Tag: Transported review

Ten Reasons Why Transported Makes a Great Present

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Presents. We all need to come up with them from time to time: for Christmas, for birthdays, for other holidays. But what to buy? For many situations, the answer is short story collection Transported, by Tim Jones (which you can buy online from Fishpond, New Zealand Books Abroad (for both overseas and New Zealand residents), or Whitcoulls). Here’s ten reasons why.

Teenagers: Although – or perhaps because? – Transported wasn’t written with a Young Adult audience in mind, I’ve heard that it’s doing well in high schools, among both boys and girls. So if you’re looking to buy a present for that young man whom you wish would read more, or that young woman who has recently started writing short stories, Transported is the book to give them.

Adults: But just because Transported is a good gift for teenagers doesn’t make it an unsuitable gift for adults. Transported is packed with adult themes and content. There’s sex (discreet), violence (not too much), and language. In fact, it’s nothing but language from the first page to the last.

Fun: Transported is fun. Don’t take my word for it: listen to reviewer Mike Crowl, who says: “Tim Jones’ Transported is a pleasant surprise. None of the tales have that kind of super-seriousness about them that’s typical of NZ short stories. Instead, they’re an intriguing mix of tongue-in-cheek, subtle humour, history turned inside out, and sci-fi”.

Funny: It’s not only fun – it’s funny. There are jokes, quips, and jests. There is surrealism, absurdism, and plain old silliness. Reviewer Rosemarie Smith says: “The mix is clever and compelling, and though there may not be much riotous laughing out loud, there’s many a quiet chuckle.” So Transported is the perfect book for buses, trains and planes, where riotous laughing out loud won’t go down well.

Proudly local: Transported is as New Zealand as the All Blacks, Lemon and Paeroa, and our banking system – oh, hang on a minute …

But anyway, the contents include stories set in Southland, Fiordland, Dunedin, and Wellington. Palmerston North gets a look-in too. It’s as New Zealand as a Tourism New Zealand billboard!

Confidently international: Tired of stories set in provincial backwaters? Ready to go exploring? Then take a trip to the Caribbean, Russia, the USA or even Dubbo. Investigate the inner workings of the Soviet Politburo, the Australian Tax Office, and the College de France. Meet famous historical figures such as Michel Foucault, V.I. Lenin and Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Live a little!

Boldly outerspatial: Hard to find presents for the alien in your life? Cow tipping and rectal probing not really doing it for them any more? Then invite them to kick back and relax with tales that encompass election campaigns contested by talking kangaroos, eyes that work like telescopes, and how alien immigrants are received by the inhabitants of a typical New Zealand street.

Epiphanacious (not sure this is actually a word, but what am I, an author?): Everybody knows that proper short stories must include an epiphany, a still, small moment in which the protagonist experiences a moment of revelation about his or her life. New research reveals that 11 out of the 27 stories in Transported contain an epiphany. That’s over 40% proper short fiction in one compact volume!

Value for money: Transported contains 27 stories, and its recommended retail price is NZ$27.99. That’s only a dollar a story (apart from a few inconvenient cents which we can account for as “rounding error”). A buck a story? That’s real value!

Readily available: Sure, you can buy Transported online, but it’s also available in lots of New Zealand bookshops. A full list is here, and it includes Whitcoulls, Dymocks and Borders branches, Unity Books, and many independent booksellers, such as McLeods (Rotorua), Page and Blackmore (Nelson), and Wadsworths (New Plymouth).

So there you have it. Transported. You will be.

You can buy books by Tim Jones online!

Another Good Review for Transported

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This review of my short story collection Transported, by reviewer Mandy Evans, appeared in the Marlborough Express on 19 August 2008.

Transported by Breadth of Imagination

Expect to be transported by this collection of short stories and you won’t be disappointed.

From a neighbourhood debate about aliens moving in next door, a changing climate resulting in kiwifruit growing in Otago, an eye transplant that allows a man to better see the stars, and a country so crowded there’s standing room only, Tim Jones’s imagination and his pen range freely.

Jones has previously published two volumes of poetry, and one earlier collection of short stories, however, this is the first work of his I’ve read.

I found his writing polished and easy-to-read. His protagonists are all distinctive characters and the writing tone for each story reflects this. I particularly like that Jones has taken such diverse situations that at times seem like stray thoughts that would flit through most people’s minds and disappear, and turned them into thoughtful stories.

While not every story in the book was to my taste this just serves to prove the breadth of Jones’s imagination. I loved The New Neighbours which featured aliens living among humans. After The War, which tells the tale of one of Tolkien’s Orcs, also appealed to me.

One of the essential ingredients in a short story is its power to surprise; to produce the unexpected. I derive a great deal of satisfaction from reading a collection that does so with a flourish. Most of the stories in this collection finished with a satisfying element of doubt, ensuring the stories linger in the mind.

You can buy books by Tim Jones online!

Transported: Reviews

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I thought it was time to collect the reviews of Transported that are available online into one post. So here they are:

That’s all the online reviews I know of. If you’ve seen another, please post a comment with the details.

You can buy books by Tim Jones online!

A Watched Book Never Sells

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So I’m sitting in the food court area of Wellington Airport. I’m heading up to Auckland for a conference. Due to bad weather, my flight has been delayed for 90 minutes. That’s bad – it will make the kind person who’s picking me up from the airport late. But it has a good side: I’ve had the chance to sign the copies of my short story collection Transported in the Wellington Airport Whitcoulls.

The staff are very well organised. The books are on a nice little display cabinet near the entrance to the shop, and they have a pen and a bunch of “Personally Autographed” stickers close at hand. I kneel down in front of the display, sign each book, and carefully place a sticker on the front. There are 17 copies to sign – that’s good, because I know the bookshop started with 20. I rise to my feet (wishing I hadn’t decided to wear both my jacket and my raincoat onto the flight as the easiest way of carrying them).

But now I’m about 50 metres from the bookstore, nursing a coffee, doing a spot of work, and peering intently at the foot traffic into and out of Whitcoulls. Nobody is stopping at the display of Transporteds. Are they too low, too far below eye level? Should I have piled them up higher when I put them back on the stand? Is the blue “Personally Autographed” sticker on the front putting people off? (I prefer the way Unity does it – instead of putting stickers on each book, they put a nice “Signed Copies” notice on top of the pile.) And, though I really like the cover, does it stand out enough from the gaudier books around it?

Eventually they call my flight and I head off to Auckland. The conference goes very well. While waiting for my flight back to Wellington, I sign the copies in the Auckland Airport Whitcoulls. There are less of them, and they are modestly hidden on the shelves. It’s still good to see them, though, these old friends in unfamiliar places.

I’m aware this is all rather pathetic. I’m aware I should get over myself. Just as a watched pot never boils, so a watched book never sells. But whenever I walk past a bookstore that stocks Transported, I find it very hard not to go in and see if any have sold. Half the stock in the Wellington Borders has sold – joy! None have sold in Dymocks – damn, if only I’d been able to give a more exciting description of the book when Bruce Caddie asked me how they should describe it to customers.

The world faces multiple, interlocking problems: peak oil, climate change, food shortages … the list goes on. I have work to do, a family to love, and a novel to be getting on with. But I took some visitors to Wellington Airport today, and – I stopped after farewelling my visitors and counted – now there are only 15 copies on that display. Two more copies have sold – yes!

Even the outrageous carpark fees (if only we had light rail out to the airport!) can’t dampen the feeling, so precious, so fleeting, of success.

UPDATE

A review of Transported and author interview with me have just been published by The Short Review. Thank you, Tania and the team!

You can buy books by Tim Jones online!