Cory Doctorow Was Here!

Cory was in Berlin this week and presented his latest two books at the Otherland Bookshop - not once but TWICE! While I'm not one hundred percent sure what he talked about on his first event on Sunday (I guess it was The Lost Cause?), tonight he read from his latest, the second Martin Hench book The Bezzle. The series which started with Red Team Blues, Hench's last adventure, goes back in time, so each newly released book goes in reverse chronological order - it's because following the success of Red Team Blues the publishers wanted more of the main character, not really taking into account that the book is about his last case, so Cory told, he just started to write the cases that come before, lol, and as a positive side effect doesn't have to worry about continuity.

So he read to us a good chunk out of The Bezzle which starts off with the US prison system, and I guess there's a lot to say about that.

Doctorow is an author I used to read a lot when I was younger, as he was one of the few writers beside names like China Miéville, Ursula K. Le Guin or Olaf Stapledon who combined my passions of leftist politics and science fiction and I had the feeling that spoke to me. I haven't read much by him in the last couple of years, even though he has been incredibly hard working and writes with amazing pace. I was also incredibly lucky to have been able to get to know him personally a couple of years ago, while still working at the Otherland, and to find he's a pleasure to talk with. So I'm always happy when he drops by.

I hope Cory will keep on visiting us to talk to us about his books and I will surely have read more of his newer work by then.

Talking about events and readings, keep an eye on the Otherland website, they have some new events coming. In March Flavius Ardelean will be there, the Romanian author of Der Heilige mit der roten Schnur (I'm not sure if there's an English translation) and contributing author to the The Valancourt Book of World Horror Stories, Volume 1. I have read Der Heilige, and it was a very very interesting work, I absolutely loved the amazing translation by Eva Ruth Wemme. This is definitely one of the spring events I'm excited about.