Books

Posts about books by Kaleb Nation.

Bran Hambric In The New York Times & WSJ

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It isn’t exactly the New York Times bestseller list (yet!), but my publisher’s recent decision to push back the e-book release of Bran Hambric: The Farfield Curse has been causing a lot of buzz this week. The Wall Street Journal was the first to report:

bran-hambric-line-logoIn an interview, Sourcebooks’ chief executive said it will delay by at least half a year the e-book version of “Bran Hambric: The Farfield Curse,” a young-readers title in the vein of Harry Potter that goes on sale Sept. 9. While the book is a debut novel, the author, Kaleb Nation, has a following with his Twilightguy.com blog.

Sourcebooks is issuing 75,000 copies of “Bran Hambric,” a sizable print run in this economy, and has arranged a substantial marketing campaign and book tour for Mr. Nation. (read more…)

This turned into more than a dozen big blogs getting in on the discussion. Now this evening, an article in the New York Times reported it as well:

nytlogo152x23Sourcebooks, an independent publisher, is releasing “Bran Hambric: The Farfield Curse,” a novel aimed at children, in September in hardcover. It will hold back the e-book until six months later. (read more…)

For those of you not in the publishing biz, this basically means that Sourcebooks will not release an e-book or Kindle edition until about 6 months after the bookstores get it on 9/9/09 (only 56 days left!). At the same time, the hardcover goes for about $12 in most online stores, as opposed to the usual $20 or so for others, so all of you who have pre-ordered or who are waiting won’t notice the difference.

Thanks to the articles, there was a huge pre-order’s spike this morning for Bran Hambric. As if all that good stuff isn’t enough, Borders recently posted an interview they did with me at Book Expo America — this came the same day as the news that Borders is giving the book front-of-store placement (all you people waiting instead of pre-ordering, this means it’ll be VERY easy to find at Borders!). I talk about gnomes and writing and some creatures in the books (including winx, one of my own creations that you’ll find in The Farfield Curse). Click below to watch it:

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And for anyone who didn’t catch it, the Wall Street Journal gave out a little bit of information that I haven’t mentioned before — that Sourcebooks is planning a book tour! I’ll have updates on that as soon as I know all the details 😀

For the comments: any suggestions of where I should go on that tour? (note: I don’t really get to pick, but it’ll be great to know where people are!).

More Awesome BranFan Stuff!

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Much to the annoyance of my local post office, I only get to check my PO Box about twice a month because it’s so far away from where I actually live! Because of this, my mail gets VERY piled up (this is part of the reason I don’t reply for months!) and I have to carry it all home and dump it on my bed to sort through it. Example:

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My favorite part about coming home from the Post Office is when I finally get to open all the packages and check out all the awesome stuff people have made for me and Bran Hambric. I think everyone has finally caught on how much I love gnomes. Who would have thought that in the 80’s there would actually be a Star Trek comic book with GNOMES:

gnomestartrek

I’ve uploaded the rest of the photos and some of the cool stuff (including a gnome pillow!) to the Fans page. Thanks to everyone who wrote all those great letters 😀

New Features And Songs And Stuff

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There are some new features to point on on my site, and a bunch of little updates that I’ve been meaning to post, but just didn’t seem to merit an entire blog to themselves! So without further ado:

– I added an entirely new Fans page, where I’ll be posting some of the awesome stuff that BranFans are making. Creative people are always sending in photos or pictures they drew, so I’ll be collecting and putting them on that page, along with all their cool fansites and videos and music,

– I now have an Official Facebook page, aptly located at www.Facebook.com/KalebNation. It is fan-run, but I will be dropping in at times to post updates,

– I have migrated the TwilightGuy.com Chatroom to jointly be a part of this site, so BranFans and TwilightGuy readers alike can hang out. I’ll be dropping in at random times and there are a ton of cool people there every day, so be sure to check it out,

– I uploaded a new song from the Bran Hambric soundtrack to YouTube, and you can also download it for free! Listen below:

bran-hambric-line-logoQuestion time! Since there are only 85 days until Bran Hambric: The Farfield Curse, I’ve been trying to think of cool stuff I should prepare as a countdown to the book release. I know that Stephenie Meyer always did some type of countdown where she would give quotes from the book a week or two leading up to the release. This would be a bit difficult for me to pull off since this is a first book, and nobody really knows who the characters are or what I’d be talking about. The only way anyone would understand it was if I forced them to read the preview chapters. FOR EXAMPLE:

“Oh terrible nights of woe and destruction, as I break down and blow up all forms of construction!” he screamed in delight.

If you had never read the book or preview chapters, you might think that Bran had said this under the guise of the pronoun ‘he’, and suddenly feel to your horror that the book you undoubtedly pre-ordered (because ALL GOOD CITIZENS have preordered Bran Hambric*) is actually about a fat brat who likes being brazenly destructive**. ANOTHER EXAMPLE:

“Blast the library,” Sewey said. “We’re going where we can be as loud as we want and not get thrown out!”

“Yay, the zoo!” Balder oinked.

“No,” Sewey snorted. “A bookstore.”

In this case, while the characters are obviously not Bran, you might come to the conclusion that Sewey and Balder are Bran’s pet pigs who happen to talk***, which he keeps in his bedroom closet. Or, to your utter disgust, you might assume that Sewey and Balder are two friends of Bran’s, and that the line afterward would be

“Yes! Let’s burn all the books while we’re at it, comrades!” Bran Hambric sneered, whilst throwing rocks at old ladies and bending over to punch a small rabbit.****

which isn’t at all the case, at least with the book I wrote.

I don’t even know how I got onto that tangent, but as some people have mentioned, there are some of you who would still like a quotes-countdown. You can at least be sure that I’ve got a bunch of plans together to make it lots of fun before the release date!

QUESTION FOR THE COMMENTS: What are some cool things and ideas you would like to see happen as part of the Bran Hambric countdown?

——NOTES——

*Obvious attempt at brainwashing

** No offense to those of you who are like this: I happen to have a character for you in the book, whose name also begins with the letter ‘B’.

*** Unfortunately, there are no talking pigs in Bran Hambric.

**** This does not appear in Bran Hambric: The Farfield Curse. I am not barring it as a possibility from the sequel, however.

Bran Hambric To Be Published In Russia

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bran-hambric-line-logoI just received news this morning from my wonderful foreign rights agents that the Russian translation for BRAN HAMBRIC: THE FARFIELD CURSE has been sold to Eksmo, one of the largest publishing houses in Russia. Eksmo is well known for many authors, but especially for being the first Russian publishers of the ARTEMIS FOWL series.

Of course, I am wildly thrilled at this news. I hadn’t expected any foreign interest in Bran Hambric until the book was out and selling in the United States. But as with most happenings surrounding this book, I was delightfully surprised to see things unfold even better than I had thought. In fact, it was so unexpected, that the first I heard about the deal was this morning in an email! It was quite a wonderful thing to wake up to.

Seeing the books that Eksmo has put out so far (Artemis Fowl being one of my all-time favorite series) I have great confidence in this deal. I don’t know their release date for the book or what the cover will look like yet — I’ll keep my site updated with anything I get on that, because I can’t wait to see how Bran Hambric looks in Russian!

eksmoAlso, it is worth noting that once one country picks up foreign rights, it is quite common for many other countries to start reporting back from reviewing the advance copies they picked up at the London Book Fair. So for those of you who are eagerly awaiting Bran Hambric in your countries, I am more confident than ever before that we will soon get some good news for others around the world!

More Great Stuff From BranFans!

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branfansNow that I’ve finally slithered out of bed (after recuperating from jetlag thanks to hitting both US coasts in the same week!) I’ve been delightfully surprised to discover a whole wave of great new stuff from the BranFans! It has been a thrill seeing all the wonderful people already involved in the Bran Hambric fandom — with still just under 100 days left before the full book is even out!

For starters, check out this song from the wonderfully talented Adrienne Frailey, who wrote it as a tribute to Bran Hambric and recently recorded it between studio sessions for her upcoming album:

Not only that, but a ton of BranFans have been using music from the soundtrack in their own YouTube video creations! Here is one by HideTheMushrooms on YouTube that uses my song The Box In The Bookstore (which you can download for free) to make a music video interpretation of the song (I like how since no one has read up to the actual box-in-the-bookstore scene in the preview chapters, the video makers invented their own ending 😀 ):

I’ve been using Google recently to help keep up with the Bran buzz, and I’ve spotted a whole assortment of really cool startup fansites for the book: like the BranHambricLexicon.com, BranHambricFansite, BranHambricByKN, TeamBranFans on YouTube (complete with another original song by Ethan, inspired by The Farfield Curse!), and a couple Bran Hambric and Kaleb Nation fan pages on Facebook. I’m amazed at how much all of these sites (and any I might have missed!) are doing to help spread the word about Bran Hambric!

And as for all the music: I’m so happy that there are already so many songs inspired by the book, when all anyone has read so far is the preview chapters! If you missed it, the Twilight-inspired band Bella Rocks! also has a song called “Emry’s Farewell” based on the prologue of the book. As an author, who created these characters and names and places, it feels wonderful seeing others find creative ways to take on my world.

A lot of the art that is used in these videos and websites is available for free from BranFans.com, including special computer wallpapers, buttons and widgets. Plus, at BranHambricMusic.com, you can now download four of the songs from the Bran Hambric soundtrack (and listen to nearly all of the others!). Kudos to all the great people for using their talents to make all this cool stuff 😀

FOR THE COMMENTS: What do you think of all the great Bran Hambric music and sites that are appearing?

My First Book Signing At Book Expo America 2009 [Video]

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Book Expo America 2009 was a BLAST! It is quite an amazing thing to go into an airplane-hangar-sized conference hall, and be surrounded by others from your own world of writing and publishing. I met countless authors and got a stack of books (including an advance copy of Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins, a signed copy of the Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman, and loads more).

My book signing for The Farfield Curse started at 11:00 AM, and there was already a short line formed. Once the time hit, people began to come from everywhere, and the signing didn’t really stop! There were so many people, we actually ran out of books, so that by the time the signing was over I simply couldn’t sign any more because there were none left to hand out. Hopefully this is a good sign for how it will do in stores 😀

I was interviewed for Borders Media by the one and only Pel from the Twilight Lexicon. It was a bit odd since it was my first film interview, and I had never been in a studio set up like it. There were five cameras, all set up at different angles, and they wired me up with a microphone and had lighting hanging all around. I also had to get film makeup put on — a first for me, and a bit itchy (it had to be explained to me that you actually have to wash it off afterward, ha ha). After BEA we headed over to Books Of Wonder, where I saw Tiger Beat play. Tiger Beat is a rock band entirely made of YA authors, with my editor Daniel Ehrenhaft on lead guitar and Libba Bray doing vocals. YES they were very good.

Even more exciting was the nearly-half-page article about me, TwilightGuy.com and my Twitter/Youtube stuff in Publishers Weekly. As with the opening of pre-orders and the signing of Brandon Dorman, publishers generally tell their authors nothing until after we’ve read about it in the papers: I learned via the article that Bran Hambric will have front-of-store placement at Borders bookstore and a 75,000 copy first printing! There are no extra zeroes in that number. It was easily 4 times what I was expecting!

Here are some photos from the event (special thanks to my friend Becka for taking them!)

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ARC’s For Bran Hambric: The Farfield Curse!

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As you can see, the Advance Reader Copies of BRAN HAMBRIC: THE FARFIELD CURSE have finally arrived! Here’s video of me opening the box from my publishers and going a bit nutty when I hold my book for the first time 😀

This moment was truly one of the biggest in my life: getting to hold this book was somewhat symbolic of six years of work on this story and the characters. Of course I’m thrilled to finally be able to see it in print: and very soon, it will be in bookstores all across the country (in hardcover, of course!).

These ARCs and those my publisher still have will now be sent out to key media people and reviewers who will help to promote the book before it comes out. There will also be many ARCs available at Book Expo America coming up at the end of next week, where I will have my first book signing! I’ll make sure there’s plenty of video of that for those of you who can’t make it 😀

If you’d like, you can download the first five chapters of the book completely free at BranHambric.com, as well as pre-order it from nearly any bookstore!

D. J. MacHale: “The Farfield Curse brims with mystery, magic and fun.”

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DJ MacHale

DJ MacHale

As we get closer to the 9-9-09 release of BRAN HAMBRIC: THE FARFIELD CURSE, news surrounding the book just seems to keep getting bigger! Already with two wonderful blurbs from authors Kim Harrison and Kaza Kingsley, we now have one more to add: this time, from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Pendragon series, D. J. MacHale!

The Farfield Curse brims with mystery, magic and fun. Kaleb Nation’s wry sense of humor kept me smiling, even while the mystical sparks flew. Get ready for lots of surprises and watch out for gnomes!

D. J. MacHale, Author of The Pendragon Series

D. J. , who not only wrote the enormously popular Pendragon series, is also a well-known television director, who happened to have worked on the show pilot for Ghostwriter, which was my absolute favorite growing up. Who would have thought that he would eventually write a blurb for my own novel?

You can find out more about D. J. MacHale’s books at his website, and more about The Farfield Curse at www.BranHambric.com (where you can read the first four chapters for free). And a huge thank-you to D. J. MacHale for the wonderful review!

Nicoleface And The Relay For Life

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At the Twilight premiere

My friend, who everyone knows as Nicoleface in the TwilightGuy chat, is doing a relay in honor of her mother who is battling cancer. She is one of the mods for my chatroom and my BlogTV shows, and she has a goal of $100. She is heading out for the relay today, and I think it would be wonderful if the Twitter and blog world helped her beat that goal!

I know we can get her past $100 by this evening. She’s at $50 now, which means we only need 25 people to donate $2 each for her to reach the goal, or 10 people to donate $5. If you would like to donate to her wonderful cause, please head on over to this page.

Oh, and one person who donates any amount and leaves a comment below (don’t post you donation amount or address) will get the first signed Bran Hambric postcard ever printed. If you didn’t already have enough incentive, there’s something for you 😀

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These things are ginormous. It's nearly the size of a book jacket.

Kim Harrison and Kaza Kingsley Are BranFans

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The first blurbs for BRAN HAMBRIC: THE FARFIELD CURSE have finally arrived! Blurbs, for those not familiar with the book business, are those prized and coveted reviews from Very Important People, especially reviewers and famous authors, that a writer receives about his or her book. These usually appear on the back of the book jacket.

Being a writer who has had a seemingly endless supply of good luck and an eternally wonderful agent and publisher, my first blurbs come straight from the bestsellers: KIM HARRISON and KAZA KINGSLEY.

kim-harrisonKim Harrison, bestselling author of The Hollows Series (with Dead Witch Walking), co-contributor to Stephenie Meyer and others on Prom Nights From Hell, and whose upcoming book Once Dead, Twice Shy is currently in my reading pile of ARCs, wrote:

Innocence gives way to danger as Bran pieces together his deadly past before his legacy can rise up to kill him in turn. With characters both silly and serious, Kaleb Nation has crafted a world vastly different from our own where magic sits next to cell phones, and gnomes really do travel. Reminiscent of Harry Potter, Bran Hambric: The Farfield Curse is everything a young adult read should be.

Kim Harrison
Author of Once Dead, Twice Shy

kaza-kingsleyKaza Kingsley, bestselling author of the Erec Rex series (with Erec Rex: The Dragon’s Eye) whose latest book Erec Rex: The Search For Truth comes out in a mere 49 days, wrote:

Whimsy, magic, and suspense collide together in this breathtaking tale. The Farfield Curse is a story you’ll want to pick up, but not put down!

Kaza Kingsley
Author of the Bestselling Erec Rex series

I couldn’t be happier with our first blurbs and reviews of the book! They will soon be up on the pre-orders page and on the Bran Hambric site as well. There will be many more of these to come before the release on 9-9-09 (and perhaps a few… surprise… blurb-ers in the next month or so 😀 ). I’ll be posting them as they come in!

Also, funny how my first two blurbs came in from authors whose names also begin with the letter K. Coincidence? Or FATE.