FantasyCon 2012 - Day 3

So... Sunday... Day 3 of FantasyCon 2012.

Not so much going on today (other than the British Fantasy Society AGM, the BFS Banquet and Awards Ceremony, and the World FantasyCon 2013 Dead Dog party) but then it is the day after the (already notorious) FantasyCon Disco!

Today you'll find me in Room 134 of the Royal Albion Hotel reading from 10.30-11.00am. As to what I'll be reading, I am as yet undecided. It might be an extract from the final part of Time's Arrow - White Noise - or it might be a short horror story (just what you want on a Sunday morning), or maybe a bit of both. Anyway, if you're up do come along and keep me company.

Maybe I'll see you there...

FantasyCon 2012 - Day 2

So... Saturday... Day 2 of FantasyCon 2012.

Today you'll find me on the 'Is Steampunk Here To Stay?' panel (5.00-6.00pm in the Russell Room) alongside such genre luminaries as Mr Kim Newman and Ms Kim Lakin-Smith. The panel is being moderated by Jared Shurin (of Pornokitsch fame) so it should be a lot of fun all round.

Other highlights of the busiest day of the Con, as far I'm concerned, include the James Herbert signing, the Abaddon/Solaris Giveaway, the Mark Gatiss interview (with Mark Morris), the Media Tie-ins panel, and the Disco (of course).

Also hoping to catch up with a few friends throughout the course of the day, so if you see me in the bar (or wherever) do pop over and say hello.

FantasyCon 2012 - Day 1

Yes, it's here at last - FantasyCon 2012!

I'll be heading down to Brighton today for what will no doubt prove to be a raucous, entertaining and very useful weekend, hobnobbing with other genre authors, editors, publishers and fans.

As well as Yours Truly, amongst those attending are Will Hill, Cavan Scott, Sarah Pinborough and Simon Bestwick.

Today - Friday - you'll be able to find me on the 'Blurring Genre Boundaries' panel (2.00-3.00pm in the Fitzherbert Room) but if I arrive in time, I'll also be in the audience for 'How Important Are Blogs?' (same venue but from 1.00pm). I'm hoping the general consensus of opinion will be 'Yes' seeing as how I dedicate a fair amount of time to blogging. (Not missed a single day so far this year!)

In the evening there really is an embarrassment of riches - from a showing of Wicker Tree, and the Quiz, to readings by Lou Morgan and Will Hill. With so much on offer, I think  I'm just going to have to decide when I'm there.

Steampunk Thursday: Abaddon's Open Submissions Deadline Looms

This weekend I - along with Abaddon/Solaris editorial team Jonathan Oliver and David Moore - will be taking part in FantasyCon in Brighton.

However, while we're all away from our desks, if you fancy yourself as a future Pax Britannia writer and you've not got your novella submission in yet, then you need to get your skates on and probably spend this weekend chained to your desk.

As Gareth L Powell put it on his blog the other day, 'I dislike the term “aspiring writer”. You see it a lot in people’s social media profiles, but to me it seems noncommittal. Either you write, or you don’t.'

You can read the rest of this particular blog post here.

If you're still intent on becoming an Abaddon author, you need to send a 150-word synopsis, 1000-word chapter-by-chapter (or section-by-section, however you structure it) breakdown of your novella, and a 2000-word sample of the novella, to submissions@rebellion.co.uk, by midnight on the 30th September (i.e. Sunday night).

Oh, and good luck!

European Day of Languages

In case you didn't know already, today is the European Day of Languages.

Over the years a number of my books have been translated into other language editions, mainly my Fighting Fantasy gamebooks and the colour text I wrote for Games Workshop back in the day. (I remember walking into a shop in Venice once and discovering an Italian copy of the old Wood Elves Warhammer Armies book which was full of stories about characters such as Durthu the Treeman, all written by me.)

For reasons that are far too complicated and tedious to explain right now, I'm not currently in the place where most of my books are, so trying to remember how many different foreign editions I've got is tricky... However I can tell you with certainly about these...

Spellbreaker (1993)

Translated into French as Le sépulcre des ombres.

Knights of Doom (1994)

Translated into French as Les chevaliers du destin and Hungarian as Démonlovagok. 

Curse of the Mummy (1995)

Translated into Portuguese as A maldição da múmia.












Bloodbones (2006)

Translated into French as Le Pirate de l’Au-delà.

Night of the Necromancer (2010)

Soon to appear in a French edition, entitled La nuit du nécromancien.

The Dead and the Damned (2002)

Translated into French as Mort ou damné and Spanish as Los muertos y los condenados.

 Crusade for Armageddon (2003)

Translated into French as La croisade d'Armageddon.

Magestorm (2004)

Translated into Spanish as Tormenta mágica and Polish (although I can't remember the title).

Necromancer (2005)

Translated into Spanish as Nigromante.












I believe that there are also plans to have my Gamebook Adventure Temple of the Spider God translated into French and that a German publisher has shown an interest in producing German language editions of my Pax Britannia novels. And only last week, another company showed an interest in producing a French edition of Herald of Oblivion.

Strangely, despite being one of the most popular Fighting Fantasy gamebooks ever written, Howl of the Werewolf has yet to be translated. However, the cover continues to appear on everything from t-shirts and magazine covers to people's backs!

If you have to know of any foreign language editions of my books that I've missed, I'd appreciate it if you would drop me a line at info@jonathangreen.com.

Warhammer Wednesday: Work in Progress

On Sunday, at Games Day, Matt (a friend of Pye Parr's) showed me this...

I can't wait to see the finished thing and reveal it to you all here.

Tie-in Tuesday: Star Wars The Early Years

Games Day 2012

Yesterday I spent the day at the NEC outside Birmingham at UK Games Day 2012 - which I realised was actually my 18th Games Day in a row!

I had a great day, which began with me chatting to John Blanche - Warhammer (40K) visionary and Sorcery! artist.

 John Blanche - the master.

And it didn't end there... I also got to meet Jes Bickham - new editor of the brand new White Dwarf - and whilst chatting to him, the original editor of White Dwarf, Ian Livingstone, turned up with a folder full of archive material (including old Games Day programmes and a copy of Owl and Weasel).

Jes Bickham - new editor of White Dwarf, and the man who commissioned this...

The old and the new - no offence, Ian.

I spent quite some time in the Design Studio area chatting to the likes of Dave Andrews (former Fighting Fantasy cartographer), Jervis Johnson (living legend of games design), Robin Cruddace (author of the awesome Tomb Kings army book).

Dave Andrews - drew the maps in Out of the Pit, donchaknow?

Then it was on to the retail zone where I caught up with George Mann (BL head honcho) and Eddie Eccles (who used the word 'dozens' when describing how many copies of Herald of Oblivion he had sold), before heading over to the Black Library area for a good chat with the likes of editors Christian Dunn, Laurie Goulding, Lindsey Priestley, and fellow authors Graham McNeill and Jim Swallow.

Path to Victory gamebooks - sold quite well, or so I hear.

With time flying by, like a journey through the Warp, I headed to the Forge World area to say hello to Alan Bligh and Talima Fox, before ending the day (briefly) catching up with Dan Abnett and Nik Vincent, and saying an all too brief hello to rising star Josh Reynolds.

I came away feeling thoroughly inspired and can't wait to get started on some of the projects that were discussed today.

So here's to UK Games Day 2013!

Thought for the Day

"The harder I work, the luckier I get."

~ Samuel Goldwyn, American film producer (1879-1974)

Untitled Web Series About a Space Traveler Who Can Also Travel Through Time

Short Story Saturday: Work In Progress

I'm working on a new short story at the moment* and these are just some of the research books I'm using...

Any ideas what it might be about? In case you're wondering, it's my contribution to this.


* Yeah, right! Try 30,000 word novella!

Gamebook Friday: A Mystery Package From Across the Sea

So, this arrived in the post yesterday...

I know what you're thinking: "What the hell's that?" Well that was my reaction too. So let's find out, shall we?

The label said 'Grande Bretagne' so I immediately knew it must have come from Wales... Only kidding! Obviously the parcel (or rather post bag) was from France.

Opening it up I found this inside...

And like a game of pass the parcel, I eventually got (down) to this!

That's right, the day after International Talk Like a Pirate Day, my author copies of the French edition of Bloodbones turned up from Gallimard Jeunesse..

Le Pirate de l’Au-delà (as Bloodbones is called in French) is a very fine edition of the book and the third to date. It's printed on good quality paper and has a strong card cover. The font they're chosen to go with internally gives it a very pleasing appearance and one touch that I like is that each picture has a brief description beneath along with the paragraph number it's linked to.

Bloodbones featured a few maps with text on them and these have been adjusted for French language speakers in Le Pirate de l’Au-delà, including my own map of the Port of Crabs.

If you would like to get your hands on a copy of Le Pirate de l’Au-delà, simply follow this link.

Gamebook Friday: Your Adventure Ends Here

This appeared online last week...

Apparently, quite a few people have got rather excited about how the article takes a gamebook approach to its subject matter.

They obviously didn't read my piece on the 30th anniversary of the Fighting Fantasy phenomenon published back in March.

And, for the record, Temple of the Spider God is a Gamebook Adventure - not a Fighting Fantasy book.

Steampunk Thursday: White Noise released today!

The third and final part of my eighth Ulysses Quicksilver Pax Britannia novel Time's Arrow (a.k.a. White Noise) is available for download now! You can get yours here.

PAX BRITANNIA

TIME’S ARROW

Part Three

White Noise

In which the city of Paris faces destruction, and our hero is faced with a deadly dilemma.

But is Cadence Bettencourt to be trusted or not? Is she the friend she appears to be, or does she have a hidden agenda in offering to help our hero?

It's International Talk Like A Pirate Day!

To celebrate, why not pick up a copy of Bloodbones, my own pirate classic?

Tie-in Tuesday: Build Your Own BLUBÖKS

First there was the TJARDIIS...

Now there is the BLUBÖKS...

Thought for the Day

Forthcoming Events

A quick round-up of events you can find me at over the coming weeks...

Games Day 2012
Sunday 23 September
I will be attending Games Day next weekend and - as well as wandering around checking out the participation battles, Design Studio revelations and the rest - I shall be hanging out at the Black Library stand, from time to time. So if you see me, and want me to sign a copy of Herald of Oblivion, or The Armageddon Omnibus, or whatever, do ask. Maybe I'll see you there.

FantasyCon 2012
Friday 28 - Sunday 30 September
I'm going to FantasyCon again this year (although I've got a fair bit of work to do before then!) arriving around about Friday lunchtime and leaving around Sunday lunchtime. As well as attending the obligatory Saturday night disco, I shall be taking part in the following*:

Friday - 2.00pm-3.00pm - FITZHERBERT ROOM - 'Blurring the Genre Boundaries' panel
Saturday - 5.00pm-6.00pm - RUSSELL ROOM - 'Is Steampunk Here to Stay?' panel
Sunday - 10.30am-11.00am - ROOM 134 - Jonathan Green Reading

Black Library Weekender
Saturday 3 - Sunday 4 November
I shall also be attending the Black Library Weekender. Specifically you'll find me taking part in a seminar about Gamebooks on the Sunday, 11.15am-12.15pm*, along with Christian Dunn and Graeme Lyon.

And that's your lot for now. More events and public appearances will be added as and when...


* Timing may change, so check the latest schedule/timetable on the day, if you're going.

Cello Wars

Short Story Saturday: Download World's Collider FOR FREE all weekend!

FREE today and all weekend...

Something very different to read on your Kindle. Featuring 18 short stories that combine into one novel-like narrative. You can read it from start to finish just like a regular book, but experience fresh perspectives on the shared apocalyptic world with each new chapter.

Featuring original stories by Steven Savile, Trent Zelazny, Jonathan Green, Jordan Ellinger, Kelly Hale, Aaron Rosenberg, James Moran, Simon Kurt Unsworth, Dave Hutchinson, Richard Wright, and many more.

Did I mention it's FREE? Please help spread the word!

You can download World's Collider from Amazon.co.uk here, and from Amazon.com here.