HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!! Yes, everyone, it's the July issue of the Shanville Monthly, and that always means a Happy DOUBLE Birthday -- both for the Shanville Monthly and for me! The Shanville Monthly celebrates its 11th birthday this month, while I'm a wee bit older -- I turn 39 on July 2nd!! Closing in on the big 4-0, which I'm not looking forward to!!! But I've still got a year of my thirties left, so let's push all thoughts of impending old age from our minds and focus instead on this month's news. There's plenty to report on, and this month also sees the first installment of the Darren Shan Great Global Giveaway, which I hinted at last month, a competition which is going to make LOTS of fans all around the world VERY happy over the coming months! To find out more about it, read on...
The Ocean Of Blood Facebook App Competition (see below) is hotting up nicely! As I write this, they've just passed the 150,000 drops mark, with almost 100 prizes given away, and another 900 to come!! To celebrate passing the 100,000 drops point, my UK publishers, HarperCollins, decided to release an exclusive extract from Palace of the Damned, the third Mr Crepsley book, on their hugely popular Official Darren Shan Facebook page. Palace goes on sale at the end of September in the UK and USA, but if you want to read a chunk of its first chapter before anyone else, CLICK HERE. You can read the extract (and enter the compeition) no matter where in the world you live.
In the UK, the third collected volume of The Demonata goes on sale on July 7th. It contains Blood Beast and Demon Apocalypse. should be on sale in book stores around the country from the start of July. If you can't find it on the shelves, please feel free to ask a member of staff to order in a copy for you. Or you can order it online by clicking on this link: AMAZON.UK.
GET IN BED WITH DARREN SHAN!!
It’s time to “Get in bed” with me on the fabulous GoodReads site to find out about five of my all-time favourite horror books!!! These brutally beautiful little beasts are five of the books that helped set me on the path which I’ve been treading these past 12 years and more!! http://www.goodreads.com/interviews/show/594.Darren_Shan
You can also check out my shelves on Goodreads, to find a list of all of the books that I have ever read (well, ever since I started keeping track of them when I was a teenager), and the mark I gave them. I add to my shelf every time I read a new book, and have started to arrange them in chronological order, so you can easily see the most recent books that I have read. http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/4643841-darren-shan
COVERING ALL THE ANGLES!
Check out this fascinating piece written by Catherine Casalino, the cover artist for my City trilogy in the USA. In it she discusses the process of designing all three covers. A rare insight into the complex world of cover design! I strongly recommend this article, which shows how complicated and time-consuming a job it is to create a really good cover for a book!! http://blog.figment.com/2011/06/14/how-do-book-covers-get-designed/
The winner of the June Shanville Monthly competition was
Anthony Case from Wolverhampton. Many congratulations to Anthony, and regrets to everyone else who entered but who weren’t so fortunate — better luck next time!!
OCTOBER TOUR
My publicists and I are in the process of putting together the details of my October tour of the UK and Ireland, to promote
Palace of the Damned. I'll be revealing more details next month, but to whet your appetites, I can reveal that we'll be starting late in September in the midlands of the UK. We'll then be working our way south, covering as many different areas as we can along the way, ending the UK stretch in the southwest, before I head to Ireland to do some signings in Dublin (including the signing in Dundrum which had to be cancelled in May) and the surrounding area. I had hoped to fit in some signings in the north of the UK on this tour, but the logistics made this impossible. Hopefully I'll get back up there, and into Scotland, next time round!! As I said above, I'll be able to give more details next month, so tune back in August!!!
SUMMER IRELAND/UK OCEAN OF BLOOD TOUR
I will be doing the following events in the UK and Ireland over the course of the summer, before my next major tour in October.
20th August, Saturday, 1.30pm -- Edinburgh Book Festival -- panel event with Barry Hutchison and Alexander Gordon Smith. http://www.edbookfest.co.uk/the-festival/whats-on/darren-shan-barry-hutchison-alexander-gordon-smith-talk-horror
21st August, Sunday, 10.30am -- Edinburgh Book Festival -- solo event. This is an EXTRA special two hour event in which I will cover all 12 books of The Saga Of Darren Shan to celebrate my 12th year at the festival!! CLICK HERE for more details. http://www.edbookfest.co.uk/the-festival/whats-on/darren-shan-1
4th September, Sunday, 3.00pm -- public event at the Mountains To Sea festival, Dun Laoighre. http://www.mountainstosea.ie/
THE DARREN SHAN GREAT GLOBAL GIVEAWAY!!
When my books are published, my publishers always send me free copies of them. I've built up a massive collection of Darren Shan books over the years, from countries all around the world. I always keep a few of each book for myself, but in many cases I have extra copies. These were stacked away haphazardly in my old house, then in storage for a year while I was living elsewhere, but when I moved back in, I had a chance to go through them and sort them out. Which means that I am now in a position to start GIVING THEM AWAY FOR FREE as competition prizes!!! Most months, for at least the next several months, I am going to run a competition for readers in different countries. The number of prizes will vary for each country depending on how many books I have to give away. I won't announce the number of books up for offer for any given country in advance -- all I will say is that I have a LOT of books to give away, so I'm going to be trying to issue as many prizes as possible each time! You don't get a choice of book as a prize -- basically, I'll see what I have available, and issue prizes accordingly.
This month, I am starting with Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, and the USA. If you live in one of those countries, read the following terms, then send in your entry and keep your fingers crossed!
GENERAL TERMS FOR ALL ENTRANTS:
1) This competition is only open to fans who live in Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, or the USA. (You cannot enter if you work for one of my publishers or are one of my relations.)
2) You can only enter ONCE, and there can only be one entry per household. If you try to enter more than once, ALL of your entries will be disqualified.
3) Put the NAME OF YOUR COUNTRY in the SUBJECT BOX when you send your e-mail. I will not accept your entry if you don't! And make sure you INCLUDE YOUR NAME AND FULL POSTAL ADDRESS in the body of the e-mail. This is so that I can easily send your prize to you if you win! Also, if you are 15 years old or older, and would like to be considered for one of my adult books, please note this in your entry.
4) Closing date is midnight, UK Time, Sunday, July 24th, 2011.
5) The draw for the winners will be made on Monday, July 25th, 2011, or on a date not long after that. It will be a completely random draw, made by Darren Shan personally (I use an online number generator to pick the winner). I will try to notify the winners by e-mail, and will post their names on the Shanville Message Board and in the August issue of the Shanville Monthly.
6) Information submitted by entrants WILL NOT be shared by me with any other individual or company. I'll keep your details on my PC, then delete the info once the competition ends.
7) My decision will be final.
8)
To enter, send an email, along with the NAME OF YOUR COUNTRY in the SUBJECT BOX, and your full name and address in the text, to this email address: [email protected]