Smugglers’ Stash and News

So. I wake up today with a strange feeling and then I realise that I feel like watching a horror movie (Let The Right One In) and then I move to my bookshelves and I pick up a horror novel to read: and it is the fourth in a row.

But that is not all. Yesterday, I did not go online at all, and instead chose to play a GAME. On the Computer.

It is like Bizarro World at Casa de Ana, folks. I swear. That or, THEA AND I SWITCHED PLACES!

HA!

All of this talk of Horror is of course, preparation for our upcoming Halloween Week (24-30 October) and I take this opportunity to officially announce:

A Demon Bunny Invitation – Open to Everybody!!!

Follow the Demon Bunny

On October 31st, Halloween, we invite you all to celebrate all things Horror! After a week long of reviewing loads of Horror books and watching horror movies, we will have an open post Halloween Day, with a Mr. Linky where you can add a link to a post in your blog about a scary book or movie. Hope you can all take part!

Things I learnt this week:

Over at Torque Control, a conversation about Women and The Clarke (award) have sparked a huge comment thread about Women Writers and Science Fiction. The comments range from insightful to ludicrous (of course) and are well worth a read.

The good thing is that the debate continues: inspired by that thread, Torque Control’s Neil Harrison has started to compile a list of Sci Fi written by women between 2001-2010 and invites everybody to chime in before 23.59 on Sunday 5 December. You can read about it here and people are already contributing, which you can see here.

Meanwhile: the 2010 Man Booker Prize was announced and the winner is The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson, said to be the first comic book to win the prize:

“He should have seen it coming. His life had been one mishap after another. So he should have been prepared for this one…”

Julian Treslove, a professionally unspectacular and disappointed BBC worker, and Sam Finkler, a popular Jewish philosopher, writer and television personality, are old school friends. Despite a prickly relationship and very different lives, they’ve never quite lost touch with each other – or with their former teacher, Libor Sevick, a Czechoslovakian always more concerned with the wider world than with exam results.

Now, both Libor and Finkler are recently widowed, and with Treslove, his chequered and unsuccessful record with women rendering him an honorary third widower, they dine at Libor’s grand, central London apartment.

It’s a sweetly painful evening of reminiscence in which all three remove themselves to a time before they had loved and lost; a time before they had fathered children, before the devastation of separations, before they had prized anything greatly enough to fear the loss of it. Better, perhaps, to go through life without knowing happiness at all because that way you had less to mourn? Treslove finds he has tears enough for the unbearable sadness of both his friends’ losses.

And it’s that very evening, at exactly 11:30pm, as Treslove hesitates a moment outside the window of the oldest violin dealer in the country as he walks home, that he is attacked. After this, his whole sense of who and what he is will slowly and ineluctably change.

The Finkler Question is a scorching story of exclusion and belonging, justice and love, aging, wisdom and humanity. Funny, furious, unflinching, this extraordinary novel shows one of our finest writers at his brilliant best.

I caved, bought the book and hope to be reading and reviewing it soon!

And finally, check this out, coming to Investigation Discovery channel:

How much of today’s great mystery writing springs from the imagination … and how much of it is ripped from the headlines?

Each episode of Hardcover Mysteries pairs an author with a real-life case close to their heart, whether it inspired one of their own creations, mirrors the themes presented in their bestsellers or resonates with their personal life story.

Hardcover Mysteries premieres on Investigation Discovery on October 11 at 9pm ET.

You can read more about it over at the official website.

This Week on The Book Smugglers:

On Monday, I review Fly On The Wall by the amazing E.Lockhart, which is turning out to be one of my fave authors.

On Tuesday, we present our Hunger special: we review the book, followed by an exclusive interview with the author, Jackie Morse Kessler conducted by no other than Death itself.

On Wednesday, I am back and I will review Bloodthirsty by Flynn Meaney….

then, on Thursday, Thea reviews Star Crossed by Elizabeth Bunce.

and finally, on Friday Thea closes the week with a review of The Scorch Trials by James Dashner.

And that’s it from us today. Just one final warning:

BEWARE THE DEMON BUNNY

~ Your Friendly Neighborhood Book Smugglers