Patrick Ness's Blog, page 13

World Book Night 2013

The Knife of Never Letting Go has been selected as one of the titles for World Book Night 2013.  It's a huge book giveaway, where some 400,000 books are given away by thousands of volunteers.  I'm in the UK & Ireland version, and there's a US one as well.  Info (and how to apply to be a book-giver!) are here.  Cool stuff, stay tuned for more.

A Monster Calls, meanwhile, has been chosen Best Foreign Book at the Sharjah Book Fair, which is very cool.  I was out of town already, or I'd have gone to Sharjah in a shot.

Greetings to the new commenters, some wonderful things coming through, and more soon...

Webinar for US librarians and readers

Though they REALLY need to get a new word for it, I'm doing a "Webinar" (web seminar, see what they did there?) for Booklist on Tuesday, 13 November.  It's kind of focussed on US librarians (who are a super bunch of folks!) but anyone can register.  There'll be a few videos of me talking, a live audio interview (with a chance to ask questions, I think), and some videos on use of A Monster Calls and Chaos Walking for libraries.  All really cool, info is here.

Greetings to the new commenters, including a couple of absolutely lovely personal notes about A Monster Calls, thank you all so much.  Sorry it's been a bit, but BOY have I been busy.  Just wait 'til I'm allowed to tell you...

Late night radio interview

Quick hit today to say that it looks like I'll be a doing a late night interview tomorrow night just after midnight (appropriately for A Monster Calls) on the Eddie Nestor show on BBC London 94.9.  Tune in!  You know, if you've got a few minutes before clubbing or something...

Greetings to the new commenters!  More soon (and you wouldn't believe the stuff I'm working on at the moment...)

Jugendliteraturpreis (Youth Literature Prize)

I've been away, hence the lack of updates, but one of the places I was away to was Frankfurt in Germany, where I'm thrilled to report that me and Jim Kay and Siobhan Dowd and our brilliant German translator Bettina Abarbanell won the Jugendliteraturpreis for the German version of A Monster Calls.  This is most prestigious award across all of continental Europe, so we were beside ourselves!  Very, very pleased.

Just a brief one today, but more soon, lots of things on the way.  Greetings to the new commenters, so sorry I can't answer everyone's questions!

This is the Playlist

Still working away, mostly at the moment on a whole raft of short stories, none of which I can talk about quite yet, but working, working.  I'm also off to Frankfurt this week for the announcement of the Jugendliteraturpreis, the biggest children's book prize in Europe.  The German version of A Monster Calls is up in two categories, so wish us luck!

In the meantime, how about another playlist from my own iPod.  I call this one This Is The Playlist:

This Is How It Feels, Inspiral Carpets - You should all have more Inspiral Carpets in your lives.

This Is Radio Clash, The Clash - Joe Strummer was a very early hero of mine.

This Is The Picture, Peter Gabriel & Laurie Anderson - They're standing on their heads/They're ready!

This Is The Night, Kurt Calleja - Malta's Eurovision entry this year; oh, yes, culture high and low on Paddy's webpage...

This Is Not Who We Were, Mull Historical Society - He's also got one called This Is The Hebrides, both great.

Enjoy!  Greetings to the new commenters and more soon.

Watch me on ITV This Morning

I was on ITV This Morning today talking about A Monster Calls, alongside the really terrific Leman Family.  You can watch it (possibly only the UK) for the next seven days on ITV Player.  Pick the 3 October episode and we're all on about the 43 minute mark (you'll have to watch some adverts first).

The questions were really sensitive and nicely done, though I think I may inadvertently end up looking like an expert, which I'm really not.  I'm just a writer like any other, trying to imagine out the truth as best I can.  And the family are fantastic!  Such great, funny people backstage, too.  I wish there'd been a bit more time to really think about how unimaginably hard it all was for the mum, too, as well as the kids, but they're all such great folks, wish you could have met them.  They were telling me, too, about how helpful Macmillan Cancer Support was to them, so check them out.

Otherwise, greetings to the new commenters and more soon.

ITV This Morning on Wednesday

Looks like I'm going to be on ITV This Morning on Wednesday, probably about 1130.  It's live TV, so always subject to change, but it looks like I'll be alongside some really awesome-sounding young readers of A Monster Calls.  Tune in!

Diversity Role Models

I'm very honoured to have been asked to be a patron of Diversity Role Models, a charity that tackles homophobic bullying schools through education.  It's run by the absolutely kickass Suran Dickson, and has other patrons including John Amaechi and the Welsh rugby player Gareth Thomas.  Awesome folks at and awesome charity.  Check 'em out.

A cool prize for undergraduates (that I'm judging)

Are you a final year undergraduate in the UK?  Well, I'm a judge on the London Library Student Prize this year, which is an essay contest for UK undergrads just about to leave school.  First prize is £5,000 and publication in the Times, so quite a cool prize!  Details are here.  Enter, it's five grand!

Also, have a laugh at how my bio is three times longer than anyone else's.  Modesty, eh?

Greetings to the new commenters.  More soon.

All of the Radio 4 interviews & A Monster Calls readings

Quick hit today (I'm nearing the end of a very long 2nd draft, so I've been deep in writing work lately) but looks like all of the interviews I did for Radio 4 Extra and, even better, all of the 10 part reading they did for A Monster Calls are now in one handy place.  Have a look, if you're interested (though that's not my favourite photo of me ever taken).

More soon, I promise!