Alex Bell – fantasy author

Regular readers of my blog will know that about once a year I grudgingly praise another writer’s work. I do not like to do it too often because I am greedy and grasping, and I despise the thought of people out there spending hard-earned money on books that were not penned by me. But every now and then, I enjoy reading a book so much that it enables me to rise above my natural, in-built pettiness.

So, up next is Tome of the Undergates – from the Next Big Thing ™, Mister Sam Sykes:

I think we can all agree that this cover is wicked, and the man on it is sexy as anything, and the water is . . . well . . . sort of mesmerising. It’s also a very big book (600 pages plus), and, as Amanda at Floor to Ceiling Books has already pointed out, if you were so inclined, you could, feasibly, beat a man to death with this thing. I don’t like to put it too close to any of my books because it makes me feel insecure, and I start wondering whether my efforts are just novellas, rather than actual novels . . .

Anyway, there are, basically, three main reasons why I love Tome:

1. The monsters. Heretofore (eek! I just said ‘heretofore’! The ol’ legal training creeps in when you least expect it!) – heretofore, I would have said that the estimable Chris Wooding was the undisputed king of fantasy monsters, but now I would have to say that Chris and Sam are pretty much on a level with each other on this, for there are several really cracking monsters in Tome. I don’t want to give any juicy details away, but the highlight for me were the Omens – these creepy monsters with bodies of birds, and heads of old women who parrot the words of dying men.
2. I have a special soft spot for characters who are at least a little bit mad/unstable/unhinged etc. Anyone who’s read The Ninth Circle will know this to be true (see what I did there? Sneakily got the post back onto my books, ah ha). And Lenk, who is the leader (in the loosest sense) of the mismatched band of adventurers in Tome, is haunted by a voice inside his head that only he can hear. More often than not, this urges him on to greater bloodshed and so on. It’s not clear where this voice comes from, or what its purpose is, but I’m an absolute sucker for this sort of internal conflict.
3. The similes. I know it seems a bit of an odd thing to highlight, but they really jumped out at me all the way through the book. From now on, I might have to refer to Sam as the King of Similes (he is, after all, yet to be christened by me with an appropriate nickname). I’ve never complimented an author on similes before – that’s how freakin’ great they are.

In addition, I think I would probably enjoy any adventure story that involved a rich fantasy world; a band of companions who are constantly at each other’s throats; and a heck of a lot of blood and gore. It’s true: I like my fantasy novels to be just a little bit filthy (hence my gushing love for anything written by Mr Abercrombie).

So for anyone looking for a thoroughly entertaining read, I would whole-heartedly recommend Tome. Sam is also an active Twitterer (is this a word?), but please don’t follow him because he already has more Twitter followers than me, despite having been around for only a fraction of the time, and that just isn’t right. Perhaps if I made my tweets a bit angrier, I would get a sudden influx of followers . . . ?

Finally, and most vitally, I must add that whilst Mr Sykes may write books that practically eclipse mine in size, my dog could eat his dog in one bite, because Moose is a Great Dane, and Sam is the owner of a teensy-tiny, ludicrously adorable pug by the name of Otis who, I believe, is soon to feature on the shiny new Gollancz blog.

Tome is released in the UK on 15th April, available in all good bookstores, etc etc.

I realised it’s been a while since I did a Wunderkammer post, and as I don’t want the blog to be lacking in weird stuff, here I shall present not one, but two, instances of weirdness.

Number One – the Mastodon:

 As you can see, it is both shrivelled and dead. Obviously, therefore, I love it. I found this mastodon whilst heading an archaeological dig in the wild jungles of Peru. Now Seth, as I like to call him, keeps my shrivelled mermaid and shrivelled bigfoot company. There is a fourth member of their little gang, but I will write about him another time.

Number Two – Erin’s New Hat:

This is Erin’s new hat. My Mum recently went on a trip to Marrakech, and she bought this for him in one of the markets there. That’s how cool my Mum is – when she goes on holiday she brings back presents for me, and for my skeleton. And it was perfect timing too because Erin was becoming bored with his Victorian top hat, and had taken to trying to put it on the Siamese, which she dislikes. And an unhappy Siamese makes for an unhappy human. Now, because of the hat, we are all happy, and living together in harmony once again. Soon, Erin will own more hats than I do. I spoil my skeleton almost as much as I spoil my Great Dane. Moose has a hat too. Here she is wearing it on her birthday:

So make that three instances of weirdness.

Oh yes, we are all mad here.

I currently include a hedgehog in my varied menagerie because it seems that my Great Dane has something seriously wrong with her lips – in that she has no feeling in them. I caught her a few weeks ago running around the garden tossing the hedgehog around, apparently in the belief that it was a spiky ball. I got it off her and, fortunately, it did not appear to be hurt. But it was seriously underweight, and the hedgehog rescue people told me that it would be unable to survive hibernating as a result. I therefore have to look after the hedgehog until it warms up in the spring, at which point I can let it go.

I have been calling the hedgehog Spiky Harold, which has got me thinking about the original Spiky Harold. For those who don’t know, Spiky Harold is a fiendishly difficult retro computer game back from the days when computers didn’t have mice. It’s the first computer game I can remember and, even now, just hearing the name of it gives me that childish excited feeling. Having said that, my brother and I could never get very far on it before poor Harold got killed.

But after Spiky Harold came the Sega. I know 99.999% of gamers will probably deride me for saying so, but I regard the Sega as by far the best games console. These were games that you could just sit down and play without having to spend hours and hours and hours practicing first. The original Sonic, for example – absolutely loved it. Spent many happy hours battling Dr Robotnik and co. But a while back I tried to play a new Sonic races game with my brother on his Playstation 2, and I couldn’t even finish the race. Stupid bloody New Sonic kept running off the edge of a cliff, damn him.

My eight year old cousin got a Wii for Christmas, and when I saw her playing on this recently I was like ‘jeepers!’ It all looks so complicated! A far cry from the pick-up-and-play games of yester-year. And I can’t help but lament the decline of the Sega because for people like me – who are not hard-core gamers but wouldn’t mind whiling away an hour every now and then – we need games we can just plug in and play. Things like old Sonic and the absolutely tremendous Castle of Illusion.

Perhaps the new games have better graphics, and the remote controllers vibrate now and all the rest of it, but I will always prefer the Sega, and I miss that clunky old games console even now. I could actually beat my brother in the occasional Sonic race or Bloody Roar battle back then (which infuriated him, and made me feel tremendously good about myself). Now if I ever try to play a game with him on one of these modern consoles, I get pitifully thrashed within minutes. Seconds, even. If I want to play a computer game now, it’s pretty much a question of tetris or nothin’. And – let’s face it – there’s only so much tetris a person can play before they get the urge to kill someone. So my plan is for the shops to scrap all this PS3/Wii/X-Box nonsense and just bring back the good ol’ Sega. Games ain’t so much fun when you have to spend hours perfecting your technique before you can even start. It was all so much better in my day . . .

This is the exciting tale of Smith and the Snow Hounds. A story of snow, stealth, Siameses and sinister plots. You have never heard a legend quite like this one. Once upon a time . . .

This is Smith:

These are the Snow Hounds:

This is the Evil Siamese, who has just ordered the Snow Hounds to find Smith and destroy him:

The Snow Hounds were shocked, but as the Evil Siamese must be obeyed in all things, they set out on their daring mission to find Smith and defeat him. The Black Snow Hound was the bravest but the Spotty Snow Hound – as shown in the second picture – was able to levitate at will by flapping her ears. Together, they made a formidable team. They travelled many miles through harsh and terrible terrain, sometimes going for days without food or sleep:

Carrying huge and fearsome weapons with them as they travelled:

Until, finally, after many months of weary searching, the Black Snow Hound discovered Smith’s Lair:

And the White Snow Hound pulled off Smith’s nose and ate it - effectively stripping the snowman of all his powers:

The Snow Hounds returned to the Evil Siamese’s Castle in triumph:

And the Evil Siamese slept well that night, safe in the knowledge that her enemy had been defeated:

And they all lived happily ever after, except for Smith.

The End.

Cast:

Black Snow Hound: Loki

Spotty Snow Hound: Moose

Evil Siamese: Suki

Smith: As Himself.

Pretty good, innit? I ought to go into the novel-writing business . . .

‘Everything should taste like bacon.’

It’s hard to argue with that, I feel. But, as a vegetarian, this obviously presents me with something of a dilemma. Imagine my delight, therefore, when I received this for Christmas:

It is bacon flavoured mayonnaise! Why was this not invented before? You can smother it on anything! I have eaten it with jacket potatoes, pizza, veggie sausages, sandwiches . . . in fact, so far, I haven’t found anything that is not improved by Baconnaise. Although not advertised as a vegetarian product – for this would, no doubt, massively put off the hard core meat eaters – Baconnaise is vegetarian. I wouldn’t say this product was the highlight of my Christmas (because that would, possibly, be a little pathetic) but it was certainly one of the highlights. Baconnaise has brought joy to my life. Rather like when I first discovered a vegetarian red wine after five years, and took to carrying the bottle around the house with me, which concerned visitors for it made me look like one of those depressed, alcoholic writers which, of course, I am not! Aha ha. I suppose eventually I will stop carrying the Baconnaise around with me but, honestly, I could eat it straight from the jar with a spoon, it tastes that good. 

But anyway – hello 2010. No doubt, like all the other years, there will be both good stuff and bad stuff. Mostly I am looking forward to Lex Trent coming out in February, as I wrote the first draft of that book when I was twenty years old – three long years ago, although it seems like much longer – and, really, I have had to wait an indecent amount of time to see it on the bookshelves. But I know that this year, my work will be duly universally recognised as the genius that it really is. Or else, people will just say with a haughty sniff: ‘But it’s not Terry Pratchett, is it?’ in much the same way that one might sneer at Daniel Craig because he is not Sean Connery. No one is Sean Connery. Probably not even Mr Connery himself. I think my favourite James Bond is Pierce Brosnan but there it is, we all have different tastes. To me, Baconnaise is the nectar of the Gods – to others it might be some foul spread that no one in their right minds would willingly eat.

Now I’m off to write my traditional long list of New Year’s resolutions, about half of which I might actually keep.