A Review So Good It Made Me Feel Sick

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The latest review on the blog tour for The Jump is at Raven Crime Reads. I actually felt a bit queasy reading it, because the reviewer so absolutely got what I was trying to do with this book. So, so grateful – thanks Raven!

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A Brand New Short Story

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I have a brand new short story called ‘Beyond the Heliopause’ in the new issue of Gutter magazine. It’s about grief and suicide, as per usual, and is set in Portobello, New Zealand. There are loads of terrific writers in the mag such as Liz Lochhead, Ron Butlin, Pippa Goldschmidt, Christine De Luca & Rodge Glass. Quality. You can buy it here.

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THE JUMP Press Round Up, Part Two

the jump front cover

Well there has been an absolute flood of press coverage for THE JUMP over the last week or so:

Another absolutely terrific review over at What Are You Reading For. ‘Exceptional’, ‘heart-breaking’ and such like.

Here’s a thing I wrote called How I Became an Author for the Scottish Book Trust.

This is a terrific review over at Our Book Reviews by Mary Mayfield, where she says: “I sometimes feel Doug Johnstone isn’t very well known outside Scotland but he certainly deserves to be! If you haven’t discovered him yet, why not?” Good question, Mary!

Over at Shots Mag I wrote something about what it was like to write The Jump.

A great review over at Liz Loves Books – “The writing is clever, the narrative style is addictive and the character building is superb… I loved it.”

Amanda Gillies wrote the most amazing shit-hot, absolutely loving it review at Eurocrime. “Just when you start to wonder how on earth it could be possible for him to write anything better than his last masterpiece, he does it again and ups the stakes still further. Magnificent.”

David Robinson gives a typically considered opinion over at Wow 24/7. “Although this book is a thriller, what it says about parenting is just as important.”

Here’s a Q&A I did with The Crime Warp to go with their previous lovely review.

“Incredibly moving!” say the good people at Northern Crime, and who am I to argue? No one, that’s who.

Pam Norfolk gives the book a rip-snorting review in The Lancashire Evening Post. “A pulsating psychological page-turner which blends edge-of-the-seat suspense with a searing exploration of love, loss and parenthood.”

I love the Reading Matters blog, and Kim Forrester loves The Jump in return. An astute and in-depth review, as always from Kim, but she ends with this wee bit of wishful thinking: “This would make a terrific movie — I can already see Kelly MacDonald and Ewan McGregor in the lead roles!”

Here’s the story behind the story of The Jump, written by me for Upcoming4.me.

And here’s a list of my favourite movie, album etc I did for AAA Edinburgh.

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Blackwell’s Writers at the Fringe Tonight!

I’m on at Blackwell’s Writers at the Fringe tonight, at their shop on South Bridge, Edinburgh. It’s free, starts at 6pm, and I’m on alongside Ian Garbutt, Jane Alexander, Alwyn James and Sue Lawrence.

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The Shortlist for the Gordon Burn Prize

They announced the shortlist for the Gordon Burn Prize today, which I’m one of the judges of. The five shortlisted books are below, it’s going to be hard to pick a winner. Details about the prize are over at the Bookseller, and the winner will be announced on the 9th October at Durham Book Festival.

In Plain Sight: The Life and Lies of Jimmy Savile by Dan Davies (Quercus)
Midland by Honor Gavin (Penned in the Margins)
Noontide Toll by Romesh Gunesekera (Granta Books)
Original Rockers by Richard King (Faber & Faber)
Nothing is True and Everything is Possible by Peter Pomerantsev (Faber & Faber)

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Total Rave Review for THE JUMP at Eurocrime

Complete and utter mad-crazy loving-it rave review for The Jump over at Eurocrime:
“Just when you start to wonder how on earth it could be possible for him to write anything better than his last masterpiece, he does it again and ups the stakes still further. Magnificent.”
Thank you, thank you, thank you Amanda Gillies.

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Wunderbar!

Guten Morgen! My novel Hit & Run is published in Germany today by btb! Turns out the German for ‘Hit & Run’ is ‘Hit & Run’. Wunderbar! Lovely cover, by the way.

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Thank You!

11214362_1137666276249957_8908516654005623961_n It’s taken me a couple of days to recover, but HUGE thanks to everyone who came along to help launch The Jump into the world the other night, especially Looking Glass Books and Helen Fitzgerald. Top night!
To celebrate, here’s an absolutely rave review of the novel over at Liz Loves Books blog, and here’s a thing I wrote about the writing of the book for Shotsmag.

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THE JUMP is out today!

JUMP launch E_invite

THE JUMP is out today! Come and help me celebrate at Looking Glass Books tonight. Chat, reading, music, booze – the stuff of life!

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THE JUMP Press Round Up, Part One

the jump front cover

OK folks, things are starting to happen, reviews and such like, so here’s a quick round up of stuff that’s appeared in print and online in the last wee while:

First up, Joanne over at The Portobello Book Blog gave the book a glowing review, saying: ‘I found this a real page turner and recommend it if you like a gripping thriller’. That’ll do!

Next, the good people at The Crime Warp loved the book as well, calling it ‘insightful and unsettling!’ Nice.

Keith Nixon at Crime Fiction Lover gave it another cracking review, coming up with this line, which I like a lot: ‘It’s like the author’s wrapped a brick in velvet and hit you over the head with it a couple of times. Smooth and blunt.’ Warning: The review contains a few spoilers.

I wrote a thing over at the Faber Academy about Why I Write. In summary, because I’m fucking angry.

I appeared in The Metro today, talking about the books On My E-Reader. I don’t have one really, but I just banged on about books I love by David Gates, Megan Abbott and Don Winslow. Good excuse.

And I did the Off The Shelf column for The Big Issue in the North, which was a similar thing, except this time I talked up books by Helen FitzGerald and James Sallis to go with Megan Abbott and David Gates. And I got to share the page with the inimitable Limmy.

And finally for now, I wrote a thing over at Crime Time about the inspiration behind writing The Jump. Lots of chat about suicide, basically.

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