Get acquainted with Orbit author Gail Carriger in the most recent episode of Sword & Laser! Gail joined Veronica and Tom for tea and to talk about her Parasol Protectorate series (starting with SOULLESS [US | UK | ANZ]) and other projects.
We invite you to be so kind as to look below for some more entries to our competition to celebrate Gail Carriger‘s UK tour. What these lovely beauties are all hoping to win is a beautiful teapot or one of two tea strainers, which Gail signed for us when she graced the UK office with her presence on Wednesday. Be sure to send in your entry by 5pm UK time today to be in with a chance of winning. More entries and winners will be posted next week!
And don’t forget that tonight there will be a Steampunk Extravaganza held in Gail’s honour at the Waterstones in Nottingham. It looks like it’s turning out to be quite a party indeed . . .
Great Britain is honoured and privileged to announce that Gail Carriger shall be setting foot on our shores this April – for a gloriously grand UK tour. Orbit Books shall also be launching a frightfully wonderful competition to celebrate – where you can win this enchanting teapot. Read on for more . . .
For years Ms Carriger has resided in the colonies, supping on the finest of infusions imported from London, wearing the tiniest of hats and penning the novels which have brought her fame and fortune throughout the Empire: the Parasol Protectorate novels – most recently Timeless (UK | US | ANZ).
Yet now the time has come for this illustrious lady to return to the British Isles – and to greet the legions of fans waiting to pay tribute to her magnificent work.
You are all cordially invited to attend several splendid events taking place over the course of a week in April:
Sunday 8 April: Eastercon, Heathrow, London
Those of you attending this year’s convention will be delighted to hear that Gail shall be appearing on the following charming panels:
‘Meet the new king (same as the old king)’ – 11am, Room 12
‘You got your robot elf sex in my SF’ – 3pm, Commonwealth
‘Multicultural steampunk’ – 9pm, Room 38
Monday 9 April: Foyles, Shaftesbury Avenue, London, 6.30pm
In coordination with the most honourable chaps over at Pornokitsch, Gail shall be hosting an exclusive steampunk soirée at Foyles bookshop in Central London. Climb into that corset, pull out your pocket watch and buff up your brass goggles – and pop along for a tipple or two and to get your book signed by her fair hand. This event is free but ticketed, so please send an email as soon as possible to events@foyles.co.uk to obtain a cherished spot on this exclusive guest list.
Friday 13 April: Waterstones, Nottingham, Bridle Gate, 6.30pm
Gail shall be speaking to a thoroughly privileged throng for another steampunk extravaganza at the Waterstones in Nottingham. Special guest Jema Hewitt (author of Steampunk Emporium) and friends will also be frequenting the event in full costume. The evening shall commence – as is only right – with Pimm’s & cake at 6.30pm for a 7pm start. This event is ticketed and costs £5, or £3 if you hold a Waterstones card, so please purchase them here in advance.
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Now on to the competition. We are delighted to announce that whilst on her Grand UK Tour, Gail shall be signing three very special items for us to give away as prizes. The first prize is this darling teapot, and the two runner-up prizes are these twee tea strainers – all from the lovely shop Oliver Bonas.
All you have to do to be in with a chance of winning these prizes is send us a photo of yourself with a parasol or umbrella in a darling pose and send it to orbit@littlebrown.co.uk. This is an Orbit worldwide competition, and we shall be posting the entries on the site. Ms Carriger herself will choose the winner and runners-up at the end of her Grand UK Tour on 13 April. See terms and conditions here.
And to show you just how easy it is, here are Orbiteers Anna Gregson, Emily Rowland and Rose Tremlett with a shining example (and no fear, they have honourably excluded themselves from winning):
Best of British, and the Empire salutes you!
It is with a mix of joy and sadness that I launch the cover for TIMELESS by Gail Carriger. Joy, because I have loved working on these covers so much, and I happen to be a nerd about things ancient Egyptian, so Alexia Tarabotti + Pyramids = Squee. However, it is sad because this is the final book in the adventures of Alexia Tarabotti!
Of course, that doesn’t mean the end of our Lady Maccon. Did you hear about the Yen Press manga Soulless adaptation being created as we speak? The artwork is amazing! I’ve seen the cover and first chapter, I just can’t wait to see more…Trust me, even if you’ve never thought manga was your thing, you have to keep tabs on this book as it develops. Stunning work, and bravo to our Yen Press brethren.
As usual, we have a fabulous image of The Lady Maccon, portrayed by Donna Ricci, the captain of the steamship we call ClockworkCouture.com. Alexia in her explorer’s gear was shot by Pixie Vision Productions, who was also responsible for documenting the awesome Afternoon Tea that Gail and Donna co-hosted recently in L.A. (There’s a great fan writeup of the event here). I so love collaborating with people active in the world of Steampunk when we’re doing steampunk and victorian titles (hmm, foreshadowing alert for next season perhaps?). Everyone already knows the lingo, they always catch my chronological aberrations, and even better, they always add things to the books that I would never have thought of on my own.
So without further ado, here’s a teaser for Timeless…
Well, as you can tell from the infrequency of the postings from the Art Dept since the holidays, it’s been craaaaaazy busy here. Our Fall/Winter 2012 covers are due in 3 weeks, and we’re killing ourselves bringing you the coolest artists and designs we can. We also have a couple new features in the pipeline which we’ll be talking more about after the evil 2/18 deadline, so hang with us. Meanwhile, we are going to finish posting the rest of the Spring/Summer 2011 Covers for your viewing pleasure, starting with one of my fave series…
Here you go folks, Heartless, the fourth Alexia Tarabotti/Soulless book by Gair Carriger. I love this series, and I am really digging the covers too – who wouldn’t, when I get to work with such fun material as the photos Steampunk icon Donna Ricci keeps sending me? The photographer this round was Pixie Vision Productions.
I tried to find a good British castle as a stand-in for the pack headquarters, and I think the cool heavy stonework here does the job – I can totally picture Alexia going up and down those steps to visit with the werewolves camped out on the back lawn…and whipping some military discipline into them!
After the jump is a teaser, and I’ve tried to take out as many spoilers as I could, but still, if you haven’t read the previous books (Soulless, Changeless, and Blameless) then BE WARNED, SPOILER ALERT. (more…)
And the winner is…….Bountiless! The contest really did come down to the wire between Bountiless and Breathless, but in the end, Boba Fett took the prize. And speaking of prize, we were SO impressed with the quality of the contestants, and the feverish commenting, that we decided to award the winner with a $100 gift certificate to Clockwork Couture, helmed by none other than expert panelist and Alexia model, Donna Ricci.
Mr. Fett, please contact me at lauren (dot) panepinto (at) hbgusa (dot) com and we’ll work out the details on the prize.
Of course, ’tis true that Boba Fett is a bit of a tough fit for the world of the Parasol Protectorate, but I think it can work if you think of it like this: If you forget that this is a reimagining of Boba Fett, and just take the costume fresh and just on Steampunk merit, it is absolutely a fine piece of craftsmanship and design. And a hell of a lot of manpower. And I think there is definitely room in the Parasol Protectorate for a helmeted bounty hunter.
And, you know, besides that, it’s freaking Boba Fett in Steampunk. That’s awesome.
You can find out more about the mysterious Mr. Fett at his facebook page. I hear he is available for parties!
Truth be told, all of our finalists — and really all of the contestants — embodied the best aspect of Steampunk: they had fun. I love Steampunk and other “retrofuturism” because you really can bring so much of yourself to it, and look awesome doing it. Your own background, look, culture, your own nerdy obsessions. And it takes chutzpah to dress up on a day not related to Halloween, even for a convention where a whole lot of other people are dressed up too. I applaud the entire Parasol Protectorate Class of 2010. And get working on your costumes again for next year!
Parasol Protectorate fans, I have a special treat for you today. I have the face of Alexia Tarabotti herself, Donna Ricci, here to give some critiques and comments on the Parasol Protectorate cover finalists. We’ve talked about Donna’s role in the covers before, but I love talking about what a great team-up these covers have been. Donna is the proprietress of Clockwork Couture, which, in my opinion, has the best selection of Steampunk clothing and accessories on the web. She’s also a professional model, a writer on Steampunk fashion, and a champion of beasts great and small. I can’t think of a more fitting person to be our Alexia. And as an extra treat, I’m going to post the images below that became our Parasol Protectorate covers, before and after I did all the photoshop magic to them. You’ll see Donna needs very little retouching!
Before I hand it over, however, I just want to update you guys. We’re going to leave voting open over the whole weekend, and I’ll be tallying votes sometime Monday (after my first coffee, at least) and announcing the winner. N0w remember guys, one vote per email address please…that means you, mom-of-Doubtless! haha.
Ok, here’s the original images of Donna, next to the cover images of without the text, as a bit of a cover “evolution” shot:
The competition is fierce and the comments are flying over at the finalist round for the Parasol Protectorate cover contest, and I thought it would be fun to have some “Steampunk Experts” give us some professional opinions of the finalists ensembles and posing. First up is the Ay-leen the Peacemaker, mistress of the fabulous blog Beyond Victoriana, who also contributes to other blogs and projects on retro-futurism. Beyond Victoriana focuses on multiculturalism in Steampunk and retro-futurism, and just won a Last Drink Bird Head Award.
I really enjoy reading Ay-leen’s essays because it’s good to remember that although there is a huge Victorian Age element to Steampunk, that does not mean that it has to be solely Victorian England. I’m really into the idea that a lot of the fun of retro-futurism is that you can really make it personal in style, and that can include your own family and cultural heritage. For example, check out the costume in the Careless cover below, which kind of has an awesome eastern/turkish element to it.
Anyway, enough about what I think…on to Ayleen’s comments…
Voting is now open for the finals of the Parasol Protectorate cover contest! The competition was fierce, and after 5 rounds of intense voting, here are your finalists. You’ll have all this week to vote. On Monday I will again tally the votes and name the winner and new Team Captain for the Parasol Protectorate Class of 2010…or is that 1910?
You might notice there are 6 finalists, and that’s because there was a bit of suspicious voting in Round One. So let me make the rules clear once more. Only vote once. I can see your email addresses so if there are two votes coming from the same account (that aren’t an obvious computer error) then all the votes from that account will be disqualified. To vote, please state clearly in the comments which cover (by title) you are voting for. DON’T say “#3” and don’t say you’re stuck between Sugarless and Hairless, because neither will count as a vote. DO feel free to applaud, praise, or heckle other finalists in the comments as well. DO feel free to vote for yourself. And most of all DO remember that you are voting on the person’s costume and pose. And poise. Not the title, cover layout, or background, which were all entirely my doing.
Over the next few days I will have some Steampunk and fashion experts weighing in on the finalists, so stay tuned! The finalist covers are after the jump…
Day five and competition is fierce. I love reading all your comments in the posts, so keep it up! This is the last batch of covers, and the winners of each day will have a runoff vote on Monday!
I kind of love the Steampunk-versions-of-characters costumes too. It’s already awesome to be mashing up time periods and technology, but then you throw Green Lantern, Doctor Who, and Star Wars into it, and that’s just doubly awesome… If you havent seen them around the web, there’s some really cool anachronistic and Steampunked worlds here, here, and here. And altho not technically Steampunk, these “premakes” are favorites in the same anachronistic vibe.
And on to today’s covers, after the jump… (more…)
