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Proof Copies Arrive

After marching around the house preparing to curse the postman for every minute he was late, they arrived. Here, finally, are the proofs (advance reading copies) of Nights of Villjamur. (Thanks, Julie!)

It’s not quite the final product, but it will certainly do for me. This, incidentally, will be sent out to various reviewers, in the vague hope they will praise it immensely, and not rip it to shreds. It also acts very nicely as a paperweight, raised gaming terrain and fuel (in these harsh economic times), should the reviewer find the literary substance somewhat lacking, which I hope they don’t. And it’s also uncorrected, so I’m bound to have littered it with hundreds of brand new grammatical constructs. Marvel at how I push language boundaries unintentionally! It’s received the high-level structural edits, as well as the line edit, so it’s pretty polished, but the copy-edit has only recently taken place – which means that there will be the odd typo. The main thing is that reviewers can get their paws on it before the book hits the shelves in June.

The pictures aren’t great quality since they were rushed on my iPhone whilst trying to contain stupid sounds of glee. What I’m most struck by is how much the artwork looks like a photograph of a fantasy city if you’re casually glancing at it. I’d certainly recommend a visit there…

13
Feb 2009
AUTHOR Mark Newton
CATEGORY

my books, news & reviews, writing & publishing

COMMENTS 14 Comments
  • Part-time Punk

    Ooh, shiny!

    Can’t help but notice you’ve taken the photos in front of the Penguin classics rather than, say, something a bit more on-genre… ;-)

  • http://blog.markcnewton.com Mark C Newton

    There’s plenty of genre in the house! This is just the side table. There’s a Poe book there, if you look carefully. And Bolgakov’s Master and Margarita – there’s some genre!

  • http://davebrendon.wordpress.com Dave

    Looks like a meaty book, and I’ve gotta say it again, the cover looks great! :-) I’ll make sure to ask Pan MacMillan (TOR’s dist. here in SA) to try and get me a copy! :-)

  • http://alexcarnegie.blogspot.com/ Alex Carnegie

    LOL @ – “brand new grammatical constructs.” Very much a Descriptive approach to linguistics there Mr Newton!

    They look great. I can’t imagine what the buzz must be like to finally hold your work in your hands as a real printed book. I would be swinging from the lamp-posts.

    Very much looking forward to venturing into Villjamur myself – off to Amazon to pre-order!

  • http://blog.markcnewton.com Mark C Newton

    I like to take a speculative approach to linguistics, or at least that’s probably what my editor thinks. It really is a buzz – but typically for me I’m not worrying about what the reviewers will say!

    And thanks so much for the pre-order – I really hope you enjoy it.

  • http://www.nextread.co.uk gav (nextread.co.uk)

    Now that’s a lovely sight – was it better than Christmas when you opened the box?

    Though what is shocking is all those classics behind yours. I didn’t realise you were that well read :P

  • http://scifichick.com SciFiChick

    How exciting! Congrats!
    I’m looking forward to reading it.

  • http://blog.markcnewton.com Mark C Newton

    Gav: yep, I think it certainly was. Although when I get the final copies, that will probably merit a stupid dance.

    Thanks, SciFiChick! I hope you enjoy it.

  • http://shadoth.blogspot.com Tim Akers

    Part of the joy of writing is offending strict grammarians, my friend. Congratulations. When will it be in the US?

  • http://blog.markcnewton.com Mark C Newton

    High-five for pissing off grammarians!

    Um, well there’s no official US pub yet – although it’s available on import. The ARCs are on the way to American editors now, I think, so I have my fingers crossed that there will be some interest.

  • http://www.aletheakontis.com Alethea Kontis

    Yay!! I can’t believe it took me so long to see these! They’re gorgeous. Me wants!

  • Mike Short

    I really hope the proofreading for this one is better than it was for The Reef. Or were the errors deliberate? Was it intentional to jar us back out of the book at those points? If it was, I confess the logic of doing so is lost on me. But there were SO MANY.

    I am really looking forwards to getting to grips with NoV in spite of that. The Reef was a very engaging read and I remember becoming increasingly concerned that it would not all be resolved by the last page, spinning us away into trilogy-land. Well done on forgoing that…

  • http://blog.markcnewton.com Mark C Newton

    Hi Mike,

    Yes, unfortunately because The Reef was published by a small press, there was a very low amount of editorial input and a lot of errors went into the final edition. NOV has received huge editorial input at several levels – from the structural to the fine detail, so there should be next to none!

    Glad you enjoyed it though – but I can’t promise that the next one isn’t open-ended… Although I still like to make each of the novels as complete as possible.

  • Mike Short

    Consider me reassured. I will definitely be getting a copy of this then.

    And on the sequel issue, I don’t generally have a problem with serialised works except where the first mention of this is at the end of what you then realise was Part One. I like my expectations to be managed…

    Oh, and the tag at the top right of NoVs cover was clue enough, thanks. ;)