If you like what you see here, be sure to visit my ramblings at the Steve Chats page!
May 6, 2010 -
Just a quick note to say I've struck a deal with a digital media company to release lots of my back catalogue, including the unpublished horror novel The Sufferer's Song, for the Kindle, Nook and Sony eReaders very soon. This will also include the release of The Last Angel (which was originally published by DarkTales in the US a decade ago under the name The Secret Life of Colors) and will include a 30,000 word essay about the history of the book including massive outtakes from various rewrites, characters that never made it into the final book, etc. Laughing Boy's Shadow and Angel Road will also be part of the package of releases. I've also struck a deal with Crossroads Press to do an audio edition of the Hoke Berglund stories Fragrance of You, All that Remains is You and Remembering Me, Forgetting You, which will be released under the title The Forgetting Wood and will include the Fragrance of You graphic novel in digital format as a bonus.
MAY 1st 2010 - There's been a long radio silence following the release of Silver, but over the next few weeks I'll be adding some new updates, covers etc. So what's been happening over the first few months of 2010?
Big news first: I've just finished the first chapter of the new novel Black Chalice, the first in the Knights of Albion series being published early in 2011 by Abaddon in the UK and US. It's a big classic tale of knights and chivalry with my usual dark nasty slant. I'm having a blast writing King Arthur.
New release: Fantastic TV comes out on May 3rd (Monday) in the UK and US and has already earned itself a couple of cracking reviews at Unbound and Wondrous Reads. I will also be doing a series of radio interviews over the coming weeks to promote the book and generally chat about my addition to tv shows. Fantastic TV is an illustrated celebration of five decades of sci-fi and fantasy series. Featuring interviews with writers and creators of each of the classic shows covered, offering a unique insight into the impact of genre TV from the men and women who brought their visions to life on the small screen. Interviewees reminiscences and the author s loving tributes describe the importance and/or uniqueness of all these different shows; how they relate to the world of genre fiction; how video truly did kill off its radio star predecessor, and how these shows continue to influence the writers and artists of today.
Monster Town, the debut Logan Savile novella has been released as a limited edition from Bad Moon Books in the US. There are a few of the deluxe hardcovers left. They really are works of art with gold foil stamping, full page art and a wonderful flip-book design.
The first of the Silver translations, Srebro, released by Replika in Poland, has hit the streets a few weeks ago, and I've just been interviewed by the wonderful Kazimeirz Świetlikowski for the Polish website Crime in the Library.
Over in France, Bibliotheque Interdite have released the first two volumes of the Von Carstein trilogy. While in Italy volume one, Inheritance, has just been released by Oscar Mondadori.
Work in Progress Update - London Macabre is finished, at 140,000 words, and is currently doing the rounds. I've begun mapping out a second Greyfriars novel which is as yet untitled. I've recently finished The Horned Man, a novelette for Jean Rabe's forthcoming DAW anthology, Boondocks. I've just finished the MGM edits on my Stargate SG-1 novel, The Power Behind the Throne, which I believe should be on the shelves in about 6 weeks now. And then there's Redeus, but rather than go into what, exactly, Redeus is here, I'll direct you over to Steve Chats, but I've got my begging cap out. You've been warned.
JANUARY 21, 2010 -
Well it's happened... Amazon are shipping Silver, and all good bookstores in the US are in the process of shelving it and sending it out of the door with lovely readers... but that's just the first part of the story... the wonderful people at Replika in Poland just sent the absolutely stunning cover of their upcoming edition out in just a few weeks time! How seriously pretty does it look?
JANUARY 12, 2010 - With 7 days to go, the clock is ticking on the release of Silver... Stan Tremblay and the good people of Variance have created this little video teaser trailer for Silver to whet the appetite... out you go into the world little viral video... fly... fly...
JANUARY 11, 2010 -
The Kindle edition of Silver has popped up on Amazon today. $9.99 makes it a bargain at half the price of the hardcover for all you gadget orientated folks like me. The switch will be flipped for you to buy this bad boy any minute now... but put it in your download queue, you know you want to.
I've just had word from the lovely people at BadMoon Books that Monster Town has just gone up for pre-order, shipping in February, green cloth, gold foil, very beautiful, 130 pages of monsterish fun...
The price and limitation are in, $65, with only 100 copies being produced. This is almost certainly destined to be my rarest book on the market, especially as it is the basis an upcoming movie!
JANUARY 7, 2010 -
In preparation for the release of my first book in France, the lovely people at Bibliotheque Interdite have just asked me a few questions, which, if you can read French, you'll find here.
http://www.bibliothequeinterdite.fr/blog/
Actually you'll find them there even if you can't read French, they just won't make a great deal of sense...
JANUARY 6, 2010 -
Just received the back-to-back cover for Monster Town/Box Hill from BadMoon Books. I think it is flippin' loads of fun ahem...
So what 's the story about, you ask?
Monster Town:
When down and out Monster Wrangler JD Enron accepts a missing persons assignment from the mysterious blonde with breasts you can ski down, he knows it’s something he’s going to regret. Especially as the job is going to take him back to Monster Town, the giant prison settlement in the New Mexico desert which houses all of America’s monsters. Be they Vampires, Werewolves, Gargoyles, Chubacabras, Moth Men, Zombies, Big Foots or any of the other godless creature to have walked the Earth, Monster Town is the place where they all end up. And the one place you never want to go...
The Beast of Box Hill:
JD Enron is having the time of his life. As a senior Monster Wrangler for the Brotherhood of the Hand (the clandestine off-shoot of the Catholic church hired by the US government to capture all of America’s monsters), he gets to hunt monsters on a daily basis. And JD really hates monsters. But when his latest mission takes him to the remote logging town of Box Hill, Montana, in the dead of winter, he soon discovers that not all monsters have fangs. And that freshly spilt blood looks so very different on snow…
DECEMBER 18, 2009 -
A very long, and hopefully interesting chat with me conducted by Jeff Ayers of Author Magazine has just gone live at AuthorMagazine.org. I talk about my tie-in work, and of course, go into some detail about the what's what with SILVER. Hope a few of you will wander over and check it out.
DECEMBER 17, 2009 -
The eagle-eyed amongst you will have noticed that Temple: Incarnations is no longer available. I made the decision a few weeks ago to take it out of print. There were a lot of reasons behind my decision, one being that it was always intended to be a 'limited' edition and having it available as an on-demand title a few years later rather defeated the object, another was that I was never entirely happy with Temple's world/story. I like a lot of it. Love some of it even. I think Part III of the serial contains some of my very best work in terms of thought/voice/creativity but as a continuous narrative the fact that it was a serial shines through, leaving it more disjointed in retrospect that I would like. So, in removing it from sale, this gives me the opportunity to return to the story and see if I can't turn it into what I always intended it to be - an incarnations of immortality cycle... we shall see. Perhaps in 2012 when the world is coming to an end you'll see mention here of a return to Temple's world.
DECEMBER 12, 2009 -
Taking a brief break from the incoming Silver blurbs to share the French cover for Heritage (Inheritance) which is due ship out to stores in early January.
DECEMBER 11, 2009 -
A couple of very humbling blurbs for Silver from two authors I greatly admire and have been reading for a long, long time, Douglas Preston (one half of the fabulous Preston Child partnership) and Mr. Jurassic Shark himself, Steve Alten, author of the fantastic Meg series.
"The mix of history, suspense, and action in Silver is a perfect combination for those DaVinci Code fans looking for another electrifying read combining Biblical history with modern-day Armageddon."
--Douglas Preston, NYT Bestselling author of IMPACT and BLASPHEMY
"With Silver, Steven Savile takes everything you thought you knew about religious thrillers and turns it upside down. Fascinating, gripping, horrific, tragic and compelling. Savile pulls back the curtain on a 2,000 year old heresy destined to rock the Vatican."
-- Steve Alten, NYT Bestselling author of MEG and THE SHELL GAME
DECEMBER 3, 2009 -
A fresh round of blurbs in for Silver, this time from Matt Hilton, the author of ball-clenching, gut-wrenching Joe Hunter novels that are currently taking the thriller world by storm:
"With SILVER Steven Savile delivers a barn-storming tale of action, intrigue and suspense in a plot laced with ancient secrets and modern terror. His 'small heresy' will light the spark of debate as surely as anything delivered by Dan Brown. Savile writes like a charm...a SILVER charm."
And the latest, fresh in from Jeff Ayers:
"SILVER is everything I want in a thriller. History, ancient prophecy, religion, conspiracy, chases in exotic locales, and a Mission:Impossible-like team that brings it all into focus. Hardcore excitement. I can't wait to bring home the GOLD."
I'll be appearing on Jeff's podcast (links to follow) on 12/4, talking all about SILVER and doing my best not to give the plot away... I hope you'll check it out when you have the chance. I've got a British accent if that helps ...ahem. Shameless, that's me.
DECEMBER 2, 2009 -
Obviously 2010 is a 'big' year for me as a writer. I've got a lot of new material on the way, including Monster Town/The Beast of Box Hill hardback double novella co-written with my good friend Brian M. Logan. Penguin Roy over at Badmoon Books just sent one of the back-to-back cover images over for a sneak peak, so here it is in all of its wolfish glory. I'm not sure exactly when the hardcover will be available beyond 'early in the new year'.
DECEMBER 1, 2009
-
As we race toward the end of the decade (How did that happen?
Seriously? It was only yesterday I was standing outside the observatory in Stockholm sipping champagne and wondering if the Millennium Bug was going to wipe out the work-in-progress) we've got some news for friends over in Germany. The lovely people at Cross Cult have put a news-page for Silber online:
NOVEMBER 30, 2009 -
The latest blurb has just come in from the rather excellent thriller writer Jon Land -
"With the spine-tingling, brilliantly conceived SILVER, Steven Savile eclipses Dan Brown and various imitators of THE DA VINCI CODE. His new take on previously accepted gospel breathes new life into the tired religious-thriller, establishing him as a force to be reckoned with in the genre, placing him in the rarefied air of Steve Berry and James Rollins. The impossible-to-put-down SILVER is flat-out gold."
I rather like it. Actually, I'm lying, I think it is great.
NOVEMBER 20, 2009 -
A new blurb in for Silver, from Robert W. Walker, the author of the brilliant Instinct Series... doubly nice because Robert turned me into a one-legged drunken lecherous copper's narc in Blind Instinct a decade a go!
"If you love international thrillers replete with theological puzzles and a team pitted against true evil that mirrors our world today you won't beat SILVER. Steven Savile is in complete control of his material and not afraid of a complex plot. [He] beats Dan Brown hands down... Masterfully accomplished." -- Robert W. Walker
NOVEMBER 16, 2009 -
Curse of Necrarch has just been released by Copernicus Corporation over in Poland. This is my first outing over there, which I am very excited about, especially as Silver is ramping up for Polish release with Replika in the not too distant future. It is also the first translation for Necrach, which I believe is now sold out and out of print in the UK. This was my last novel for Games Workshop and almost certainly my last 'vampire' novel so I will always be rather fond of it. I hope you guys out in Poland enjoy it, and continuing in that vein of hoping... a visit in 2010 is very much on the cards.
Actually a quick visit to the Copernicus Corp website http://www.copcorp.pl suggests I am in fact completely wrong and have had two stories out in Poland for quite some time... Both Lies of the Flesh (Invasion!) and Death's Cold Kiss (Cold Hand of Betrayal) have been translated over a year ago. I haven't, alas, actually SEEN a copy of either book.
NOVEMBER 11, 2009 -
I am very pleased to finally be able to announce that Silver will be coming out in March 2010 in Germany, published in hardcover by the wonderful people at Cross Cult who previously released my Primeval novel Shadow of the Jaguar last year. I genuinely couldn't be happier about this. I've worked closely with the guys at Cross Cult and am thrilled they are taking a risk and branching out into very different territory with this novel. I hope it sells gazillions for them!
NOVEMBER 6, 2009 -
Remember remember the 6th of... okay, no gunpowder treason or plot...
The 6th of November is always a sad day for me. I tend to sit back and remember the best man I ever knew, my Grandfather, Norman Carr, who died on November 6th 2001. My first novel, Laughing Boy's Shadow, is dedicated to granddad with the regret that I never did get to buy him that pint of beer in the Working Man's Club back home in Prudhoe. We all have regrets, that one's mine, even if it became something of a running joke between us. So, tonight, granddad, I'll be raising a glass in your honour.
Work update: I've just signed a rather unique deal with Vodaphone in Germany to direct distribute German language translations of Silver and Laughing Boy's Shadow to ... wait for it... 34 million subscribers. The German portal should be going live on Monday/Tuesday next week, with my titles being listed as as coming Dec 1st. The lead title in Europe will be Wolfgang Holhlbein's WRYM, with about 40 other German authors. A similar promotion is being planned for Verizon UK and Verizon USA. I'm really not sure how this will all go down, but the idea of Vodaphone having novels direct to smartphones like the Apple iPhone and Nokia N97 etc is rather nifty, I have to say. If nothing else Vodaphone have the most immense customer base across Europe which will increase the name recognition of Silver in ways I can't begin to imagine. Rumour has it customers in Finland, South Africa, and India will be getting native language editions as well. I had a conversation with Larry Niven a few years ago about the role of the writer and how we have to find new ways to tell our stories. I guess I listened.
NOVEMBER 4, 2009 - Entering the final stretch with London Macabre, and could not be happier with it. Usually by this stage I am sick to death with the work-in-progress and just want it over, but LM has me in a tizzy because I still love it. This is unusual, but I ain't complaining. And in the spirit of still liking, here's a sneak peak at the amazing Frank Walls' even more amazing cover art for LM.
OCTOBER 23, 2009 -
Just a quick update to let everyone know what I've been doing since turning 40... I promise I have been productive. I've signed contracts on GOLD, so book two in the Ogmios series is a go. I've also updated several of the entries in FANTASTIC TV, bringing some of my favourite shows kicking and screaming into Fall 2009 (including Supernatural, Torchwood, Doctor Who, and Battlestar Galactica). As if that wasn't enough, Robert Walker (of the Instinct series and the rather brilliant Ransom books) and I have just wrapped the first 10k on a collaborative terrorist thriller, COLD FUSION, that we are working on together. And my favorite, LONDON MACABRE, having topped 60,000 words and entering the final third, was just described as a fusion of Philip Pullman and Neil Gaiman by my first readers who are valiantly reading along while I make stuff up. Next up, it's all about outlining the GUILD WARS 2 novel for Simon and Schuster and fleshing out the factions for the interactive mobile phone game Ninth House I'm developing with some rather talented chaps in Sweden. Of course H1N1 slowed me down...
ahem.
OCTOBER 23, 2009 -
The latest blurb for SILVER has just come in from one of my favourite authors, Raymond Benson, who is best known for his James Bond work, as well as being the guy behind Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell and has written the Metal Gear Solid novels...
"Start with a measure of ancient religious speculation, add a spoonful of high-tech modern espionage, stir in a motley group of intriguing characters, blend in a liberal quantity of apocalyptic terror plots, sprinkle with chills and thrills, and finally mix with damned fine writing...and you have SILVER. A non-stop read!"
OCTOBER 21, 2009 -
Following on from Abaddon's Kindle release of Slaine the Exile recently, the second in the series (which has never been released for general sale in the US) Slaine the Defiler is now available.
I'm really pleased to see this out there, as a cheap alternative for readers in the US who until now have had to pay exorbitant import prices for the long out of print Black Flame paperback
OCTOBER 15, 2009 -
40 for 3 days now, and the the first bit of news now life has officially begun: Fandemonium have released the cover for my debut Stargate SG-1 novel, THE POWER BEHIND THE THRONE. It's also up on Amazon now, and hits the street in May. Go to the Novels page for details!
OCTOBER 7, 2009 -
Slaine: The Exile, the first of my Slaine Mac Roth novels has just been given a new lease of life by Rebellion, becoming my first Amazon Kindle novel. I am assuming this means Slaine: The Defiler is on its way to the Kindle soon, which will be good news for readers in the US who have had the choice of paying stupidly high import prices if they wanted to read it, or going without. My hope is obviously that these new editions do so well Rebellion invite me to finish off the trilogy next year - you just never know!
SEPTEMBER 28, 2009 -
Word from Fandemonium is that Stargate: The Power Behind the Throne has just passed its editorial phase and is winging it way to MGM right now.
Everyone involved is very happy with how it has turned out, so all is good with the world. Huzzah! Hopefully I should have a cover to show soon, MGM just need to approve the image/layout from Fandemonium and it's good to go. I love this stage. There's nothing like seeing how someone else has decided to interpret your words.
SEPTEMBER 18, 2009 -
Look what just arrived in Variance Towers... yep, a spine-bending monster of a book called Silver. One more step toward reality!
SEPTEMBER 3, 2009 -
Been in LA for the last week with the winners of the Writers of the Future contest. 25th year, 5th visit for me, once as a winner, four times as a guest. As always one of the high points of my year. This year's ceremony was interspersed with an offer on a new novel, which made the day doubly sweet. Expect an update by the end of the week with all the details. Then returned home to hear that a major Hollywood producer has signed on to produce Monster Town, the monster munching adventure I've co-written with my red-headed step-brother Brian M. Logan. Brian himself just signed up with Circle of Confusion, so lots of stuff is happening!
I'll be talking in more detail in Steve Chats later - but for now, these are the days we live for!
AUGUST 18, 2009 -
The page proofs for Fantastic TV arrived in the mail. It's a very weird feeling looking at all of my words suddenly drawn together into what is essentially the final book. I can see and feel almost exactly what it will finally look like and I don't mind saying I am rather impressed. Sandra Wake over at Plexus has done a tremendous job of pulling this all together. It's 102,000 words of opinionated Savile blathering about tv and I have to admit it is a rather curious experience to read back through these essays given some of them were written almost 3 years ago. It's like revisiting myself and hearing (or reading) my own mind through the filter of one thousand days. I think people are going to like this book.
AUGUST 16, 2009 -
I know, I know, I swore a moratorium on short stories but Joe Morey over at Dark Regions (who are putting out The Odalisque and Other Strange Stories in a few months) knows how to blackmail along with the best of them, so today I agreed to dust off the typewriter and chip out a new short story for his upcoming anthology Carnival of Madness.
I mean who could resist writing a 'clown horror' story? Not I. I've fancied doing something along these lines for the best part of a decade, so Joe knew I'd be easy to cajole into it.
In other news Will McDermott (over at ArenaNet) and I nailed down the title and details of my upcoming Guild Wars novel. Due to non-disclosure agreements and the rabid nature of the 'net we're keeping the title under wraps for now but it's a fun one and it really fits the book. Huzzah!
AUGUST 13, 2009 -
Just been told that the page proofs for my massive non-fiction look at genre tv over the last 50 years are in the post from London winging their way to a bright and sunshiny Stockholm. This makes me very happy indeed. Fantastic TV was a serious labour of love in between the final Games Workshop novel and kicking off the Primeval novel, so it's taken some time but I just know it is going to be worth it. It's a big book, bright, shiny and maybe just a little bit sexy... if you find books sexy. It's certainly opinionated, but you wouldn't expect anything less, would you?
AUGUST 10, 2009 -
Just heard from Mathieu Saintout over at Bibliotheque Interdite in France that my Vampire Wars trilogy Inheritance, Dominion and Retribution will be debuting in French in 2010. First time in French for me, and considering my old high school teacher declared me his worst ever student in 20 years of teaching I am just happy they don't expect me to translate it!
JULY 27, 2009 -
My proofs and cover blads of London on the Brink of Never arrived today. The story, a hefty 9,000 word piece is coming out in Martin H. Greenberg & Hean Rabe's anthology Spells of the City, where I get to share the table of contents with Timothy Zahn, Michael Stackpole, Mickey Zucker Reichert and Tim Waggoner among others. It's a lovely looking collection of urban fantasy that will be out just in time for christmas stockings everywhere.
JULY 25, 2009 -
Mild case of shock here. I just found out that my PRIMEVAL novel SHADOW OF THE JAGUAR just won the International Association of Media Tie In Writer's Scribe Award for Best Young Adult Novel. That means this book was a #1 Bestseller in the UK and has now won the major media writer's award. Shock doesn't begin to describe it. And what they say is true, it's an honour. It really is.
JULY 22, 2009 -
A couple of weeks back Aaron Rosenberg and I thrashed out a massive story arc for a brand new fantasy series called The Relicant Chronicles. We turned it in to the agent and off it's gone to the prospective publisher. I'm absolutely thrilled to be working with my buddy Aaron, and should probably confess that we were born mere hours apart, and have had spookily similar lives to the point that he read the fun facts here and went holy crap now this is getting beyond a joke, but I am not telling which part it was that inspired his humour.
So, what can I tell you, if anything about Relicant? Hmm... here's the basic tag line: The Relicant Chronicles is an anime-style fantasy series. A mix of Kurosawa, Clavell and Tolkien. Picture sweeping landscapes, rustic but elegant pontoon settlements on bamboo platforms, sacred stairs leading to temples built into dizzying mountain peaks, powerful elemental and sensory magic, treachery, betrayal, and of course the intricate dance of combat. Phew....
JULY 15th, 2009 -
La aristocracia de la noche te da la bienvenida. De todos los vampiros que acechan el Viejo Mundo, los Von Carstein son los más infames. Sus meros nombres - Vlad, Conrad y Mannfred - conjuran imágenes de fatalidad, muerte y destrucción. Esta edición ómnibus recoge las tres novelas de Steven Savile sobre este linaje - Herencia, Dominio y Venganza - en un sangriento volumen que se adentra en las profundidades del mal. Which I think says something like meet the aristocrarcy of the night... or maybe not. Timun mas over in Spain have just released the omnibus edition of my Vampire Wars trilogy in all of its 1024 pages of vampire goodness... It's nice to see these older stories still have some legs. Funny to think that six years ago I sat down, quit my teaching job and started to write full-time. I'll always have a soft spot in my heart for these vampiric chaps and chapesses. View the Spanish release here.
JULY 14, Bastille Day News -
Just heard from the good people at Fandemonium that Shadows is in fact going to be released in May of 2010, rather than rushed out now, and just to add to the confusion will be reverting to one of its earlier titles, The Power Behind the Throne. It's nice to know it's coming, but very weird to think it will be almost 3 years from hatching the plot to seeing it hit the streets. We were toying with The Faces of the Mujina, which I rather like as a title, but The Power Behind the Throne is very much indicative of all the shennanigans going on inside the book so it fits very nicely. I am hoping we'll have a proper cover up for people to see soon. The rescheduling of course means 2010 is starting to look like a really busy year promotion-wise with the Guild Wars novel, Silver, the Stargate book plus London Macabre. Then there's Monster Town with my pal Brian M. Logan... and and and... I mentioned being a workaholic, right?
JULY 6, 2009 -
I just signed up as Contributing Editor for the ITW newsletter The Big Thrill, which goes out to 11,000 thriller readers.
I'll be reposting the columns here in the Steve Chats after the newsletter has been in circulation for a while. My first article will feature in the August Issue.
JUNE 26, 2009 -
Started work on a sequel to The Hollow Earth, LONDON MACABRE, a new steampunk adventure for the Greyfrair's Gentleman's Club. I'm hoping to turn this one in to the publisher, Dark Regions Press, by the end of the summer. It's coming out in limited edition hardcover in the fall.
JUNE 23, 2009 -
Just turned in my final edits on STARGATE: SHADOWS, the 14th outing of
SG-1 to Fandemonium. Look for it in bookstores soon.
JUNE 18, 2009 -
Just finished a new short story, NOSTRADAMUS' FATE, for a new horror anthology of the same name coming from Dark Regions Press later in the year.
JUNE 10, 2009 -
Just finished the final new short story for my forthcoming short fiction collection THE ODALISQUE AND OTHER STRANGE STORIES and zipped it off to the publisher, Joe Morey over at Dark Regions Press. I'm rather proud of this one.
JUNE 1, 2009 -
News just in, Silver has sold into hardcover in Spain with Grupo Anaya, and into Poland with Replika where it will debut as a mass market paperback... find out what all the fuss is about, pre-order SILVER on Amazon!
