The Good Son is one of ELLE Magazine’s Best Books of the Year! along with Louise O’Neill, Benjamin Wood, Ali Smith and Kate Atkinson. Stoked!
“blackly hilarious… one of the most endearing, charming characters I’ve come across in a long while”
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The Good Son – Sold out!
Howdy folks! The great news is that The Good Son has sold out and is going to a new print run – Huzzah! There aren’t many copies around. Amazon and my publishers Salt have sold out, as are Easons Bookshops in Northern Ireland.
There are some you can order from Waterstones bookshop in Piccadilly, Waterstones online and Blackwells online. And of course still available on your Kindle/Reader.
If you already have your copy you’re now in possession of the First Edition! Thanks for making The Good Son a big success.
Savidge Reads Reviews The Good Son
Savidge Reads Reviews The Good Son
Book blogger, reviewer, author and founder of The Green Carnation Prize, Simon Savidge, gives a wonderful review of The Good Son on his blog.
“The Good Son is such a brilliant book… unflinching rawness… something I have not experienced before and I thought it was marvellous. It also gives us hope.
McVeigh does many wonderful things with The Good Son and first and foremost of these is the character that he has created with Mickey. McVeigh excels in the use of light and shade within his writing… incredibly powerful… Whilst many novels of the Troubles would make them the main focus and give you them in all their rawest and most shocking detail, I think McVeigh gives you something far more clever and intricate… no word is wasted, no sentence unplanned… ”
You can read he whole interview by clipping the link at the top. You can also listen to my interview with Simon in his podcast ‘You Wrote The Book‘.
George Saunders on Story & My Interview
George Saunders Explains How to Tell a Good Story. Click to hear the short story master sharing his unique insights into creating a great story for The Atlantic. It’s fantastic. And if you’ve never read his work I urge to you give it a go.
George Saunders (c) Paul McVeigh
I was lucky enough to interview George, in London, on the day he won The Folio Prize. You can read that interview here – he is rather fantastic.
A little snippet…
P: You described your job in Sumatra as – you drilled deep down then put in dynamite and exploded it. Isn’t that a little like the writing process?
G: Well it is actually! I never thought… You’re kind of looking to see where the energy goes, that’s the same thing – you put some energy in and see how it sorts itself out.
Canadian author Lauren B Davis choses ‘The Good Son’ as one of her 10 Best of 2015.
Canadian author Lauren B Davis choses ‘The Good Son’ as one of her 10 Best of 2015. I’m in very good company too- EL Doctorow, John Williams, Anthony Doerr… ! Thanks Lauren. Here’s a snippet.
“This book is astonishing. It’s hard to believe this is a first novel, it’s so good. A masterful combination of tragedy and humor, stirred into a batter of scathing social commentary. Paul McVeigh is a writer we’ll be hearing a great deal from in years to come.”
You can read the rest here.
You Wrote The Book Podcast
I was asked by book blogger (and writer) Simon Savidge to take part in a podcast interview for his wonderful ‘You Wrote The Book’ site. There are interviews with excellent writers on there: Carys Davies, Helen MacDonald and Val McDermid. It was a real honour to be asked.
I’ll warn you I’m not the most inarticulate of men. I should stick to writing things down.
Simon asks great questions and you might enjoy listening to me stutter and stumble as I try to answer. Here you go.
Bristol Short Story Prize Best Collections of 2015
I love short stories. I love reading them, writing them and watching them being read by their authors. I work at Word Factory short story salon in London and love the short story community it has been a beacon for.
I Co-Founded the London Short Story Festival with Spread the Word and that was like diving into a short story pool and swimming in them for a few days.
The Bristol Short Story Prize asked me to pick my best collections of this year – a very difficult thing to do – and I made some choices and a hot pick for next year. You can see my picks and the those of some fantastic writers and short story champions here. There’s 5 short posts – check them out for top picks.
The Good Son makes Best of 2015 at The Reading Agency
The Good Son makes it onto Staff Picks: Our Books of 2015 at The Reading Agency. “To round off the year, we’d like to highlight some of our favourite books of 2015. Most are books published in 2015, some are books we have revisited and loved this year. What has been your favourite book of 2015? Leave a review and let us know!”
In some great company too inc Anne Enright, Elena Ferannte, Margaret Atwood and shout out to Ben Johncock on there – who let me know.
Looking Like a Pro – Reading Live
Reading for Word Factory at Waterstones Piccadilly this week was a whole lot of fun. It was great to read alongside friends and colleagues. I can remember only a couple of years ago being so terrified I stopped reading and froze after just a few lines. Now I look like a pro.
The ceiling was bouncing from the music and dancing above and below there were readings from authors such as Booker Prize-winner Marlon James. Lots to distract and get nervous about.
I say look like a pro because I never feel like one. I think it’s all a confidence trick. Just pretend you’re a pro and see what happens. Readings can be funny things – a mixture of ‘can’t wait for my turn’ and ‘please let me disappear’. My legs were shaking so badly I had to keep shifting from my front leg to my back leg so they didn’t give way completely. I couldn’t stand still or both legs. On the other hand – or rather, the top half – I was giving it my all. If I’m totally honest I was showing off. I got lots of great feedback from people who had seen me read before and no-one noticed. Not one. That’ll do for me. And I really enjoyed it.
One great piece of advice you’re given is that when reading you should make an effort to look up from the page. It drives the energy out, the audience see more of your ‘performance’ and with some eye contact they become more engaged. And I just found out – by looking up you could catch some images like this… people really having a good laugh. Strong and genuine reactions to your work.
Thanks to James Lawson for the pics. A video of the reading is coming soon… yikes!
Get Writing! Get submitting! Get Published!
The Word Factory December round-up of writing links and submission opportunities from my blog is here. For all you writers out there – check them out.
Get writing! Get submissions! Get published!
