WELCOME TO THE NEWSLETTER!

Welcome to the first issue of the Stephen Booth Newsletter - a little delayed to allow as many people as possible to get signed up.

I aim to use this as an informal way of sharing the latest news and a bit of chat - often the sort of stuff that won't make it onto the website. I'm hoping to run competitions later, too (yes, prizes!).

Incidentally, there are readers from at least fifty-seven different countries visiting the website now, and it's getting harder to keep up with the amount of mail and update all the various editions of the books.

So the newsletters will go out as and when there's news and I have time to share it. I hope you enjoy them.

If you have any suggestions for what you'd like to see in future issues, please don't hesitate to let me know. Send your ideas to: newsletter@stephen-booth.com.

If you're receiving the html version of this newsletter, you should see a photograph in the heading (I hope!). This was taken at the San Francisco Mystery Bookstore, where the owner, Diane Kudisch, has a store dog called Cooper - named after Detective Constable Ben Cooper. He's a black dog, too, though this may just be a coincidence.

However, those of you whose email systems only accept the text version are lucky enough to escape the photo. And if none of you are seeing it, then something has gone horribly wrong already.

All the best

Stephen Booth

OKAY, SO WHAT'S NEW?

Well, I've just finished work on the fifth Cooper and Fry novel, ONE LAST BREATH - that is, all but for the usual pain of copy-editing and proof-reading. This is the part I hate, because I'm usually all fired up with new ideas by then and want to get on with writing the next book!

The publication schedule is a bit later this year, so apologies to readers who've been used to getting the UK edition of a new book in April or May. ONE LAST BREATH is due to be published in hardback on 5th July here, closely followed by Canada, Australia, New Zealand, etc. No publication date yet for the USA.

More on ONE LAST BREATH in future issues of the newsletter.

Meanwhile, the massmarket paperback of BLIND TO THE BONES will hit the shelves in April in the UK and September in the US. This is the book that led one US reviewer to describe me as a cross between Stephen King and Charlotte Bronte - which just goes to show that even a reviewer needs plenty of imagination!

I'm already contracted for two more books in the series, so I'll be busy writing again very soon. But, before that, I've decided to move my office further up the house (we live in a three-storey Georgian dower house in Nottinghamshire, England). This means I won't know where anything is for a while.

Actually, that's not particularly unusual, because I tend to work in the middle of a general chaos that mounts up steadily without me even noticing it - until I want to find something!

When planning the new office, one priority has to be somewhere for the cat to sit. We have three cats (in addition to the goats), but one of them has appointed herself my Desk Cat and her daily responsibility is to supervise my work very closely. She's even learned how to use the 'Delete' key herself. (I wonder if I could train her to do the copy editing?) Every morning when I go to my desk, she's already there waiting, grumbling impatiently (well, snoring impatiently). But she's a black cat, so I guess I must be really, really lucky, mustn't I?

IS THIS IMMORTALITY? (or merely immorality?)

I have many claims to fame, of course. Not only am I an eminent goat breeder (President of the Toggenburg Breeders Society, no less), but I was also once suspected of being the Yorkshire Ripper. I've been interrogated by the British Special Branch on suspicion of involvement in Irish terrorism (I pleaded gullibility and got away with it), and I was the subject of a high-level BBC memo after I said a rude word 'live' on air (twice).

But this looks like real immortality to me. Apparently, I'm quoted in the latest edition of the 'Oxford Encyclopaedia of Proverbs', which uses an extract from BLACK DOG to illustrate the saying: 'Don't teach your grandmother to suck eggs'.

They only select contemporary masters of the English language to quote from in these editions, you know.

BEN OR DIANE?

DC Ben Cooper has had lots of fans for a while now. Some female readers seem to fall for him in a big way - he must bring out the maternal instinct or something. In fact, one elderly lady sent me a message a while ago to say that she doesn't want to die until Ben Cooper has got married and settled down. I hope she's still in good health, because Ben hasn't even got a steady girlfriend yet.

Diane Fry - well, let's say she hasn't had quite so many fans. Until now, anyway. But one fervent Fry hater recently admitted to having changed his mind about her completely after reading BLIND TO THE BONES. And a reader in Germany emails me to say that's she's fallen in love with Ben AND Diane. What can be going on? Is Diane Fry human after all?

MEMORY LANE SPOT

I recently received copies of my first Japanese translation, an edition of BLACK DOG by Tokyo Sogen-sha. I was really struck by how different Japanese books are from the Western editions I'm used to. First of all, I couldn't figure out which way up to hold it, since it appeared to open from what I considered the back. The pages turn from left to right and the text runs down the page instead of across. Although it's a softcover, it has a dustjacket; and it's very small - smaller than a UK or US paperback.

Something about the size and colour of this book took me back to the 1960s, when I was a young teenager. We had a young, trendy English teacher at our school, who for some reason got us all to write to the Chinese Embassy to ask for copies of the notorious 'Thoughts of Chairman Mao', otherwise known as Mao's 'Little Red Book'. Anyone remember it? It was very similar in size and colour to this Japanese edition of BLACK DOG.

I wish I still had my 'Little Red Book' as a memento of the 60s, but unfortunately my father hit the roof so hard when he saw it that I thought he was going to join Sputnik in orbit.

MORE ANIMAL NEWS

Black Pig, the Border morris side credited in BLIND TO THE BONES, have a CD of their music available, if you're interested in something a bit different to listen to. It's called ROLL A FERRET FOR JESUS, and details are on their website:

http://www.blackpigborder.co.uk

And if you don't know what Border morris is, or you think morris dancing means a bunch of old men dressed in white and waving hankies, take a look at the Black Pig site anyway. I guarantee the intro page alone will enlighten you.

READING RECOMMENDATIONS

Whenever I come across any books I really like, I'll share my enthusiasm for them via the newsletter. Meanwhile, here are two recent titles you might be interested in:

I contributed a recipe for a Peak District recipe, 'Accidental Bakewell Pudding', to 'Another Helping of Murder: More Diabolically Delicious Recipes from Contemporary Mystery Writers', edited by Robert Weibezahl and Jo Grossman (Poisoned Pen Press). Believe me, there's some tasty stuff in there!

And then there's 'Interrogations', a great book packed full of fascinating interviews conducted with British and American mystery authors by Jon Jordan. It's published by Mystery One Books. Oh yes, and I'm one of the authors Jon interviewed (how did you guess?).

EVENTS

My next major event is the Left Coast Crime convention in Monterey, California (19th - 22nd February). One of the highlights should be 'Beat the Pros', a panel game in which British ex-pat Meg Chittenden and I take on a team of professionals to solve a murder mystery set by Rhys Bowen (another ex-pat). The 'pros' are a serving police officer, a licensed private investigator and a physician.

Personally, I don't think Meg and I could beat custard, never mind that lot, but we're only there to provide the laughs (I think). In a crisis, Meg has offered to lead the audience in a spot of line dancing.

Also at LCC, I'm doing a workshop on 'Research' for Sisters in Crime with Cara Black, and a panel called 'What Writers Read' with Margaret Lucke, Shirley Rousseau Murphy, Elaine Flinn and Julianne Balmain.

All of this is presuming that I recover from my arrival in Monterey. I fly in from Los Angeles on the Wednesday evening, after about 18 hours of travelling, to have dinner with two dozen members of one of the best internet mystery groups around, 4 Mystery Addicts (known as 4MA). This is the friendliest and most active group I know (and there are a lot more than four members, by the way, despite the name). If I'm not jetlagged already, I certainly will be after a couple of hours in their company. If you should happen to be at Left Coast Crime and you see me on the Thursday, for goodness sake, offer me a chair or something.

I'm delighted to say that I'm scheduled to visit Canada for the first time this year, in June (details later). I'm really looking forward to that trip. In fact, I may be back in the country again in October for Bouchercon, the 'World Mystery Convention', which takes place in Toronto this year.

There'll be a number of UK events during the year, of course. Coming up soon are a couple of talks to readers' groups:
Friday 6th February, 2.30pm. Doncaster Central Library, South Yorkshire.
Friday 12th March, 6.30pm. Tavistock Library, Devon.

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PARANOID CORNER

I AM NOT ALONE #1

There are a lot of us about - Stephen Booths, that is. I couldn't register the domains stephenbooth.com or stephenbooth.co.uk because they were already taken - by an artist and a plumber. So that's the reason for the hyphen in the URL, for those of you who were wondering.

I AM NOT ALONE #2

There are at least two other Stephen Booths writing books. Alternative Stephen Booth number 1 is a British anarchist who went to prison a few years ago for conspiracy and has written three novels.

So how do you recognise them? Well, they're published by Green Anarchist Press, which is not part of HarperCollins, last time I checked.

I AM NOT ALONE #3