Doug Johnstone

I love Euro Crime

Posted on January 30, 2013 by Doug Johnstone

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Specifically their reviewer Amanda Gillies, who made Hit & Run her number one book of 2012!

Thanks, Amanda!

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Look what came in the post…

Posted on January 28, 2013 by Doug Johnstone

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My review of Chloe Hooper’s THE ENGAGEMENT in The Independent on Sunday

Posted on January 25, 2013 by Doug Johnstone

Here’s my review of this Aussie literary psychological thriller. Didn’t really get on with this, I’m afraid. Lots of nice atmosphere, but some unconvincing characterisation and plot stuff. IMHO.

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The Dead Beat – “fix it in the mix”

Posted on January 23, 2013 by Doug Johnstone

OK, so just finished the first draft of my next novel. It’s provisionally called THE DEAD BEAT. It’s about an obituary writer, suicide, mental illness and early 90s indie rock. Billy and Rose from Hit and Run make an appearance, as do Teenage Fanclub and The Afghan Whigs.

Only yesterday I posted this on twitter:

Fuck’s sake, this novel I’m writing is TOTAL AND UTTER DOGSHIT. Sort it out, Johnstone. #FirstDraftPanic

At that point, I thought I had about a week to go to the end. But I stopped today. Think I’d just had enough.

Now all that’s needed is to sort it the fuck out. I actually love redrafting and editing, or polishing a turd, as I like to think of it.

We have a phrase in my band, Northern Alliance. After every duff recording take on a guitar riff or a keyboard line we cannae be arsed re-recording: “Ach, we’ll fix it in the mix.”

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5,502 thank-yous

Posted on January 17, 2013 by Doug Johnstone

My local library yesterday

Just got my PLR statement in, which is a payment for library loans over the year. If you don’t know, all writers get paid a wee bit each time one of their books is checked out of a library in the UK.

So, just wanted to say 5,502 thank-yous for each and every time someone took one of my novels out of a library over the last twelve months. Youu’ve kept me in whisky and the kids in sweeties for a wee bit longer!

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books I’m looking forward to in 2013

Posted on January 11, 2013 by Doug Johnstone

OK, so here are some books I’m looking forward to getting my grubby mitts on this year. Not an exhaustive list by any stretch, just the first ones that caught my eye. Note, these are mostly fiction, I’m still hunting out the non-fiction (see my last post).

What are you looking forward to?

JANUARY
Warren Ellis, Gun Machine (Mulholland)
Peter Leonard, Back from the Dead (Faber)
Erin Kelly, The Burning Air (Hodder & Stoughton)
Chloe Hooper, The Engagement (Jonathan Cape)
Belinda Bauer, Rubbernecker (Bantam)

FEBRUARY
Niall Griffiths, A Great Big Shining Star (Jonathan Cape)
Dan Rhodes, Marry Me (Canongate)
Woody Guthrie, House of Earth (Fourth Estate)
Dave Eggers, A Hologram for the King (Hamish Hamilton)
Lucy Ellmann, Mimi (Bloomsbury)
Amy Sackville, Orkney (Granta)
Sophie Hannah, The Carrier (Hodder & Stoughton)
Joyce Carol Oates, Daddy Love (Head of Zeus)

MARCH
Kate Atkinson, Life After Life (Doubleday)
John Jeremiah Sullivan, Blood Horses (Yellow Jersey)
JM Coetzee, The Childhood of Jesus (Harvill Secker)
Karen Campbell, This is Where I Am (Bloomsbury)
Amity Gaige, Schroder (Faber)

APRIL
Emma Brockes, She Left Me the Gun (Faber)
Frank Bill, Donnybrook (Heinemann)
Ron Rash, Nothing Gold Can Stay (Canongate)

MAY
Yrsa Sigurdardottir, Someone to Watch Over Me (Hodder & Stoughton)
Marcel Theroux, Strange Bodies (Faber)
Jens Lapidus, Never Screw Up (Macmillan)

JUNE
Evie Wyld, All the Birds, Singing (Jonathan Cape)
D.W. Wilson, Ballistics (Bloomsbury)
Alan Glynn, Graveland (Faber)
Craig Davidson, Cataract City (Atlantic)

FURTHER AHEAD
Steve Mosby, Untitled (Orion)
Denise Mina, Untitled (Orion)
Helen FitzGerald, The Cry (Faber)
Margaret Atwood, MaddAddam (Bloomsbury)
Stephen King, Doctor Sleep (Hodder & Stoughton)

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PUBLISHERS! Please send me more varied books.

Posted on January 9, 2013 by Doug Johnstone

Sheila Heti – a woman who writes books!

OK, so one of the things I do as a part-living is review books for various papers and magazines. I am at the mercy of various editors, but I try to pitch to each of them as varied a list of books as possible – fiction and non-fiction, male and female authors, writers from around the world, etc.

BUT. Publishers sometimes don’t get it. The vast majority of books I get sent are novels written by men. I get it. I’m a man and I write novels. But that doesn’t mean that’s all I read, ferchrissakes.

A quick glance at the bookshelf of 2013 titles says it all. There are 45 books, 34 written by men, 11 by women. Similarly, 35 of the books are novels, the rest non-fiction. And even these ratios are slightly skewed because they include the books I have specifically requested for review for January, which had an even balance across both those spreads.

So. Please, publishers, try to alert me to a wider range of titles and authors, eh? Ta. Much appreciated.

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my review of Stuart Neville’s RATLINES in The Independent on Sunday

Posted on January 7, 2013 by Doug Johnstone

My review of Stuart Neville’s excellent RATLINES ran in yesterday’s Independent on Sunday. Click on through for the details. The thing that struck me most about it, is that I never really appreciated Ireland’s thorny relationship with the Second World War. Neville uses that as a brilliant backdrop for a cracking thriller. I don’t always find historical fiction engaging or credible, but RATLINES was definitely both those things and more.

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last chance to buy HIT & RUN for 99p on Kindle

Posted on January 6, 2013 by Doug Johnstone

Folks,
My most recent novel, HIT & RUN, has been on this 12 Days of Kindle promotion for the last, well, 12 days, I guess. Along with a bunch of other books, it’s only 99p. I presume today is the last chance to get it at that price, so click on the link or pic above to get on it, if yer so inclined.

Cheers,
Dx

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A round up of pish

Posted on December 20, 2012 by Doug Johnstone

Here is a random round up of some chat and stuff:

Here I am in The Herald talking about my favourite books of the year.

Here I am in The Scotsman, naming different books as my favourite of the year.

Here I am naming at least one more different book of the year on Faber’s blog.

Here is a very nice mention of my next novel, GONE AGAIN, by Declan Burke on his blog. He names it as one of his books of 2012, which is clever, cos it isn’t out till March 2013.

Here is another very nice mention of GONE AGAIN by Rhian Davies over on It’s A Crime. “Will be one of the big books of 2013,” she says. Oof.

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