Full steam ahead on Liberator
Contracts all signed, structural edits received from US, UK and Australia - I'm doing them all at once. So now it's full steam ahead on Liberator, the second half of the duology with Worldshaker. This is one amazing sequel. I've had two trilogies published before in Australia, but this is the first ever time I truly believe the second book matches the first. Worldshaker has the plus of creating the world, but Liberator is a bigger story. Everyone said Worldshaker was a hard book to put down, but responses from editors and sample readers are telling me Liberator is almost impossible to put down!
And it's going to be getting better, because I've just started work on the revisions, and I can feel the improvement coming through! Very exciting! It'll take me a couple of months, because I always revise through from first page to last, a total rewrite. It'll be coming out in the first half of next year.
Tours All Over!
Two weeks touring Worldshaker in the US, two weeks touring Worldshaker in the UK, time spent meeting publishers in France, UK and US - and now I'm back in Australia feeling very satisfied. The tours exceeded expectations … all my publishers are great people … and the final week of holiday with Aileen in Paris, Bruges and Amsterdam was a bask in the sunshine. All wonderful!
The only hard part is that now I have to get back into a writing routine. I'm so far out of it! I'll be glad when the structural edit suggestions on Liberator come in - that'll be a nice easy step for getting back in the mood. I guess the touring author lifestyle was a bit overwhelming for this simple provincial lad!
I kept up a blog on Wordpress while I was overseas, at www.richardharland.wordpress.com. Now I'm back. I'll copy it across to the News & Blog page of this website-
Announcing the News & Blog page!
I finally did it. The items on this Home page keep multiplying and multiplying - no way can I fit a whole blog on. So I've set up a separate page just for announcing news and blogging. I'll still mention the latest news on this home page, but all the details will go here -
I can't fit it onto the bar at the top, but there'll be a link to it at the bottom of every page.
I've just put up all the latest info about the US and UK tours in the NEWS column of the new page.
German Worldshaker Out Soon!
Just heard that the German edition of Worldshaker will be out in the shops by the start of August. Jacoby & Stuart have created a great cover - see the image just below. I ran out of time in Europe and couldn't fit in a trip to Berlin, but I'll definitely be calling on Nicola at Jacoby & Stuart next time I'm over.
MORE COVERS FOR WORLDSHAKER
The French edition from Hélium appeared in April; the American and UK editions in May/June; and the German edition at the end of July. It's all happening, and very very exciting!
Other News
Worldshaker shortlisted for the Ethel Turner prize
Review in famous French newspaper Le Figaro
Story "A Guided Tour in the Kingdom of the Dead" in the Tor anthology, Year's Best Fantasy #9
Tips on Writing Steampunk…
If you want to write as well as read steampunk fiction, there are some writing tips on the Tips for Writing Steampunk page, under Steampunk, under Worldshaker. Or click here.
Extracts from the sequel to Worldshaker
I've just put up two extracts from the sequel to Worldshaker, called Liberator. Not final book version, these are first drafts (collector's items?) There's still a lot of editing done. But if you want to see how Chapter 1 kicks off, or what happens when the Imperialist juggernauts try to take revenge on the world's only liberated, revolutionary juggernaut, check out the SEQUEL page under the WORLDSHAKER button. Or click here …
STEAMPUNKING!
Now I have two steampunk costumes! One is my Victoriana costume, with tailcoat and vest and fob watch and cane - as worn for the launch of Worldshaker at the steampunk convention in Melbourne and the steelworks launch at Wollongong. The only change is that I now pin one of my bits of steampunk jewel to the front of my top hat.
The steampunk jewellery came from a shop called In Visible Light in Newtown, and so did the new bit of copper jewellery that goes with my leather cap. Don't ask me why a leather cap, I just think it looks sort of steampunky. I wore it at Swancon in Perth, and got really fond of it. Very comfortable - maybe I'll take to wearing it all the time.
Along with the cap and copper thingy, I wear my steampunk vest, with amazing brass buckles. God only knows what it was for originally - I found it in a second hand shop and thought it looked interesting. It was only after wearing it to a Regency dinner at a Canberra convention that I thought, hey, this could belong in a steampunk costume too.
Memo to self: must get a photo of my gas mask! Such as might be worn by intrepid 19th century balloonists when flying through heavy industrial pollution. Or World War I soldiers, or whatever … steampunk knows no boundaries! (or if it does, I try not to find out about them)
THE WRITING TIPS SITE goes American, British and Australian
The writing tips website - all 145 pages of it - is now in 3 different version: Australian, US and UK. Click on the bar at the top of any page for Australian version; for the US and UK versions, you need to go to
www.writingtips.com.au
Where was I? I produced the website as my community service to Australian fantasy/SF writers, but it's had such great feedback, that I thought it ought to go overseas too. Maybe I should say that Aileen - my partner - believed even more that it ought to go overseas, and kept prodding and prodding until I did something about it. So there it is in an American version and a British version as well as an Australian version. My overseas editors have helped me adapt parts of the last "Getting Published" section for overseas conditions - though actually there weren't as many differences as I expected.
So check it out if you're interested in writing, or even if you're just curious about what goes on behind the scenes in producing a book. Each version can be read on the web or downloaded for free and printed out like a small book. No strings attached - it really was a community service.
Lots of little illustrations too … in fact I'll copy a few of them now.
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