One of the cool things about going to San Diego Comic Con was that Keith was there too. Our work on Leviathan has all been by email, so this was a great chance to meet many awesome people and check out a huge dealers’ room full of art books and toys.
We also sat down for an interview with Suvudu. We were in a crowded hotel lobby, so I recommend headphones, but I think it turned out wonderfully. Because Keith and I haven’t spoken much face to face, it’s still kind of fresh for us to talk about our work.
Click this image to go to the Suvudu page, and check out all three parts if you have the time.
More about Comic Con soon, and thanks for you suggestions!
I’m headed off to Comic Con in San Diego (schedule below), and will be seeing some (all too few!) of you there. So here’s me sitting down between packing and enplaning, thinking I should get in one more blog post, because it’s been a while, and yet . . .
I can’t think of what to say. Seriously, there’ve been a bunch of cool news items about toxoplasma, some awards news, etc., but I have not felt motivated to blog them. Maybe it’s being in the middle of the hottest summer in recorded history, or maybe it’s being in the middle of writing Goliath. But whatever it is, I’m weirdly bereft of ideas.
So let’s use this comments space as a teachable moment, or a motivatable moment, perhaps. In other words, tell me what you want me to blog! Seriously, what kind of the posts on this blog do you most enjoy, re-read, link to, or at least chortle at? Parasites? Travel pics? Fan art? Writing advice? Bungee jumping? I aim to please.
All right, here’s what I’m doing at Comic Con:
Thursday, July 22. 4:00-5:00
Room 25ABC
Twisting Genres— Fantastic fiction authors talk about pushing the envelope on genre, not confining it to one definition. Participants include China Miéville (Kraken), Justin Cronin (The Passage), Naomi Novik (Tongues of Serpents), Daryl Gregory (The Devil’s Alphabet), Jeffrey J. Mariotte (Cold Black Hearts), Robert Masello (Blood And Ice), Keith Thompson (The Leviathan trilogy), and Scott Westerfeld (The Leviathan trilogy). Moderated by Maryelizabeth Hart of Mysterious Galaxy.
And by popular demand: There will be a signing with all of us afterwards, sponsored by the wonderful Mysterious Galaxy (a bookstore, not an actual galaxy). This is first time that Keith and I have signed together in the United States, and unlike boring me with my scrawly-ass signature, he can draw stuff for you.
Okay, I have a plane to catch. Ciao for now.
With the Leviathan paperback only month away, I figure it’s time to show you a first piece of art from Behemoth. (Yes, I put this on Twitter a week ago, but it’s still NEW, right?)
So . . . behold the Ottoman sultan’s airyacht Stamboul, which appears about a third of the way into the novel.
Image by Keith Thompson, of course. Click the image for a larger view.
As you can see, Keith has created a whole new style for the Ottoman Empire. It’s sort of a middle eastern Clanker look, with elements of both machinery and animals. (The Ottomans use walkers that look like beasties, so they’re sort of halfway between Clanker and Darwinist.)
This is, of course, only one of fifty-five pieces of art in Behemoth. I’ll be showing some more pieces on August 10, when the paperback of Leviathan appears in stores.
In other news, Keith and I will be at Comic Con in San Diego this year. I’m on a panel on Thursday at 4PM, as you can see on the schedule.
Here’s the description:
Thursday, July 22. 4:00-5:00
Twisting Genres— Fantastic fiction authors talk about pushing the envelope on genre, not confining it to one definition. Participants include China Miéville (Kraken), Justin Cronin (The Passage), Naomi Novik (Tongues of Serpents), Daryl Gregory (The Devil’s Alphabet), Jeffrey J. Mariotte (Cold Black Hearts), Robert Masello (Blood And Ice), Keith Thompson (The Leviathan trilogy), and Scott Westerfeld (The Leviathan trilogy). Moderated by Maryelizabeth Hart of Mysterious Galaxy. Room 25ABC
Hope to see you there! And I’m happy to sign stuff after if you bring it along.
A few weeks ago, I revealed the new paperback cover for Leviathan. Well, now it’s time to show you the matching cover for Behemoth Here they are together:
And here’s Behemoth on its own:
Although I loved the old cover style, this is also a really great look, especially with this new color scheme. The blue and green seems perfect for the Darwinists, just like the rusty metallic reds suited the Clankers.
But I’ll let you guys say your piece in the comments, as NO DOUBT you will.
In other news, the word “Leviathan” now has its own species, an extinct killer whale from 12 million years ago. Behold!
A skeleton of the highly predatory, 17-meter-long (55 ft) whale was discovered in Peru. It’s teeth are twice as big as those of any current-day whale, possibly because it shared the water with a prehistoric 15-meter-long shark! (Remind me not to bring my swimming gear when traveling to any era before, say, 1492.)
And what’s the scientific name of this newly discovered monster? They’ve chosen Leviathan melvillei, in honor of Moby Dick,
So study hard and grow up to be paleontologists, because the bones of a Behemoth westerfeldii would totally rock my mantelpiece.
Here’s more from BBC News.
More cool stuff soon.
This Just In:
Here’s an interview with me about the art of Behemoth and Leviathan at Suvudu.
Just wanted to announce that Leviathan has won the Locus Award for Best YA Novel of 2009. w00t!
Congrats to the other winners, which include the wonderful Boneshaker by Cherie Priest, which won Best Novel. It was blurbed by me as follows:
A steampunk-zombie-airship adventure of rollicking pace and sweeping proportions, full of wonderfully gnarly details. This book is made of irresistible . . . it totally pushed all my buttons!
Also winning for Best First Novel was Paulo Bacigalupi’s The Windup Girl. Paulo just came out with an awesome YA novel, Ship Breaker, which, by happenstance, I also blurbed:
A riveting tale of adventure in a broken world. Gritty and real, yet full of wonders, Ship Breaker is the best debut novel I’ve read in ages.
Click here for more about Windup Girl and here for more about Ship Breaker.
By the way, you should have all realized by now that I only blurb books whose titles rhyme with “Zombie Staker.” It’s just a thing I do.
As a special surprise, those of you in the NYC area will get to see both me and Paulo this week! Joining us will be Jon Armstrong, author of another wonderful first sf novel, Grey.
Here are the details:
Time:
Thursday, July 1
7PM
Place: McNally Jackson Books
52 Prince St.
(b/t Lafayette & Mulberry)
New York, NY 10012
212.274.1160
Event details here, and here’s a map.
Anyway, thanks to everyone who voted for me in the Locus Awards. It’s great to see people from the adult science fiction world reading and thinking about YA. And if you don’t know Locus Magazine, you should check it out. It’s a the best source for news about sf and fantasy publishing.
And now, because I missed Fan Art Friday last week, here are some Intentionally Enplasticized Reproductions, otherwise known as Lego Midnighters!
These are by Ean, who can be found here on Flickr. Cool, huh?
Justine and I are back from a lovely tour of Britain, so thanks for not wrecking the US while we were gone. I didn’t do any public events there; sorry about that!
But we did get see lots of beautiful countryside:
And amusingly named towns:
And olde worlde pubs:
And, of course, many wonderful and welcoming schools:
So thanks to everyone at Simon & Schuster UK for having me, and special thanks to all the schools and the Scottish Book Trust. By the way, the tour was for the paperback release of Leviathan, which is out NOW in the United Kingdom, and looks like this:
I love the new look. (Here’s the old one for comparison.) It’s very Victorian wallpaper-ish, and quite close to the hardback USian and Italian covers. It’s been weird seeing how the cover has changed as the book moves across the world.
Speaking of which, I’ll be releasing the Behemoth cover very soon!
Ciao for now.
BONUS FACT
Deryn Sharp has been nominated as Best Hero in the Indigo Teen Reads Awards! Check it out and cast your vote now. NOTE: Only Canadians are eligible to vote.
A few months ago, Disney announced something called “The Mechanical Kingdom,” a set of collectable pins featuring steampunk versions of Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Donald, etc. Here’s the wallpaper:
You can get more wallpapers right here.
Of course, once a massive entertainment consortium like Disney gets involved with something alternative and kewl like steampunk, it gets sort of, I don’t know, Disneyfied, and certain people will decide it’s totally over. Check out the debate raging here at Brass Goggles.
But here’s the thing: Disney has always been at the forefront of steampunk, even before there was such a thing. In our panel discussion from two posts ago, Cherie Priest and I both confessed that our nascent fixation with steampunk was inspired by 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. And we weren’t talking about Vernes’ novel or even the movie, but the frickin’ ride. And let’s not forget Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (Oops: CCBB was not made by Disney,it just feels like it was), The Rocketeer (1991), Around the World in 80 Days (2004), or even the vine-and-coconutpunk stylings of Swiss Family Robinson (1960)!
I mean, we’re talking about Disney, an organization that owns multiple mechanical Abraham Lincolns! How steampunk is that? About this much:
Image by Scott Wegener and ganked from here.
So let me put it this way: everyone who’s complaining about Disney’s “Mechanical Kingdom” had best step off and go learn some history. And also get used to the fact that subcultures don’t just start off cool and then go mainstream to die. Rather, cool stuff bounces back and forth between alternative and mainstream in ways that are both unpredictable and awesome.
I, for one, welcome our new mouse-eared overlords. After all, they’ve been here all along.
____________
People who know much more about this than me and have written about it more eloquently include Cory Gross and Mike Perschon. Go read them.
Really, the headline says it all: Leviathan rap. In Italian.
It’s by Mondo Marcio (autotranslated Wiki page/original Italian), and I TOTALLY have to learn the language now.
For more about the Italian edition, published by Einaudi, click here.
Needless to say, anyone translating any lines from this will win my undying gratitude.
In case you didn’t get to go to Book Expo America, here’s my panel with sf author/blogger/activist Cory Doctorow, steampunk author Cherie Priest, and New York Public Library Manager Karen Grenke. It’s an hour of us yammering about steampunk past and present, from childhood inspirations to current concerns for the genre. Check it out:
Steampunk Panel – SLJ Day of Dialog, BEA 2010 from School Library Journal on Vimeo.
For those of you in Italy, check out La Repubblica’s Il Venerdì this weekend, and you’ll find a three-page interview/profile of me and Leviathan.
I have proof:
Thanks to Diana Cullen for this photo.
And finally, some belated Fan Art Friday! This is Deryn in her Huxley, by Quarter Teaspoon.
Check out more of QT’s work on Deviant Art.
That’s it for today, but I have something wonderful to show you early next week! Until then, have a good long weekend.
Exciting news: The US paperback version of Leviathan will have a brand-spanking-new cover.
Here is it:
Pretty cool, huh? But I’m not going to say more, because I want to hear your impressions and opinions first.
Four key points about the US paperback version:
One: It will appear on August 10, 2010, about two months before book two in the series, Behemoth, which goes on sale October 5.
Two: It will be printed on the same awesome thick paper as the hardback! You may have noticed how much heavier Leviathan is than most books its size. The paper is a brighter white as well, all the better to show up Keith’s lovely art.
Three: It will be $9.99.
Four: Alas, the glorious endpapers map will not be in color in the paperback version. Only hardback books have end papers, so the map will appear as a spread in b&w. (Otherwise the book would be noticeably more expensive.)
Update: The paperback will be almost the same format as the hb, just a bit shorter. It’s my understanding that the art won’t have to be resized. (Phew.)
And now I attempt to anticipate your questions:
The UK paperback will have a different cover altogether, not the same as this or as the hardback there. I’ll reveal it here once it’s finalized.
I’m not sure what the plans are for the Australian paperback edition. I’ll let you know.
Leviathan has also sold in France, Italy, Germany, Netherlands, Russia, Turkey, Greece, Israel, and Portugal. I have no idea about pub dates or covers, except that the French edition comes out in early September from Pocket Jeunesse.
MORE NEWS SOON ABOUT MANY THINGS.
As you can see, my website has had its first makeover in many years. This is to celebrate the fact that my first new series in years, Leviathan, comes out this autumn. (October 6, to be exact.)
Things may be wonky for a while as we play around under the hood. But I hope you enjoy the new look. Let me know what you think!
Click here to contact Scott Westerfeld.
Jill Grinberg
Jill Grinberg Literary Management
244 5th Avenue, 11th floor
New York, NY 10001
212-620-5883
info@grinbergliterary.com
