Updates and news

21 Tuesday Jul 2015

Tags

Book Signings, events, facebook, Graphic novels, How to Kill a Vampire, Kindle Special offers, Leeds Armouries, Leeds Central Library, Leeds Steampunk, News, Ravenmaster of the Tower of London, Salford Media City, Salford University, Sequential art, Steampunk, Vampire

It has been a while since I did a post on here that was not a review, something which I intend to rectify over the next few months as a number of ideas for posts have been bubbling up in my brain and just need to be committed to blog. Well, some of them need to be committed full stop, possibly with the full strait jacket and padded walls treatment, but I am sure I can keep them all under control.

For now, you will have to satisfy yourself with this digest of random snippets.

First, Vampire month has proven to be a very popular feature on this blog. It makes for a very busy March for me but that effort is well worth it especially when one of your contributors gets their post referenced in an article as happened to Jonathon Ferguson. Of course this is an article from quite a while ago (late last year in October 2013) but it seems to have emerged out of the social network woodwork like some termite to go viral again. Rumour has it the article that LM is referenced in was posted on the Facebook page of the Ravenmaster of the Tower of London but I have looked and cannot find it there (but then I did not look that hard… if anyone spots it let me know 🙂 ). The upshot is that Vampire month is totally now and thing and I am aiming for international acclaim as soon as possible so please help to make this happen.

You can do this by sharing posts, spreading the word and commenting on the blog posts or Facebook posts I make on the subject. You can also help by volunteering to contribute to Vampire month next March… contact me to discuss how you can do this.

Secondly, we are coming up to a Month of conferences.

First off we have the Literally Literary Steampunks at Leeds Central Library event on the 1st August. Here Leeds will play host to a number of authors including LSM regulars such as Craig Hallam, JP Bernett and Alex James. There promise to be readings and other events and the chance to talk to authors and, of course, buy their books. See the Facebook page linked above or the webpage on the flyer for details.

Then, we have the Mancster Con which is set to kick off on the 29th August 2015 at the University of Salford Media City campus. This conference seeks to celebrate Sequential Art in the North West, by which we mean graphic novels and comics. There is a small, elite team of non comic writers, several of whom you may be familiar with from this blog, who intend to infiltrate this event ninja style and who are setting up on a panel entitled ‘Irony in Fantasy’. In this we intend to talk about common tropes in fantasy novels and I for one will be asking everyone for their opinion on this issue in a later blog and through my Facebook page so I have some ammunition to use. What tropes do you think are common? Why are they common?

This week (until Sunday) both the US and UK Amazon versions of Lurking Miscellany are on special offer. Go to the relevant site to see what bargains you can gain…

Finally, I have been making progress on a number of projects but nothing significant is ready for release yet. Gods of the Deep is getting there slowly, Mercury Snowstorm is gaining new stories to add to it and I’ve been pondering ideas for an upcoming anthology collaboration with R.A Smith, Ninfa Hayes and a few others. Hoping to have something ready to launch before Mancster con…

If you want to contribute to this blog, either with reviews or articles, feel free to contact me. Plenty of space for any blogger who wants a guest spot. I am currently pondering a more regular review section and would like some more people who might want to contribute to this… If interested contact me.

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D.A Lascelles is the author of Lurking Miscellany, Transitions (Mundania Press) and Gods of the Sea (Pulp Empires). He lives in Manchester UK. You can sometimes see him writing about Zombie porn on https://lurkingmusings.wordpress.com/ but he mostly blogs about books, vampires, science fiction and Terry Pratchett. He is inordinately proud of the fact that one of his Pratchett articles was referenced on the French version of the author’s Wikipedia page.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DaLascelles

Twitter: @areteus

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What to wear…

31 Sunday Aug 2014

Posted by D.A Lascelles in Musings, Publicity

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

#amwriting, Blake Northcott, Cosplay, Frances Hardinge, Labyrinth Literary Festival, Leeds Steampunk, Leeds Steampunk fair, Manchester, Ninfa Hayes, R.A Smith, Readings, Sexy female spiderman, Signings, Steampunk, Stockton Literary festival, World Book Night

As regular readers will already know, I have been to a few public events over the last year or so. I am now a regular at the Leeds Steampunk market (in a vague, loose coalition operating under the title of the Tea Society with Ninfa Hayes and R.A Smith and others) and at World book night I did a reading in the Fab café in Manchester. Now, this coming weekend I am going to be at the Stockton Literary festival…

Me with Starburst columnist Ed Fortune in front of a TARDIS.

The problem is that I have absolutely no idea what to wear.

You see, for Steampunk it is easy. I actually have quite a selection of waistcoats and cravats and could even go so far as to get a top hat should I feel it necessary (I haven’t so far, mainly stuck with the waistcoat and cravat look and a gentleman would never wear a hat indoors…). Ok, I am not up there with the dedicated goggles and nerf guns with cogs on brigade but I can dress well enough to look like I belong. Most of the traders there are steampunked up to a greater or lesser extent and while there are usually many ‘non steampunks’ in the crowd, you don’t look like an idiot – the only person wearing costume.

For World book night I might have had the ‘what to wear’ dilemma. However, the necessity of having to go straight from work to the venue (via the train station to pick up Frances Hardinge) meant that I was more or less limited to wearing what I wore at work. Since that day also coincidentally happened to be the day a member of the Royal Family was visiting work, this meant I was in a rather more formal shirt and tie than normal. In the photos you can even see the cufflinks. Though I had taken off the jacket and tie by that point.

But Stockton is not Steampunk nor is it right after a royal visit. I therefore have more or less free choice in what to wear. This means I am being indecisive. I could do the casual jeans and nerdy t-shirt that I usually wear when not at work. I could also do a more smart casual look – a shirt with jeans. So long as I avoid looking like David Cameron on holiday (which is a fate worse than death in many areas) I will probably be ok… But then I am wondering if I shouldn’t dress up more – bring out the waistcoat and cravat look or go in an even more bizarre costume? There are rumours of cosplay possibly happening there, after all and Blake Northcott recently did a con in Canada dressed as a sexy female Spiderman…

So, while I ponder these issues, I’d love to know your opinions. How do you expect a writer to be dressed when you meet them? What have authors you have met worn for cons and events? How much does a writer’s clothing matter?

And those of you in the UK, feel free to pop up to Stockton on Tees on the 6th of September for a lot of fun…