This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 15th, 2007 at 1:45 pm and is filed under The History Book. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Hi and thanks for visiting. Send me your thoughts on The History Book or any of my reports that you can reach from the left hand side of this page. One thing that keeps us going is lively debate.
This is the big moment for The History Book, when Kat Polinski, its hard-driving, unsettled protagonist, is officially introduced to her readers. One reviewer described her tough, edgy and compassionate, and I’m on the edge of my seat as to whether you’ll like each other. So far the reviews coming in have been fantastic. The Washington Post compared The History Book to George Orwell’s 1984 and BookLoons to Ian Fleming’s James Bond, which, for me, hits exactly the right spot. The History Book is a story of unstoppable action that’s underpinned by the serious issues we face today. Other great notices have come from Armchair Reviews —- a pulse-pounding must-read for fans of political thrillers and suspense and Reader Views — Any reader who loves a riveting action-packed book will love The History Book. A lot of it’s made up, which is what fiction writers do. Much is based in reality and some of it — in a few years time — could turn out to be too close to the truth.
The issues are total government surveillance, contracted out to private companies who control energy supplies for their own gain. True or false? The realistic backdrops match my Dragon trilogy of future global wars and the three stand alone thrillers. But with Kat, I’ve tried something more ambitious, so please let me know if you think it works.
I live in London and travel crazily. Most recently, I’ve reported from Brazil, Cyprus, India, Iraq, Israel, Kosovo, Sweden and all over the US.
7 Responses to “Hi and thanks for visiting”
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August 23rd, 2007 at 5:17 am
You have said: “The issues are total government surveillance, contracted out to private companies who control energy supplies for their own gain.”
Democracy is about ‘gain’. Theoretically. Clearly? men and women who gain power choose to hold it.
I would like to hear you write about ‘middle level’ persons, people who can be reasonably expected to shout.
Since human nature does not change, only the impetus to collect the spirit of ‘the family of man’ will count. LIFE Magazine interpreted that photographically. The generations since? well, too much info, too little concern, too much ownership? who knows.
August 23rd, 2007 at 3:34 pm
Congrats on the History Book and the new blog. There was a mention of the History Book on Steve Le Vine’s blog, The Oil and the Glory.
Cheers, Candy
August 23rd, 2007 at 7:48 pm
I tried to blogroll Steve Levine but it doesn’t seem to link. I am very new to this complicated world. But thank you.
August 23rd, 2007 at 7:52 pm
Thanks Judy,
Middle level people that’s interesting. When they start shouting, do they not either gain power or forfeit what they already have?
August 24th, 2007 at 6:24 pm
On the mid-level issue, the ‘whistle blowers’ have a mixed history of success/failure. And they are very often women. But they DO have substantial cinematic presence. There is a body of filmography about just such heroic activity. Movies love a bulldog, often a female, who perseveres. Finance (think ENRON); GE (think pollution); energy (think on the coalmining industry); over and over films have gone for the heroic individual who takes on government, unions, whatever. I’ll bet somewhere in China there is a scribbler who might have written about lead paint whether published or not. Of course, Kat is just that, heroic. There is a quality about her that shouts out for film. Shout it out!
September 10th, 2007 at 6:13 am
Still thinking broadly about the context and character. Still think Jodie Foster is the model. If Bourne can be played by a cheerful type from Massachusetts (muscled out) you need that sort of physical response. But Kat is more than that. She has attitude and doesn’t settle down to a Miami housewife, if you see what I mean. Anyone realistically who has these skills has the opposite happen. But fiction allows us to go to the extreme, and learn something in between. I’ve learned not to forget to edit a reply. Lost some sentence structure on one.
September 11th, 2007 at 6:13 am
Am commenting singularly on web options. I believe that Jodie Foster is Kat Polinski.
Age apart, the attitude is right. And it is not an attitude derived from the general public. It is smart, angular, tough, and only found behind a wall of silence.
Kat is a character we need to understand. The future may well bring us more young women of physical strength, anger, character. It is always ANGER which must be contained. Or used.
Just thinking