Tag Archives: Harper Collins

Virtual Advent Tour 2011 | Twelve Books for Christmas, Part 1

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Someone recently told me that when he doesn’t like giving books as presents, because he feels “books are so personal.” He’d much rather give someone a gift certificate, and let them choose their own books. Now, I’m personally not a big fan of gift certificates (unless it’s a gift card to a coffee shop, which in my case will be very useful!), but I can understand the reluctance to give someone a book they may not necessarily enjoy, or that they may already have.

My sister told me once that she finds it hard to buy me books. For several birthdays and Christmases, she’d stand in the mystery section of a bookstore, trying to find authors I might enjoy but have not read. Result: she’s introduced me to the books of Robert B. Parker, Ian Rankin, Donna Leon and C.J. Sansom, all of whom I now count among my absolute favourite writers.

That is what I love about receiving books as gifts. Books are indeed personal things, and for some, they may well prefer to get a gift certificate and choose the books themselves. But personally, I love being introduced to books I may not necessarily have picked up on my own and yet may end up devouring. I also love the feeling that my sister, or whoever gives me that book as a gift, knows me so well they can guess what writer I’d like to read next.

So, for anyone who may be thinking of surprising someone on their list with a book, I do have a few, humble suggestions.

Scroll down, or click on the images below to go straight to that book’s write-up:


1. Harry Potter Page to Screen, Bob McCabe

Harry Potter Page to Screen is at the top of my wish list this year. I firmly believe the Harry Potter series is the Lord of the Rings of our generation — a sweeping epic about the battle between good and evil, a series that not just captivates a generation, but defines it. The books are pure magic, and I especially love the progression towards darker stories that mimics so well the way our understanding of the world changes as we grow older. These books grow with us, and the movies have captured this magic wonderfully. What better way to relive that magic over and over than with a book that chronicles that journey from books to movies?

Then of course, there’s this book trailer:

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2. The Chronicles of Harris Burdick, Chris Van Allsburg et al

Chronicles of Harris Burdick is one of my favourite books of the year. Click on the cover photo to enlarge it, and check out the amazing list of authors who contributed to this book. Stephen King, Lois Lowry and Cory Doctorow all in one book? I want!

Then add the wonderful imaginative nature inspired by Harris Burdick: here are fourteen illustrations, paired with intriguing captions. What stories do these images tell? This book contains the stories created by professional authors, but I personally would love to know what stories readers can come up with.

This book is written for children, but I’d recommend it for people of all ages. All it takes is imagination. For more details, you can read my full, glowing review here.

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3. The Giver (gift edition), Lois Lowry and Bagram Ibattouline (illustrator)

We all have that one book from childhood that completely changed how we view the world. For me, that book is Lois Lowry’s The Giver. I first read it when I was about 14. The story of a society where choice and emotion have been taken away scared me; like Giver protagonist Jonas, I want to live, with all the passion and wonder the italics imply.

I’m 28 now, and every time I read it, it’s a completely different experience. This book is a classic, and I just love this beautiful, illustrated edition. Whatever your One Childhood Book was, I hope you too get to see it so beautifully reissued. If, like me, it was The Giver, it’s a wonderful story to share with the young people in your life.

For more details about The Giver and this edition, my full review is here.

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4. Perfect People, Peter James

I made the mistake of reading Perfect People in a mall. Every few pages, I’d gasp or shake my head or I’d stop reading and stare into space to absorb what I’d just read. The people walking past probably thought I was nuts. But really, that’s how good this book is.

What if you had the chance to free your unborn child from all genetic imperfections? Would you be able to face yourself if you turned it down? There are no easy answers, especially for John and Naomi Klaesson, who’d already lost a child to a rare genetic disease. Add a fanatic religious cult determined to destroy all “unnatural” children, and you’ve got a gripping, emotional, amazing thriller that just never lets up.

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5. The Invention of Hugo Cabret, Brian Selznick

Confession: I’ve had Invention of Hugo Cabret on my reading list for a while now, but it was the movie Hugo that made me buy the book. The movie was sheer magic. It featured amazing use of 3D (I could almost feel the snow flakes blowing past) and a sweet, innocent story about an orphaned boy, a girl and a mysterious mechanical man. The plot is all about the magic of cinema, which makes it such a wonderful story to turn into a movie.

The book conveys this same magic through beautiful pictures. I love how Selznick integrated art and story — the images don’t just illustrate the story; they actually move the story forward.

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6. Hark! A Vagrant, by Kate Beaton

I was fortunate enough to have seen Kate Beaton speak at the recent International Festival of Authors. She is as funny and entertaining in person as her comics promise. She even drew Jane Eyre in love with a burned, disfigured Rochester on my copy of Hark! A Vagrant! We agreed that it’s great Jane Eyre is a love story between two unattractive people, but also that Rochester is a jerk. “Here,” Kate says, brandishing her pen after we chatted about how horribly Rochester treated Jane (quite a big secret to keep from your fiancee, Rochester!). “Let’s make him look even more disgusting.” Love it!

I especially love her send ups of literary figures like Tiny Hermione, the Bronte sisters and Holmes and Watson. She also pokes fun at history (can you guess the historical figure on the cover?) and Canadian stereotypes. Hark! A Vagrant collects a lot of her cheeky, witty and oh-so-true comics in a single, fun volume I’d recommend for just about anyone with a sense of humour.

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Part 2 here, featuring the following books:

(Note: You may also click on the thumbnail to be taken directly to that book’s write-up.)


Author Encounter | Stuart MacBride

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Dear Harper Collins Canada: I love you! Thank you for bringing all these awesome crime, mystery and thriller writers to Toronto and for hosting fan events with them! First Peter James, and now Stuart MacBride. Do I dare hope for a Val McDermid, Martin Walker or James Rollins event on the horizon?

First, kudos to Harper Collins for such a killer event title (sorry, couldn’t resist). As a life-long mystery fan, how could I pass up the opportunity to plot a murder with a best selling crime author?

The evening began with a woman asking about Stuart’s writing process. Stuart turned the question back to the audience and asked how we read: in the bathroom, in bed, naked? Turns out he does sometimes, when the day is warm, write his books in the buff. Things you learn at these author encounters.

Stuart talking to us about murder

Stuart is just absolutely hilarious. He’s such a big, cheerful man, and the event felt more like a casual chat over drinks than an Author Event. At least until he mentions a fascinating fact that makes you wonder, how on earth could he know something like that? He’s probably best described by an audience member’s question: “You’re such a jovial man. Then I just read the first few pages of your book (Birthdays for the Dead, on-sale January 2012. Harper Collins kindly gave us all ARCs), and it’s horrific. How do reconcile the two Stuarts?” She sounded absolutely bewildered, and I can understand why. The first chapter of Birthdays is, in Stuart’s own words, “dark, nasty, and pretty damn twisted,” and hard to imagine coming from the man who repeated the question as “I’m such a handsome, sexy man. How do I write such dark stuff?”

"I didn't expect half this many people!" Stuart said when he entered the room.

We plotted a fictional murder with Stuart, which led to an interesting discussion on murder techniques. Someone in the audience came up with drowning as our murder method, and Stuart, the friendly, jolly man you can imagine having a beer with, said that a very effective way to drown someone is water boarding. He then drew a diagram and explained how the technique worked. “Trained CIA agents last 12 seconds under this.” An audience member points out that the method is ineffective because under those conditions, one would say anything. Stuart agreed and said that torture scenes in books and movies usually get it wrong. He then explained the most effective way to use torture to get information from someone. Then he gave an absolutely charming sheepish smile and said, “This is getting quite dark, isn’t it?”

Cory from Harper Collins gives Stuart his cake

So, given all this knowledge, how does Stuart MacBride get the information he needs for his books? “A couple of gin and tonics, and pathologists blab all the gory details.” He then goes on to explain why burying a victim in concrete is ineffective unless done properly. It was actually very scientific and, dare I say it, fascinating. This is actually a perfect Halloween event; an evening with Stuart MacBride is worth dozens of ghost stories in a dark room. Delicious horror.

Swag from Harper Collins Canada

Stuart also gave a reading. He chose a short story he wrote entitled “The Princess and the Pervert,” a re-telling of “The Princess and the Frog.” It was dark and twisted; I was squirming in my seat, and almost gasped out loud at the ending. You can read the story here and it’s a fantastic, well-written, creepy-as-hell piece. But you definitely missed out, not hearing Stuart read it live. He’s a fantastic performer; his reading brought his characters to life. Some parts were hilarious, other parts just really, really freaked me out. Then he told a few of us later on about a short, rhyming story he wrote for his nephew Logan (after whom Stuart’s series character Logan McRae was named). It was about a skeleton whose mother gave him a fuzzy pink sweater. Sweet, funny story, completely different from “Princess and Pervert,” and I at least can imagine a Tim Burton short based on it.

One of my favourite parts of the night was the contest to win the entire Logan McRae series by Stuart. To win, we had to write down the most creative way to kill someone. You get a few dozen mystery fans in one room, and you’ll get a range of quite gruesome ideas. Murder weapons ranged from a poisonous snake to fibreglass to Silly Putty. Best part is that after Stuart read each suggestion, he explained why it wouldn’t work and sometimes, how an idea could be made more effective. Again, I wondered how he knows so much about the subject.

I love Stuart's artwork! Here, fellow audience member Brenda gets a friendly ghost from Stuart.

Anyway, I won! 😀 Stuart was having a tough time deciding between my entry and the fibreglass one, and fortunately, Harper Collins said they’d give out two prize packs instead of one. Even better, Stuart laughed at my entry: Justin Bieber music videos played in a continuous loop until the victim kills himself. When he was signing my copy of Birthdays, he shuddered, looked at me and said, “That’s unnecessarily cruel.” From Stuart MacBride, that’s high praise. He then scribbled “Bieber!” and signed with a flourish.

That’s another thing about Stuart MacBride that I love: he personalizes the books he signs, or at least writes something different in each one. One of the women had a sketch of a dead teddy bear, and another had a drawing of a skull with a princess crown. Another woman had a copy signed for a friend who couldn’t make it because of work. Stuart wrote “Sorry excuse for missing this!” then said, “We had cake!”

Speaking of cake, Harper Collins served this fantastic treat. It was delicious, but more importantly, I love the Death figure! Isn’t it cute? Stuart noticed the Death figure has glasses and a beard and called the designer cheeky.

Stuart’s just such a friendly, wonderful person, and I’m so glad to have met him. He even agreed to sign the entire Logan McRae library I’d won. So, added to my “Bieber!” I also have a skull and crossbones and a bloody eyeball. Love it.

If you’re free and in Toronto tonight (Wednesday, October 26, 2011) or tomorrow, definitely check Stuart out for yourself at the International Festival of Authors. He’ll be reading from the latest Logan McRae, Shatter the Bones, tonight with Denise Mina, David Adams Richards and one of my favourite crime writers, Ian Rankin, and hosted by Andrew Pyper (event details). Tomorrow, he’ll be performing with a literary all-star cast at Fleck, A Verse Comedy, also at IFOA. He told me it’ll be a lot more formal than the Harper Collins event, and he won’t be discussing water boarding at all, nor will he be reading from “Princess and Pervert.” But it should still be a great event. He’s an amazing reader, and such a friendly man. If you’re already a fan, heads up on these events and if you aren’t, I do hope you check him out.

Thanks again to Harper Collins for such an amazing event! And most of all, thanks to Stuart MacBride for making the event so amazing. To cap the night off, a Harper Collins employee gave me a Hershey’s Chocolate World plastic bag to carry my new Stuart MacBride collection. Just an amazing, wonderful evening. Thank you.

[Final image courtesy of the International Festival of Authors website. All other images courtesy of Harper Collins Canada]

On book covers

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My sister sometimes makes fun of me and how much stock I put in book covers. Browsing through a bookshop or flipping through the IFOA booklet, she’d ask me what I thought of one book or the other, and my response usually is, “Ooh, I love that cover!” or “Meh, the cover doesn’t grab me.” My sister would then ask, “No, what do you think of the story?” and I’d go, “Story?”

Now, I don’t usually buy a book simply because of the cover art. Usually, it takes at least an eye-catching cover and a gripping first page to make me buy a book. That being said, in this age of e-books, it’s even more important for print books to be works of art in their printed form, and I appreciate it when publishers make the extra effort to provide that. One book I boughtprimarily for the book design is Chip Kidd’s The Cheese Monkeys. The story, about an art student and his class, is pretty good, but what really makes this book pop is the book design. Beyond the eye catching cover art, the text on the title page, copyright page and table of contents scroll right off the edges of the pages. Harper Collins offers a view of the first few pages here, but it’s an effect you can appreciate only from the physical book. I love it, and I think it’s a great example of the extra wow factor book design can give a print book.

Cheese Monkeys actually made me a Chip Kidd fan, and I am absolutely in love with his latest work — the cover of the single volume edition of Haruki Murakami’s 1Q84. Now this image is beautiful enough, but what the picture doesn’t show is that the book jacket is actually in two layers. An onion skin layer covers the image of the woman, and, my personal favourite part, the portions of the woman’s face within the book title are printed on the onion skin layer and left white on the layer beneath. I can’t remember where I read it, but someone wrote about how the onion skin layer on this cover is defiantly fragile. This seems antithetical to the sturdiness people look for in hardcovers, but it’s also a beautiful testament to the ephemerality of Aomame and Tengo’s love story. I also love that, even with colour e-readers now out, the physical 1Q84 will still have the advantage of design; the e-book version will necessarily merge both cover layers into one image, and it will still be beautiful, just not as beautiful.

I also love the cover of Jose Saramago’s Cain. Featuring a detail from thepainting Cain and Abel by Titian (oil on canvas, 298 x 282 cm, 1542-44), this cover is both beautiful and powerful. It takes the horror and violence of the Titian painting and makes it personal, by focusing on the brothers. You can almost feel Cain’s rage emanating from the cover. Abel’s death is almost secondary; this is an image of action and movement. You can almost feel that weapon being smashed down. Cain just blew me away, overall. A powerful story, in just as powerful a package.


I am a huge fan of the Penguin Essentials series. I love the cover art so much that I bought that edition of The Great Gatsby, even though I already own another edition of that book. I love the playful cover art, and I love that these books are small enough to tuck into your jacket pocket.

One of my recent favourites from Penguin however is the hardcover edition of Madame Bovary, translated by Lydia Davis. I loved the beautiful, subdued cover so much that I chose to buy the hardcover rather than buy the e-book or wait for the paperback. Then I saw the paperback edition recently, and just love it as well. I especially like how both covers are so different, how they set such a different tone for the same novel, and yet, to me at least, are both equally beautiful.

Paperback

Hardcover

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When it comes to Agatha Christie books, I usually love buying super old, ratty, used versions. Call me romantic; I love the idea of a fellow Christie fan having enjoyed that book before me. But the Harper Collins re-releases of Christie’s works have such beautiful covers that I admit I’m tempted to start buying brand-new Christies. You can find a comprehensive list with images on this Agatha Christie website, but here are a few of my personal favourites.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Two of my favourite covers from the past year, both from Anansi:

The cover for The Sisters Brothers is just absolutely iconic. Simple, stylized, yet very striking. I love how the Sisters brothers’ heads feature as the skull’s eyeholes. I especially love how the red eyes act as both the eyes of the cowboys (giving them both sinister, one-eyed glares) and the eyes of the skull. You can remove the top and bottom thirds of the cover, and the image is instantly recognizable as The Sisters Brothers, at least for bibliophiles who’ve read so much buzz for this book over the past year. At the very least, I’d say it’s the most striking, most memorable cover among the 2011 Man Booker Prize finalists.

I also love this cover for Stephen Kelman’s Pigeon English. My boss and I were discussing this cover recently, and she told me she just kept discovering more birds than she expected: “I thought that was just a collar!” At first glance, it’s a simple silhouette with striking colours. But a closer inspection reveals a jigsaw-like fit of birds and boy, and I love that this cover forces you to look closely to see all that.

 

 

Finally, a couple of gift editions that I just find so beautiful I think they’re well worth the additional cost:

The Giver by Lois Lowry changed my life when I first read it, with its story about thinking for yourself and questioning even things you grew up believing were true. I love my copy for sentimental reasons, yellowed pages and all. But this one, with beautiful illustrations by Bagram Ibatoulline, is just absolutely beautiful. I was literally moved when I first saw it. I love that such a wonderful book has been given such a beautiful edition. And I love turning the pages, reading Lowry’s words, seeing Ibatoulline’s art, and just being drawn back in to the magic of Jonas’ world.

Christopher Moore’s Lamb is a classic, a re-telling of the Gospels by Christ’s childhood friend Biff. It’s hilarious, entertaining and just a great book overall, and this is a case, I think, where the design is just perfect for the text. This gift edition of Lamb looks just like an old, fancy Bible, complete with ornate gold lettering and a ribbon bookmark. The utter seriousness of this design is wonderfully cheeky considering the subject matter, and I love it.

 

How about you? What’s your favourite book cover art? Have you ever bought a book just because, or at least mostly because, it was so beautiful?