Andrew Hook's Blog, page 16

Cover Art - Church of Wire

Just a quick blog post to reveal the cover art (by Iain Robertson) of my new novel, "Church Of Wire", which will be appearing from Telos Crime early 2015. It's the second in a series of neo-noir crime novels featuring my PI, Mordent. The third in the series has already been written and I'm currently midway through the fourth. Would be interested in any comments on the cover. The book can be pre-ordered here.

Burning Daylight

My short story, "Burning Daylight", has recently been published in the second issue of the excellent Confingo magazine, and as usual I'm blogging just a few lines about the birth of the story. Be aware there may be spoilers for those who have yet to read it.

Most of my fiction stems from the title, and rather embarrassingly I must confess the term burning daylight came from the TV show, "Dog The Bounty Hunter", where Dog - as usual - was trying to track down a bail jumper and time was running...

The Opaque District

Recently my short story, "The Opaque District", appeared in Horror Uncut, a collection of austerity stories published by Grey Friar Press. As with previous posts I've decided to explain the background to the story for those interested to know. Beware, there may be spoilers if you haven't read the piece.

I originally became aware of the anthology via correspondence with one of the editors, Joel Lane, who asked me to take part when we were discussing his possible contribution to an anthology I w...

Norwich Zine Fair

Last weekend we attended the Norwich Zine Fair at the arts centre. We've previously attended other zine fairs at different locations with mixed results. What usually happens is that the number of sellers outnumber the number of attendees and if we managed to sell one or two copies of my partner's Fur-Lined Ghettos magazine then we consider ourselves lucky. It's more of a networking thing, but even then the variety of zines can be quite disparate and the opportunities for cross-promotion...

FantasyCon 2014

Last weekend saw the annual convention of the British Fantasy Society, FantasyCon, in York. I was pretty excited as I hadn't been to York for a long while, was looking forward to catching up with my writer friends, and as my partner had been away for a couple of weeks it was going to be cool seeing her again too.

We arrived in York around 1pm on the Friday after an easy, sun-filled drive. We were staying at a hotel ten minutes walk from the convention at a fraction of the cost. The very friend...

Periscope

My short story, "Periscope", has recently been published online at Perihelion SF (you can read the whole story from that link), and as usual I'm blogging a few words about the creation of the piece for those who might be interested. Please note, there will be spoilers so it's probably best to read the story before reading this blog.

This particular story was written a couple of years ago and has taken a while to find the right home. Because of this, I find my memory to be a little sketchy as t...

Beyond The Island Of The Dolls

My short story, "Beyond The Island Of The Dolls", was recently published in the anthology Postscripts To Darkness Volume 5, and as usual I'm blogging the gestation of the story for those who are interested. There may be spoilers if you have yet to read it.

The initial inspiration for the piece came after I discovered (online, rather than in person) the Isla de las Munecas situated near Mexico City. There's plenty of information about this island online, but the following photograph should give...

Flytrap

My short story, "Flytrap", has just been published in issue #253 of the long-running science fiction magazine, Interzone, and as has been common with newly published stories I'm blogging about the gestation of the story for those who might be interested. Beware, there will be spoilers for those who have yet to read it.

I initially wrote "Flytrap" for the Terra Aphrodite anthology from Whippleshield Books. The remit was for a story that featured the planet Venus, and the devil in me decided a v...

The Immortalists - promotion and feedback

As regular readers of this blog will know my neo-noir crime novel, "The Immortalists", was published in March by Telos. As well as the publisher ploughing ahead with their own agenda I've also been active in promoting the book (any author has to in this day and age, you can't sit back and watch the royalties flood in whilst thinking that the writing of the book sees the end of your involvement).

So, I thought I'd summarise what I've done so far together with some reader feedback, but also ment...

The Battle of Fantasy vs Reality

I'm not a great fan of domestic football but I love the World Cup. It's not often the world comes together in such a competitive yet encouraging way, and the concentration of the competition over a few weeks and the opportunity to root for an underdog really makes for a great occasion. I don't get all patriotic and jingoistic, however; in fact, when England play I always support the opposing team (true punk that I am). However there can always be spoilers in the tournament and whils...