So, I’ve been wasting all my time writing a movie of Malice and everything, and it turns out someone’s already got there first! Specifically, some rather amazing young people from Israel who’ve spent a year making their own film of my book. I am totally awed and humbled by the creativity and effort of these 10-11 (!!!) year olds who with little or no resources managed to create a 40-minute-odd movie out of a book with numerous fantastical elements, monsters etc etc. So without further ado:

MALICE, the movie! Directed by Michael Busheri, produced by Einav Yehezkeli, shown to you by kind permission of parents, cast and crew. It’s quite a thing.

Comments welcome but keep ’em nice. This isn’t 4Chan, and I shoot trolls. Then splash acid on them so they can’t regenerate.

Meanwhile, as far as the other movie goes, I’m prevented from going into detail about where it is in the process but at present we have a script that everybody loves and currently things are rumbling along well enough. As soon as there’s anything official to announce, I’ll announce it.

Motoring through VELOCITY (the eagle-eyed there will spot a clue to the nature of this book…) and on course to deliver it by the end of the year for a June-ish release in 2015. I’d give you a blurb for it, but blurbs give too much away and I haven’t finished it yet and besides, it’s an author’s prerogative to keep secrets, because we’re all massively paranoid someone’s going to steal our ideas and write it before we do.

Goodbye, summer! You were a good ‘un!

Gollancz are having their own mini-festival and I, of course, shall be there! Come by!

SO! NEWS!

First up, my trip to Sweden for the SweCon Steampunk Festival in Gävle. It runs from June 27th-29th, and I’ll be doing, like, a ton of panels and interviews and talking about The Haunting of Alaizabel Cray (if I can remember what happened in it!) and Retribution Falls and all things steampunky. I will also be doing a signing and talking about steampunk with Swedish author Nene Ormes on Weds 25th June at 6pm at the Science Fiction Bookshop in Stockholm. Apart from being mildly concerned that I’ll be out-steampunked by everyone there, I’m very excited!

Second, I’ve started on a new book in amid my screenwriting projects. It’s a YA book. It’s kind of science fiction but not really. It’s called VELOCITY. We’re aiming to get it out by the end of summer next year, but no guarantees. And that’s all the information I’m giving out at this stage. Stay tuned for further developments…

Now that is one sexy cover. If only I had a larger version of it. Allow me to quote the starred review it got in Booklist (spoilers ahoy – if you were gonna buy it anyway, don’t read):

“A couple of boys on a biology field trip uncover a silver creature with chitin markings eerily like a computer chip. But it is only the first of many horrible creatures whose scratches turn humans into silver insects—or the Infected. It’s a biological weapon experiment gone awry, a horrifying precursor to an evil world bent on destroying itself. The challenge for a lucky (?) few Mortingham Boarding Academy students: how to survive and perhaps, more importantly, what happens if they do? Wooding has morphed a traditional English boarding school story—bullies, evil headmaster, well-intentioned teacher, and boy/girl drama—into a horror/survival story that would make William Golding and Gary Paulsen envious. The ugly, morphing Infected are graphic, both awe-inspiring and terrifying, as they devour their comrades to become larger, more intelligent, and more vicious. The tension is palpable as a small group of teens gradually out-thinks its few remaining adult leaders, thus leading the scant remaining survivors in a quest to escape. Is “sometimes being nice being stupid” or can goodness actually prevail? Carve out enough time to read Silver in a single sitting. You’ll need it.”

TL;DR? “It’s totes awesome.”

Available here.

Y’know, even though I have the excuse of being born before the age of social media sapped all meaning out of everything, I’m beginning to suspect I’m a bit slow at this blogging lark. But you’ve all been very patient, and as I’ve just turned 37 I’m literally likely to die at any minute, so here’s an update.

Since I delivered The Ace of Skulls about a year ago, I’ve been writing for the screen. Mostly for TV, actually, as it’s rather more exciting than the movies at the moment. Some of the work I’ve been doing has been writing pilot episodes, crafting series outlines, then sending them off into the aether via my agents. Some of these works pick up interest from producers of other things, who either want to develop them or offer other work, which takes me off in other directions. Over the past year I’ve been really pretty busy, but in this world projects  have a long gestation period (comparable to human lifetimes in some cases). Things are gestating nicely, but as I’ve said many times, it’s pointless talking about projects until they are some way down the line as many of them just disappear. Some resurface after years, some don’t.

At various points over the year I’ve been writing for a TV series in production that is, not to put too fine a point on it, goddamn awesome. The project is helmed by a big-name Hollywood screenwriter, there’s a big US network behind it, the concept for the series is fantastic and the writing is of really high quality, and I got to work with a brilliant team of screenwriters planning the series and working on episodes. Yet even a high-profile project like this has a hard time getting to the screen, and it’s currently on hold while people behind the scenes shuffle vast amounts of money around trying to make risk and reward add up. Maybe it’ll kick in again tomorrow and we can get back to work (God, I hope so). Maybe it will be years (I’m told Musketeers, the new big show in the UK, took years and years of torment to bring to the screen).  Maybe it’ll quietly die, and that will suck. You’ll get news (and a name for the show) if and when we get the green light again.

I’ve also been working on something else. I know I’m going to regret this, but *whispers quietly* malicemovie 

*covers ears as a thousand squees echo throughout the troposphere*.

…

…

*takes hands off ears*

Done? Good. Yep, writing a movie of Malice at the moment, a project for Sky Movies with Kudos producing (they of Life on Mars, Spooks, Broadchurch, and more, and more). Currently tapping through the first draft and having a lot of fun with it. But this is at a very early stage right now, and it’s a long, long journey of development, so hold them horses for a while. Right now we don’t know whether it will be a TV movie or a theatrical release, whether it will end up megabudget or minibudget, who will star, or any of a hundred other variables.

But, still, Malice movie, eh? Hehehe.

Broken Sky ebooks: I’m looking into ways to get them done with the proper level of quality that won’t eat up loads of time that I can’t afford to devote to them. This may or may not be possible. I’ll let you know if it is. I know people out there are waiting – some more patiently than others – and they’d love to get their hands on ebook editions of books that were beloved to them in their younger years. I’m genuinely touched by the enthusiasm and devotion to those stories. But I don’t want to release them until I can put them out in the best version I can, and there’s only one of me. So until I can get someone to help me out with them, they’ll have to wait.

I’ve also been talking about an idea for a new YA book with Scholastic. Once I get up and going on that, I’ll let you know more. But it’s in the pipe.

And that’s your lot! Man, I’m exhausted. Time for a restorative game of Thief.

Festive cheer, Yuletide joy, and let’s hope this isn’t the year when dread Nyarlathotep returns from the illimitable vasty dark wherein he dwelleth and devours all our tasty souls.

Santa’s update is scanty this year. Suffice to say that the latter half of 2013 has demonstrated just how slowly things move in the screen world. But with two big projects on the go and several others in the pipe, I’ve been busy at least! As ever, I’ll tell you more when I’m actually sure they’re getting done; in the meantime I shall labour in secret.

Gotta go play in the wrapping paper now. Have a good one!

Just a quick note to let you know that I shall be shambling around WFC 2013 in Brighton from Thu 31st Oct to Sun 3rd Nov (though likely I’ll be hauling my newly cirrhotic carcass back home to London fairly early on Sunday). In among my hectic schedule of dossing about, eating and wandering hither and thither I have generously agreed to make time to appear on a panel:

!!!

Buy, buy, buy, my pretties!!!

Pre-order it here in the UK, or here from overseas.

🙂

Yes, I’ve been away for a long while, haven’t I? First it was Japan & China (and blessedly off the Internet for most of it) and then when I came back I began furiously working oooooon….

Can’t tell you.

Yeah, yeah, sorry. This is more a post to let you know I’m still alive than one with any real news. Basically I’ve been squirrelling away at some TV & film work, but due to the nature of that industry I can’t talk about it, because

a) I’m not supposed to, and

b) even the most sure-thing projects don’t make it to the screen sometimes.

But anyway, it’s all very cool. Trust me on this. Basically, after I finished The Ace of Skulls I decided to take a break from prose work for a while as I was feeling pretty burned out with book writing and fantasy/SF in general. Since then I’ve been much more occupied with doing work for the screen, and it’s been a lot of fun so far, but that industry moves very slowly so I’ll let you know when or if anything gets nailed down. As to books, I don’t have anything in the pipe at the moment, so enjoy Ace of Skulls, as it’ll be your last from me for a little while. In the meantime I’ll reconsider, regroup, plot and plan and decide what kind of book I want to write next.

Speaking of The Ace of Skulls, it’s all done and ready for its 19th September release. Check out the cover. Pretty!

People have been asking about the Broken Sky ebooks too. I’ve been looking at ways to get them done that won’t require a ton of work of my part, but long story short, the editing is taking more time than I have and it was destroying my soul. Maybe I should have just released them as they were, but having polished up half the series it’s hard to leave the rest undone, and even unpolished, self-publishing ebooks is a pain and if I’m going to do it I want to do it properly, not by releasing some badly formatted version with a crappy generic cover on. So, anyway, it’s unfortunately on hold for the moment and I’ll come back to it when I have time (or a personal assistant). Apologies to those who are waiting for it: I should have looked into it more thoroughly before I announced it in the first place.

Also, if you haven’t bought Silver yet, what are you waiting for, eh? You need something to tide you over till 19th Sept!