FREE PROMOTION from OLD SALT PRESS

The Beckoning Ice free for a very limited time

To celebrate the launch of my Promise of Gold trilogy by Old Salt Press, the fifth Wiki Coffin mystery will be free on Amazon.com for three days.

This promotion begins on May 18.

The Beckoning Ice, the fifth in the Wiki Coffin series, finds the U. S. Exploring Expedition off Cape Horn, a grim outpost made still more threatening by the report of a corpse on a drifting iceberg, closely followed by a gruesome death on board.  Was it suicide, or a particularly brutal murder? Wiki investigates, only to find himself fighting desperately for his own life.

“Combining historical and nautical accuracy with a fast paced mystery thriller has produced a marvelous book which is highly recommended.” -- David Hayes, Historic Naval Fiction

Don't be put off by the fact that it is part of a series, as it can be read as a stand-alone mystery.  So go on, get acquainted with my Polynesian hunk of a hero, Wiki Coffin, while you have the chance. And post a short review, to say what you think.

Pirated 50 Shades a boomer in China

Contraband erotica is popular, according to The Telegraph

And censorship be damned.

Ever since Fifty Shades of Grey was translated into traditional Chinese for the Taiwan market last August, contraband copies have been making their way onto the bedside tables of the mainland.

As many as 400 booksellers on Taobao, China's enormous shopping website, are stocking pirated versions of the novel, with the whole trilogy costing roughly £13.

Wrapped in the same distinctive blue steel cover, these copies are printed off in the southern city of Guangzhou from smuggled Taiwanese editions.

The Good Union bookstore, which usually sells school textbooks, said it had sold roughly 80 sets of the trilogy in the past month.

"Not many people know about it yet," said a spokesman for the Foreign Multi-Resource bookstore. "There has been no publicity, so it is only a cult book at the moment," he added.

Opinion, however, is divided about the merits of Christian Grey's - or, in the Chinese version, Ge Lei's romance with his young female conquest, Si Di'er.

"Most of the feedback we get is that it is very repetitive," said the spokesman.

The users of Douban, a Chinese social networking website, gave the book just 5.3 out of 10, complaining of its "tedious style".

So whether it will lead to a population boom in the Celestial Kingdom is moot...

 

PROMISE OF GOLD TRILOGY

Now available from Old Salt Press:

JUDAS ISLAND

The first book in the Promise of Gold trilogy

As she stood on the deck of the brig Gosling, Harriet Gray was forced to face an unhappy truth. She had been duped, yet again. At eighteen, the lovely English actress had already known more than her share of betrayal. And now, a dishonest shipmaster had stranded her on board a ship that was manned by a lusty, treasure-hunting crew, with a pirate captain whose dangerous smile barely concealed his fury. And whose quest for the dark secret of Judas Island was about to unveil an ancient tragedy…

CALAFIA'S KINGDOM

The second of the Promise of Gold trilogy

Like a phantom dogging Harriet Gray’s trail, Frank Sefton is polished, charming—and utterly ruthless. Once, he abandoned the actress to a miserable fate on the far-flung shores of New Zealand.  Now, he is back in her life—full of devious schemes to rob and mortify her, far from the protection of Captain Jake Dexter, and his gold-seeking crew.

DEAREST ENEMY

The third book in the Promise of Gold trilogy

That the Gosling Company should become a theatrical company was a preposterous idea—as crazy as the actual fact that Captain Jake Dexter, once a respectable Yankee mariner, was now an infamous pirate. Yet, he had already travelled such a long, strange path as a fortune-hunting adventurer that metamorphosing into the manager of the first theatre in Sacramento was just another step.

But Jake Dexter could never imagine the danger that this would involve for his actress, Harriet Gray, or that his own life would be so threatened.

Hell Around the Horn

FREE PROMOTION

Here is what I said about Rick Spilman's nail-biter, Hell Around the Horn, when it first come out:

Ringing with authenticity, this nail-biter is a tale of battling wind and weather to sail from the Atlantic to the Pacific via the most dreaded landmark in the sailor's lexicon, Cape Horn.

Stories of ships in the Age of Sail are usually told from the quarterdeck, and the fight is against other ships. Rick Spilman's novel, by contrast, revisits the windjammer era when men fought the elements with just rope and canvas, using muscle and willpower to get a freight to a destination. In the tradition of old salts who once wrote hugely popular stories of life under sail -- men like "Shalimar" (F. C. Hendry), Captain F. Coffin, Jan de Hartog and Alexander Bone -- Hell Around the Horn tells it like it was for the ordinary people who lived unthinkably dangerous lives at sea, from the point of view of the foc'sle and the half-deck, as well as the cabin.

Based on real events, this is the story of one captain's struggle to get his ship to port, with just his seafaring knowledge and his increasingly weary crew to help, and with the added problem of a bloodyminded mate. A detail I particularly liked was that he had his wife and family with him. Spilman reveals her experiences through her letters, which are as convincingly written as the rest of the book.

Highly recommended.

Until May 19, you can download this book for free, as a promotion for Rick's publishing venture, Old Salt Press, which I have been honored to join.  Just hit the image of Hell Around the Horn to the right, and take advantage of this generous offer.

As Rick says in his blog, Old Salt Blog (link to the left) -- To celebrate the upcoming publication of Joan Druett’s Promise of Gold trilogy, Old Salt Press will be running a free book promotion for Rick Spilman’s Hell Around the Horn, and Joan Druett’s The Beckoning Ice and A Love of Adventure over the next two weeks. Starting today May 15th and running through Sunday, May 19th, Hell Around the Horn will be free on Kindle. From May 18 – 20, The Beckoning Ice will be free and from May 21-23, A Love of Adventure will be also be free.

Topless Terrace

It was a city council blunder

City officials in Wellington, New Zealand, realized that they made a mistake when they installed a street sign. It is supposed to be Torless Terrace NOT Topless Terrace! Ironically, the street sign had been vandalized several times before with people changing the name to Topless Terrace either with tape or paint.

City Council spokesman Richard MacLean said, "The council's usually managed to avoid the temptation. Now we are abreast of the situation we'll do a bit of an investigation and get things fixed to protect the honor of the good people of the lane. We don't want it turning into a tourist attraction or to be overrun by tittering schoolboys."

Now the blunder is being used to support breast cancer awareness.  The sign, hastily removed, is destined for sale on TradeMe (New Zealand's version of eBay), with the money destined for that charity.

And it has also inspired restauranteur Todd Hunter of Leuven, to stage breast cancer awareness breakfasts, all profits also to go to the charity.

And when she handed the sign over to the Wellington Chapter of the New Zealand Breast Awareness Foundation, our mayor, Celia Wade-Brown, bared it all.

Todd was there (complete with huge grin) because he and his wife, Karen (who recently went under treatment for breast cancer) are huge supporters of the Foundation.

"Poor proof-reading provided a huge opportunity for us to support a good cause," said Wade-Brown. "I was happy to turn this spelling boob into a lift for the Breast Cancer Foundation."

Among world's best

Yes, I am talking about the Museum of Wellington, City and Sea

This is the museum I take overseas visitors to -- and they invariably love it.  Small on the outside, it is large on the inside, replete with experiences from Wellington's past -- much of it Wellington's seafaring past.

In the Dominion Post today, it is announced that the Museum has been listed with the top fifty museums in the world, a list that includes the Smithsonian.

Britain's The Times commissioned a panel of ''inveterate'' museum-goers to come up with the a list of the world's 50 best museums.

The list largely favours European and United States museums with just a handful from the Southern Hemisphere.

No other New Zealand museum made the list and only the Australian Museum in Sydney got a mention in Australia.

AND, among the big names, at number 41, is the small Museum of Wellington City & Sea on Queens Wharf.

The Times says Wellington has a tiny population but a great heritage ''as this museum proves''.
   
"Set on three floors, it takes in social and cultural history from early Maori and European settlement through to its maritime past, including a memorial to the 1968 Wahine ferry disaster.''

The Times recommended seeing A Millennium Ago, a show about Maori creation legends.

Museum director Brett Mason said it was an honour to be included on the list.

''Being named alongside museum heavyweights like the Smithsonian Institution, British Museum and Acropolis Museum reaffirms the work we are doing as Wellington's museum," he said.

I have to admit I love the Australian museum in Sydney, too.

WWW a Winner!

Good lord, World of the Written Word has been nominated for a Liebster Award.

The surprise came courtesy of the Otago University Bookshop Blog.

The Liebster is an award that fellow bloggers nominate to each other to offer recognition and support. According to Google translate, Liebster means ‘dearest’ in German. This means that the Liebster blog award is acknowledging the dearest bloggers out there who may not have millions and trillions of followers, but still deserve recognition for all of their hard work.

But there are Rules.

Here are the Liebster Award Rules:

1. List 11 random or interesting facts about yourself.
2. Answer 11 questions from the blogger who nominated you.
3. Nominate 11 bloggers who have less than 200 followers.
4. Ask 11 new questions to the bloggers you have nominated.
5. Notify the bloggers you have nominated that they have been awarded the Liebster Award.
6. Thank the blogger who nominated you

So here I go. Harrumph!

Slightly interesting facts about me.

1. I am the co-founder of a cooperative publishing venture for Indie authors of fine maritime books. It's called Old Salt Press, and is to be launched on May 15, 2013. Which is today.  But, as New Zealand is on the wrong side of the dateline, it is actually being launched tomorrow.
2. My first book (Exotic Intruders) was written because an editor walked unannounced into my kitchen with a bottle of wine and talked me into it.
3. My career as a writer of books about the sea began when I fell into a grave in Rarotonga.
4. My blogging career began because Graham Beattie (Beatties Book Blog) talked me into it.
5. My husband, Ron, is a fine maritime artist whose paintings are in collections all over the world.
6. I love Wellington and Wellington's public transport, but I walk at least 14 kilometres a week.
7. After years of writing for American publishers, I punctuate the way Americans do, and can't get out of the habit.
8. And unless I am very careful I spell the way they do, too.
9. My favourite beer is Leffe Brun, and the best place to drink it is Leuven in Wellington (and they are not paying me for this).
10. And if I was going to be executed tomorrow for my last meal on earth I would ask for poached eggs on toast.
11. I always write my best sentence of the day just as the potatoes are boiling over.

Questions from my nominator.

1. What do you like best/least about blogging?  Most of the time, it is fun. I love passing on gossip and jokes and interesting tidbits about writers and writing.  I get a little frustrated that it is supposed to be about the written word, but what the hell, if I am writing about a film or a painting or an auction, it's all in written words, isn't it?
2. Which book do you remember as important in seducing you into reading & bookish things, and how old were you? Snugglepot and Cuddlepie, and I was probably about four.
3. What was the last thing you read, watched, and listened to? Charity Norman's "Second Chances," which is brilliant and powerful and set in Hawkes Bay; Iron Sky, which is a hoot of a Finnish film where the Nazis try to take over earth from their base on the Dark Side of the Moon to the accompaniment of Wagner, and Sarah Palin is the president of the US; Jacques Loussier.
4. What is something you would never do again? Eat crayfish. It tasted divine, but it nearly killed me.
5. Is there a book that everyone seems to love but it just didn’t work for you? Captains Courageous.
6. Do you grow any of your own vegetables? Silverbeet in tubs on the deck.
7. Are you a yellow person or a purple person? Definitely purple.
8. What book(s) would you recommend be on a “Before You Die…” list? Anything published by Old Salt Press.
9. Do you prefer spring or winter? Depends on the weather.
10. Ebooks or hard copies? Print for research and looking up things, ebooks for travel.
11. What is one thing your author blurb/bio would say (that it doesn’t already, for those who have them)? That I fell into a grave in Rarotonga. 

Eleven blogs that I nominate for the Liebster

Joan Curry's Words and Pictures.
Black Horse Westerns.
Rick Spilman's Old Salt Blog
Shayne Parkinson's Notes from New Zealand
Sarah Gaitanos
Katie's Book Blog
National Library Blog
Signposts
NZ Book Council blog
Booksellers NZ blog
And Beattie's Book Blog because though he has hundreds of followers I'd like to see the answers to the following ...


My eleven questions

1. Who is in charge of blogging in your house or your organization?
2. What was the trigger for the blog?
3. What is your current rave?
4. What is your current rant?
5. Is blogging destroying newspaper book reviewing?
6. What was the first book you read?
7. What was the last book you read?
8. How do you celebrate Saturdays?
9. How do you keep your blog going when you are on vacation?
10. What is your favourite city in the world?
11. What would you like to be doing exactly one year from today?

AND THANK YOU TO BRONWYN OF THE OTAGO UNIVERSITY BOOK SHOP

A LOVE OF ADVENTURE

Like the new jacket?  As part of the promotion for a new publishing venture, the independent writers' cooperative OLD SALT PRESS, The Beckoning Ice and A Love of Adventure are being reissued with the new jackets, and new front and back matter.

And there will be free books available.  Watch this space.

And the three books of the Promise of Gold trilogy will be published very soon. Within days, if not hours...

Teacher's book collection under the hammer

The BBC reports that a Stirling teacher's book trove holds hidden gems

It's amazing what a man can collect on a school teacher's salary.

A first edition of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol is among a treasure trove of books being auctioned in Edinburgh this week.

The collection of the late Stirling-born English teacher Bruce Ritchie has an estimated value of up to £230,000.

It also includes first editions of F Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby and Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited, with a note signed by the author.

And a first edition of James Joyce's Ulysses could fetch £3,000.

The copy of The Great Gatsby, the subject of a new film adaptation starring Leonardo DiCaprio, is expected to fetch about £700. A first edition of children's classic The Wind in the Willows will also be on sale.

Mr Ritchie attended Dollar Academy in Clackmannanshire and studied English and German at St Andrews University before taking up a post at Merchant Taylors' School in London, where he was described as an "inspirational" teacher.

He retired to Stirling and died in October last year.

His collection is being sold by Lyon and Turnbull on Tuesday.

Unexpected ending

Jack decided to go skiing with his buddy, Bob. So they loaded up Jack's minivan and headed north.

After driving for a few hours, they got caught in a terrible blizzard.

They pulled into a nearby farm and asked the attractive lady who answered the door if they could spend the night.

'I realize its terrible weather out there and I have this huge house all to myself, but I'm recently widowed,' she explained. 'I'm afraid the neighbors will talk if I let you stay in my house.'


'Don't worry,' Jack said. 'We'll be happy to sleep in the barn, and if the weather breaks, we'll be gone at first light. 'The lady agreed, and the two men found their way to the barn and settled in for the night.

Come morning, the weather had cleared, and they got on their way.

They enjoyed a great weekend of skiing.

But about nine months later, Jack got an unexpected letter from an attorney.

It took him a few minutes to figure it out, but he finally determined that it was from the attorney of that attractive widow he had met on the ski weekend.

He dropped in on his friend Bob and asked, 'Bob, do you remember that good-looking widow from the farm we stayed at on our ski holiday up north about 9 months ago?'

'Yes, I do.' said Bob

'Did you, er, happen to get up in the middle of the night, go up to the house and pay her a visit?'

'Well, um, yes!,' Bob said, a little embarrassed about being found out, 'I have to admit that I did.'

'And did you happen to give her my name instead of telling her your name?'

Bob's face turned beet red and he said, 'Yeah, look, I'm sorry, buddy, I'm afraid I did.' 'Why do you ask?'
..........................................................

'She just died and left me everything.'