“Declan Burke is his own genre. The Lammisters dazzles, beguiles and transcends. Virtuoso from start to finish.” – Eoin McNamee “This bourbon-smooth riot of jazz-age excess, high satire and Wodehouse flamboyance is a pitch-perfect bullseye of comic brilliance.” – Irish Independent Books of the Year 2019 “This rapid-fire novel deserves a place on any bookshelf that grants asylum to PG Wodehouse, Flann O’Brien or Kyril Bonfiglioli.” – Eoin Colfer, Guardian Best Books of the Year 2019 “The funniest book of the year.” – Sunday Independent “Declan Burke is one funny bastard. The Lammisters ... conducts a forensic analysis on the anatomy of a story.” – Liz Nugent “Burke’s exuberant prose takes centre stage … He plays with language like a jazz soloist stretching the boundaries of musical theory.” – Totally Dublin “A mega-meta smorgasbord of inventive language ... linguistic verve not just on every page but every line.Irish Times “Above all, The Lammisters gives the impression of a writer enjoying himself. And so, dear reader, should you.” – Sunday Times “A triumph of absurdity, which burlesques the literary canon from Shakespeare, Pope and Austen to Flann O’Brien … The Lammisters is very clever indeed.” – The Guardian

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Fly Concord For Free

I had a piece published in the Irish Times yesterday on the Concord Free Press, which is currently publishing Scott Phillips’ rather excellent RUT. The opening ran a lot like this:
The best things in life are free books. That’s the philosophy of the US-based Concord Free Press, which publishes books and gives them away.
  “GIVE + TAKE, my fourth novel, inspired the whole idea,” says Stona Fitch of CFP. “It’s about a jazz pianist who steals diamonds and BMWs and gives away the money - in short, a modern retelling of the Robin Hood fable. But it’s also about the limits of generosity and the slippery nature of value. When the book ran into classic delay at a major New York publishing house, I decided to start the Concord Free Press and give it the book away, asking only that readers give some money to a charity they believed in or someone in need.”
  The CFP publishing model - which they have dubbed ‘generosity-based publishing’ - is overseen by an Advisory Board of writers that includes Joyce Carol Oates, Russell Banks, Megan Abbott and Gregory Maguire, among others. “It’s important to point out that we’re a group of writers that publishes books,” says Stona, “not a publisher only. We’ve just seized control of the machinery of publishing and put it to work in a new way.”
  For the rest, clickety-click here

1 comment:

michael said...

I recently got my book "Rut" from Concord Free Press.
My charity was First Book and my Rut book is numbered 800. The thought of 800 plus people donating to their favorite charity should make everyone at Concord Free Press proud. I sure Scott Phillips is pleased with the increase in readers as well.

The whole experience was wonderful and one I plan to repeat.