Peter James: Novelist and Film Producer: NOT DEAD ENOUGH LAUNCH

Peter's blog

Saturday, June 02, 2007
NOT DEAD ENOUGH LAUNCH

My new baby, Not Dead Enough (which I was pleased to see was the No 1 most pre-ordered novel on Amazon prior to its release) was given a fantastic send-off at Borders bookstore in Brighton on Thursday night, with a group of 200 people there, including half of Sussex CID, the Mayoress, and the whole of Brighton and Hove mortuary's staff - so it would have been a bad place to commit a crime, but a good place to drop dead, straight on the pm slab in the morning with no hanging about! They always say that death is a great career move for an author.

Team Macmillan

Among the great and the good were the majority of my wonderful team at Macmillan - from left to right, Geoff Duffield, the Sales and Marketing Director, and the man really responsible for my writing crime and moving to Macmillan, Anna Bond to whom I owe a massive debt for getting me into a major promotion with every single book retailer in the UK, Stephen Dumugn, who is responsible for the look of the advertising and promotion, some geezer in the middle wot rites buks, Stephanie Bierworth, my editor, (who secretly writes my books - I just fill in a few blanks that she leaves), Rebecca Ikin, the new and wonderful marketing guru at Macmillan and last, the Greatest Ever Living Agent, Carole Blake, my mentor.

The highlight of my evening was being given the great cartoon (below) by Pete Betts, cartoonist genius, and husband of Pat Silver-Lasky, who herself is a talented author and screenwriter and has an amazing claim to fame - her former father-in-law, Jesse Lasky, one of the first and original Hollywood movie moguls, founded Famous-Players-Lasky which eventually morphed into that not insignificant organisation, Paramount Pictures.

It was also great to see my songwriter friend Tony Macaulay, who has written songs for Elvis Presley, Gladys Knight, Frank Sinatra and Englebert Humperdink, among many others and whose hits include the classic Build Me Up Buttercup.

But it was equally great to see some of my wonderful, less famous, readers. Trace Storey, a fan for very many years, who I have corresponded with but never met, who came all the way from Nottingham. Margret Ladboke, self-styled My Number One Fan who came from the Isle Of Wight - and brought me a wonderful and very touching police dog medallion from her late husband, a police dog handler, and many other fans who had travelled a great distance, and made it a very special event. Certainly the happiest book launch I have ever experienced.

So now, gulp - I have to wait for the reviews. If any of you read the book and enjoy it, please put a kind word for me up on Amazon. And if you don't enjoy it, well, hey, you can always hope I skid off an icy road late on a dark night, when you just happen to be around to pull me from the wreckage and have a chainsaw and a blowtorch handy!

posted by Peter James at 11:02 AM 18 comments

Comments:

Good to see the launch went so well!
I have no doubt I will enjoy this chapter of Roy Grace's life - and I am hoping that the postman will deliver it to my desk on Tuesday morning!
Love the cartoon!
Jo

By Jo, at 4:06 PM

Thanks Joe!

Well, I did back Leander in the Derby - but hey - it didn't win but it is still more fun to back a horse that someone you know has a connection with... so I will forgive you. Just give me all six winners at Ascot compensate, please!!!!

By Peter James, at 7:24 PM

Goodness 6 ??? OK we will do out collective best....
I spoke to Mark at 1am in the morning and he was still excited about just riding in the race! He was interviwed on BBC and thought that was brilliant!

By Jo, at 2:39 PM

Hi Peter,

My girlfriend has informed the book has arrived, wahey!

I want to ask is there an actual person you base Roy Grace on, looks wise? I seem to picture Roy as looking like "Barry" from Eastenders! Hope you've seen him, but hes no stud! Ha ha!

Regards,

Andy

By Anonymous, at 12:57 PM

Hi Peter. Best of luck with the new book; I hope it does well for you. I notice it's on a half price offer this week at Waterstones, should you have failed to mention it elsewhere.

And very nice to hear you on Front Row the other night. (And even nicer to hear your TV version will feature an "unknown" actor and not Barry from Eastenders!)

Incidentally. Something I'd wondered about LOOKING GOOD DEAD, if here's the appropriate place to ask. You'll recall the initial body parts were found in the farmer's field and the police forensic investigation proceeded from there. Would the farmer have received any compensation for the damage to his crop? I appreciate that's a morally suspect question -- after all, there was a particularly grisly murder committed! -- but I did wonder, as any self-employed person couldn't help but do!

All the best,

Mark

By Mark, at 7:51 PM

Mine's arrived this morning!!!
Yee haaaaaaaaa, I can't wait to start it and have to discipline myself and remind myself I AM AT WORK and cannot keep taking sneak peeks.

I'm glad too to hear that it will be an unknown that will be 'our' Roy GRace - that's not only good for the books but for the actor!

I have noticed there tends to be a certain pool of actors in the UK that are used for every series - when they get old and grey there'll be no one left in the business if the production houses/casting people don't take note!

By Jo, at 2:04 AM

Hi Mark

Thanks for your really kind comments!

It is a good question about compensation for the farmer - I will find out and let you know.

Hi Jo

Great that your copy arrived - and I hugely look forward to your verdict.

I could not agree with you more about the same old pool of actors again and again. It is not so much the fault of the production houses but the TV channel commissioners who want to play safe.... And it can be very, very frustrating - and in my view all part of the dumbing down on tv which has contributed so much to its decline.

By Peter James, at 7:27 AM

Exactly Peter - they are dumbing down (and my apologies to the production houses!).

One agent that had a look at a six-part TV drama I wrote, said there was no way any channel would look at it because it didn't have a recurring character and 'people needed to see the same actor each week in order to tune in'

(it didn't have a recurring character because they were all self-contained stories!)

Am 1/4 of the way through Not Dead Enough and now need tea and biscuits to keep me going - I can see me finishing this in the early hours of the morning!
Jo

By Jo, at 1:10 PM

Hi Joe, no need for apologies to any of the production houses it is not their fault - it is the utter mediocrity of the television network system.

So what biscuits are you eating???

Best

peter

By Peter James, at 9:53 PM

An entire packet of chocolate Hob Nobs !

That was a brilliant book Peter - I have to say much as I really liked Dead Simple and Looking Good Dead (and they were fantastic), this was even better.

I finished it at 2am this morning- so consequently my eyes are hanging out of my head!

Just finished the review and sent it to Amazon and also put it on my blog.

http://joadams.wordpress.com/book-reviews/

Everytime I thought I had it worked out I had to re-think! Sending Roy Grace off to Munich was a great move and I can't wait for the book when you reveal what has happened!

Well done, your hard work will pay off as I am sure without a doubt that this will be an award winning book.

Jo

By Jo, at 5:50 AM

Jo, thank you so much for this incredibly high praise. I am thrilled to bits that you enjoyed it so much.

By Peter James, at 11:44 AM

Looking forward to the signing tomorrow..... have to be there to get the third in my collection.....a DEAD CERT.... and I did get Silver Birch for the Grand National!

By Jon, at 1:04 AM

Hi Andy I just realized I never replied to your question whether there was a real life person I base Roy Grace on. No, I have a real life former Detective Superintendent who is in part the career model for Roy, but his appearance is my own imagination - and certainly not the character from Eastenders!!!!

By Peter James, at 11:37 AM

NDE is here Peter!
I saw it in Page One on Tuesday!!
Sneaked in rather quietly I thought until I saw it as Number 2 on the new releases display!!!!

Oh I don't know what was number 1 - I wasn't paying any attention to it.
There was a lady looking at yours and I said 'it's brilliant, you must read the series'
She bought it!!

By Jo, at 2:45 PM

Hi Jo, you are such a total star! Maybe my publisher should hire you to hang around in bookshops, press ganging folk into buying my books!!!

By Peter James, at 3:26 PM

What a good idea! I must go to Borders tomorrow and see what they are doing!

By jo, at 4:44 PM

Borders have it on display on their shelf of new releases and again it's number 2 - only problem is you have to be 6' tall to get it down - so I discreetly moved a few copies down so the shorter people could have a look - only a few, I didn't want to take all of them away from the top 'highly recommended' pile!

By jo, at 1:04 PM

Jo, you are a total star! Thanks so much!

By Peter James, at 8:23 PM