! And now, enjoy...

Bona Fide's Menu

Books
Delivery of the week: Drood by Dan Simmons
Shelf discovery of the week: The Light Ages by Ian R. Macleod

Blogosphere
Steampunk Month on Tor.com
The David Gemmell Legend Award: Master Drosdelnoch's crossword puzzle
Giveaway by writer David Douglas

Movies
Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant
The Legend of the Seeker TV series will be aired in Germany

Quotes
This week's quotes are related to Pressure

Books

This week I received my paperback copy of Drood (2009) [US] [UK] by Dan Simmons who is a very versatile writer.
From Drood (about Charles Dickens) to Terror (2007) [US] [UK] (about the Sir John Franklin expedition to discover the Northwest Passage) to Hyperion (1989) [US] [UK] (a masterful work of science fiction, read Alec's review), Mr. Simmons has produced a wide range of titles. I read and liked Terror. Hyperion is on my shelf and Drood is sitting on my table. I look forward to reading Drood, but I won't forget Hyperion. What is the book about? No, you neither get a blurb nor a summary from me today. I think it is best to listen to Dan Simmons himself:


From time to time I check my shelves and other places where I store books. I think you know the phenomenon of the "forgotten" book. This week, while rearranging a shelf, I found a book which is the missing link between Drood and steampunk: The Light Ages (2003) [US] [UK] by Ian R. Macleod. I remembered that I bought the book some years ago after the German hardcover edition turned out to be a bit too expensive for me. I only had a vague memory of the story, so I sat down and read the blurb on the back cover:

"In the year 1678, Joshua Wagstaffe discovered aether. Once refined, aether had the power to keep blades sharp and makes bridges stable, to power telegraphs and heat homes. Aether, its secret jealously guarded by the Guilds, became the glue that bound English society together, and started the Industrial Revolution.
But Robert Burrows has seen the dark side of aether in his native Yorkshire, and when he flees to London, he joins the growing revolution, determined to overthrow the Guilds. Roaming the vast city and exploring its myriad social layers, from petty criminals and revolutionaries to salon mistresses and opium dreamers, Robbie discovers secrets that threaten the very fabric of society, secrets that involve the deepest mysteries of aether."

The book is still sitting on my table, and I know I that must find I way to read it within the year. Also not to be forgotten is The House of Storms (2005) [US] [UK] set a hundred years hence in the same setting, but with different characters. I checked my Goodreads book lists and therefore I know I own this book... I only have to find it. Consequently, my next bookshelf expedition will be starting soon.

Blogosphere

In case you read my Roundup regularly, you know I have a foible for steampunk. Therefore I was really happy when I received a mail from Tor.com with subject Announcing Steampunk Month! Not all of you are member of Tor.com and receive their newsletters. Therefore I will share with you the first part of the mail. Viva la steampunk!

In other words, October is Steampunk Month on Tor.com! All month, we'll be hosting special content, including giveaways, wallpapers, reviews, and posts by guest bloggers from the steampunk community. Check out the Steampunk Month index page to see what's going on; Tor.com being a well-oiled machine, we'll naturally update it as each post goes up.

The David Gemmell Legend Award came up with a wonderful idea. In order to celebrate the 25th Anniversary Edition of Legend, by David Gemmell, they organised a special giveaway. You do not need to be member.
There is only one hurdle: You need to

"To get your hands on a copy for FREE all you have to do is solve one of Dros Delnoch's fiendish crosswords".

So click on the link above and solve the crossword. I hope to find time on Sunday to do it. Good Luck!

Via this blog I am in contact with David Douglas, an up and coming writer who lives in Munich, Germany. Isn't it slightly unusual to live in a foreign country and write books in English? His first book will be released at the beginning of the next year. So far you can read the prologue of Demon's Bane and you take part in the giveaway. But let Dave speak himself:

"Revisions of the book are ongoing now! DEMON'S BANE should be available in December or January, if all goes well. Now the big news:
I am doing a promotional book giveaway, with a personally autographed copy to be shipped free of charge to each winner after publishing. There will be one random winner per month until it's published--JUST SIGN UP FOR THE NEWSLETTER to be eligible in October! And for those living far abroad... yes, I will even ship it to you (for free) in Malaysia, China, Australia, etc if you win.
For the October drawing, I'm going to use the Newsletter subscription list. If you receive the newsletter now, you're already in the running--no need to do anything! For the rest, just sign up for the newsletter (or a website account) using the links in the right sidebar. The first winner will be picked in the last week of October.
Please let your friends, family, and blog readers know, so they can have a chance at winning as well :-)
Good luck...
Dave"

Movies

Vampires, Vampires, Vampires. I'm surrounded by vampires in videos, movies, blogs and books. Hopefully not in reality, but who knows... After changing the release date several times,Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant will hit the cinemas in US on the 23rd of October. The movie is based on the book series The Saga of Darren Shan, by none other than Darren Shan! It is the story of a school boy who, by pure chance, breaks a 200 yeas lasting truce between two warring factions of vampires. Darren and his best friend go to a freakshow where they meet Laurent Crepsley, who is a 200 year old vampire himself. Mr Crepsley offers Darren the opportunity to become a vampire. This is the kick-off to a freaky adventure...


Sometimes the unexpected happens. You may know that I live in Germany, which means I have to wait and hope that films and series aired in US and UK may find their way to one of the German TV channels. And I have been lucky. Firefly and the Torchwood minseries finally made it to Germany. It seems October will be a "golden" month because on 11th of October another series will begin: The Legend of the Seeker. The series is based on the Sword of Truth series, by Terry Goodkind. I know that there have been mixed reactions and reviews about the tv series, but regardless, I will give it a shot. If you want to check out a trailer, just follow the link: Legend of the Seeker is coming. If the series doesn't pan out, I will use the time to continue reading Goodkind's books. So far I have only read the first book, so only ten more to go!

Quotes

Well, we all have to cope with pressure that is sometimes a result of unrealizable expections. Believe me, I know what I'm talking about. Please delight in my very subjective choice of quotes commented by Bona Fide:

"No matter how much pressure you feel at work, if you could find ways to relax for at least five minutes every hour, you'd be more productive.”
Dr. Joyce Brothers, US psychologist & television personality (1928 - )
Bona's comment:"Hmm, he is a doctor. Edi should try it next week."

"No pressure, no diamonds.”
Mary Case
Bona's comment:"What of it? I'm neither a girl nor a geologist!"

"Tears are the safety valve of the heart when too much pressure is laid on it.”
Albert Smith
Bona's comment:"Emotions. Tears on my pillow. Dancing With Tears In My Eyes."

"Under pressure, people admit to murder, setting fire to the village church or robbing a bank, but never to being bores.”
Elsa Maxwell, American author, 1883 - 1963
Bona's comment:"Is that the last one? You know I'm the exception. I'm getting bored under pressure. And you know what will happen when I'm getting bored. Elsa will tell you:"

"Bores put you in a mental cemetery while you are still walking.”
Elsa Maxwell, American author, 1883 - 1963

Interview: David Gunn

I have been fan of the Death's Head series, hard hitting military science fiction, since its inception. Curious to learn a little about the author, David Gunn, whose pen uses adrenaline instead of ink, I was surprised to find out that he writes incognito. Probably the most relevant source of information on Mr. Gunn, besides his infrequently updated Myspace page, is an insightful interview over at Fantasy Book Critic that I encourage you to read. After plowing through and reviewing Death's Head: Day of the Damned, I put in an interview request and was pleasantly surprised by a positive response.

The main thrust of my questions were aimed at uncovering what it is like to write such intense military science fiction in the first person. Sven, the protagonist of the series, for all his harsh talk is a unique and surprisingly complex character. However, revealing plot from the limited perspective can be a challenge that, apparently, is going to take six more books to finish. I threw a hardball or two, but Mr. Gunn handled them well, channeling a bit of Sven in the process.

---

Thanks for taking the time to talk to me David, I am a big fan of Sven's. Now tell me, it must be exhaustingly fun channeling a character like Sven all day. How do you take the edge off after all that adrenaline packed writing?

Alcohol helps, cigars, thunder storms. Weird as it sounds all help to relax me. Mostly I walk or rough climb hills. There are a couple I know that take you into the middle of nowhere and let you look at a world that hasn't changed in centuries. I'm entirely at home inside my own skin so can go without human company or contact for long periods of time. The cold also works for me. Preferably extremes of it.

How is the next installment to Death’s Head coming along, given that you already hinted at a general objective for the Aux, setting Jaxx Jr. up as emperor? Is there anything you can share with us at this point in time?

I'm halfway through the fourth novel, which if you've read the third, you'll know begins somewhere very far from Farlight indeed. I reckon it's going to take six more books to bring everyone back to where they should be and unravel what needs unravelling. Since we can only see it through Sven's eyes and process it through his brain, we're going to get a little bit more
information and a little bit more of an understanding of the Commonweatlh of the United Free and the outlying empires with every book.

I know some authors who guide their characters and some who are guided by them, and striking a balance between the two can be a real challenge. Does your protagonist drag you along for the ride when you “channel” him, or do you set some boundaries and then let him loose? Essentially, can you describe for us your relationship with Sven?

Sven has been running around inside my head for years. Literally. He was this weird guy in a black uniform in snow-covered ruins, half starving and barely human. Occasionally, I'd think of him and then close that down and get on with what I needed to be doing at the time. But he was always there. Not so much an alter ego. More a elemental force that wandered in from the frozen wastes. It took getting a fever in Central America and crawling around floors halucinating to get him out of my head and onto a laptop. I wrote the first book in a matter of weeks, on adrenaline and a constant hangover.

He's pretty much in control. Mostly I don't know what's going to happen until it does and then the plot goes off on a new path and I think, Right, follow that... There's minimal planning. Sven's a minimal planning kind of guy.

You crank up the intensity of your narrative by writing in the present tense from Sven’s point of view. In retrospect, do you regret the boundaries the limited perspective has imposed on the overall story arc or are you still happy with your choice?

I like that we see what Sven sees. And I like that not everything Sven sees he understands. It lets me unfold his character and increase the scope of the world with every book. Also, he's a fast learner. He's always had the guts. He just never knew he had the brains. That bit of Sven is based on an old friend, now dead, who never quite got that he was a lot brighter than he knew.

With respect to your last book, Death's Head: Day of the Damned, you broadened the scope of the Death’s Head series, gave us a taste of intergalactic real politik, and colored in a lot of blanks for your readers. Much like Sven’s relationship to chess, we are starting to appreciate the size and complexity of the universe in which the Aux live. How did you decide on the shift away from a tightly focused mission driven narrative towards a broader, more complex story?

I've pretty much given the reasons already. The events of the first book lead to the second book, the events of the second book lead to the third, the critical mass grows each time and the scope widens. We begin the series in a cage in a desert fort, about as locked down as you can get, and end the third book... Well, you know where it ends. What matters is one guy, from a cage in a desert fort, now threatens the greatest civilisation the galaxy has ever known. He might not quite have grasped that yet. But he will.

---

Smartly dressed, resourceful, and discreet, David Gunn has undertaken assignments in Central America, the Middle East, and Russia (among numerous other places). Coming from a service family, he is happiest when on the move and tends not to stay in one town or city for very long. The author of Death’s Head, Death’s Head: Maximum Offense, and Death's Head: Day of the Damned, Gunn lives in the United Kingdom.

Extended Preview: 2012

Last night, Sony released a 2 minute clip on, well, pretty much every channel in existence. The preview of 2012 shown below is the exclusive five minute scene unveiled at Comic-Com. Hold your breath fans of apocalyptic science fiction, this will no doubt be the most epic movie of the year.

Brandon Sanderson Interview On Finishing The Wheel of Time

Brandon recently stopped by Blog Talk Radio for a fairly informal interview to talk about finishing up Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series and to discuss some recent developments in multimedia publishing. I encourage you to listen to the candid interview with Brandon Sanderson, but here are the paraphrased highlights.

When asked to summarize the Wheel of Time for those unfamiliar with the series Brandon laughed a bit and then used RJ's description The series revolves around a central question: "What is it like to be told that you are the one to save the world? That you are a savior doomed to die to protect mankind." I had never tried to summarize the series in a single sentence, but this seems like a pretty good way to do it.

"RJ wrote the last scene before he passed away, and I am just trying to get there". When Brandon arrived at RJ's home after signing the contract for the final three books, he was asked by Harriet if he wanted some soup. He replied honestly, asking instead to read the ending to the series. It was a "reverent and surreal experience" and made him realize just how much he has to do to get from where book 11 ended to that final scene.

Apparently, Brandon would not have undertaken to finish any other series, but he has been following the WoT since the age of 15, and could not say no.

Instead of trying to imitate RJ's style, which would have been impossible, he instead decided to adapt his own style to the series.

There has been every possible reaction by fans to Brandon finishing the Wheel of Time, but he is happy that the only death threats he has received have been "good ones". They are condition in that if he does a good job, he will be spared. He is also surprised that the "hardcore fans" have accepted him so well.

The series is on track to be finished two years from the release of The Gathering Storm, but Brandon doesn't want to even think about the last book just yet, so the schedule is absolutely conditional and might change.

He says that Asmodean was killed by Perrin, who is actually a Darkfriend. Joke.