Metatemporal Detective

Moorcock: Always a Big Deal!

Graeme’s Fantasy Book Review proclaims that Michael Moorcock’s The Metatemporal Detective“manages to capture perfectly the ‘pulp feel’ of the authors that Moorcock has affection for. Hard-bitten detectives, beautiful women, gun fights and car chases sit within these pages and some of the double crossing kept me guessing right up until the end of each story… All in all, a very entertaining read that made my daily commute go very quickly. A good one for fans, who are looking for their favourites, as well as the casual reader who may be looking to try Moorcock for the first time.”

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On the Road: John Picacio & Michael Moorcock, Part II

John Picacio reports from the road:

Great times in Austin, Texas yesterday…Mike Moorcock and I signed copies of The Metatemporal Detectiveat BookPeople, the largest independent bookstore in Texas. Mike did a short reading from the book, and then answered a wide range of questions from the audience. Amongst the topics discussed — the origins of Elric; his theories on magic; the status of the developing Elric film project; his relationship with the Weitz brothers; his days with Hawkwind; why people should read Barry Bayley; and much, much more.

After that, we signed lots of copies of The Metatemporal Detectiveand hey, even some copies of my artbook, Cover Story: The Art of John Picacio. Mike’s birthday isn’t until Dec. 18th, but that didn’t stop us from celebrating with a decadent Chocolate Eruption cake, sponsored by The Metatemporal Detective’sever-loving publisher, Pyr. Damn good. Here’s what it basically looked like, but much bigger (scroll down the link above for “Chocolate Eruption”).

After such a fine dessert, Linda Moorcock suggested we have dinner at Hyde Park Grill….fried egg sandwiches; buttermilk-battered fries; Kobe beef burgers; chicken fried steak; corn & cheese tamales; sirloin burgers smothered in cheddar cheese and scallions….so good. If you attended the signing, thanks for coming out, and if you missed out, maybe we’ll try to do it again in ’08 when Elric The Stealer of Soulsreleases in February.

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Two Great Gift Recommendations

Lisa Tuttle, of The Time’s Online, has recommended Ian McDonald’s Brasylas part of The Times Christmas choice: science fiction / fantasy. She says, “Brasyl is the best novel yet by Ian McDonald, who deserves to be much better known. Audacious in scope and style, the story he tells is very human, full of vividly realised characters. It is a magical alternative history of Brazil and a mind-expanding intellectual adventure in prose bordering on the hallucinogenic.”

Meanwhile, Jeff Vandermeer, of Amazon’s Omnivoracious blog, recommends Michael Moorcock’s The Metatemporal Detectiveas part of Four Great SF / F Gifts. He says, “Put out in a gorgeous hardcover edition from Pyr, featuring the art of World Fantasy Award winner John Picacio, this collection of short fictions will entertain anyone who loves wild imagination wedded to impeccable storytelling, along with liberal doses of humor and suspense. Detailing the exploits of Seaton Begg and his companion Dr. “Taffy Sinclair” as they solve mysteries in alternate universes, The Metatemporal Detective ranges far and wide, from 1960s Chicago to the wild west to Paris and points unknown. Another example of the range and depth of Moorcock’s prodigious talent.”

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On the Road: John Picacio & Michael Moorcock

Via John Picacio’s blog, On the Front:

This is gonna be fun. Michael Moorcock and I will be signing copies of his new hardcover release THE METATEMPORAL DETECTIVE on Saturday, Dec. 8th at 3pm at the largest bookstore in Texas, BookPeople / Austin, TX. (Store location details here.) In addition, I’ll be bringing a few of my original drawings from the forthcoming release of ELRIC: THE STEALER OF SOULS. (Rumor has it, we may also be celebrating Mike’s birthday early, with free chocolate cake all around.)

Here’s a recent pic of a BookPeople shelf display featuring “Great Illustration & Design Books.” Needless to say, I’ll be happy to personalize copies of this book as well. 🙂

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We’ll Always Have Paris

Michael Moorcock signed copies of The Metatemporal Detective to a packed house this past November 5th at the Shakespeare & Company bookstore in Paris, France. He is pictured left with co-owner and event coordinator Sylvia Whitman (daughter of the legendary bibliophile George Whitman) and Martin Stone, (sometimes known as Martin “Mad Dog” Stone, whose guitar work will be familiar to all Stiff Records listeners. )

Pictured right is a shot of Mike reading taken from the very back of the crowd, and lower left shows Mike signing The Metatemporal Detective for a fan.

Meanwhile, Mike will be returning to the states shortly , where he’ll join cover illustrator John Picacio for an event at BookPeople in Austin, Texas, at 3pm Saturday on December 8th.

We’ll be back with more pictures from that event too!

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The 2007 NYLA Annual Conference

This week, my parent company Prometheus Books are exhibiting at the 2007 NYLA Annual Conference “Libraries: Learning for Life,” currently being held this October 17 -20, 2007 in Buffalo, New York. Our director of publicity, Jill Maxick, sends along these pictures of the Prometheus Booth, including a close up on the Pyr display. On hand for the show is Richard Snyder, Marcia Rogers, Lynn Pasquale, and the aforementioned Jill Maxick (pictured below.)


Jill reports: “It is PB’s ‘first-ever’ NYLA conference and though exhibit floor traffic was slower than we’d hoped for (we were told that Eastern NYS conference locations are busier due to a higher concentration of library systems in the eastern districts of the state,) Pyr was extremely well-received. Many comments were made about the female action-oriented protagonists of both the Quantum Gravity and Cassandra Kresnov series, which is funny because I think you’ve recently blogged about the similarities in their appeal, no? Librarians also favorably commented on the durability for circulation of our trade paper bindings versus mass-market only titles. “

That’s Crossover: A Cassandra Kresnov Novelby Joel Shepherd being given out in the stack to Jill’s right. Meanwhile, here is a picture of the Pyr display, where I can spy a copy of the just-out The Metatemporal Detectiveby Michael Moorcock. I’m still waiting on my own copy – but it looks good, doesn’t it?

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Adventures in the Multiverse: Michael Moorcock Podcast

Shaun Farrell’s always magnificent podcast, Adventures in Scifi Publishing, has just uploaded his extensive interview with fantasy master Michael Moorcock, discussing his imminent work, The Metatemporal Detective.

Almost the entire 45 minute podcast is devoted to Mike, who talks about the origin of the Sir Seaton Begg character, all his literary allusions, his connection to the Pyatt novels, etc… He also discusses classic science fiction writer Alfred Bester, contemporary literary writer Michael Chabon, the origin of his multiverse, the differences in how he is published in the US and the UK, and much more besides.

Listening to it now myself. My favorite quote: “Tom Paine, addressing the Americans before the Revolution said – I think it’s in Common Sense – that it was unseemly that such a large nation should be ruled by such a small one. And I think that’s true of the science fiction and fantasy world, that it’s such a very large nation indeed being to some extent ruled by a very small nation of critics. Because in terms of sales, you know, there are a lot of literary writers I know who would give a lot to have the kind of sales that many science fiction and fantasy writers have.”

It should be noted too that Shaun is holding a contest to give away three copies of The Metatemporal Detective. Entry details are on his website.

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Interview: Michael Moorcock on the Wire

John Joseph Adams interviews Michael Moorcock on SciFiWire today. They talk about the history of The Metatemporal Detective, and the book’s connection to Victorian detective Sexton Blake, New Worlds magazine, and the Pyat quartet. Speaking of Elric in his Count Zenith guise, itself modeled on Blade adversary Zenith the Albino, Mike says:

“Zenith was an influence on my character Elric, so in some ways these stories are homages. But there are many other homages in the stories, too. For instance in ‘The Affair of the Basin des Hivers,’ there are characters from French pulp fiction and movies, as well as a victim from a Balzac novel.”

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Moorcock Interview: The Making of a Metatemporal Detective

Jeremy at The Fantasy Review has posted an interview he conducted with Michael Moorcock, in which they discuss, among other things, the genesis of the Sir Seaton Begg character and The Metatemporal Detective’srelationship to the Elric saga.

When asked about the direct connection between Elric and the book’s villain, Count Zenith, Moorcock says, “through it I could add a dimension to the Elric stories, as I’ve tried to do in the most recent trilogy beginning with The Dreamthief’s Daughter(which of course also dealt with the Nazis). I’ve always been wary of what I consider to be the fascistic elements in certain sword and sorcery stories. I feel that I want to make those elements manifest and use Elric/Zenith to question and oppose those elements.”

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