As her latest Jackson Brodie thriller comes out, the award-winning author discusses cosy crime, sniffy critics, and how she investigated her own family’s secretsKate Atkinson has an idea for a fun side-hustle: at some point in the future, when she’s done with the second world war, and with her jaded private eye, Jackson Brodie, she’ll bring to life the creative projects that have hitherto existed only as facets of her characters’ lives. She’ll take the fortune teller Madame Astarti from her third novel, Emotionally Weird, and put her at the centre of her own series of mysteries; she’ll conjure up a script for Green Acres, the rural soap opera that features in her two short-story collections, 2002’s Not the End of the World and last year’s Normal Rules Don’t Apply; she’ll craft episodes of the TV police procedural Collier, in which Brodie’s one-time girlfriend Julia played a pathologist. And finally, she’ll flesh out the breathtakingly hammy murder mystery that a cast of clapped-out actors perform at Burton Makepeace, the stately home that is the setting for her new Jackson Brodie novel, Death at the Sign of the Rook.Writing these scenes – teeming with aristocrats, actors, Russian countesses, clergymen and a “fastidious little Swiss detective” – were Atkinson’s treat, she tells me, as she constructed the novel during lockdown. “I would have done so much more of that,” she explains, as we sit sipping coffee in a studiedly antiquated hotel near her home in Edinburgh. “But I... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2024-08-10 08:00:37 UTC ]
The author of "World War Z" and "The Harlem Hellfighters" says it's okay to have over 200 drafts. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2014-05-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The existence of the D-notice (aka DA-notice) committee is under threat, reports the Sunday Times. It cites sources who say some officials in the Ministry of Defence, which is considering a review of the system, want to fold the committee into the new press regulator or place it within the MoD's... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2014-01-26 00:00:00 UTC ]
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My friend Paul Westlake, who has died of cancer aged 65, was a pillar of the radical publishing world from the mid-1970s onwards. He was an advocate of workers' co-operatives and gained much experience in ensuring that the output of independent publishers reached the bookshops.In autumn 1976,... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2013-11-24 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Hutchinson has acquired a new anthology of life-writing from and about the First World War,... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2013-11-12 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The Bookseller is to run a category preview on First World War titles in the issue of 13th... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2013-07-18 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Oscar season is over, which means one thing: it’s on to the summer blockbusters. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2013-03-29 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The embattled St. Mark's Bookshop has a new defender. Lucky Ant, a year-old, hyper-local crowd-funding platform, is helping the 35-year-old East Village literary landmark raise the money it needs to move to a cheaper location. The online campaign, at Luckyant.com, launched Wednesday at midnight,... Continue reading at Crains New York
[ Crains New York | 2012-07-26 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The History Press has signed The First World War in 100 Objects by battlefield specialist Peter... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2012-05-25 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Andrew Martins First World War novel The Somme Stations (Faber) has won this years... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2011-12-01 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Orbit has acquired a fantasy retelling of the events of the Second World War by American author... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2011-11-23 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Written By: Charlotte Williams Publication Date: Fri, 07/10/2011 - 10:59 Penguin has acquired a diary written during the Second World War by a teenage concentration camp internee, striking a deal directly with the author at her home in Prague. Viking publishing director Venetia Butterfield... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2011-10-07 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Publication Date: Thu, 23/06/2011 - 05:28 Aurum Press has bought a biography about the service that monitored and intercepted the German military's radio traffic during the Second World War. Publisher Graham Coster bought world English language rights to The Secret Listeners by Sinclair McKay... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2011-06-22 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Written By: Charlotte Williams Publication Date: Mon, 13/06/2011 - 15:17 Allison & Busby has acquired two books by crime writer Jacqueline Winspear, with the author moving from John Murray to the independent. Publishing director Susie Dunlop bought UK and Commonwealth rights (excluding... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2011-06-13 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Written By: Graeme Neill Publication Date: Tue, 22/03/2011 - 16:31 The Japanese earthquake and tsunami has caused the worst disruption to the Japanese book industry since the Second World War, the president of the Japanese Publishers Association has said. read more Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2011-03-22 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Written By: Charlotte Williams Publication Date: Thu, 17/02/2011 - 12:05 Pan Macmillan has acquired a biography of the first woman to work as a British secret agent in the Second World War, outbidding Penguin at auction. Editorial director Georgina Morley bought UK and British Commonwealth... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2011-02-17 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Written By: Charlotte Williams Hodder & Stoughton has acquired the account of the life of "real life Charlotte Gray". Pearl Witherington was the only female agent in the Special Operations Executive to run her own network in France during the second world war. Hodder non-fiction publisher... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2011-01-27 00:00:00 UTC ]
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