It’s Thanksgiving in the US and the start of a retail frenzy that will continue right through the Yuletide season. It’s a brutal time for authors. More books are sold than at any other time of the year. The stakes are high, everyone’s competing for attention so their book doesn’t get lost in the snowstorm. It’s going to be a backstreet knife fight from here on out. Not pretty.

And here’s where I jump into the fray. Look away now if you can’t bear brutal displays of marketing and attention-seeking in a bid to get everyone to notice the first Swords of Albion book, The Silver Skull, which is out NOW in the US. You know the one – Elizabethan spies versus Faerie on the eve of the invasion of England by the Spanish Armada.

And look – new reviews are in. Prestigious site Monster and Critics says “In a year of outstanding fantasies, The Silver Skull may just be one of the best.” Which comes on the back of fantasyliterature.com’s reviewer claiming it’s their favourite book of the year. That sounds like a trend.

That provides a slight silver lining to the book not coming out in the UK until April. UK reviewers can now make it the best book of two years. Go on – you know you want to.

And look – here’s another review, this time from also-prestigious magazine Realms of Fantasy: “Chadbourn’s plot moves swiftly, from London to Scotland to Spain, with surprises galore along the way, and with memorable heroes and villains, especially the Faerie prince Cavillex, who is a worthy adversary for Swyfte, and a promising young playwright and sometime secret agent by the name of Christopher Marlowe. Smart, fun, at times surprisingly moving, and occasionally downright shocking, The Silver Skull is impossible to put down.”

Then there’s the recent review in the – yes – prestigious magazine Locus: “The Silver Skull has such an array of complex characters, deeply involved in their interesting times and guarding so many painful memories and secrets, there’s something here for anyone who wants more than a bunch of cardboard figures going through the motions while the body count keeps rising.”

Sick of all this pimping yet? Get used to it – there’ll be more. Much more…

Courtesy of Kaz Mahoney.

Here’s a first look at the cover to the UK edition of the first Swords of Albion book, out from Bantam in April:

The first reviews of The Silver Skull prior to its US publication are starting to trickle in. Here’s one from Geeks on Fire! – favourite book of the year so far. I’m happy with that.

Also featured on: fantasyliterature.com.

(Usual note: UK publication to follow with a UK-specific edit.)

A nice Lord of Silence review from Robert William Berg.

“Traditionally, many of the major questions that mankind has faced have been tackled by philosophy or theology. However, in the last few centuries, science has gradually begun to seek, and has been able to provide to a certain extent, answers to such questions. One of the areas still eluding science’s grasp has been the question of what happens when we die, as well as the nature of the human mind and consciousness and their relationship with the brain.”

A research project at medical centres across the UK, US and Europe is examining what happens to consciousness after we “die” (in inverted commas because death is measured by a sliding scale and it’s possible to be brought back, sometimes up to an hour after the heart stops beating). It’s arisen out of numerous reports of Near-Death Experiences, as well as a study that shows 20% of people who have a flatline brain state and are resuscitated, still have lucid memories of what happened around them. Obviously, a lack of brain activity suggests that shouldn’t be the case.

The study could release its findings as early as 2012.

Meanwhile, Critical Care Doctors at the George Washington University Medical Faculty have released a new report which shows that patients “experienced a sudden electrical ‘alertness’ or spike in brain waves in the moments before they died. The spikes came in the same moments just before each patient’s death. They rose to comparable levels and were consistent in duration.”.

Researchers suggest this may be the first scientifically recorded sign of the near-death experience.

The Silver Skull US Edition

It’s worth noting for US readers of this blog that the first Swords of Albion book is now available at the usual outlets across America. Elizabethan spies vs Faerie, in a line.

UK readers have to wait a few weeks – and I hope they do wait. If everyone rushes to import the US edition, my UK publisher (Bantam) isn’t going to be very happy. It’ll be worth the wait – for once, the UK and US versions may be quite different.

For one, the UK version probably won’t be called The Silver Skull (although that’s not yet definite). Secondly, the books have two different editors with different tastes and suggestions.

Often a book is edited and published in one territory first and then re-published in a new territory with minimal changes. But the Swords of Albion books were sold to the US and the UK simultaneously, and instantly went into the relevant publishing schedules with editors attached. The US one just ran through the process quicker. Once I’ve seen the editor’s notes on the UK version I’ll know how different the two editions are.

I have had an advance look at the cover for the UK edition and it’s excellent. Apologies to UK readers for the wait, but I promise for future books in the series the publication dates will be perfectly aligned.