Let’s stay in the water shall we? But this time you might actually know the beast. Far from the half-monk persona of the Bishopfish, the Loch Ness monster is more like part snake, part dinosaur! His nickname, Nessie, comes from the Scottish Gaelic: Niseag, but we don’t really know a lot about it – what he eats is a mystery, (probably humans), as are his exact size and his general habits – but this can perhaps be attributed to the fact that Nessie is a myth, and it is therefore less likely that any scientific study of the beast will turn up significant results.

Why pick Nessie for my post when almost everyone knows about it? Well, this might be one of my favourite monsters because, whilst all the others are definitely dead or difficult to believe in, with Nessie there is always a little part of you wondering. This legend has managed to mess with a lot of peoples’ heads over the last few centuries. Even today, if you head for the banks of Loch Ness and take a look in the dark depths of the lake, you’d probably think, “this creature might just be down there”. Though, some people would say, that if such a monster exists he would probably be slightly bored, given that he has been in the same lake for more than four centuries . . .

Yes these are the kind of thoughts that cross my mind when I loose myself in the deep blue carpet of the lake. Well don’t laugh I am not the only one.

The first account of the Loch Ness monster comes from the seventh-century Life of Saint Columba. It depicts the story of a monk who came across a funeral being conducted near the Loch Ness. The deceased had been innocently taking a swim, when a “water beast” decided to go for the unfortunate man, and took a bite. The villagers could only drag his corpse to the shore. But when the monk ordered someone to swim the Loch Ness and fetch his boat, he prevented a repeat attack by making the sign of the cross and, essentially, telling the beast to go away.

But it was more obviously brought to the world’s attention in 1933 by Alex Campbell in an article in the Inverness Courier, where he mentioned, for the first time, a “monster” in the lake. Later that year George Spicer and his wife saw a “most extraordinary form of animal” in front of their car, and gave quite a precise description of it.  Since then big N has had quite a success.

The most outstanding of his shining moments, is definitely when the first photograph of the Loch Ness monster – taken by Hugh Gray – was published, and the Secretary of State for Scotland actually ordered the police to prevent any attacks on it. In 1934 came the famous “surgeon’s photographs” showing a head and a neck emerging from the water . . . and then its equally famous denouncement as a hoax.

So, no genuine proof has emerged quite yet, but don’t despair and maybe, if some researcher put his mind to it, we might even find some big plesiosaur bones under there in a few years.  As was said on the last monster post, I would rather go with the uncommon explanation.

Post by Astrid . . . . . . .

Time now to discuss the third acquisition recently made by Jo for the JFB list. In fact, we did a thirty-second questionnaire with the author the other day, check it out here.

One more debut for the JFB list, and equally as cool as The Detainee, this is Gemsign by Stephanie Saulter. Set in a world where a deadly Syndrome, triggered by our reliance on technology, has decimated the human population. A solution has been found in the Gems – genetically modified humans. But now the Norms (humans) have managed to gain full control over the Syndrome and the Gems are no longer needed. The Gems must fight to be accepted as part of this new world, and to gain human status – and all the while they are up against the horrifying Godgangs, who believe the Gems should never have existed, and the Gemtechs, the corporations that created them, who are striving to protect their investments at any cost. If it wasn’t such a lame term, I’d call it a social SF, but it’s sooo much more than that. It’s a pacy SF thriller that’ll really make you think.

I’m so excited that we get to publish it, especially as it is so different from anything else we have published so far, plus, we’re bringing an awesome female author to the SF field – evening out the score, shall we say! Especially if you consider another of our SF debut authors Naomi Foyle, whose astoundingly lyrical Seoul Survivors is out with us next February, and the wonderful Karen Lord, whose debut SF novel (after her first fantasy novel Redemption in Indigo) The Best of All Possible Worlds is out with us next March. *Phew* What an exciting 2013 we have planned – watch this space!

To continue the theme I set yesterday, I thought I’d bring you another sneaky glimpse into 13 of our most recent acquisitions, read on to find out what’s going into our ebooks schedule for this year!

Another of our other exciting acquisitions involves one of our current authors Lisa Tuttle . . . and 13 of her backlist titles! You’ll have read me whittering on about the brilliant The Silver Bough, coming from us in July this year, but having read that novel, it is certainly enough to get me excited about these (even if it did mean I suddenly had a lot of admin to do). I’ve now got a couple of them lined up on my desk, all ready to read, although I will admit to have already taken four home . . .  Should you fancy taking a gander in due course, the titles include: Memories of the Body, Gabriel, The Pillow Friend, The Mysteries, Lost Futures, A Spaceship Built of Stone, Panther in Argyll, Snake Inside, Familiar Spirit, Love Online, Ghosts and Other Lovers, My Pathology and Other Stories and finally A Nest of Nightmares. These titles span all of the genres JFB publish, and with quotes from such eminent writers as George R. R. Martin – ‘Lisa Tuttle never disappoints’ – and Neil Gaiman – ‘Lisa Tuttle has quietly been writing remarkable, chilling short stories and powerful, haunting novels for many years now, and doing it so easily and so well that one almost takes it, and her, for granted. This would be as big a mistake as not reading Lisa Tuttle’ – this is sure to be one of the strongest JFB backlists.

Hi All,

After an absence of quite some time, I thought it prudent to come back to the blog and make an extra-special effort to reacquaint myself with you, our lovely digital fans, who keep us going! (In my defence, I am still catching up with everything following my Himalayan trek; it is amazing what ten days away from the office can do to your inbox . . . and all your carefully organised schedules.)

One of the serious things that I missed out on were the acquisitions JFB made while I was in Nepal (and blissfully unaware of all the work piling up for me upon my return), so I thought I’d chat a bit about them and give you a glimpse of future delights in store for you.

The most exciting thing, for me, was coming back to the news that we had acquired a seriously awesome novel by debut novelist Peter Liney. It’s called The Detainee and is set in a somewhat-dystopian future, where all the financial markets have crashed and the blame has been placed squarely on the shoulders of the old and infirm (why not, right?). As a result of this, all of the elderly have been shipped off to an island off the coast of San Francisco, where they live in absolute filth on the (literal) waste of the city, watched by the punishment satellites hiding in the sky . . . and the Wastelords, who like to go hunting on foggy nights, when they are hidden from the satellites and justice. Having read the first draft, I can tell you that not only is this an exciting, pacey, well-written piece of SF, but that the Wastelords are some of the creepiest inventions I have ever seen in genre fiction – but you’ll have to read it to find out what they are, and why they are just so wrong. Clancy, the ageing ‘Big Guy’ who leads this novel, is a sympathetic character, simple and direct without being annoying; it is he who provides the ray of hope that runs throughout, and turns an otherwise dark, bleak world, into something worth fighting for. This is something to really look forward to, and, good news, it’s the first in a series. At present we plan to publish in August 2013, but watch this space.

So that’s the first one I missed out on, but there are more – oh yes, and I’ll be telling you about them over the next couple of days. Stay tuned for sneaky glimpses into the JFB programme, and to find out what else we have going on in the JFB offices!

Time for another 30-second interview I reckon. This time it’s with the brilliant Tom Pollock, whose awesome debut novel The City’s Son is out in August this year. If you haven’t heard of it yet, you might want to have a little search online and get boning up on the subject, and if you fancy a chat, Tom is on Twitter, circling under the name @tomhpollock. You can also visit his website here www.tompollock.com.

Where were you born?

London Town

What’s your comfort food?

Chicken Noodle Soup (the hungry part of me at least is still a good Jewish boy)

What’s your favourite tipple?

Tea strong enough to arm-wrestle Vladimir Putin.

What superpower would you want / which superhero would you be?

Flight, always dreamed of it. And Nightcrawler, I always wanted a pre-hensile tail.

Dog or cat?

Cat, despite the scars . (typed while being climbed all over by three of them)

What keeps you sane?

My #futurewife, she blisters me with appropriate scorn whenever I get crazy.

What scares you?

Those people in power who appear think that ‘evidence’ is for wimps.

Beaches or adventure?

Adventure.

What’s your holiday read?

China Mieville

What is the best present you’ve ever received?

Hang Gliding lessons.

What have you learned about yourself as you’ve got older?

Everybody’s faking it just as hard as I am.

What would people be surprised to discover about you? 

That I’m faking it just as hard as they are.

Sweet or savoury? 

Both, continuously, but only consecutive, never concurrent.

What is your favourite sport?

Parkour. It’s just a joy to watch.

What is your favourite way to travel?

River boat.

Would you rather read the book or watch the film?

Book. Obviously.

Sarkozy or Obama?

Dude, Obama.

Night in or night out?

Out (although anyone who’s seen me dance will wish I’d said otherwise)

What are you currently listening to?

Balam Acab.

Women: Louboutin or Reebok? Men: Armani or JD Sports? 

Neither. Threadless, all the way.

PRAISE FOR THE CITY’S SON

‘Gritty, dynamic, and beautiful. I can’t wait for more’
Tessa Gratton, author of Blood Magic

‘Nails that spot between utterly normal and blood-curdlingly weird perfectly’
Jon Courtenay Grimwood, author of the Assassini series

‘A wildly inventive portrait of London that will fill you with fearsome delight’
Karen Mahoney, author of The Iron Witch

‘An impeccably dark parable, endlessly inventive and utterly compelling’
Mike Carey, author of the Felix Castor novels

‘Bold, and weird, and quite, quite wonderful. The very definition of urban fantasy. Just glorious’
Adam Christopher, author of Empire State

‘A book that is by any standards impressive . . . A wonderfully confident debut that will have even the most critical fantasy fans clamouring for more’
Fantasy Book Review.co.uk

‘Phenomenal. One of the most imaginative pieces of genre fiction I’ve ever read’
Fantasy-faction.com

I started last week’s series of mythical monsters with a Greek god:

TYPHON – THE IMMORTAL STORM GIANT

Simply because he sounded just that cool. Now though, I want to continue with one that sounds just that barmy. Yep – it’s completely and utterly bonkers, but what I love about it most -and, in fact, about most of these monsters – is that, in the past, it was written about as though it was undisputed fact, as though this thing actually existed. Which, I guess it could have done, who am I to say? This monster comes, once again, from Breverton’s Phantasmagoria, but this time I’ve stolen it from the ‘Mysteries of the Deep’ section, to get a little bit of variety going. And, like I said, it’s a little bit crazy, it is:

BISHOP-FISH – THE CHRISTIAN SEA-MONSTER

Although I’m not sure it’s quite as entitled to the large bold font as Typhon. This sea-monster is European in origin and was said to have the shaved head of a catholic monk (if it’s a fish, I would imagine it didn’t have much hair to begin with anyway). However, this legend is clearly true because sightings were ‘documented’ as early as the 13th century, when one was apparently caught swimming in the Baltic Sea. It was then unceremoniously lifted from its natural habitat and given to the King of Poland – all making perfect sense so far! Right? – but here’s where it starts to get slightly more mad. After it was shipped off to the King, it was then shown to some Catholic bishops, to whom the fish guestured – appealing to be released. The Bishop obeyed and set it free, at which point it made the sign of the cross (yep, this fish has fingers and arms, because, let’s face it, you can hardly make the sign of the cross with a fin) and swam off. What makes this tale even funnier is that another was apparently caught in Germany in 1531, but it refused to eat and died after three days.

The origins of this story are probably far more boring than we imagine. Some researchers believe that the Bishop Fish may be a kind of deformed manta ray, whose features bear some slight semblance to those of a man and that a ray’s ‘wings’ could create the illusion of the cape-like appendage so often attributed to these creatures.

Personally, I’d rather go with the original. I like a bit of mystery and I think it’s something we’re severely lacking in now we think we know so much more about the world – and although I don’t believe that a fish can make the sign of the cross or has the face of a man – I like to know that someone, at least once, had the imagination to make it up.

Hope you enjoyed today’s blog, more on monsters later! Hoping you have a great weekend!

Hey everyone,

I’m honoured to announce that the awesome British Fantasy Society has just announced its shortlists for this year’s awards and I’m delighted to say that a whole host of stories from A Book of Horrors as well as the anthology itself are up for prizes in 3 categories!

Our Nominations and their respective categories are:

Novella

• Ghosts with Teeth; Peter Crowther (A Book of Horrors, Jo Fletcher Books)
• Near Zennor; Elizabeth Hand (A Book of Horrors, Jo Fletcher Books)
• The Music of Bengt Karlsson, Murderer; John Ajvide Lindqvist (A Book of Horrors, Jo Fletcher Books)

Short Fiction

• Sad, Dark Thing; Michael Marshall Smith (A Book of Horrors)
• Alice through the plastic sheet; Robert Shearman (A Book of Horrors)
• The Coffin-Maker’s Daughter; Angela Slatter (A Book of Horrors)

Anthology

• A Book of Horrors; editor Stephen Jones (Jo Fletcher Books)

You can check out the shortlist in full over on the society’s official website.

One of my favourite books that we are publishing this year has a little bit at the back which recommends books on Scottish mythology. Now, I am very interested in mythology, so naturally I went and bought one (need I an excuse to buy books? I think not). But what it has led to is this: mythological creatures – how cool are they? Therefore, I decreed that we should have a series of blogs on monsters of legend . . . Only problem was, I didn’t know where to begin; there are so many! Anyway, after I spent a little while trawling the internet for books on mythological creatures, I vaguely realized that I did, in fact, work in a publisher and promptly wandered off down to the contracts department (by this I mean I turned to the editorial assistant for the contracts department, who sits next to me – it’s a loooong way to the other side of the office) and found that we had indeed published a book ourselves on mythological creatures, under the title Breverton’s Phantasmagoria, a rather grand name for a nonetheless brilliant little book. Now, having taken a quick look through, it looks like quite a comprehensive list I will have to pick from, my plan is therefore to pick a few of the monsters at random and post them at irregular intervals on the blog – hopefully as much for your enjoyment as mine. Here we are then, kicking us off with the first monster:

TYPHON – THE IMMORTAL STORM GIANT

Which I imagine absolutely has to be said in the deepest, loudest voice possible, just because it sounds so cool. Here’s a picture of Typhon:

According to the Phantasmagoria, the physical description of old Typhon is thus: ‘He was so huge that his head was said to touch the stars. He was man-shaped down to the thighs, with two coiled vipers in place of legs. Attached to his hands in place of fingers were 50 serpent heads per hand. He was winged, had dirty matted hair and a beard, pointed ears and eyes flashing fire.’ – if this hasn’t convinced you that he belongs on the blog, the rest of it will: ‘According to some sources, Typhon had 200 hands each with 50 serpents for fingers and 100 heads, one in human form and the rest being heads of bulls, boars, serpents, lions and leopards. As a volcano daimon, Typhon threw red-hot rocks at the sky and storms of fire erupted from his mouth’. Phew, those Ancient Greeks didn’t half have imaginations on them.

There you have it then – Typhon, youngest son of Gaia (Earth) and Tartaros (the Pit) (according to Hesiod anyway) earns his place on the JFB blog. Have you ever come across him before? I certainly hadn’t, but he’ll definitely be inspiring any writing of mine from now forwards!

My thanks to both Hesiod and Terry Breverton for providing me with the info to write this blog, check out his book here: http://www.quercusbooks.co.uk/book/Brevertons-Phantasmagoria-by-Terry-Breverton-ISBN_9780857383372

Some of you may know that recently we have acquired several new titles for the JFB list and, along with that, we now have several new authors to welcome to the JFB team. And what better way to welcome our authors than by bombarding them with questions so we have fodder for the blog? (sorry!). First up is debut author Stephanie Saulter, whose brilliant SF novel Gemsigns will currently be out with us on 28th March 2013, she has a blog here and has obligingly completed her thirty-second questions for us extremely quickly. So here goes, we hope you enjoy!

Where were you born?    

Jamaica

What’s your comfort food?

Home-made chicken soup if I’m feeling poorly. I don’t really eat for comfort.

What’s your favourite tipple? 

If I’m in Jamaica on a hot afternoon, a good planter’s punch. A good red wine anywhere else.

What superpower would you want / which superhero would you be? 

I wouldn’t.

Dog or cat? 

Dog. I don’t have one, though.

What keeps you sane? 

Books

What scares you? 

Not much

Beaches or adventure? 

Adventure

What’s your holiday read? 

Whatever’s been piling up unread on my coffee table because I haven’t had time

What is the best present you’ve ever received? 

My brother Storm, born the day before my 17th birthday

What have you learned about yourself as you’ve got older? 

I know less and understand more

What would people be surprised to discover about you? 

That I have an active, vivid and unconventional imagination. When this book is published I think a lot of people are going to be very surprised indeed.

Sweet or savoury? 

Savoury

What is your favourite sport? 

To watch? Probably football

What is your favourite way to travel?

By train

Would you rather read the book or watch the film? 

The book. Always.

Sarkozy or Obama? 

Obama

Night in or night out? 

Night in

What are you currently listening to?

Florence + the Machine

Women: Louboutin or Reebok? 
            Men: Armani or JD Sports?

Reebok. Not that I have either, I’m mainly a Clark’s girl.

Our thanks to Stephanie for such prompt answers and for putting up with the nonsense we like to spout here at JFB towers. We hope you enjoyed a little more insight in to the mind of a writer!

Morning all! I am really happy to be announcing this great bit of news for JFB – especially as it’s a Monday morning, and we all need a pick-me-up on a Monday – so here goes: A Book of Horrors, a collection by Stephen Jones, and one of the first books JFB printed, has been nominated for no less than three Shirley Jackson awards. Hooray!

Announced last week, the nominations include two for Best Novella, for the stories by Reggie Oliver (A Child’s Problem) and Elizabeth Hand (Near Zennor) and one for Best Edited Anthology.

In recognition of the legacy of Shirley Jackson’s writing, the Shirley Jackson Awards commemorate outstanding achievement in the literature of psychological suspense, horror, and the dark fantastic.

For those of you who don’t know, Shirley Jackson wrote such classic novels as The Haunting of Hill House and We Have Always Lived in the Castle, as well as some of the most famous short stories in the English language (The Lottery). Her work continues to be a major influence on writers of every kind of fiction, from the most traditional genre offerings to the most innovative literary work.

We will know the outcome on July 15th 2012, when the results will be announced at Readercon 23 in Boston Massachusets. Until then, thank you to Stephen Jones for putting the book together, to all the awesome authors that contributed to make this book so great, and to the judges of the Shirley Jackson Awards who have not only recognised that, but given me the best Monday morning I could have had in a very long time.

(And if this doesn’t make you want to run out and buy it, to see what all the fuss is about, I don’t know what will! Let us know what you think either below, or on twitter at @jofletcherbooks)