Brent Weeks

The David Gemmell Legend Award is now open for voting. I have been nominated to the long list. “The award will be given to a work written in the ’spirit’ of the late, great David Gemmell, a true Master of Heroic Fantasy.” From the website (and Gemmell’s obituary): “Characterisation is acknowledged as one of Gemmell’s major skills, and… themes that remained pivotal to his work [included] the lone hero, often tortured by loss or doubt; the battle against advancing dotage; the pursuit of seemingly lost causes; complex villains, and the inclusion of elite, usually mystical, groups. A consistent thread in Gemmell’s fiction, and one which reflected his Christian beliefs, was the conviction that redemption was possible for even the most corrupt.”

If you think that sounds like my work, please VOTE HERE. It only takes two or three clicks, and you don’t have to register. Although if you’re already part of my Ning forum, you’ll find they’re using the same platform, so it should be a snap. Then you can take part in the Gemmell discussions, or tell people why they should check me out. It’s also a good place to find other great work published this year. I’m up against some huge talents, and making the short list would make my year.

Civilian Reader has selected its annual 10 Best Fiction Releases of 2008 (in all genres), and I’m delighted to report that they have chosen my books. Thrice. For spots 3, 2, and yes, #1. Woo hoo!

The Night Angel books “take the top spot because they fulfill every criteria that goes into making an excellent read: plotting, characterization, pacing, interest, style, imagination and originality…. A stunning achievement for a first time author.”

And as before, I’d like to publicly affirm that I do not engage in payola to get on these lists. Not that I’m above it. It’s just that bloggers haven’t figured out that payola isn’t just for DJ’s any more. (C’mon, people, innovate.)

The winner of the Fan Art Contest is Meaghan Beninati with this cool rendition of Vi in Caernarvon:

(Click to enlarge)

Congratulations, Meaghan. (Check her website for other cool stuff.) Great work. I wish I had half of your talent. You will be receiving a signed set of the Night Angel Trilogy, made out to whomever you want. (Check someone off that Christmas list!)

I got lots of cool entries for this contest, (and hated having to choose just one winner) so I will be posting all of the fan art (of those entrants who give me permission) into the pictures area of the forum. So give that a day or so for people to tell me yes or no, and then you should be able to find some more great fan art all in one place.

Indie Bound is a site organized by independent booksellers to help them better compete with the biggies, and foster all the independent-bookstore goodness you can imagine. I just learned learned recently that I was selected as an Indie Next Pick of the Month. (For November, but hey, I just found out.) Peeps in the industry tell me this is a semi-big deal.

Book-industry-person quote: “Oh, yeah, biiig deal. Just last year, Virginia/Brad Shake’s book ‘Billions of Small Pieces, No–Make that Trillions of Tiny Pieces, Microscopic Pieces, Nano-Pieces Really’ was selected. Two months later, she-he got The Call. Ya know? From Oprah. Instant millionaire.”

Really, I was most excited that I wasn’t a fantasy pick… just a pick. I feel like an unruly nerd inadvertently released from the ghetto.

Still waiting by the phone, though. Ya know. For The Call.

(p.s. I’ll be posting the Art Contest results tomorrow…sorry, buried.)

There’s this guy, invented a little operating system called Linux. Name’s Linus Torvalds, “the world’s most famous computer programmer.” He dug my trilogy. (Or should that be Dugg?) True, I’ve received higher praise than HIS, but still…