Tim Jones – Page 3

Author Interviews at The Good Books Guide

Posted on June 9, 2008

Eric Forbes, who edits Quill magazine in Malaysia and blogs about books on The Good Books Guide, has made it his mission to interview (together with Tan May Lee) all the authors longlisted for the 2008 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award. As part of that series, his interviews with me about Transported and with Elizabeth Smither about The Girl Who Proposed have now been posted on the site.

All the authors have been asked the same questions – the similarities and differences in their answers are fascinating!

One of the unexpected bonuses of this longlisting process for me is the opportunity to find out about so many fine short story writers throughout the world.

In other news: thanks to the New Zealand Book Council, you can Read at Work. It looks like an ordinary work PowerPoint – but look closer, and it’s literature!

Transported Longlisted for 2008 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award

Posted on May 8, 2008

I’ve been blogging like crazy this week, but there’s good reason for one more post: my short story collection Transported (which you can pre-order online), which will be published by Random House New Zealand in June, is one of four New Zealand short story collections longlisted for the 2008 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award.

The New Zealand collections longlisted are:

Transported, Tim Jones (Random House New Zealand)
Etiquette for a Dinner Party, Sue Orr (Random House New Zealand)
The Girl Who Proposed, Elizabeth Smither (Cape Catley)
Ask The Posts Of The House, Witi Ihimaera (Raupo)

The Guardian has the full longlist of 39 books and an article about it.

I’m really pleased about this, but it’s important to keep a sense of perspective. It’s a longlist – a looooong longlist. The quality of the other New Zealand selections (congratulations to all the authors!) indicates the strength of the field. The shortlist is announced in July, and I don’t expect Transported to be on it – but I won’t deny that I’ll be very pleased if it is!

It’s also good to see a prize specifically for short story collections, which are sometimes neglected beasts in the literary zoo.

UPDATE: If you’re looking for a review copy of Transported, or other ‘official’ publicity material about the book, please contact Jennifer Balle, jennifer (at) randomhouse.co.nz

Transported: The Tracklisting

Posted on April 28, 2008

I came back from a few most enjoyable days in Dunedin, visiting my lovely friends there – and making some new ones – to find an advance copy of my short story collection Transported waiting for me on my return. It looks great! The cover colours, which appear slightly washed out in the image to the left, are beautifully sharp on the book itself, and so far as I can tell, all the words inside are in the right place and in the right order.

No matter how excellent the publisher – and the team at Random House NZ (who have published the book under their Vintage imprint) are indeed excellent – opening one’s new book for the first time is still a nervous moment. The book doesn’t go on general release until 6 June, but it’s already available to pre-order at some bookshops, and publicity for it should appear shortly before it is released.

Released … tracklisting … yes, I think of it as something like a record (that cherishably old-fashioned artifact) with 27 tracks, some of which have already been released, in earlier versions, as singles. Here’s the “tracklisting” for Transported, with links to a few previously-published stories which are available online. I hope this will whet your appetite.

Rat Up a Drainpipe
Said Sheree
When She Came Walking
A Short History of the 20th Century, With Fries
Win a Day with Mikhail Gorbachev!
The New Neighbours
Sisters
Not Wanted on Voyage
Jim Clark
Alarm
The Wadestown Shore
Filling the Isles
Homestay
The Visit of M. Foucault to His Brother Wayne
Borges and I
Measureless to Man
The Seeing
After the War
Best Practice
Robinson in Love
Going Under
Morning on Volkov
The Royal Tour
Queen of the Snows
Going to the People
Cold Storage
Books in the Trees