Book Trailers

There’s a great article over at Inis Magazine that discusses the book trailer, its effectiveness and the producers’ ways of showing enough but not too much.

It got me thinking about my own book trailers. Since I come from a film background, I was, of course, excited about having a trailer for my book. Even before I had discussed the possibility with my publisher, Mercier Press, I had an idea of what the trailer should be. Dark, atmospheric, creepy were some of the adjectives that came to mind.

I had quite a bit of experience with trailers like this, having produced short viral promos for various theatrical productions over the past couple years. These plays often faced a similar problem that books do – until the production is staged, there is a lack of actual filmed footage. So I would take photographs and text and animate them to suit the piece. These trailers seemed to be quite successful in getting bums in the seats so I was certain that something similar would work for my book. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s real.

So, as you can guess from the post below, I got the first copy of my first book in the post the other day.

It’s a strange feeling, finally holding it. It’s real. I can flick through the pages, I can smell the ink, I can even crack the spine if I was so inclined. The words aren’t on a screen anymore; the characters aren’t running around my head. They’re there – on the pages of a real life book for all to read. Read the rest of this entry »

Books I Like: Point Horror

Somewhere at home, in my parents’ house, under my old bed or under stacks of broken toys in one of the wardrobes or under Christmas decorations in the attic is a box of books. There are, I would guess, 40 or 50 of these paperbacks, all the spines broken, the pages dog-eared and the covers worn. Most of them cost £3.99 at the time although as the years went by, this rose to a staggering £4.99. They all have gaudy, illustrated covers reminiscent of seventies and eighties cheap slasher films. These books are Point Horrors.

The first book I read in the series was The Babysitter by RL Stine. I don’t know what age I was – (although I’d make a guess at 10) – but the books were all about 15 and 16 year olds being stalked by serial killers or murderous ghosts and I was probably too young. From the moment I picked up The Babysitter, the Point Horror books were a constant companion for the next few years. Read the rest of this entry »

Book Review: A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness


There’s not much I can say about this beautiful book that hasn’t been said in every other review out there. Written by Patrick Ness (Chaos Walking trilogy), illustrated by Jim Kay and from an idea by the late Siobhan Dowd, this really is a special story.

 

We meet young Conor on the night a monster calls to his house. The monster wants one thing from the boy; the truth. To go into any more detail of the plot would just ruin the experience.

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