Happy Christmas! This is the final Compass Points of
the year and we would like to wish every bookseller, publisher and publicist a
fabulous festive season! Here’s a round-up of the publicity highlights for the final
weeks of 2018.
First up is this
beautiful ten-minute film made by BBC Future about Brian May and his
passion for Victorian stereoscopy. It references Queen in 3D and
Mission Moon (which of course have been two of our biggest sellers
this year) and is a genuinely fascinating little documentary. As Robin Rees
publisher at London Stereoscopic
says: “The footage is far higher calibre
than the usual live interviews and if I had to pick one item summarising everything
we are trying to do LSC, this would be it.” Have a watch I think you will
enjoy it!
Another author
this year whose passion for his subject really helped shift those copies was
the wonderful 96-year-old WWII veteran John Martin, whose appearance on The One Show at the end of November sent
A Raid Over Berlin (£8.99, pb, 978 1912681198) straight into the bestseller lists. This engaging and
compulsively readable true-life tale of the airman who cheated death in the
sky, only to face interrogation, the prospect of being shot by the Gestapo, and
months of hardship as a prisoner of war has been a huge and well deserved
success for Parthian – and if you
didn’t see it, you can watch that One
Show interview on the iPlayer here
– it’s 29 minutes in.
The BBC National
Short Story Award 2019 is now opened for submissions, so if you fancy
dashing off an entry over the holiday – then here's where you should submit it! The new judging panel
will be chaired by broadcaster Nikki Bedi, alongside Booker shortlistee Daisy
Johnson and previous winner Cynan Jones, and of course the anthology of all the
shortlisted stories will be published by Comma
next September.
My Bangladesh Kitchen:
Recipes and Food Memories from a Family Table by
Saira Hamilton
(978 0754834502, £20, hb) was a Bookseller
editor’s pick for March saying: "My
cookery choice of the month is this enticing book on the authentic cuisine of
Bangladesh" and this vibrant book published by Lorenz is packed full of Saira’s much-loved
recipes, with everyday classics, regional specialities, street snacks and
impressive celebration food too. There are gorgeous photographs, chatty
anecdotal descriptions of every dish, and an informative introduction
describing the key ingredients and cooking techniques of this land of
contrasts.
Great to see a
poem from Carcanet’s new selection
of Charles
Tomlinson’s poetry, Swimming Chenango Lake (£14.99,
pb, 978 1784106799) chosen as a Guardian Poem
of the Week. You can read it here.
As the Guardian writes: “Tomlinson was a wide-ranging poet. His
technical scope includes free form and more traditional structures, and he is a
master of both. They cohabit enrichingly in Swimming Chenango Lake: a finely
chosen collection for existing enthusiasts and an excellent introduction for
newcomers.”
We’re loving
the antics of the cheeky little Gazelle
elves over on Twitter! Check out their festive fun and games at Gazelle Book Services @Gazellian
Quite a bit of
promo for Jeremy Marchant’s
excellent title Network
Better: How to Meet, Connect and Grow your Business (£12.99, pb, 978
1788600514) which is a very insightful guide to how to conquer any fears you
have about this vital business skill, how to do it better, and how to stop tripping
yourself up. Most books and presentations on networking stick to its
behavioural aspects. But successful networking is also about the successful
initiation and nurturing of relationships with other business people, which
requires emotional intelligence and an understanding of how to apply it. Network Better provides the necessary vision into what’s going on as
well as many tried-and-tested suggestions and encouragements to enable you to
do just that. Jeremy will have an article in Business Works, an interview in Financial
Management, a featured contribution on Emotional
Intelligence & Networking Better in ManageMagazine
/ Biz Catalyst 360, a guest article in HR
News and a feature on the MBA World
Book Club. It was published by Practical
Inspiration this autumn.
If you’d like
to re-connect with your natural side over the festive season, here are two
podcasts to listen to from the Royal
Horticultural Society, both of which feature London’s Street Trees (pb, £12.99, 978 0993291135) by Paul Wood which
is published by Safe Haven. There’s How to help winter wildlife,
unusual street trees and are glittered plants a crime against nature? and also Books Special
2018: Experts pick their favourites old and new, and books for Christmas
presents.
A very
thought-provoking article here
in Stylist by Winnie M Li,
Legend’s author of Dark Chapter (pb,
£7.99, 978 1785079061) entitled A Message
to Everyone Who Dares to Say Women Shouldn’t Travel Alone. Winnie was raped
during a solo trip to Belfast but she refuses to let that incident stop her
from travelling independently. “It
saddens me to think that there may be young women who will not be allowed to
travel now, because of what happened to Grace Millane. We are not meant to live
our lives in fear, shackled by the spectre of “what might happen”. Lots of
things can happen, and the majority of them are good. So get out there,
discover the world, live the life you want to lead. And realise that even if
you travel solo, you’re not alone. There are so many of us women out there
doing the same.”
Most beautiful
book covers ever in 2018? See if you agree with this
selection from Buzz Feed!
Under the Wig (£16.99, hb, 978 1912454082) from Canbury Press continued its stonking
run of superb reviews and stellar sales by being named as one of the best law
and order books of 2018 by the Times
under the heading “Escapism, extortion
and everyday sexism: Put down the papers and indulge your mind during the
Christmas holiday with the best of this year’s law and order books.” You
can see the selection of ten titles here.
There will be
a review of Tentacle (pb,
£8.99, 978 1911508342) by Rita Indiana, translated by Achy Obejas, which has just
been published by And Other Stories
in this Saturday's Guardian Review.
Tentacle
is an electric novel with a big appetite and a brave vision, plunging headfirst
into questions of climate change, technology, Yoruba ritual, queer politics,
poverty, sex, colonialism and contemporary art. Bursting with punk energy and
lyricism, it's a restless, addictive trip.
The Sheffield Telegraph included Comma’s New Uncanny (£7.95, pb, 978 1905583188) anthology
in their Christmas books wish list, saying: "It
might not be a conventional holiday read, but if Christmas starts to get a bit
saccharine, this sounds like the perfect read to cut through it all." You
can read that here.
Super to see a
massive feature for the gorgeous Amber
title Ireland:
The Emerald Isle (hb, 978 1782746560 £19.99) in the Daily Mail last week, saying: “Here's something we can ALL agree on about
Ireland – it's beautiful! Jaw-dropping pictures capture the Emerald Isle's
landscape in all its glory.” You can have a look at a selection of the 150 pictures
which the Mail correctly describes as
“mesmerising” here.
Congratulations
to debut Palestinian author Nayrouz Qarmout who
has made World Literature Today’s
list of 75
Notable Translations of 2018! The Sea Cloak (£9.99,
pb, 978-1905583782) her first short story collection (translated from Arabic
into English) will be published by Comma
in February 2019. You can find the full list of all the notable translations here.
“If you are told you’re something often
enough, you begin to believe it. Eventually, you become it. Racism can
institutionalize not only the person being racist but the person on the
receiving end . . . racism imprisons you and it’s incredibly difficult to
escape.” A really interesting piece here
in the Irish Times, looking at
the increasing awareness of racism in 2018 on the terraces and asking if it is very
different to the experiences of Howard Gayle, Liverpool’s first black footballer
in the 70s and 80s, with reference to what it calls “one of the most under-the-radar sports books of the past few years, 61 Minutes In
Munich (hb, £16.99, 978 1909245396).”
It’s published by de Coubertin.
Everyone loves
a bit of Disney at Christmas, right? So this is a good moment to tell you about
How to Read
Donald Duck: Imperialist Ideology in the Disney Comic by Ariel Dorfman and Armand Mattelart (978 0745339788, £14.99, pb) which is out from Pluto next March. First published in
1971, How to
Read Donald Duck shocked readers by
revealing how capitalist ideology operates in our most beloved cartoons. Having
survived bonfires, and being dumped into the ocean by the Chilean army, this
controversial book is certain to ruffle feathers (see what I did there) and
examines how the hapless mice and ducks of Disney, curiously parentless,
marginalised and always short of cash, not only reflect capitalist ideology,
but are active agents working in this ideology's favour. How to Read Donald Duck is a devastating document of twentieth-century
political upheaval and a reminder of the dark undercurrent of pop culture. Ariel Dorfman,
who has written a new introduction for this edition, has been getting some good
publicity already – there’s an author article in the Guardian here
and an interview here
on Democracy Now.
And if you’d like to see a bit of Donald daftness – without worrying too much
about its imperialist undertones – then this is for you; Donald Duck’s Snow Fight, from 1942.
Happy Christmas!
This weekly blog is written for the UK
book trade. If you would like to order any of the titles mentioned, then please
talk to your Compass Sales Manager, or call the Compass office on 020 8326
5696. Every Friday an e-newsletter containing highlights from the blog is sent
out to over 700 booksellers – and if you’d like to receive this then please
contact nuala@compass-ips.london
