K.M. Grant's Blog, page 4

in the pink and cracking on

I’m a little pink from the pleasure of successful publication, pinker from the lovely reviews, and very pink from my new task of tweeting the reviews: twitter is real ‘heyLOOKATME’ stuff. But I’m a modern author in modern times, and if I really am ‘Jane Austen on crack cocaine’ (as gloriously described by Tom Adair in the Scotsman) I’d better stop being pink and crack on.

So – cracking on!

not a blue Monday

A bit of an ‘ouch’ in the Sunday Times review – and what would life be without a few ‘ouches’ – but in the end Sedition is a ‘… witty, subversive story of sexual politics’ (The Sunday Times). And then this, in regional newspapers, which made me smile.

http://www.northantstelegraph.co.uk/w...

bankers and Bach

Really lovely review in the Times this morning. Very happy for my girls. In amongst so many nice things, particular thanks to Antonia Senior for this: ‘Grant captures a dizzying sense that this is a world being remade simultaneously by bankers and Bach.’ Money and music. A seditious combination.

woke up to tea and a smile

‘… Sedition – who is calling the tune? Packed with colourful characters and with an unexpectedly poignant coda, this is an original, winningly imagined tale of the ties that bind (and some very naughty pianoforte lessons). Daily Mail

head in a hatbox – the seditious connection

http://www.theweeklings.com/kgrant/2014/01/16/21610/

publication day

Publication day is a bit like Christmas – not for the presents, but for that slightly sick excitement in the bottom of the stomach. Strange, really, since very little actually happens. It’s just the thought of Sedition winging its way in the UK through the Royal Mail and dropping through letterboxes (or generating those irritating Sorry To Have Missed You cards – apologies if you’ve got to traipse to the sorting office for your copy). And of course, in the book shops.

Amongst many nice emails this morning was one from a fire extinguisher company. It was only after I’d hit ‘reply’ and typed ‘thank you so much’ that I realised their interest was not in my book, but in getting me to order an extinguisher large enough to dowse an Amazon warehouse.

Not entirely true that nothing happens. Nice things happen. One is that the husband and I are going out to lunch. We may be some time. Sedition, by Katharine Grant, published 16th January by Virago. Hardback. Better than Christmas.

Tis the very day: Sedition, 16th Jan, Virago

Sedition‘s publication day! Here in Glasgow the sun is shining. This is so unusual, it must be a sign. Welcome to the world of coffeehouses, gossip, speculators, pianofortes and restless girls. And Monsieur Belladroit. Not forgetting him. Also Mrs. Frogmorton’s dog, Frilly. A small part, is Frilly’s. But if I don’t mention him, he may bite me.

There’s music in Sedition, and if you like, I’ll post up links so that you can hear some of it. The music grew pretty familiar to me as I wrote, though I always stopped to listen. I write in silence. The first music we hear is in chapter 2, as Annie Cantabile demonstrates pianos to Mr. Drigg. She plays a work by a woman composer nobody now remembers: Maria Barthelemon (1749-1799). I could find no extant recording of MB’s music itself (perish the thought, but perhaps her work wasn’t very good!) – but here’s something by her talented daughter:

publication eve

So – Sedition is out in the UK tomorrow (Virago). Tried and failed to concentrate on my Goldberg practice. I’m perfectly sure that Bach did his practice whatever else was going on but I’ll bet he didn’t have his first cup of tea at 4.05 a.m. Mind you, he’d probably composed a variation or two by 6, a cantata by 7, a prelude and fugue by 8 and small concerto for two instruments he’d learned overnight by 9. But he may not have listened to Martin Chuzzlewit on audio whilst walking a couple of terriers, so I have him there.

a musical taster of Sedition – one day to go

Music and silence – Annie and Alathea know this piece well.

Tomorrow, my girls are launched into the world. I wonder what they’ll make of it.

4 days to go – speechless, unusually

http://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/boo...

review Scotland on Sunday