Thing is, you're allowed to bin your own copy of a book, even if you work at Waterstones. If you want to bin my book because you hate me...that's OK! I won't get you fired. I feel like I'm inviting a big conflagration of my books, but you know what? I still won't get you fired.
You think you're a normal, well-balanced person, but then your copyedit comes along, you find someone's messing with your hyphens and they don't understand Ironic Capital Letters, and it turns out you're a howling demon person who wants to start Armageddon.
Last year I thought my career was over. My last publisher rejected a novel I'd worked on for years (sequel to Valery K), and said they were finished with me. I was on submission with a sci fi book I thought no one would buy (despite the very cool mammoths). Now...!!
Instead of making everyone do maths until they're 18, I reckon it would be much better to say everyone can do another degree for free once they're 35. What would yours be? I'd be signing straight up for Modern Chinese.
OK, I went to Oxford. I knew people like Boris. They were always turnips. The tutors demonstrated how to deal with them. Talk over them with facts. Don't feel it's rude. Don't be shy. Wield your specificity like the fucking Vorpal Sword, make turnip stew, move on with your day.
To celebrate the paperback release of The Haunting Season, I have a copy to give away! RT and tag a friend who might like ghost stories for a chance to win. Winner announced TOMORROW (Sept 30th) 12 noon UK time. Worldwide.
#HauntingSeason
It's finally getting cold! To celebrate, here is the cover of The Lost Future of Pepperharrow, which is about snow, and ghosts, and a certain octopus who is still alive and well.
#MoriIsMissing
Cat Ward
@Catrionaward
has written a book called The Last House on Needless Street, and it is the BEST HORROR NOVEL I HAVE EVER READ.
Even Shirley Jackson, her Majesty, would have to concede to this one.
I. Joke. Not.
A lady came up to me in a cafe today and said hello, are you Natasha, and I went yes, (oh God have I dropped some embarrassing piece of correspondence on the floor?) and she said, I just wanted to say I love your books
and now I'm DEAD 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭
The proofs are here! 🐙And I'm giving one away.🐙 For a chance to win, RT (and follow) with a quick note about what you're reading right now. Worldwide: winners announced 12 noon Sunday, UK time.
The Mars House is out today! This is me posing by fire extinguishers, ready to put out the INFERNO of enthusiasm I expect will ensue!! (would be v happy with a modest stove fire of passing superficial interest though)
Me: So, um, I've written a sci fi book, and I'm super proud of it and they've bought it in the US and I know it's really hard to sell sci fi but possibly...?
Entire UK Publishing Industry: Get. In. The. Bin.
Me: *closes lid of trash can over own head, weeping*
Thank you everyone who borrowed my books from libraries! I just got some lovely unexpected money from libraries because of it. Writers earn a tiny bit every time you borrow a book, and if enough people use libraries, it adds up. Writers: remember to sign up for PLR!
Honestly, you write a book full of suffering and death and an exploding lady, but you put in ONE scene where a guy shoots a tortoise as a time-travel experiment and BANG, it's all Pulley, You Have Crossed A Line.
There's a happy octopus in the next one, I promise.
Lovely agent humans: is anyone looking out for very beautiful literary fiction at the moment? I have a student who's written the most stupendous novel, she's won a university prize for it and everything, but she's struggling to place it. Think Sayako Murata in the Netherlands...
NEWS. Remember that bananas Mars book I was terrified about? The one with mammoths in?
It's got a brand new home with Gollancz
@gollancz
in the UK, and Bloomsbury US
@BloomsburyPub
. It's called The Mars House. Out Spring 2024!🦣🦣🦣🦣
Tilly is an AMAZING bookseller; she's helped so many writers find so many readers and what's happened to her is awful. All of us should be allowed to have moral disagreements without being fired. Please indie bookshops, hire her immediately!
Hey
#BookTwitter
. I think you hopefully all know I generally try to keep this a positive space, but I can’t really put a positive spin on how I feel right now.
My heart is broken, and I’m so disappointed in a company who won’t forgive a single mistake like this.
Slightly freaking out that having spent my whole career writing historical fiction it is now the act of a SILLY FOOL to set a new thing on Mars and everyone will punish me. Pat me on the head please?
I have just approved the final cover for The Half Life of Valery K, which I THINK means it's being printed imminently!
If you want it fast: try a physical book shop. They'll put it on the shelves as soon as they have it - often a bit before the actual publication day.
Have submitted my strange Dionysus book that I've been working on for years and now don't know what to do with myself, or who this Natasha person is anyway. Wine, though right? Wine must be correct.
Today is my birthday! I'm 33. I can confirm that 33 is an excellent age, and everyone should hurry along to get here if you haven't been already. I'm setting up a little happy tent, but I'm also looking forward to turning (one day if in luck) into Windswept Silvery Academic.
This is a short story collection. Short story collections usually sell minus eight copies to the authors’ families, who then secretly return everything. This is nuuuuuts!
I know I’m such a dork, but I started learning classical Greek in September and now it’s why I get up in the mornings. I love it and it’s helping so much with Mystery Dionysus Book and MAYBE I’ll be good enough to read poetry soon yeeeessss
It's Halloween soon, and chilly weather is coming, and so is The Winter Spirits! It's a collection of ghost stories by a whole bunch of writers, including me, and I am SO PLEASED WITH MINE. And look at the precious. I mean. Really. Why haven't you preordered it yet.
Right! Next year, I'll have a book out about a scientist who is taken suddenly and without explanation to a mysterious secret facility in Russia. It used to be called The Rust Country. Now, after much discussion, it has a new title: The Half Life of Valery K.
So I've been on Bumble (I know, shut up, I'm very lonely) but what's encouraging is how many people want me to have my own eyebrows; like, it's mentioned specifically. And I do. I do have my own eyebrows. I'm feeling unexpectedly good about my eyebrows now.
HAH. Time for the immensely smug I've-got-my-orange-banner-tweet and I am NOT sorry, I worked bloody hard on this book and now I shall caper around like Gollum for the remainder of the day. *capers*
Sarah Perry
@sarahgperry1
gave me some really expensive makeup, which I (a saint) shared with my brother.
Later, he marched with huge purpose into Waterstones, pointed to The Essex Serpent, and said with PALPABLE glee to random passersby, 'I'm wearing her bronzer.'
Have sent off the final Pepperharrow notes. There will be UK proofs soon.
Very soon therefore, some lucky people here will be introduced ahead of time to House Mori's ancestral home in Yokohama, where there lives a mysterious woman called Mrs Pepperharrow...
Watch. This. Space.
Right, I have 100,000 words of this project now and I am staring at it with INCREASING FEAR.
Mars. Gender abolished. There's a mighty dust storm. And a murder. And a huge glamorous romance where nought is as it seems.
See?
C19th historical fiction it is not.
FEAR.
I have TWO signed hardback copies of The Lost Future of Pepperharrow to give away! For a chance to get your hands on one, RT, follow, and tell me your favourite ghost story with hashtag
#Pepperharrow
👻
Open worldwide; winners announced 10am on Friday (UK time)
Tee hee hee hee I have good news regarding a book that WILL INCLUDE:
-an actual real life octopus who sometimes changes the television channel to his liking;
-many radioactive things;
-MYSTERIES
*wibbly fingers*
The second I walked into Waterstones Piccadilly today for our Winter Spirits event someone recognised me and gave me a present with a red velvet octopus on it 😭😭😭😭😭😭
Also I would like to showcase my Special Swansea Dress. Dresses are very important to the whole writing/publishing process as all professionals will tell you.
The hardbacks are here! And I have one to give away! For a chance to win it (signed of course), follow me (if you don't already) and RT with a recommendation for a book (not mine!) that you're really looking forward to this year.
Worldwide; winners announced Sunday noon UK time.
I'm RTing this because although I love Bedlam, and Peru, and the Quechua fairytales the story is based on, the book didn't do well, and I spent a long time being deeply ashamed that I missed all those people who liked Watchmaker. It's amazing to know it stuck with someone.
just so we're clear, it's been literally 4 years since i first read THE BEDLAM STACKS by
@natasha_pulley
& i am still absolutely not over That Ending™, it devastated me in the most beautiful of ways
The paperbacks are here! I have two copies of The Half Life of Valery K to give away: for a chance to win, RT with a book recommendation for anything you really enjoyed lately.
Winners announced 12 noon tomorrow UK time. Worldwide.
I have sent three chapters of a new project to my agent.
But no pressure, I have an awesome back up plan.
My career does not hang on this.
I am calm and everything is rainbow unicorns*.
*Several of these are villainous lies.
Oh GOD I just made bread by hand and it was HORRENDOUS, there was a clear fifteen minutes where I certain I'd made quicksand, and then maybe a black hole, and it ATE MY ARM, it's the worst thing that's ever happened to me and I've been rammed by a goat.
Do you love inventive, original, charming & ever so slightly quirky historical fantasy? Then do we have a treat for you - it’s the sequel to
@natasha_pulley
’s brilliant The Watchmaker of Filigree Street!
🐙 🇯🇵 ❄️ 🗡 🏔
Authors, if you would like a proof, do let me know!
Valery K is now published in the UK and this is traditionally a rubbish time for writers as we await The Verdict so I am in Greece this time and pretending to be Queen of Troy. I have like 5 pedalos rather than 1000 ships but it’s great.
Err; the New. York. Times. Books.
I shall waft through the day on a cloud of literary smugness, it will be very annoying, but you will just have to put up with it, sorry.
In Natasha Pulley's novel "The Kingdoms," England has been annexed by the French, the result of Britain's decisive loss in the Napoleonic Wars. But there may be a way to change history.
If anybody has read Watchmaker over lockdown and liked it, could I very shyly draw your attention to the sequel, which is out now. It's set four years on. Thaniel and Mori go to Japan, where the ghosts are waiting.
It’s here! I have ONE copy of The Mars House (American cover) to give away: RT with your best sci fi recommendation for a chance to win! Worldwide, winner announced this Sunday 12 noon GMT. Good luck!
#MarsHouse
The Half Life of Valery K has not one but TWO covers: one UK, one US. Here is the excellent US version, out in July (watch this space for the UK answer...):
The Kingdoms is out in May 2021 -- BUT, it is also RIGHT NOW on netgalley. It's well worth checking at your local bookshop a few weeks before pub date too, because they get stock in really fast. And on here, because sometimes I have spare books to give people :)
For those of you who might not have seen earlier: I have TWO signed paperback copies of Pepperharrow to give away. For a chance to win one, follow me if you don't already, and RT with any book recommendation you have for the spring!
Worldwide: winners announced 12pm GMT Feb 26th
Last night, two people waited after my event in Ely to give me this INCREDIBLE pamphlet of fan art from a whole group of artists, plus a card full of personal messages. I still can't believe it. The pictures are just fantastic (thread):
If you're looking for a Christmas present for a Readerly Person who perhaps enjoys lighthouses, time travel, and sailing; the hardback of The Kingdoms is rather good-looking. Just saying.
I say this as a person who isn't scared of anything, including getting in fights with big men and traipsing round the world alone. What is happening in the US is wake-up-in-the-night terrifying. Being forced to give birth is torture. It's why we write horror movies about it.
Just got my PLR statement: thank you everyone who borrowed my books from libraries! You might not know this, but the writer gets about 13p every time someone borrows a book...which is better than if you buy it in a £1 sale online. Writers: remember to register!
A small tip: usually, bookstores get their stock in early, well before publication date, and so unless there's an embargo on the book, it tends to be out in shops a week or so before the official date. I believe Pepperharrow has been seen in the wild already.
Hint.
Hint.
😎