Hungary 1, The Rest of the World 0

Three excellent things have happened:

1. Hungary has won the global race to get Marry Me into the shops. Our friends at Athenaeum have published their edition already, under the title Elvehetlek feleségül? (Will You Marry Me?). And very nice it looks too, all in black:

2. The first review of the British edition has come in – and it’s a beauty. The Observer‘s Kate Kellaway is an early contender for our coveted Reviewer of the Year Award. In fact, this might just be the best review of anything ever. Normally we would pull out a quote or two, but this one is such a masterpiece that it seems wrong to chop it to bits. Read it here.

3. Magnificently, Aiden Moffatt has been filmed reading two of the stories from Rhodes’ new book. Here he is with Stick:

And Two:

Aiden’s new record with Bill Wells is brilliant. You can buy it here.

Happy reading

Five Incredible Facts about Marry Me

So here we are, just days away from the publication of the eighth Dan Rhodes book, Marry Me. It hits the shelves on 31st January in a handsome and sensibly priced hardback edition.

Thanks to Rhodes’ near total lack of interest in promotional activities, it’s fallen to us to assemble some enthralling nuggets of information about the latest release. Here goes:

1. Marry Me is named after the words written across Morrissey’s chest when The Smiths performed William It Was Really Nothing on Top of the Pops. Watch it here.

2. Even though it’s the second shortest of Rhodes’ books, Marry Me took fifteen years to write. The final touches were put in place just before midnight on 25th February 2012 – in the moments before he turned 40 and officially stopped being a Young Writer. He is now an Elder Statesman, but fortunately this book has not been tainted by his descent into middle age.

3. First editions of this book carry a hilarious typo in the author bio.* This will make them extremely valuable in years to come.

4. Rhodes decided to start scraping this book together in earnest after taking part in an In Chapters event at his favourite festival, The Laugharne Weekend. He isn’t able to be there this year, but you should still go. If you visit their web site you might be lucky enough to see an extreme close up of his teeth.

5. It’s also an e-book, but we recommend buying the actual book. You don’t need us to tell you that proper books are miles better than e-books.

6. It’s available for pre-order from the usual places. Book shops, for example. That takes us over the five mark, but never mind.

7. Experts are predicting that Marry Me will soon be the book most quoted at weddings – overtaking such perennial favourites as The Bible, Kahlil Gabrin’s The Prophet and Piggly Plays Truant.

8. This is the second Dan Rhodes book to be published in ten months. Don’t worry though – this extraordinary productivity will now abate.

Happy reading.

 

 

*Actually not hilarious.

Rhodes Reads

Summary of deleted post:

Rhodes announces an exhausting one-date world tour to mark the publication of his new book, Marry Me. It was at Book Slam at the Clapham Grand on Thursday 7th February, alongside Aiden Moffat, the Dirty Great Love Story people and Tim Key. It went very well.

We recommend the pilot episode of Bakersfield PD. Here it is. Nobody watches it.

The Dan Rhodes 2012 APFU

Summary of deleted post:

Our annual perfunctory festive update (APFU) reveals that our favourite reviews of 2012 are from The Scotsman and The Daily Mail.

We embed our favourite Christmas song:

Caveat Emptor

Summary of deleted post:

Rhodes’ main publisher, Canongate, decides to print a short run of extremely low quality editions of This is Life. It goes from this (lovely):

To this (immeasurably inferior):

Rhodes believes – rightly – that it’s a rip-off, and that it will alienate booksellers and readers. As both printings are published under the same ISBN, buying it becomes a game of Russian roulette.

Having been forced into a position where he is obliged to warn people not to buy his book in the run-up to Christmas, Rhodes goes understandably apeshit. The upshot is that Canongate does the right thing and withdraws this edition; the few terrible copies that make it into the outside world become highly collectible.*

And here is a bench and a sock:

*Actually, they aren’t – they are too depressing to ever become collectible.