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Bluemoose Author Stars At Film Festival

An award-winning film, co-written by Bluemoose author, Socrates Adams, is due to be screened at the Belfast Film Festival in April.

Shot on a budget of £400, Wizard’s Way concerns Julian ‘Windows’ Andrews, the world’s most celebrated player of an old, dated computer game. But when Compusoft delete the game, life for ‘Windows’ and his sidekick Barry Tubbulb will be changed for ever. It is also a detailed, absorbing look at the correct beef-to-bread ratio in hamburgers.

Director, Metal Man, said: ‘We hope Wizard’s Way demonstrates that if you have a good idea, some likeable characters and a lot of spare time at the weekends, you can make a feature film without any external support or funding.’

With good fortune, but unbeknown to the writers and directors as to how, they secured the services of Sadie Frost in a cameo role.

Wizard’s Way won Best Comedy Feature at the 2012 London Independent Film Festival, and is the 2013 winner of the Discovery Award at the London Comedy Film Festival.

The film screens at the Belfast Film Festival on April 14^th. http://belfastfilmfestival.ticketsolve.com/shows/873491879/events

Socrates Adams has also written a novel for Bluemoose Books, a humorous punch at today’s celebrity culture. A Modern Family features TV’s most popular car show presenter, who has the perfect job, but not the perfect family, which he watches disintegrate around him, unable to control anything that is not scripted.

Kevin Duffy, of Bluemoose Books, said: ‘A Modern Family looks at how obsessed we are as viewers and readers of celebrity culture, its all-consuming take on who and what we are becoming, and the catastrophic effects it has when we realise all is not well in the orange coloured world of celebrity.’

A Modern Family will be published on 25^th July.

It isn't just everyone at BLUEMOOSE BOOKS that thinks NOD by Adrian Barnes is Brilliant, the people at The Guardian think so too. 

NOD  by Adrian Barnes is 'BRILLIANT' and 'OUSTANDING'  THE GUARDIAN  MARCH 9th

There is a brilliant review in The Guardian today, March 9th of NOD by Adrian Barnes, a Canadian author we published last November. Eric Brown, the reviewer, amongst other things says of NOD, that it is 'BRILLIANT' and OUSTANDING. That'll do me. Anyway here's the review. Very pleased. Hopefully the rest of the universe will now pick up Adrian's book and read what I and the Guardian fella think is a cracking read and one, I've bet my house on this one, that WILL become a classic.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2013/mar/08/science-fiction-roundup-reviews?INTCMP=SRCH

In the main newspaper there is also a picture of the great jacket, the image is courtesy of Italian artist, Alessandro Bavari.

 Off to email the world and his brother and sister and tweet like a rabid Blackbird.

Cheers

Kevin.

Coming Soon - A Modern Family

One of the great things about publishing books is finding great new talent and in Socrates Adams, I’m convinced we’ve found it. We are publishing A MODERN FAMILY by Socrates in July. His novel looks at how a celebrity TV pundit from a number one ranking show about cars, speed and swarfega, deals with fame and how he lives his life according to the rules of celebrity, or what he deems those rule are whilst his family disintegrates around him. It is very funny, acerbic, poignant and illustrative of what is happening in our celebrity fuelled society. Socrates has also written, along with fellow authors, Joe Stretch and Chris Killen, a film called WIZARD’S WAY, which has just won The LOCO’s, THE LONDON COMEDY AWARD, for best new film. Socrates also stars in it too. They had the premier at the end of January at The BFI in London. It goes on general release in APRIL.

And so, back to A MODERN FAMILY. A very important aspect of publishing any book is getting the jacket cover spot on. The jacket has to ask a dramatic question and convey to the reader what the book is about. THE BOOKSELLER’S ASSOCIATION did a survey a few years back which stated that a book cover has a fifth of a second, 0.2 of a second, to catch the eye of the casual book browser. So, it has to do its job in such a short space of time and stand out amongst all the other hundreds of books on display, it has to be striking. We spend a lot of time with our designers, authors and editors getting what we think are the best possible jacket treatments for our books and we hope we’ve done it again with A MODERN FAMILY. We also like to think our books pass the ‘Strokeability test.’  Our books are never shiny, always matt, and feel good to hold. A book is for life, not just for a Kindle.  Once the browser has one of our books in their hands and strokes it, we hope they’ll read the blurb on the back, then turn to page one and……BUY IT.

Socrates is making a film for the launch, which you’ll be able to see nearer publication. It will be funny because Socrates has been called, ‘ A 21st Century Alan Partridge but with a beard.’ And well, he is just a funny man. With a beard.

The designer of the jacket, Stuart Brill, used to design for PENGUIN and so he has a legacy of brilliant designs behind him and here for A MODERN FAMILY, he’s come up trumps again with a jacket that I hope you will like.

And you can see the jacket here:

A MODERN FAMILY by Socrates Adams published by Bluemoose Books on July 25 th 2013.

...also in the Guardian

You know what it's like, you get very little newspaper publicity for what feels like an eternity, then two articles come along almost at the same time.

Late last year we had something in the Yorkshire Post, basically a round up of what we got up to in 2012.  It was a great article and we were very pleased to be featured.  That article explained our attempts to muscle in on the "50 Shades of Grey" action by announcing our plans for a biography of Christian Grey.  This was picked up by the national press and before you know it we were in The Guardian and the story was re-tweeted several times with international interest.  

Publicity like this is really important to a small indie like us.  We haven't got big budgets to promote our books and authors, in fact, let me re-phrase that, we haven't even got small budgets to promote our books, so free publicity like newspaper articles and our loyal readers talking about us on Twitter and Facebook is vital.  Thank you to everyone who follows us and talks about us - you are our marketing department!

Here's The Guardian article if you're interested:

The Fifty Shades of Grey biography that wasn't

 

A bumper year for the Moose

A version of this post first appeared in the Yorkshire Post on 28/12/12

2012 was a year in which whips and handcuffs played a major role, not merely in trying to secure an overdraft from my bank manager.  It was the year of EL James and ‘Fifty Shades of Grey,’ and the role Bluemoose Books played in this worldwide phenomenon. 

Publishing is fickle and when the royally related contours of one’s buttocks can secure a £400,000 advance for Pippa Middleton, I decided it wasn’t enough just to publish great stories from here in Hebden Bridge but to jump onto the bandwagon that was ‘erotica.’  So I sent off a press release to The Bookseller magazine and told them Bluemoose Books had secured the worldwide rights to the unauthorised biography of Christian Grey.  They published the story and also put it up onto their website. Within an hour I had 19 European publishers asking to buy rights, a literary agent from Warner Bros and Simon and Schuster, one of the biggest publishers in the world wanted to acquire North American rights.  The world had gone mad.  One problem, we didn’t have a book. In fact nobody at Moose Towers had read Fifty Shades.  Hetha bought it and read it on the train going down to London whilst texting the outline of the story to one of our authors who fired off the first three chapters in an afternoon.  The publishers and Hollywood were delighted.  Now given the global interest, the print run would be in the 100’000’s.  We didn’t have the cash; neither did the bank manager who was still trussed up after a previous visit.  I contacted a major publisher.  Fifteen minutes later I got a phone call from the publisher stating that corporate lawyers from EL James’s publishers Random House in New York plus her agent were sharpening their quills, donning their horse hair wigs, ready to fire off letters to Bluemoose Books ordering me to desist immediately.  The litigious vultures were circling. Apparently it was ‘passing off,’ i.e. copyright infringement.  My dream of untold wealth had been scuppered and I didn’t even have a royally related backside to fall back on.

However, the reason I re-mortgaged the house in the first place was to publish great stories.  This year we have sold rights to three of our books to Russia, Hungary and Bulgaria.  FALLING THROUGH CLOUDS by Anna Chilvers came out in Russia this October, and KING CROW by Bradford writer Michael Stewart is published in Russia and Bulgaria next year followed by Hungary in 2014.  GABRIEL’S ANGEL by Mark Radcliffe is published in Russia next year too.  We had a national review in one of the broadsheets, The Guardian for PIG IRON by Benjamin Myers, a brilliant young writer whose book is being read by Hollywood as I type.  It is a truly remarkable story of a traveller who hasn’t travelled; a young man fighting for his surname and his very survival.  We are also in negotiations with one of the world’s biggest TV/Film producers regarding STOP DON’T READ THIS by Leonora Rustamova and Stephen Clayton’s debut novel THE ART OF BEING DEAD is now a set text on the Leeds Metropolitan University MA English Literature course.  All of our titles are now available on KINDLE and the ebook is transforming the industry.  Our authors continue to attend book clubs, library events and festivals and although the world didn't end on 21st December, Bluemoose published a dystopian novel called NOD by Adrian Barnes, a Canadian author being compared to the great John Wyndham.

Books are transformative and here at Bluemoose we’re publishing stories that are travelling across the border into Lancashire, down to London and around the world.  We’ve proved you don’t have to be in London to succeed.  Dr. Johnson was wrong; I tired of London and found the landscape of Yorkshire far more conducive to publish terrific stories and post deluvian life in Hebden is wonderful.

Big Issue in the North bonanza

We've been really lucky this month with coverage of our books and authors in The Big Issue in the North.  

In their Shelf Space section they asked some leading authors to recommend their favourite reads.  Amongst the authors are two of our very own, Benjamin Myers and Michael Stewart.  Both Pig Iron and NOD get a mention in this article.  It's also available to read online here:

Big Issue Shelf Space

In the magazine itself there is a Q&A with our Canadian author Adrian Barnes.  Why not make a vendor's day and buy a copy?

My latest rant

Even if you visit this blog irregularly, you will know that I am not one to mince my words when it comes to my thoughts on publishing.  I'm also not shy and don't confine my thoughts to these pages.  

Recently, Galley Beggar Press, a new and upcoming independent publisher from Norfolk asked me to write a few words about Bluemoose Books - it turned into a bit of a rant.  Read it here: 

Galley Beggar guest post

New author performs magic on film

In July next year we will be publishing a book called A MODERN FAMILY by writer Socrates Adams Florou.  We are excited about working with Socrates and started the editing process this week.  I'm sure you'll hear lots more from us about him and his book in the coming months.

Today Socrates had some amazing news about a film he has co-written with writers Joe Stretch and Chris Killen.  He also has a starring role.  The film called WIZARD'S WAY follows two friends who play a wizard simulator game.  The great news is that the film has just won the LOCO London Discovery Award, an annual prize for a British comedy feature film that does not yet have distribution.

You can see a trailer at http://www.savewizardsway.com/ or follow the action on twitter either @socratesadams or @savewizardsway

Well done to all involved!

Bookshop tour with Adrian Barnes

Sorry It's taken a while to get round to this...

A few weeks ago we packed our bags and embarked on a whirlwind tour of the bookshops of Yorkshire and Lancashire with our author Adrian Barnes to help get his debut novel NOD off to a flying start.  Here are some photos to whet your appetite for a more complete write up of the tour.

Adrian reading at The Book Case, Hebden Bridge

Adrian signing books at Waterstones, Blackpool 

Adrian & Kevin taking a break!

A fan so desperate for a signature
in his book, he ran down the high street
in Blackpool to catch up with Adrian