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  December 2003
Dear Folks, Just a short message to wish you all a very Happy Christmas and a peaceful, prosperous New Year. Thanks for all of your support, and thanks to those of you who've written to me over the past year for your kindness, your questions and, occasionally, even your complaints. Okay, I didn't mean that last part about the complaints. Sorry. Briefly, we've added a new section to the website, since people occasionally ask about stuff I've written for the Irish Times other than the author interviews on the site. There are now a couple of articles posted, basically chosen because they're a bit different from the interviews. Over time, I'll try to add some more. Finally, publication and touring reminders. 
1) Bad Men
Bad Men comes out in hardback in the US in late March 2004, along with the paperback of The White Road. Bad Men will be also be published in paperback in the UK in March. There will be tours of both the US and UK to coincide with publication. 2) Like a Charm Like A Charm, the novel/ linked short story book featuring Lee Child, Mark Billingham, Peter Robinson, Lynda La Plante and a host of others, myself included, and edited by Karin Slaughter, will be officially launched in February 2004 in London, but should be in the shops in January. US publication follows in May. I've read some of the stories and, to say the least, they're unusual, and very good indeed. 3) Nocturnes Nocturnes, my own collection, will appear in the UK in October 2004, featuring the Charlie Parker short novel, The Reflecting Eye. There will also be a US edition, but I still don't have a confirmed publication date. For those of you with access to BBC Radio 4, five of the stories will be broadcast on radio shortly before Halloween next year. We'll keep you posted. 4) The Black Angel Finally - sigh - the next Parker full-length Parker novel will appear early in 2005. At the moment, it's called The Black Angel. So there. Peace and good wishes to all of you, and see you next year. Be well, John
October 2003
Dear Folks, I hope you all had a peaceful, pleasant summer. Apologies for being a little quiet, but I didn't have a whole lot to say until now, and there's nothing worse than receiving emails that have nothing to say apart from "Um, how you doin'?" So, um, how you doin'? NEW BOOKS The most frequently asked question over the last few months has been "When is the next book due?" As with most short questions, the answer is a long one. 1) Like A Charm 
The first new work will appear early next year (Feb 2004 in the UK etc., May 2004 in the US) as part of a book entitled Like A Charm, which is the brainchild of the very talented, and very lovely, Karin Slaughter. Basically, it's kind of a novel written by a number of different writers and linked by the charms on a bracelet, each of which relates to a particular element of the book. Karin has put together a pretty stellar line-up, including Mark Billingham, Lee Child, Laura Lippman, Denise Mina and Peter Robinson. My contribution is a story entitled "The Inkpot Monkey;" check out the particularly nasty looking charm associated with it. Some of the authors will probably get together for a signing in London in February, of which more details to come.
2) Nocturnes I've been holding off publishing a new book in order to allow the US and Canada to catch up with the rest of the world, as those countries are currently one book behind, which is why there won't be a full-length book until the second half of next year. (Boo!) On the other hand, two books will then follow in a period of just five months (Hooray, or perhaps Boo again if you signed up to the mailing list by mistake and didn't really care much for my work in the first place.) The first book is entitled Nocturnes, and will appear in the UK, Australia etc., in October/ November 2004. A US publication date has yet to be decided, but with luck it will appear close to the UK pub date. Nocturnes consists of a Charlie Parker novella entitled The Reflecting Eye, which follows on pretty closely from The White Road; a second novella entitled The Cancer Cowboy Rides; and about a dozen short stories. It will be a fairly substantial chunk of print, and all of the stories, as well as the two novellas, have a supernatural theme. I've ditched a number of stories because I wasn't entirely happy with them. One, The Inn at Shillingford, has just been added to the website. The Bridal Bed, another story on the site, also failed to make the cut. At the moment, I'm hoping to put the stories that I didn't feel were as good as the rest into a small volume, which I'll then sign and distribute free of charge to people on the mailing list as a small thank you for sticking with me. More details will appear on the site closer to the publication date but, hey, it's free stuff! 3) The new Parker novel The fifth Parker novel will appear worldwide in March/April 2005. I know it seems a long way off, but the books do take a while to write. I'm always reluctant to give away titles, but after some humming and hawing, I think it will be called The Black Angel. I can't really say much more about it as I'm still writing it, although it flicks back and forth through history and may have a chunk set in Eastern Europe. There may also be a nice little giveaway for mailing list folk before the novel is published. Again, I'll keep you posted. BARRY AWARD 
The White Road received the Barry Award for Best British Novel at Bouchercon 2003 in Las Vegas last weekend. The award is given by the very excellent Deadly Pleasures mystery magazine, and I'm very grateful to all those who voted for my book. In fact, each of the previous three novels had also been nominated for the award but had never won, so it was kind of a relief to win at last. Anyway, thanks to the lovely people at Deadly Pleasures, which is a superb magazine. Deadly Pleasures has a very good website, and it's well worth taking a look at it.
Thanks also to all of you who came up to say hello at Bouchercon. You're good people. Next year's Bouchercon takes place in Toronto. When their website is live, we'll let you know the link. FILM STUFF 
I also get asked a lot about movies. My reply has usually been that I'm pretty cautious about film interest: I love movies, and would be fascinated to be involved in some small way, but a lot of adaptations of mystery novels are very poor, and I'm very protective of Parker & Co. in particular. Nevertheless, I'm happy to say that Bad Men has become the first book to be optioned for movies, and the people involved seem like a good bunch, so fingers crossed.
TOURING I'll be in Europe next week as part of a brief tour to publicise some translations of the books. The first stop is Bulgaria, where there will be the following signings: Tuesday, 28th October: 18.30: Prozoretz Publishing House Bookshop, 39 Ivan Assen St., Sofia. Wednesday, 29th October: 18.00: Trud Publishing House Bookshop, 63 Skobelev Blvd., Sofia 19.00: Pismena Bookshop, National Palace of Culture I'll also be a guest on the Slavi talk show on October 29th, between 20.00 and 21.30. Tell me if my hair looks bad. Saturday, 1st November: 11.30: Bestsellers Bookshop (1051 Budapest, Oktober 6 Ut 11) A US tour will follow in March/ April 2004 to coincide with the hardback publication of Bad Men, and the paperback publication of The White Road. I also hope to get to the UK in March for the paperback publication of Bad Men and, with luck, to return later in the year for Nocturnes. WWW.JOHNCONNOLLY.CO.UK Those of you who have visited the website lately will have noticed some changes: a new home page, a slightly different look, and an easier-to-negotiate discussion forum. These changes are largely down to Heidi, the web mistress, who has kindly agreed to look after the nuts and bolts of the website from now on. She's wonderful. Thanks too to David and all at Tourweb, who were looking after the site until recently, and who set it up to begin with. I'm grateful to them. The new address for enquiries is johnenquiries@iol.ie, following difficulties with hotmail etc., or simply go through the Contact John section of the website. One small thing: there is a "Questions for John" section in the discussion forum, and it would be great if more people used that, mainly because most of you ask really good questions and it seems a shame that more people don't get to read them, or to see the answers. Also, please continue to post your lists of favourite books. Some of the suggestions are brilliant. Thanks again to all of you for your kindness and support. Best wishes, John Connolly
June 2003
Dear Folks, First, thanks to all of you who have written with words of encouragement about Bad Men. I suppose I was worried about it, since it was the first stand alone, and I'm grateful to you for supporting it and for setting my fears at rest (well, a little, at least.) The main purpose of this email is to let people know that I, along with Paul Johnston, will be hosting a workshop on crime writing next month in Ballylongford, Co. Kerry, as part of the Kennelly Summer Festival. It's something I've been interested in doing for a while, and we hope to cover all the bases: research, getting started, finding an agent, plotting, character, hell, just about anything we can think of. The workshop will also be suited, in most ways, to those who are just interested in writing, full stop, but the main focus will be on writing crime fiction. The workshop will take place over two days, and the details are: Crime Writing Workshop Friday 8th August and Saturday 9th August: 10.00 AM - 12.00 PM and 3.00 PM - 5.00 PM both days Cost: #65 Advance booking is required, and can be made by email at kennellysummerfestival@ireland.com or by telephone on (353 68) 43557. The festival office will also advise on accommodation in the village. Places are limited. Those who have already made a start on a crime novel or short stories are invited to submit their work prior to the festival, as one of the sessions will involve going through manuscripts in order to improve them. Those who haven't yet made a start will do an alternative session with Paul to help them take that first step. Secondly, for those of you who had previously used deadman30@hotmail.com to contact me, that address is now largely out of use after hotmail dumped most of the contact details and my stored messages, so apologies to anyone who wrote to that address and received no reply. The best way to contact me is now through the website. Publication plans for the next year or so include the appearance of Bad Men in hardback in the US in late March 2004; the US paperback publication of The White Road in Feb 2004; and the paperback publication of Bad Men in the UK, Ireland, Australia etc. in March 2004. It is also looking increasingly likely that there will be a Parker novella on the shelves early next year, as part of a collection of supernatural stories, to be followed by a full-length Parker novel early in 2005. We'll keep you posted. Finally, touring is pretty much over for the summer, but I'll be at the Bouchercon Mystery Festival in Las Vegas, Nevada from Oct 16-19th later this year (Bouchercon 2003 for details). This will be followed by some European touring in November and December, to provisionally include Greece, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, possibly Poland, and also, time permitting, the Noir festival in Italy in December. Details of any formal events will follow later in the year. Thanks again for all of your support, and enjoy the rest of your summer. Peace and best wishes, John Connolly
June 2003
Dear Folks, I know what you were thinking: he doesn't write, he doesn't call. He's stopped caring about us. How could we have trusted him? Now that you've had an insight into what it's like to date me, we can return to the business in hand. Bad Men, the fifth novel, is about to hit the shelves everywhere but the US and Canada (sorry, nice Canadians and Americans, but you have to wait a little longer), and a tour will follow shortly after. For details of UK and Irish tour dates, and a heads-up about a wider European tour later in the year, click here. I have received a couple of emails from people complaining that the new book is not a Parker novel. I kind of understand where those people are coming from, but I really couldn't have done another Parker straight after The White Road. I wanted to write something just a little different: something that moved a little faster, that was written in the third person, and that allowed me to push the combination of crime and the supernatural as far as it would go. I wanted to experiment a bit, so that I could apply what I learned to later books. In the end, Bad Men's main intention is to get the reader from page one to page four hundred in the shortest possible time, and with the maximum possible enjoyment. I like it, and I hope readers like it too, but it was the book that I wanted to write and, ultimately, I write what I would like to read. So far, I've been fortunate that it's what a lot of other people want to read too. The next novel will be a return to Parker & Co., but it probably won't appear until early 2005. This is to allow the US and Canada to catch up, so that in future the novels will be published simultaneously around the world. There may be another book in mid-2004 (or there may not: sorry to be a tease, but I haven't decided yet) and further details on that will appear on the site later in the year. Finally, we've added a Jeff Deaver interview to the website, because he's a nice man. We're good like that. Best wishes to you all, and have a great summer. John
February 2003
Dear Folks, The Almost Neverending Tour is about to recommence after a short hiatus. I will be in the US from March 10th until April 18th, 2003 to promote the publication of The White Road in hardback and of The Killing Kind in paperback. The scheduled events have been posted on the website. A tour of the UK will follow in early June to coincide with publication of the fifth book (and my first stand alone book) Bad Men. Dates will be posted in May, but for now the prologue to Bad Men has been posted on the website and should give a pretty accurate taster of the rest of the book. We've also updated the "Meet John" section to include questions on Bad Men and future publications, and there is also an interview with the very excellent Karin Slaughter. (All interviews on the site, by the way, were previously published in The Irish Times, for which fine publication I am happy to write.) Finally, apologies to those of you who found your mailboxes bombarded with test messages a few weeks ago. This was a terrible mistake, and the people responsible have been shouted at until they cried. It won't happen again. Thanks for your tolerance and your understanding. Best wishes to you all, John
January 2003
Dear Folks, First of all, happy new year. May it bring the best of everything to each and every one of you. Apologies for the delay in writing, but my best laid plans were undermined by a road accident before Christmas which has left me with a broken right arm and right wrist and has slowed me down a little. Hence, more apologies to those who have written and have not yet received a reply, and to those who have been using the chat room. I had hoped to visit on a regular basis, and publicize the likely times and dates on the site, but it will be February at least before that happens. A UK tour will go ahead next week to coincide with the paperback release of The White Road, and the launch of the newly-repackaged backlist, but there will be few formal events, apart from a crime evening in Waterstone's, Manchester, on Wednesday January 22nd. Instead, the tour is mainly an opportunity for me to thank the booksellers who have supported me for the last four years by stocking my books and pressing them on their customers. I have included a list of stores being visited, and VERY approximate arrival times, but, as I've said, it's a very informal drop-in schedule. Instead, a more formal, traditional tour is likely to take place in June, when Bad Men is published in the UK and elsewhere (apart from the US and Canada, where it will follow early in 2004.) In addition, the prologue to the new book will appear on the website over the next few weeks. Finally, The White Road will be published in hardback in the US and Canada in March, along with the paperback of The Killing Kind. Details of the US tour will be posted on the website at the end of February/ start of March. Thanks again for all your kindness and support. Best wishes, John Connolly
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