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Okay, there's probably not going to be many more entries in this section, since I now have a blog http://theskinner.blogspot.com/

15/6/06

Well, The Voyage of the Sable Keech was launched on the 16th and of course far too much beer was consumed. Thanks to Macmillan for the hospitality. Also my thanks to the guys at the Forbidden Planet Bookshop in London for having me along for a signing session, which seemed to go very well. Now here's you chance to win some copies of said book, and others, and to play the Sable Keech game! http://www.panmacmillan.com/sablekeech/

19/2/06

Just back from a few days in Berlin. The incredibly low temperatures there were an experience not to be missed in themselves (check out one picture in the gallery). Neither of us have seen a river frozen over, for real, for longer than we can remember. We also took a look at the Reichstag, the Brandenberg Gate, Checkpoint Charlie and the museum there. We rode around on the trams, U-bahn, S-bahn all of which were cheaper, more efficient and cleaner than anything found in Britain. Another impressive aspect of Berlin, which I hope applies to all of Germany, was how polite and helpful people were. We only had to stop for a few minutes to study a map before someone approached us to ask if they could be of any help -- something you don't see happening in London. Hannes Riffel, an SF bookshop owner there (bookmark on left & picture in the gallery) was a very nice guy to meet, too. He is obviously enthusiastic and knowledgeable about his trade and all things science fiction & fantasy, and keeps an excellent selection on his shelves. Go there, buy there!

7/2/06

All within two weeks and a nice start to the new year: My short story Mason's Rats has been taken by David G Hartwell & Kathryne Cramer for their Year's Best SF 11, and I've since been contacted by Gardner Dozois who wants another story published in Asimov's -- Softly Spoke the Gabbleduck -- for his 'Year's Best' anthology. And now I discover I've made it to the shortlist of the Philip K Dick Award.

1/10/06

On the Edge of the Sand now bears the title Prador Moon (for reasons not entirely clear to me, but then I don't have to sell the book). Polity Agent is now coming under Peter Lavery's scary pencil and I'm about 85,000 words into Hilldiggers. The Engineer ReConditioned is up for sale POD and I've learnt that the distributor (for next year), Diamond, apparently has 800 pre-orders so that's looking nice.

I'll be at Forbidden Planet in London to do a stock signing (for Sable Keech HB and Brassman PB), on Saturday 18th Feb from 1-2pm. If you want a copy signed to you, and are in the vicinity, come on in! I'll be there from about 12.30 -- to begin with probably ensconced in some dusty stock room.

I've just taken up the offer of broadband from Virgin (same price for a year as 24/7 if you were a 24/7 customer). I'm not sure this is a great idea since I've been spending too much time titting around on message boards just lately, rather than getting on with some work. Obviously this means an increase in the speed of that titting around and much else but, as I said on one of those message boards: crap increases to fill the bandwidth available.

19/12/05

I've just put up a page on here containing links to interviews with me that are scattered all over the Internet. The latest one was interesting: a guy called Jyoti Mishra contacted me for an interview, and upon checking the link to his website I discovered him to be the musician behind White Town and a number one in 1997 called Your Woman. Ah the cult of celebrity. I didn't recognise the title or the band until listening to an excerpt on Amazon. Nice then to realise this was a record I've heard very often and like.

Still editing Polity Agent and passing it on to various readers for their opinions, Sand has been accepted by Nightshade Books and now I'm once again returning my attention to Hilldiggers.

15/9/05

It's been a little while since I've written in here (been spending too much time winding up ideologues on various message boards) so it's time for an update. The Voyage of the Sable Keech is complete and a new-look cover designed (check out 'books') and should be coming out next January. The first draft of Polity Agent is also complete at about 142,000 words, which is about the same size as Brass Man. Nearly complete is something called On the Edge of the Sand - a novella for Nightshade Books telling the story of some rather traumatic events at the beginning of the Prador/Human war. And I'm also about 16,000 words into Hilldiggers. That's about it. Off to Poland next week (Krakow) to probably eat and drink too much and also visit the place nearby that everyone should see once in their lives.

17/7/05

First off, my short story The Gabble has been accepted by Sheila Williams at Asimov's.

Second off, The Skinner has won the Czech SF&F&H Academy Award for the best SF book published there in 2004: the Salamander Award. This was out of a shortlist of Blood Music Greg Bear, Chasm City Alastair Reynolds, The Scar China Mieville and A Deepness Upon the Sky Vernor Vinge – a high level of competition and one of the best shortlists I’ve read in ages.

9/5/05

My short story Garp & Geronamid has been accepted by Andy Cox for publication in Interzone.

21/4/05

New contract signed with Macmillan for POLITY AGENT, HILLDIGGERS & THE LINE WAR. These books may also be coming out every nine months rather than yearly.

POLITY AGENT

A runcible gate is opened into the Polity from 800 years in the future. Those who come through had been sent (from Gridlinked) to take the alien Maker back to its home civilization in the Small Magellanic cloud. The time-inconsistent gate is shut down from the Polity end once the refugees are through. Something was pursuing them. The gate is dumped into a sun.

From the refugees Cormac learns that the Maker civilization has been destroyed by Jain technology. Many questions arise from this: why was Dragon, the massive bioconstruct of the Makers, really sent to the Polity; why did a Jain node – something never before discovered throughout Polity expansion – suddenly end up in the hands of someone who could do the most damage with it, within only a few years of the Maker’s arrival? Other questions are addressed, like who or what is Horace Blegg?

Meanwhile, an entity called the Legate, is distributing Jain nodes, and the renegade attack ship the King of Hearts, has discovered something nasty outside the Polity.

(presently at 120,000 words)

HILLDIGGERS

During a war between two planets in the same solar system – each occupied by adapted humans – what is thought to be a cosmic superstring is discovered. After being cut, this object collapsed into four cylindrical pieces, each about the size of a tube train. Each is densely packed with either alien technology or some kind of life. They are placed in three ozark cylinders of a massively secure space station. A female scientist, conducting research there, falls pregnant, gives birth to quadss, then commits suicide.

By the end of the war one planet has been devastated by the hilldiggers – giant space dreadnoughts employing weapons capable of creating mountain ranges. The quads have grown up and are assuming positions of power in the post war society. One of them will eventually control the hilldiggers.

Third Book:

THE LINE WAR

A three-book contract from Macmillan for Polity Agent, Hilldiggers & The Line War, now sits on my desk awaiting my attention.

On the Index page of this website, there are now links to nealasher.com to a message board and guestbook.

Upon making the cock-up of sending a previously published story to Interzone (Scar tissue), I've been doing a large amount of updating on here, which is reflected in my files. Lots of changes in the story sections.

I'm told that The Engineer Reconditioned will probably be released by Cosmos Books this April, though that is yet to be confirmed. Brass Man hits the shelves in April too (15th). I've also learnt that Strood was on Gardner Dozois's 'nearly made it list' for his Year's Best of collection. Spatterjay, a story first appearing in Grotesque, then in The Engineer collection, is to be published by the French magazine Bifrost, to coincide with the publication of The Skinner there. And here's a message from the Czech translator of The Skinner, Petr Kotrle: I am happy to tell you that SKINNER was shortlisted for the Salamander Award given by the Czech Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror as the best SF book published here in 2004, together with the Blood Music (G. Bear), Chasm City (A. Reynolds), The Scar (Mieville) and A Deepness Upon the Sky (V. Vinge). Keep your fingers crossed! The cover for this book, along with the Portuguese cover for Cowl, can now be found in the gallery here.

Now, after a delay brought about by all sorts of crap, I'm returning to writing Polity Agent. This book will be the first book in a new three-book contract with Macmillan. The other two being Hilldiggers & Line War (probably).

Ach, ages since I've written anything in here (damned good job I never tried starting a blog) and time for an update. I'm currently in the final editing stages of Sable Keech, but no rush seeing as it won't be published for one year three months. Polity Agent, which cleared 100,000 prior to me doing this editing work on Sable, I'll be returning to anon. Polaris, the publisher in Czechoslovakia, have now taken on Gridlinked as well as The Skinner. Kirkus Reviews lists The Skinner as one of the five best SFF novels published in America in 2004 (I'm the only British writer in that five - the rest are American). I've been made an offer for Strood (first published in Asimov's) to appear in David Hartwell and Kathryn Cramer's The Year's Best Science Fiction #10. Erm ... what else? Oh yeah, I'm turning my loft into a library and would like to sing the praises of screwfix.com.

I've now introduced on here a page where you can order signed copies, some of them first editions, directly from me.

I'm now 40,000 words into book seven which may be called Polity Agent or Agent Prime Cause unless I come up with another title. The Romanian publisher Lucman in Bucharest have made an offer for the translation rights to Cowl and The Line of Polity. And my stories The Thrake and Watchcrab, in Hadrosaur Tales magazine and on the Agony Column (link in contacts) site respectively, received honourable mention in Gardner Dozois's 21st Annual Year's Best Science fiction.

Another draft of Voyage of the Sable Keech completed. I've written an epilogue for it now and linked chapter starts detailing life forms on Spatterjay as they apply to the story. It now stands at 160,000 words. Having printed that book up, and passed it on to various readers, time for me to turn my attention elsewhere: short stories, novellas, maybe the next novel.

Now Macmillan have just agreed a new 2-book deal with Stefan Bauer of Bastei-Lubbe (Germany) for Brass Man and The Voyage of the Sable Keech. The first book not yet published and the second book I haven't even finished working on. Apparently I am now also one of their top SF authors.

Excellent reviews of The Skinner (American edition) have now appeared in the New York Times and in Science Fiction Weekly www.scifi.com

Also, check out the 'Gallery' here for the German cover of The Line of Polity.

Tor Macmillan have received and offer for translation rights to Gridlinked, The Skinner and The Line of Polity from Eksmo publishers in Moscow. That's seven countries now - I'm going to have to set something up in Excel to keep track of it all.

I've just finished the first draft of The Voyage of the Sable Keech at 152,000 words. Still much to do as some areas need expanding and some need severely hacking, but I need to get away from it for a while so I can come back later and sort wood from trees.

And a late addition here: those who want their typescripts checked over professionally should check out John Jarrold's Script Doctor site https://www.sff.net/people/john-jarrold/

In the Gallery on this site I've put up bookmarks (I hope this works) so if you have a colour printer and some A4 card you can print up you very own Neal Asher bookmarks. This is total self-promotion, but then what's this website for?

The limited hardback print run of Cowl has already nearly sold out, and now Macmillan are doing a second one. Hang onto those first editions -- they'll be collector's items!

Another excellent review of Cowl here at http://trashotron.com by Rick Kleffel. I've also learnt that Editorial Presenca in Portugal have bought the book for translation. All rather cool really: two translations and four excellent reviews before the book has even been released!

The first reviews of Cowl are coming in (though it hasn't actually been released yet) and things are looking good. 'Dreamwatch Recommends' and rates it nine out of ten, there's a good one at http://www.computercrowsnest.com and now another excellent review from Russell Letson in Locus.

Once again I've sold Snow in the Desert (nice double meaning there), this time for translation in a Czech SF magazine called Ikarie.

Additional to the German sale below, I've since learnt that Bastei Lubbe took Cowl without even reading it. Now there's a boost to the confidence.

The Voyage of the Sable Keech is now rapidly approaching 140,000 words. I'm feeling particularly pleased with myself as yesterday I polished off the best part of 5000 words. People reading this may be tempted to ask, "But were they good words?" I've always found that when I'm churning it out that quickly it usually is good. It's when I'm laboring over it that it often needs revision.

Another translation deal I've just learnt about: Bastei Lubbe in Germany, who previously published Gridlinked and The Skinner, have now taken The Line of Polity and Cowl in a two book deal. The first will be published in May this year and the second in spring 2005.

Brass Man is done and dusted (well, apart from the copy editing) and now I'm back on The Voyage of the Sable Keech

I've just received the hardback and trade paperback issues of Cowl, and very nice they look too.

A lot has happened over the last month. Another crap Turner prize has passed into history and now the Hobbit has been found in Iraq. They checked him for weapons of mass destruction but only found a ring.

The Skinner has now been taken for translation by a Czechoslovakian publisher, and Gridlinked by a Spanish one, so things advance apace there. I've handed in Brass Man and the reaction seems good thus far, and am now continuing with Sable. Gardner Dozois has now accepted another story for Asimov's. Softly Spoke the Gabbleduck he felt pretty sure he was going to reject because, although well-crafted, it covered much the same ground as half a dozen other stories. It was apparently saved by the gabbleduck. 'I couldn't not run a story with a creature as interesting and weirdly menacing as a gabbleduck in it.'

What else? Spending Christmas in Chester with one of my brothers and his family. Then it'll be nose to the grindstone in the new year, and a long rest for my liver.

The Turner prize has been won by a man in a frock displaying a pot decorated with mediocre pictures said to represent child-abuse. Much controversy surrounds the last-minute removal from the pot, by the winner, of the dry-cured turd wrapped up in a ribbon. Apparently it was a close-run thing because of the entry, by a Muslim lesbian, of a simnel cake decorated with a dead dog with a cucumber thrust up its bottom -- said to represent the anger of vegetarian activists at the failure of Labour to ban fox-hunting. Judges of the prize said the entry of an ash-tray filled with tumours was risible and unsubtle, and that the competitor concerned had not truly learnt the art, taught in art colleges over many decades, of talking complete bollocks to justify crap to a bunch a pseuds. Rumours that there are people being taught how to draw paint and create sculptures have been dismissed as highly unlikely. Who would come to view the products of such antiquated skills?

Just seen Matrix Revolutions. While Matrix Reloaded was about 70% crap, I have to say the Watchowski brothers have now managed to deliver the pure product. A triumph of special effects over content, with a cast from the plank school of acting: pure unadulterated crap. In a particular scene I was nearly overwhelmed by the urge to shout, "Give it one while it's still warm!" but luckily, at about that point, my large intestine crawled up my spine and tried to throttle my brain.

In the hope that I might make some positive quotes, Simon & Schuster have just sent me a copy of 'The Darkness That Comes Before' by R Scott Bakker. As Bakker was one of the ten authors mentioned in the SFX article below, I'll certainly give it a go.

'ONE OF THE BEST WRITERS OF ADVENTURE SF presently working anywhere, Neal Asher also creates the most horrific and wonderful monsters in the genre since the publication of Harry Harrison's Deathworld. His novel The Skinner uses a wonderful device, in the heading to each chapter, of an ever-more-dreadful monster discovering that it is not the top of the food chain. Each of his Human Polity novels has more dash and brio than a handful of finely-crafted literary fictions, and their characters fizz off the page. The Line of Polity is Neal's most recent novel, published this Spring.'

"Everybody against the war. People talking openly. How can a country go into a major war with a population so dead set against it?" was what William L Shirer (writer of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich) penned in his dairy about Berlin's inhabitants, the day before Hitler's forces invaded Poland. The next relevant quote has to be George Satayana: "Those who fail to learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat it." I guess this is to be expected from a government that shows as much contempt for its own country's history as did Hitler for his...

Night Watch by Terry Pratchett should be required reading for so very many people. Here's one sample:

"Confiscate all weapons and crime would go down. ... Amazingly, quite a few weapons were handed in. The flaw, was one that had somehow escaped Swing, and it was this: criminals don't obey the law. It's more or less a requirement for the job. They had no particular interest in making the streets safer for anyone except themselves. And they couldn't believe what was happening. It was like Hogswatch every day."

I've come across (or been led to) a couple of interesting message boards: Malazan Empire & Dead Cities. The picture of the The Skinner dust jacket is up on Amazon, and now here. Sable is at about 70,000 and getting steadily more complicated and bloody. Gardner Dozois at Asimov's has taken another short story: Strood.

The French rights to The Skinner and Gridlinked will be licensed to Pocket/Fleuve Noir (part of Universpoche - one of the largest publishers in France). It's likely that they'll start with The Skinner within the next 18 months and will then publish Gridlinked at a later date. Gardner Dozois at Asimov's has now also accepted Strood for publication. And it looks as if Cowl will be coming out in hardcover next March.

A few items: I see that Cowl is now up on Amazon for pre-orders, as is the hardback American version of The Skinner, which is to be released next April. You can now also find the list of my top ten fantasy books on the Guardian website at: http://books.guardian.co.uk/top10s/top10/0,6109,1033620,00.html And I'm now 43,000 words into Sable (which incidentally won't see the light of day for over two and a half years).

Major revamp here with the addition of anthology and magazine pages and a redistribution of everything else. I've just received copies of Year's Best SF 8, and Terror Tales issue one, both of which you can see in the anthologies section. Erm, what else? I'm 28,000 words into The Voyage of the Sable Keech and they haven't even built the ship yet...

Precisely on the day Gridlinked was released in America I received an email from Gardner Dozois letting me know that he wants to publish two of my stories: The Veteran and the first Mason's Rats story. The timing could not have been more perfect. I've also been sent an uncorrected proof copy of a book from Tor in America in the hope that I'll offer some sort of quote. Does this mean I'm not the new boy anymore?

Okay, it's been a little while since I've written in here, and now is a good a time as any.

An excellent review by Russell Letson of The Line of Polity has appeared in the latest Locus; I've just recieved two wonderful hard back copies of Gridlinked from Tor in America (it'll go on general sale next month); and of The Skinner, Tanith Lee says: '...absolute solid gold genius' so overall I'm feeling pretty happy and sure I must be doing something right!

I've now finished the first draft of Brass Man. It weighs in at 145,000 words. I'm now leaving it alone and trying to forget it, so I can take a fresh look in a few months.

The Tanjen version of The Engineer being a bit of a rarity, and it seeming that this is a book some people would like to obtain, I approached Sean Wallace at Cosmos Books about doing a re-release. I thought first about calling it The Engineer Reloaded, but maybe that's taking the piss. How about The Engineer Reconditioned? It will consist of the original novella and stories, but with introductions, and some extra stories. I'm presently working through it all again and cringing at the mistakes. I guess that when I stop doing that it'll be time to give up writing.

At the end of this week I'm off on holiday to Scotland, but taking a detour to speak to the Hull SF group on Saturday 19th.

Ah, twas the Saturday after. There's also been an excellent review by Peter Tennant in issue 34 of TTA. And while I'm on the subject, also in SFX by Saxon Bullock, and Starburst, and Dreamwatch. No doubt when I get a bad one I'll implode.

I've removed the bookmarks and notepaper from the gallery as couldn't get them to work properly. Stuck a couple of pictures up there instead.

I'm told there'll be a review of The Line of Polity in this Saturday's Guardian by Jon Courtenay Grimwood. I'm also told that the first print run has nearly gone, so hang onto those first editions.

Now here's something else of interest: the number you see on the copyright page 135798642 tells you what edition the book is. What I didn't know, until it was explained to me by Rog Peyton (Andromeda), was how or why. Apparently it costs quite a bit to make alterations after the first printing, so the lowest digit in that number tells you the edition. When they do the second edition, they just delete the 1 so the lowest digit is 2, and so on. The number is arranged so you count 123456789 inwards from the outside, so that with each deletion it remains central on the page. Well there you go.

Book marks and note paper added to the gallery, and thumbnail pictures. Hope it all works.

I've now added a gallery to this site in which to pin up any pictures of interest. There's some from the Tor UK launch party, a picture of the American cover ... I'll add other stuff later.

W H Smiths will be doing some sort of promotion with The Skinner (pb) so it will be released early - next week in fact. (28/2/03)

Tor (UK), Macmillan's new SF imprint can be found here www.toruk.com . Ah, and there's a message board up for me on the TTA website here www.ttapress.com/discus

Over Christmas I received the dust jacket for the Tor (America) edition of Gridlinked, which will be coming out as a hardback in August.

Recently received an offer for 'Snow in the Desert' as published in Spectrum SF 8 (check novellas page) to be reprinted in Year's Best Science Fiction #8.

When I handed in the initial draft of Gridlinked, I was told I needed to lose the scooby-dooish ending -- that there should be no need for explanation. I've since found that there's plenty of people who want that explanation, so, if you press this link, you'll see that ending. But don't press it unless you've read the book!

"In the film business, as probably in everything else, the best and most approachable people are those who are confident in their own abilities." -- Barry Norman.

Cowl awaits at the Nexus where he is attempting to poison the protoseas of Earth. He drags people back using organic time machines, the tors, which are in turn scales from the back of the torbeast: the Eater of Worlds. From the far future they are fighting him, as best they can, but even with the sun tap they do not have the power to reach that far back. Jane, dragged back, finds a freeloader in the piece of military tech she wears: the Muse 184. And Tack, the vat grown programmable killer who is after her, is given a mission important to the survival of the human race.

This is the sequel to Gridlinked and The Line of Polity, and I don't really want to tell you much more than that, though some will guess certain elements of the story from the title!

This sequel to The Skinner takes place on Spatterjay, and who can guess what's going to happen in that nightmare place. Possibly a borderline psychotic war drone called Sniper might put in an appearance, perhaps Sable Keech himself is around, and maybe a Prador adolescent survived its encounter with a Molly Carp. You never can tell.