Marcus Sakey on The Damned

And another writer I think is great – Marcus Sakey in this case – has something nice to say about The Damned!

“It’s an uncommon novel that moves a reader, and a rare one that frightens them, but only the most extraordinary accomplish both at the same time. Enter The Damned, a tour de force that sinks sticky claws into the soft dark places in your psyche—and refuses to let go, no matter how you squirm.”

— Marcus Sakey, author of The Blade Itself and the Brilliance Saga

The Damned gets a thumbs up

Got a great endorsement from author Lauren Beukes for The Damned today! (If you haven’t read Lauren’s scary, super-smart The Shining Girls or Broken Monsters, you really should.  Her writing is insightful, often funny, and her scares are wonderfully weird and dark as the inside of a cow.  Big fan).

Pyper is a master architect of dread…Compulsive and nerve-jangling, The Damned is a story about personal hells and the relationships that haunt us.”

– Lauren Beukes, author of The Shining Girls and Broken Monsters

THE DAMNED

The new book has a title – The Damned – and a cover too.  Both took a while to get right, but I gotta say, they feel like a perfect match right now.

(The Damned is out February 2015 in the US and Canada, and March 2015 in the UK).

the damned 4.indd

Demons Take New York!

There’s surprises…and then there’s SURPRISES!

When The Demonologist was announced as a finalist for the International Thriller Writers Award for Best Hardcover Novel I took it as an enormous honor in itself, and never thought I stood any real chance of winning.  Why would I?  My fellow nominees were Lisa Gardner, Lee Child, Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child, Linda Castillo, my fellow Canuck and friend Owen Laukkanen and Stephen King.  With a field like that, I was more than happy to just be a shoulder rubber.

Then, this weekend, I went down to New York for the awards banquet at ThrillerFest.  Hundreds of colleagues, agents, and editors in a Manhattan hotel ballroom – many of whom I’ve read with admiration and who constitute the firmament of the world’s thriller writing.  An audience I found myself addressing when I accepted the award.

It still feels a bit unreal.  I feel so very privileged.  It was a fun night, I tell you.

So thanks to the ITW, the judges, Jenny Milchman for being the one to say my name into the microphone, and for anyone else who may have had a hand in this.  As I said at the awards banquet (and is captured here on video, even if you can’t quite hear me), it was the fifth most exciting night of my life.  The others?  My wedding day.  The births of my two children.  And one night I can’t discuss publicly.

ITW Awards – July 12, 2014

Lost Girls Makes You Proud to be Canadian

Over at the CBC Books website, in honour of Canada Day, they’ve compiled a list of the all-time 100 Novels That Make You Proud To Be Canadian.  And guess what?  My first novel, Lost Girls is on it!

Aside from the terrific honour at having my book on the list with The Greats, I’m proud in a slightly different way.

It’s the feeling that my story – a made-up thing about ghosts and a cokehead lawyer and a monstrous Lady of the Lake who pulls swimmers down into a lake’s depths – has entered people’s consciousness in unexpected and reality-reshaping ways.  To think that something I’ve written has changed (however slightly) the way some might see a familiar thing – a northern lake, a neglected town – is rewarding beyond description.

CBC Books – 100 Novels That Make You Proud To Be Canadian

The Demonologist on the Sunburst shortlist

Just saw that The Demonologist is on the shortlist for the Sunburst Award! And this as the sun actually appeared outside the window. Coincidence? Obviously not.

The Sunburst Award acknowledges excellence for Canadian literature of the fantastic.  My thanks to the Sunburst association and the jury, as well as congratulations to my fellow nominees, including the wonderful Nalo Hopkinson and Guy Gavriel Kay.

Sunburst Award shortlist

The Demonologist a Finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award

Shirley Jackson is the sweetest when it comes to sourness, a shining light in the darkness field. Have you read “The Lottery” or The Haunting of Hill House or We Have Always Lived in the Castle? No?  You must. I’m not kidding. Quit your job, file for divorce, barricade yourself inside a storage locker – do whatever you need to do to read her.

As you can see, I’m an admirer.

Shirley Jackson, the late American writer of literary horror, subtle psychological thrillers and weird tales, has a prize named after her.  In honour of her accomplishments, the prizes are given each year to stories, anthologies, novels etc. that mine the Jacksonian vein of horror and suspense.  And this year…The Demonologist is a finalist for Best Novel!

I’m blown away grateful to be on the list with such great writers and books, some of which I’ve already read and the others I’m about to.  Check out all the shortlists here:

Shirley Jackson Awards