Bookshelf Snooping - Nik Perring

Your childhood favourite

I remember really loving Mossflower, by Brain Jacques.

Your current favourite

There really are so many, it’s impossible to pick one. I recently read Dickens’ ‘A Christmas Carol’ for the first time and I loved that so, for now, that’s what I’ll go with.

Your top five authors

Again, SUCH a difficult question to answer as there really are so many. But the first five who come to mind, I think, would be:

Aimee Bender

Etgar Keret

Kurt Vonnegut

Michael Kimball

and Kafka.

Book(s) you’re reading now

At the moment I’m reading a book ‘Naïve. Super’ by the Norwegian, Erland Loe. I’m finding that a lot of the books I enjoy the most are translated, and I’m not sure translators receive quite as much credit as they deserve. So: Nice one, translators, from this writer!

Book(s) you’ve pretended to read

I don’t think I’ve ever lied, saying I’ve read something I’ve not. Knowing me it’d be to the person who was an expert on whichever book I said and I’d get found out straight away. I wish I’d read more Dickens though, and more of the classics. But I haven’t, and there’s not much I can do about that as there’s so much other stuff I want to read first.

Book(s) you’ve bought for the cover

I think I actually only did this for the first time the other day, and that was for ‘Naïve, Super’. We all know we can’t judge a book by its cover, but a good one does help. (Link for the cover: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Naive-Super-Erlend-Loe/dp/1841956724/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1323529968&sr=1-1)

Book you’re a champion for

I’ve been banging on about Aimee Bender’s books for a few years now, and I can’t see me stopping just yet! They’re magical. They’re brilliant. I think, and this is only my opinion, that she’s the best writer out there at the moment. So I’d heartily recommend ANY of hers. And probably Slaughterhouse Five, by Kurt Vonnegut, too, because that is a genuine masterpiece. As is Michael Kimball’s ‘Dear Everybody’.

I’m a champion of mine as well, of course.

Book that changed your life

‘Willful Creatures’ by Aimee Bender. It showed me that I could write the kind of things I wanted to write, and also the standards I’d have to aim for. And without my professional hat on, I think the stories in it are about as perfect as you’ll find.

Book you most want to read again for the first time

Probably ‘Willful Creatures’ again, for the magic. Or Frankenstein, maybe.

Book you turn to for comfort

I don’t tend to re-read books, so the ones I do, for whatever reason, I think makes them exceptional. Again, anything by Aimee Bender. Anything by Etgar Keret. There’s a passage in ‘Dear Everybody’ that’ll make me cry, nine times out of ten, whenever I go back to to read it. It’s on page 236 of the hardback, and it’s about dividing the memories of a relationship once it’s over between the two people who were in it. It’s stunning.

Favourite line from a book

So it goes.

*

Nik Perring is a writer, author, and editor from the UK. He writes, mostly, short stories. The stories he’s written have been widely published, in the UK and abroad, in print and on-line. They’ve been collected in the book ‘Not So Perfect’ (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Not-So-Perfect-Nik-Perring/dp/1906894078/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_2)(Roast Books, 2010), read at events, printed on fliers and used, with one of Dave Eggers’, as essential material on a creative writing course in the US.

‘Freaks!, (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Freaks-Caroline-Smailes/dp/0007442890/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_1) an illustrated collection of short stories, co-written with Caroline Smailes, will be published by The Friday Project (HarperCollins) in April 2012.

His online home is here: nikperring.com

Bookshelf Snooping - Adam Slade

Many thanks to Adam Slade for divulging information about his bookshelf. You can find him at his blog Editing Hat. 

1. Your childhood favourite

Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett. I started reading the Pratchetts at 12 or 13, and I'm still buying them whenever a new one is released. The man is a genius.

2. Your current favourite 

Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett! Seriously, that book doesn't get old. My favourite of the year, though, would be Joe Abercrombie's First Law trilogy. Such incredible characters.

3. Your top five authors

Terry Pratchett, Joe Abercrombie, Jim Butcher, RA Salvatore (for his Drizzt series), and Scott Lynch (the Gentleman Bastards series). If it was top six, I'd include Stephen King, for his Dark Tower series, but since I don't read horror I don't like most of his stuff.

4. Book(s) you’re reading now

I'm currently reading Ketchup is a Vegetable by Robin O'Bryant, after being bullied into it by a friend. I'm glad they did. It's a non-fiction series of humorous essays about motherhood and parenting. Normally I don't read anything like it, but now Robin has me wanting to expand my horizons a little.

5. Book(s) you’ve pretended to read 

None. I don't pretend I've read something, and I'm honest if I don't like something. This has garnered me some funny looks (I couldn't stand Pride and Prejudice, and I'm not about to pretend otherwise), but I read for me, not for other people.

6. Book(s) you’ve bought for the cover

None. My books are always stored spine out, so there's no point. Anyway, it's the words that matter! :-)

7. Book you’re a champion for 

Any written by a friend. It's hard getting out there in the publishing industry, so I'm always willing to throw up a post/review/interview to help.

8. Book that changed your life

I've honestly never read a book that changed my life. For one thing, I almost exclusively read fantasy, so it's more escapist than mind-altering. The closest has been Joe Abercrombie's First Law books, which changed the way I write.

9. Book you most want to read again for the first time 

The entire Discworld series. I'd love to rediscover them as an adult, and see if my opinions changed.

10. Book you turn to for comfort 

Anything by a favourite author. That said, I don't reread something until a fair amount of time has passed (years). I dislike remembering plot points before they happen.

11. Favourite line from a book

I have a terrible memory for specific lines, and only two stick in my mind. "YES" from Reaper Man (it's said by a god, and Pratchett used a font the size of a paperback page for effect), and "I just have to wait for Jean to get here," from The Lies of Locke Lamora, which is used in a flashback then again later on in a crucial scene. VERY well done. :-)

2012 Annual Reading Challenge

It's that time of the year, my friends. I invite you, once again, to join in the annual reading challenge. 2011 was super successful for me, as I not only surpassed my 80 books target, but went over 110 books. So for 2012, I'm going to aim for 100 books. 

100 books - 1 year. That sounds a lot, but when I think about all the hundreds of thousands of book I want to read, it's nothing really. Yet, one must remain realistic. 

What about you? How many books are you going to aim for? Don't forget to leave your links for your challenge, so I can follow your progress to. My "Books Read" list for 2012 will be available on this blog. 

Happy Reading!

WR Recommends - Must Read Inspirational Fiction

1. The Alchemist – Paulo Coelho
2. The Five People You Meet in Heaven – Mitch Albom
3. For One More Day – Mitch Albom
4. Eleven Minutes – Paulo Coelho
5. The Devil and Miss Prym – Paulo Coelho

2012 - The Ecletic Reader Challenge

As regular readers of this blog may already know, I LOVE reading challenges. Usually I create my own, because I don't like being dictated by others as to what I should read. 

But this time, I'm joining Shelleyrae's Eclectic Reader Challenge, which is right up my street. The goal is to read at least one book in the following 12 genres. 

1. Literary Fiction
2. Crime/Mystery Fiction
3. Romantic Fiction
4. Historical Fiction
5. Young Adult
6. Fantasy
7. Science Fiction
8. Non Fiction
9. Horror
10. Thriller / Suspense
11. Classic
12. Your favourite genre


For "Your favourite genre" I just take it to mean a genre that's not included in the list. While I read all of the other genres, reading Horror will be out of my usual choice. So that's something. 

You can read more about the challenge at the link above, so come and join if you wish. 

WR Recommends - Must Read Memoires

1. 84 Charing Cross Road – Helene Hanff
2. The Diary of A Young Girl – Anne Frank
3. A Writer’s Diary – Virginia Woolf
4. Nella Last’s War – Nella Last
5. Night – Elie Wiesel
6. The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin – Benjamin Franklin
7. The Upanishads - Eknath Easwaran

NaNoWriMo 2011 - Progress Report

This year NaNoWriMo has been quite frenzy free, except for the first day where the frenzy of starting is almost a ritual. Usually, I try to finish my whole draft or at least as much as possible during NaNo, but this year I don't mind if I do only 50K. So while there have been some unproductive days, on the whole, I have made a steady progress. It's a good thing in a way, because while I'm doing NaNo, I am also continuing with other things going on in my life. On the flip side, it doesn't really feel like a challenge. But on a more positive note, I am making progress, and that's the important thing. It is in fact a positive thing because if I can write 50K easily enough in November, I can do it whenever I am writing a first draft. 

So current word count is 37167. I plan to have 50K done by 27th of November, and unless things go drastically wrong from here, I don't see an issue. But I look forward to finishing this draft in December. 

What about you? How is your NaNoWriMo going? How are you finding it? Challenging, fun, despairing?