Ted Mahsun

Wow. This is big news. J.K. Rowling has announced she will be publishing a book for adults with Little, Brown later this year: "Although I’ve enjoyed writing it every bit as much, my next book will be very different to the Harry Potter series, which has been published so brilliantly by Bloomsbury and my other publishers around the world. The freedom to explore new territory is a gift that Harry's success has brought me, and with that new territory it seemed a logical progression to have a new publisher.  I am delighted to have a second publishing home in Little, Brown, and a publishing team that will be a great partner in this new phase of my writing life."

I've admired fantasy author Glenda Larke 's work for some time and I have her blog subscribed in Google Reader so I can always read her latest posts. But I never knew she just lived down the road from me! I randomly met her on Friday evening in a restaurant near where we lived and recognised her from her pictures on her blog, so I went over and said hello. We had a short chat and then she asks me, "Would you like some reading matter?" Turns out Glenda's cleaning her house out and is culling some of her books from her personal library. Well, obviously, I'd be happy to help! The next day, I was over at her house with four shopping bags and look what happened: Cataloguing this will be very interesting, to say the least. 188 books. 10 books in each stack, except for one stack which has 8 books. That's altogether 188 books, mostly fantasy but there are some science fiction (finally, I have a copy of Frederick Pohl's elusive Gateway !) and ...

Anne Lamont's wonderful book for writers, Bird by Bird , isn't a how-to book for writers. Rather, it is a book about the joys of writing as well as being an inspirational guide on the life of writing. The book opens with an anecdote that retells a childhood story of Ms. Lamont's brother who has to write an assignment for school. The assignment requires him to write about birds but when finally the day before the assignment has to be submitted, he cries in frustration that the task is impossible because there are just too many birds to write about. The father comes over, takes a look at the assignment, then gives one small but important piece of advice: "Take it Bird by Bird, son. Bird by Bird." (I haven't read the book for years, so forgive me if this isn't exactly verbatim.) It goes without saying that this is excellent advice. Recently, I met with fellow writer, Elizabeth Tai , and we chitchatted about books, reading and writing. After a whil...

  My guest post about my experience self-publishing e-books is up on John Ling's blog. I give a basic rundown about what it takes for a newbie author to get his or her e-book published on Smashwords and Amazon and I also touch a little on what it is like to put your e-book up on Amazon for free. If you've been wondering what the process is for publishing e-books, do check it out . John also has a new, exciting thriller out called The Blasphemer , available on Amazon right now. From the blurb: When Abraham Khan releases an e-book condemning radical Islam, the consequences hit him fast and hard -- an armed fanatic smashes into his home one evening, trying to kill him. He survives the harrowing attempt. Just barely. But will he survive the next one? Maya Raines is the security operator brought in to protect Abraham. She is tough and committed. The very best at what she does. Always one step ahead of the threat. But Abraham is no ordinary principal -- he will not...

I started out reading Murakami's behemoth of a book, 1Q84 , but when a friend gifted me an e-book copy of Stephen King's 11/22/63 , I read the first few pages to check it out... and was hooked. Now I cannot go back to 1Q84 . Well, at least for now. King has me caught in his death grips of superb writing and excellent plotting.

Love, love, LOVE this picture. Via the very resourceful murakami Community Livejournal .

  Neil Gaiman's personal library is like... well... it's like a library . A really nice and cosy library.

Tunku Halim has an intriguing post which starts with the sentence: "On 26 April 1994, in an elaborate ceremony at the Istana Negara, Tuanku Simon Mackay was appointed as Malaysia’s 10th Yang DiPertuan Agong"  What follows is the best speculative writing I've read this year. Tunku Halim, I want more!

I didn't intend to blog again so soon, but news of JG Ballard's death kind of shocked me. I know I should've expected it, since he's been ill for some time now, but I guess I was hoping he would make it. Haven't read Crash , but I watched the Cronenberg movie and thought it was really bizarre. Loved his more conventional––if one can truly say that about him––science fiction novels though. Okay, back to being on hiatus.

Cory Doctorow, of Boing Boing fame and author of quite a number of SF novels (look 'em up 'cos I'm too lazy to google them for you), has an article up on Locus Online on how to deal with the distractions of the Internet while writing . He doesn't believe in switching it off--the most obvious route--but has a number of useful tips to keep those distractions at bay. Some of them are obvious, like switching off your IM and carving out a regular writing routine, but the one I find most useful is his cautioning not to research: Researching isn't writing and vice-versa. When you come to a factual matter that you could google in a matter of seconds, don't. Don't give in and look up the length of the Brooklyn Bridge, the population of Rhode Island, or the distance to the Sun. That way lies distraction — an endless click-trance that will turn your 20 minutes of composing into a half-day's idyll through the web. Instead, do what journalists do: type "TK...

Finally! Something new about Haruki Murakami I can feast my brains on! He was in Berkley to receive the inaugural Berkley Japan Prize (wtf? I have a feeling they created this one specially for him...) and was kind enough to have a reading and a conversation with the many fans who attended. (The session sold out fast.) Ben Dooley of The Millions was there and reported back a lot of interesting stuff I still didn't know about the writer, such as Murakami's likening of writing to playing video games: " Writing a story for me is just like playing a video game. I start with a word or idea, then I stick out my hand to catch what's coming next. I'm a player, and at the same time, I'm a programmer. It's kind of like playing chess by yourself. When you're the white player, you don't think about the black player. It's possible, but it's hard. It's kind of schizophrenic. " He also says he doesn't dream the conventional way: "I...

My pal, Fadz, who had his second SF novel published earlier this year is featured in The Sun . Congratulations Fadz, and major props to Bissme for writing about a very much disregarded genre in local writing. As for the novel itself, Saga Horizon is set in a post-apocalyptic world where humans struggle to survive against a never-ending rampaging hoard of robot soldiers. (Think Terminator.) Haven't finished reading it yet, but so far it's quite an okay read...albeit a little too depressing for me to stomach at the moment. Am in the mood for light and happy lit right now. So sorry Fadz, your review will have to wait :p

Lydia Teh, author of Honk! If You're Malaysian and Life's Like That is having a book cover design contest for her new book, Do You Wear Suspenders? – The Wordy Tales Eh Poh Nim , a collection of her vocabularistic column in The Star. Check it out ! You could win a RM100 worth of book vouchers which I assume can be used at MPH Bookstores.

Young Adult author Eoin Colfer has been chosen to write the sixth book in Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker Trilogy (yes, yes you read that right). But why? I have never read any of Colfer's books and I'm sure he must be a good writer but I doubt anybody could match up to Adams' wit and talent. The Hitchhiker series isn't even remembered for its story more than its jokes and clever wordplay so why bother continuing it? I just hope Eoin Colfer is an atheist. Only an atheist can properly write another Hitchhiker novel!

Okay, so I'm in The Star again ! Not as a book reviewer though, but in a Roald Dahl profile written by Rouwen Lin. As evident in the article, I am a dork. Seriously. Look at this photo: Haha! Anyways, thanks Rouwen, for giving me my fifteen minutes of fame.

It's Roald Dahl Day again and this year I haven't forgotten! (Thanks to Blogger's scheduled publishing feature.) So last Roald Dahl Day, I showed you pictures of my autographed first edition copy of Rhyme Stew and the previous year I told you my experience at the book signing . This year let me show you a photo of the book signing. Look at that! My glasses are the same colour as Roald Dahl's! So this Roald Dahl fellow? What's so awesome about him anyway? Let me tell you! Roald Dahl's works appeal to me because there's always a sense of childish craftiness or mischievousness in the writing, as if he's letting the reader in on a secret joke. It's like Roald Dahl was this good-hearted prankster who never really grew up, and he threw all his good ideas for pranks into the books he wrote. Add to that his silly and funny made-up words, is it any wonder he won many a child's heart? In a way, he never really did grow up. I remember watchi...

Just in time for Roald Dahl Day on the 13th, Puffin has published an "extended" version of Roald Dahl's boyhood memoir, Boy , called More About Boy . From the Amazon UK page : What were Roald Dahl's first words? Read his account of going to football matches with Joss Spivvis, the gardener. This new edition of a favourite book contains a wealth of new photos, facts and writings about Roald Dahl and his childhood, together with the original text and illustrations from his much-loved memoir. With lots of little-known details, this is a must-have for all Dahl fans! I checked with Kinokuniya but they don't have it yet. Faster, Kino! I guess we can expect More About Going Solo in the future? And then it won't take long before they start releasing More About Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator or More About The Magic Finger or More About The Vicar of Nibbleswicke or... okay, I'll stop here.

From The Guardian : Roald Dahl never won a children's book prize in his lifetime, but today he has gone one better, as the shortlists for a literary prize bearing his name are announced. Founded by the children's laureate Michael Rosen, the Roald Dahl Funny prize celebrates honours the most hilarious children's authors. The inaugural winners will receive £2,500 - a slightly more serious prize than the Gloucester Old Spot pig handed over to winners of the Wodehouse prize for adult comic fiction. Rosen founded the prize to boost the profile of humorous books as part of his campaign to put the fun back into children's reading. "I have sat on judging panels before and what happens is that the funny books get squeezed out, because somehow or other they don't tackle big issues in the proper way," he explained. "They'll get through to the last four or five books, and then historical fiction, or something about death or slavery or new technology ...

I've always known Dahl was a ladies' man (and even called upon his talents for writing his stories) and I knew he was somewhat of a spy (as we learn in Going Solo ) but I never knew he used his manly charms in his work as a spy : Drawing on previously unpublished letters and other documents, American journalist Jennet Conant has written about Dahl's numerous sexual conquests. They include Millicent Rogers, the heiress to a Standard Oil fortune, and Clare Boothe Luce, a right-wing congresswoman and the wife of the publisher of Time magazine. Boothe Luce proved so frisky, Dahl later claimed to have begged his superiors to take him off the assignment, only to be told to get back into the bedroom. Conant writes: "Dahl's superiors watched his rake's progress with grudging admiration. "A certain amount of hank-panky was condoned, especially when it was for a good cause." Such a rogue!

So the literary corner of the interwebs is abuzz with the latest news that the number one of the 50 best-loved authors is Enid Blyton. And people have since come out to say that they too like Enid Blyton, warts and all. To say I'm dismayed is an understatement. I hate Blyton. Always have, always will. This may have happened because I was introduced to Roald Dahl first and only to Enid Blyton a few years later. If that have happened the other way round maybe my feelings for her books would be a lot different. But since we do not have the benefit of a time machine or a device capable of peeking into parallel worlds, who knows? But I'm not here to complain about people liking Enid Blyton. For what it's worth, she was responsible for instilling the love of reading into at least a couple of generations so that's okay by me. Also, if it weren't for Enid Blyton, I would have never known what a Gollywog is. Ho ho! As for the rest of the list, I think it's spi...