Next Stop, Hollywood!

My new book Fin Gall: A Novel of Viking Age Ireland (official motto: "It has ships and swords, what's not to like?") has been immortalized by my 12-year old son Jonathan, who created a Lego depiction of the opening scene, in which the Vikings aboard the longship Red Dragon attack a small Irish ship and battle the crew to the death. In the vividly rendered recreation below, the main character, Thorgrim Night Wolf, discovers a mysterious crown aboard the Irish vessel.

Once the big-time movie producers get a sense from this layout of how visually exciting the book could be, I'm expecting the offers to come rolling in.

Bounty Photos Found

I've been doing a big shovel out/remodel of my office the past few days and came across these photos which I had forgotten about. They must have been taken about ten years ago when I was visiting Robin Walbridge aboard Bounty in Portsmouth, VA. I was working on the book Reign of Iron about the Monitor and the Merrimack. The Norfolk Naval Shipyard would not let me in to see the dry dock where USS Merrimack had been converted to CSS Virginia, so Robin (Bounty's captain) suggested we take Bounty down the river so I could get photos. I climbed up into the main top and Robin took the ship past the dry dock and I snapped away. The folks at the naval shipyard were not happy to see the photos (the dry dock is in a classified area of the yard) but there was nothing indicating you could not take photos from the water. I was hoping they would arrest me (great publicity!) but beyond a few terse words over the phone, that was all I heard.

That kind of thing, the eagerness to help out, the mischievousness, was so typical of Robin. I love the picture of him standing on the rail. I think that will always be the way I remember him, standing there, conning the big blue boat into a tight spot with a bare minimum of maneuvering and fuss.

For those of you who don't know, Robin was lost at sea when Bounty went down in Hurricane Sandy. He is very much missed by the many, many people he touched.

 

 

Hey, I got Interviewed in a Blog!

So, I'm announcing on my blog that I was just interviewed by another blog. Somehow that all seems vaguely cannibalistic. But what the heck. It was quick and I didn't feel a thing. Interview was courtesy of Mary Jane Adams who writes books that are a wonderful mix of romance and American History, with covers that are steaming. If you want to read it, and who wouldn't, you can do so here.

Hey, did I mention Fin Gall? Sixteen customer reviews on Amazon.com, all four and five stars. Nice to see, but it's costing me a fortune, paying all these people off. The worst part is, even my kids charge me. Down in the four thousands for "Best Seller Rank" on the Kindle Store, which might seem like not a great number, but four thousand out of the approximately three hundred billion Kindle Books is not bad.



The cover of Fin Gall. It has nothing to do with this post, but I have to keep mentioning it.

Not to be Missed!

The new issue of The Quarterdeck is out. For anyone not familiar, this is the newsletter put out by McBooks Press dedicated to maritime fiction in particular, with a smattering of nonfiction as well. It's a great newsletter, well worth reading, and I would say that even if my mug was not on the cover, and it did not feature a review of my new novel Fin Gall (my publicists always tell me to mention books such as Fin Gall often in any interview or article, which is why I mention Fin Gall now, and not a book that is not Fin Gall. Fin Gall).

Among other things, the newsletter has an interview I did with editor George Jepson, discussing, you did guess it, Fin Gall and some thoughts on the current state of publishing. Also has one of my favorite quotes from my daughter, which she will be furious to see in print (we parents live for such moments, don't we?) but you have to read it to see what it is.

Have a great Fin Gall, everyone!

New Web Site!

My old, old web site died with my old computer. When I called my ISP and told the tech guy I had built it using FrontPage he literally laughed. Not a good sign. My old web site was more than a little lame. But I just got the new one up, and I'm pretty happy with it. I never updated the old one because I couldn't stand looking at it, but I should be able to keep this one current.

The address is www.jameslnelson.com

For those of you who got to the blog via the web site, sorry to send you back.

I discovered the other day that my kids, wired as they are, don't know what "www" stands for. I think you have to be between the ages of forty and sixty to know that. Any younger and you've never heard anyone talk about the "world wide web," any older and you missed it.

Dangerous Habit

I was going through some old photos and I came across this one. It reminded me that I once seemed unable to shake this dangerous, filthy habit - namely working aboard traditional sailing ships. I get so upset seeing this it makes me want to go have a drink and a smoke.

This was taken aboard the Golden Hinde somewhere off the Yucatan Peninsula. I hate to say what year.... Okay, 1989. There, I said it.

Okay, here's the problem...

My wife came across this interesting graphic showing what an average American family spends on what per year. You will notice that, in a society that has largely abandoned smoking, people still spend 0.7% of their income on tobacco and only 0.2% on reading! And we writers wonder why we can't make a living. From now on, I'm offering a free packet of Camel Filters with every copy of my book.

You will also notice folks spend 0.9% on booze. Could it be that people are drinking so much that they forget to read? Still, that's just a little more than $38 per month on booze. Are we becoming a nation of non-drinking, non-reading lightweights? What would Papa Hemingway say?

I know I'm ready for a little 0.9% right about now.