Sarwat Chadda's Blog, page 15

Insanely fabulous!

Here's the final cover of Dark Goddess. I rather like it. A lot.
The rewrites continue (draft five) but the end is in sight, so I thought I'd share a few details with you, some cluse of which are in this photo.
Firstly, notice St. Basil's Cathedral in the background. Russia will feature prominently. As you may know, I went to Russia last year to get a flavour of the country. Moscow is way cool and there's material there I could have used form a number of books, but I've distilled it down to th...

Barnes and Nobles Teen Top 20 for 2009

Wow, this one came a bit out of the blue but Barnes and Noble (huge book chain in the US for my British buddies) selected Devil's Kiss as one of their twenty best teen books for 2009. Which is nice. The others were (and I'm sure you've read them all, haven't you?):
Catching Fire, Shiver, Along for the Ride, The Maze Runner, Hush Hush, City of Glass, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, If I Stay, The Demon King, Leviathan, Going Bovine, Wintergirls, Jessica's Guide to dating on the Dark Side, The...

India, here I come!

Finally booked my ticket to India, home of my forefathers and foremothers. It's been a trial since I was meant to go back in November but thanks to an over-enthusiastic visa office got well and truly delayed, but here we are.
What am I doing?
Well, wrapped up the latest draft of Dark Goddess, managing to cut 12,000 words out of the process and bringing it down to 76,000 (which, to get some comparison, is 11,000 longer than Devil's Kiss).
Reading Mortlock by someone called Jon Mayhew. Hmm. It's ...

Well, wot's next?

So, a quick recap on 2009, which hasn't been too bad. There was two trips to the USA, two radio shows, one tv show, trip to Russia (research, honest!) two book tours, a large number of schools, and few bookshops (thanks to the few who turned up!), and Devil's Kiss hit the shelves. I've completed my first full year as an author, and still loving it. Oh, and I learnt how to skip in a manly fashion. It's not as easy as you think.
Right, for 2010. I'm a great believer in New Year's Resolutions an...

Make way for the original bad boys...

This came up in Publishers' Weekly some months ago and is in today's Independent (link to the article is here).
So, are vampires on the way out and angels on the way in?
Well, yes, but mainly no.
For those of you who have read Devil's Kiss (thanks guys and gals!) you'll know the book centres around Billi's misguided relationship with the Archangel Michael and his plans of humanity, namely the unleashing of the Tenth Plague.
Angels have always been there, well before the vampire. If we follow the...

International appeal for home-grown stories

This is the German edition of Devil's Kiss, due out in January. One of the strange side-effects of publishing is the foreign rights market, and wondering why some stories seem to translate internationally, and why some don't.
Frankly, I haven't a clue.
Look at 'Slumdog Millionaire'. Isn't it 'Rags to riches'? Isn't it the American Dream (local boy makes good and gets the girl). Given its setting there's nothing particularly Indian about the story, is there? You don't need to know anything abou...

Twin Peaks and staying on the path...

On Friday I went to a graduation ceremony. The last one I'd been to was mine, back in 1989. I was fresh faced and ready to go. Shake the world and see what dropped out.Now, twenty years (!?!) later here I am, sitting with all the proud mums and dads, watching their offspring spring off. And I'm wondering "My God, was I ever that young?"It doesn't seem that long ago, honest.
Oh, by the way, I wasn't there for my kids, I like to believe they're brighter than most but being under ten it wasn't...

What makes a good bad guy

I'm working on a new book and trying to build my bad guy. The trouble is, he's not that bad. I think the problem is the setting is the real world, but with strong supernatural undercurrents but the villain's just a bit...blah. He wants to conquer the world. Why? What's he going to do with it? Name all the countries after himself? Become richer?
There's the James Bond villian syndrome, where they're evil just for evil's sake. That's just lazy storytelling. The key to creating a great bad guy i...

Dark Goddess, almost finished!

This glorious cover comes courtesy of Puffin and as you can tell it will be very cool. We have Billi in her little red riding hood outfit about to get medieval on the rear of a werewolf.
I'm on the last-ish rewrite of Dark Goddess, which is more of a straightening out of the furniture. It's all there, just needs a bit of tweaking so it's all in exactly the right place.
The Puffin edition will be out next July, the Disney-Hyperion next October. I know its ages, but it'll be worth it, I promise!...

Building a better bad boy

We all love a bad boy. We either want to be one, or tame one. He's the fantasy feature of literature and he never, ever goes out of style. He is style.
So, how do we spot one? What are the key credentials in acquiring bad boy status? Let's have a look at a few examples and qualifications.
1. He's gorgeous. Well, that's a given. He's an alpha male who leads the pack or the lone wolf. Nothing shouts ego like turning up at a party alone, and still being centre of attention. Yes, I mean you, Mr.Dar...