NEW YEAR - NEW LOOK!

IN THIS ISSUE:

You Raise Me Up by Phyllis Owen

Mort de Mortimer by Jerry Dowlen

Owen Owen Painting

Archives

Welcome to 2010 and your new look BOOKS MONTHLY! Cleaner, brighter, easier to read, (and I hope all of these things are true!), and some fantastic new books to kick-start the new year! The five books pictured below represent a terrific start to 2010. NEARLY DEPARTED is a chilling ghost story involving a group of English high school students and will really scare the pants off you. Neil Cross's CAPTURED tells the tale of a young man with only months left to live, and he's on a mission to bring his own kind of justice to a man he believes had something to do with the death of his partner. Again, powerful and compelling. MR SHIVERS totally blew me away. (continued below)

ROBERT JACKSON BENNETT tells a tale of Stephen King-like proportions, with characters that simply leap off the page at you. I was unable to put it down until I'd finished it. Read it, it is brilliant. THE POISON THRONE is the first in a brand new trilogy from a new fantasy writer. Books 1 and 2 will be published in April, and I believe this trilogy will be one of the biggest fantasy sets for quite sometime. In a similar vein is N.K. Jemisin's THE HUNDRED THOUSAND KINGDOMS, also from Orbit, and breathtakingly good. Diana Wynne Jones never disappoints, and ENCHANTED GLASS is charming, funny, and brilliant. Really, there's no one quite like Diana. Fans of Harry Potter will love this book, and I can't recommend it highly enough. All in all, a truly sumptuous feast of literature to begin 2010. Of course, there are also a number of fantastic new books from DORLING KINDERSLEY, including a brilliant series of Pocket Nature paperbacks, reissued with stunning new covers; titles include TREES, FUNGI, INSECTS AND SPIDERS, BUTTERFLIES AND MOTHS, WILD FLOWERS and WILD ANIMALS. These beautiful books are fun, informative, expertly written and illustrated, and will grace any bookshelf. Next month sees a whole tranche of great new  books from CARLTON/PRION, who specialise in nostalgia and reference books of the highest quality. And there will be some great new titles from American publisher DORCHESTER. I can't wait - this year is shaping up to be a great book year! In May, of course, the new Russell Crowe ROBIN HOOD movie is released, so expect a whole raft of Robin Hood books to appear in the first few weeks of summer! Next month I shall be combining History and Nostalgia with Nonfiction and Reference - just so's you know! Not sure what I'll call it yet, but I'll think of something! Probably something like NONFICTION, HISTORY AND NOSTALGIA - that woorks for me... I look forward to the pleasure of your company next month.

PAUL'S BLOGREAD: (It's a kind of blog, but just about what I've been reading apart from the books you'll find reviewed in this issue). For a week or so before Christmas, I was left with nothing to read! As you can see, plenty of books have come in the first few weeks of 2010, but there was a time when I was left with nothing to read, so I revisited some old favourites, including PETER TINNISWOOOD's EXCEPT YOU'RE A BIRD, the final sublime comedy about Carter Brandon and his family, swiftly followed by BERNARD CORNWELL's GRAIL QUEST series, Harlequin, Vagabond, and Heretic; as I was lucky enough to receive the new Star Trek DVD (Blu-Ray!) for Christmas (and it is absolutely the best film of 2009), I decided to re-read William Shatner's take on the young Jim Kirk and Spock, STARFLEET ACADEMY: COLLISION COURSE. Totally different to the film but an excellent book and one of the best Star Trek books ever, in my opinion. Finally, because I also received the new Harry Potter, THE HALF BLOOD PRINCE on DVD, I decided to re-read that, too, to remind myself how film-makers change the written word to suit their art form. I wasn't disappointed. Then, early this year, having recently watched the film, I borrowed Dan Brown's ANGELS and DEMONS from the library, and abandoned it hurriedly when the new books started to arrive... and you can read all about those in this issue. I really don't understand why people think Dan Brown is so amazing. His books are terrible! But then I can talk - all I've ever had published is a short story in an Irish Women's magazine thirty or so years ago. Not for want of trying, though, and I just sent off my manuscript for a detective novel...maybe 2010 will be my year? I may update this from time to time during the month, just to let you know what I'm currently reading and what's coming in the next issue, so do check back from time to time to see if I've added anything...

January 26th: A new children's book arrived this morning - NEARLY DEPARTED by ROOK HASTINGS. Looks promising. Oh, and a new Reuben Maitland thriller by JOHN MACKEN. I think I'll tackle the Hastings book first. I do like children's books...

Books Monthly is published on the first day of every month. If you'd like me to publish a story you've written, please e-mail me at editor@booksmonthly.com ~ no payment, I'm afraid, as I don't make any money from the magazine. The length of your story is no problem - long or full-length stories can be serialised. Similarly, if you have a feature article on a book, author or artist you would like me to publish, e-mail it to me and I'll fit it in. Deadline for inclusion in the next month's magazine is 15th of the month. Same goes for books you'd like me to review, of course.