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Jasper Kent revamps website in readiness for publication of Thirteen Years Later

Jasper Kent has revamped his website – http://www.jasperkent.com/ – including a spiffy new flash animation, in advance of Bantam Press’s UK publication of Thirteen Years Later, the sequel to his highly successful historical vampire debut Twelve. The book appears on March 18 as a trade paperback.

About Twelve
The voordalak – a creature of legend; tales of which have terrified Russian children for generations. But for Captain Aleksei Ivanovich Danilov – a child of more enlightened times – it is a legend that has long been forgotten. Besides, in the autumn of 1812, he faces a more tangible enemy – the Grand Armée of Napoleon Bonaparte.

Fantasy Book Review said “Jasper Kent shows admirable restraint when it comes to the gruesome; there are moments in the book that genuinely make you squirm uncomfortably but it is the scarcity that makes them so effective. If an author dishes out the gore from page one then the reader becomes desensitised and the horrific becomes mundane. The author has an obvious passion for the subjects within his story and he has created an effortless and enjoyable read. The average reader will not possess a wide knowledge of Russian history and Twelve will lead to them carrying out further research on this most fascinating of countries. I personally would have liked for there to have been more tension and for the book to have ended rather differently but there can no denying that Twelve is a great read and a breath of fresh air to more than one genre. Twelve is an educational, entertaining and dark historical fantasy novel.” 8.5/10

Read the full review of Jasper Kent’s Twelve
In July 2009 Fantasy Book Review interviewed Jasper Kent

Jasper Kent was born in Worcestershire in 1968. He attended King Edward’s School, Birmingham and went to study Natural Sciences at Trinity Hall, Cambridge, specialising in Physics. Jasper has spent almost twenty years working as a software consultant both in the UK and Europe, whilst working on both fiction and music. He has co written several musicals, including The Promised Land, written and performed to mark the 3000th anniversary of the foundation of Jerusalem and Remember! Remember!, the story of Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot. He currently lives in Brighton, with seven rats called Millie, Martha, Rose, Manjula, Lurleen, Maybe and Bertie and a person called Helen.

Posted: March 2nd, 2010
Author: Lee
Categories: Jasper Kent

US rights to Jasper Kent’s vampire novels purchased by Pyr

Helen Edwards, Rights Director at Transworld UK, has sold US rights for the first two historical vampire novels by UK novelist Jasper Kent.

World rights in the novels, which open with Jasper’s debut Twelve (the second-highest-selling trade paperback debut novel right across UK publishing in 2009), were acquired by Simon Taylor from John Jarrold in 2008. The sequel, Thirteen Years Later, will appear in the UK in March 2010.

"I’m thrilled to be welcoming Jasper Kent into the Pyr fold," said editorial director Lou Anders. ‘Twelve is a magnificent blend of a historical novel and a dark fantasy novel that could appeal equally to readers both in and out of genre. Jasper is a skilled storyteller, whose compelling prose had me hooked from his opening chapter. The book is "un-put-downable. I love that he has brought back a real sense of threat and danger to the classic monsters, something that has been lacking with too many vampires lately. I cannot wait to spring this on US readers."

"Jasper and I are delighted with this deal, and looking forward to working with Lou and his colleagues. Pyr is a terrific company, who publish many of my favourite authors, and Lou’s enthusiasm has to be seen to be believed!" John Jarrold.

Fantasy Book Review said of Twelve:
"Jasper Kent shows admirable restraint when it comes to the gruesome; there are moments in the book that genuinely make you squirm uncomfortably but it is the scarcity that makes them so effective. If an author dishes out the gore from page one then the reader becomes desensitised and the horrific becomes mundane. The author has an obvious passion for the subjects within his story and he has created an effortless and enjoyable read. The average reader will not possess a wide knowledge of Russian history and Twelve will lead to them carrying out further research on this most fascinating of countries. I personally would have liked for there to have been more tension and for the book to have ended rather differently but there can no denying that Twelve is a great read and a breath of fresh air to more than one genre. Twelve is an educational, entertaining and dark historical fantasy novel."
Read the full review

Jasper Kent has spent almost twenty years working as a software consultant both in the UK and Europe, whilst working on both fiction and music. He has co written several musicals, including The Promised Land, written and performed to mark the 3000th anniversary of the foundation of Jerusalem and Remember! Remember!, the story of Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot.

Posted: October 30th, 2009
Author: Lee
Categories: Jasper Kent, John Jarrold

Jasper Kent interview (July 2009)

Jasper Kent was born in Worcestershire in 1968. Twelve, a horror / thriller / fantasy set in Russia amongst Napoleon’s invasion of 1812, was published in 2008 to great acclaim. Jasper kindly spoke to Fantasy Book Review in July of 2009.

Fantasy Book Review: Twelve was set in Russia during Napoleon’s invasion of 1812. Where will the reader find themselves when Thirteen Years Later begins?

Jasper Kent: Russia. The action takes place in Petersburg, Moscow and on the Black Sea coast, around the Crimea and the Sea of Azov.

Do the voordalak (a creature of legend; tales of which have terrified Russian children for generations) really come from folklore or are they a product of your imagination?

The voordalak is a genuine creature of Russian legend and a variety of vampire, but beyond that I didn’t make much attempt to stick to Russia’s or any other country’s folklore. To be honest, in the original draft the word ‘voordalak’ wasn’t used, only ‘vampire’. My editor made the suggestion that using a Russian word for vampire would give the text a little more flavour. The Russian words for vampire are ‘vampir’, ‘oopir’ and ‘voordalak’, of which ‘voordalak’ seemed the most exotic sounding.

In an interview in April you mentioned that Thirteen Years Later will swing a little more towards horror. Are you concerned that any major changes in style may result in losing some of your existing fan base?

It’s always going to be a problem in any sequel or series that faithful readers are not going to get what they expected. But it’s equally a problem that they will be bored by getting more of the same. Clearly Thirteen Years Later was going to have to tilt one way or the other, but direction wasn’t a deliberate choice, simply a function of the historical background. There was no war for Russia in 1825, so that meant that I had to put the action in in an area that was more under my control. In the next novel my instinct will be to push the tiller the other way, but I’ll have to see where the story takes me.

Has life changed in any major way for you since the publication of Twelve?

Not really. I’m still doing about the same mix of writing and other work. Whilst I can see a clear path now down to at least the third novel in the series, in terms of actual publication we’ve only got the trade paperback of the first novel out. Thus in terms of money, notoriety and confidence of success, it’s still very early days.

You studied Natural Sciences at Cambridge and you also have twenty years experience working as a software engineer. These do not instantly appear to be life experiences that would be a great help when writing a novel. Would that be fair comment or did you develop skills at university and at work that have been invaluable to you as an author?

I think any experience can be useful for a writer. As long as your work involves interacting with people, then, if you keep your eyes and ears open, you can find character traits to write about. A university education in any subject teaches how to research, question and discover things for yourself, and those skills are essential for an author. More specifically, developing software gives you a lot of experience of managing large projects, which writing a 170,000 word novel is. I can imagine writers who are very good at writing short works who would be daunted by the organizational questions of producing a larger work. I tend to go for a very structured approach – lots of diagrams, timelines and spreadsheets. On the other hand, I may be overdoing it completely.

You have recently concluded a deal with Transworld for the third volume of the Danilov Quintet. How confident can you be that all five books will make their way into print? Do the second and third books have to perform to a certain level, particularly in regards to sales?

Personally I’m pretty confident to see all five out there, and the people I speak to seem quite confident too. If I’d been the publisher, I wouldn’t have given me a contract for all the remaining novels at this stage, with the first one not yet out in mass market paperback. And it doesn’t make much difference to me – either way I have to write the next one next. Presumably contracts for the last two books will depend on sales, but no one has mentioned any figures.

You set up a blogging website in February (http://thelastoprichnik.blogspot.com/). Respected fantasy author Robin Hobb recently embarked on a rant (http://www.robinhobb.com/rant.html) warning authors that they should spend their time writing, not blogging. Do you think that Robin’s Hobb’s concerns over blogging have substance?

Before I read the detail of Robin’s rant, I was inclined to agree, but her specific objection seems to be that blogging takes up time that should be spent writing. The problem is that the same argument could be applied to anything that takes time away from writing. My personal favourite is watching reruns of Quincy on ITV3, and blogging must be a better way to spend my time than that. When I’m actually writing a novel, I avoid everything that could distract me, but at most that’s for two months in a year. The rest of the time, I’m happy to do other things. Having said that, you’ll notice that I’ve only managed eleven posts on my blog so far – too much Quincy.

The cover jacket for Twelve, illustrated by Anne Kragelund, was absolutely stunning. How happy were you when you were shown the final design? Did it match your own vision?

Credit for the cover should go to both Anne (who did the design) and to Paul Young (who did the artwork). I can’t say that I really had any thoughts when I was writing as to what the cover would look like. I’m pretty sure I would have had strong words to say about anything I didn’t like, and that didn’t happen. I was very happy with how it turned out, but, more importantly, I’m extremely pleased with the response that the cover has got. I don’t think there is a sillier platitude than the suggestion that one shouldn’t judge a book by its cover. What else are covers for? Currently I’m eagerly awaiting my first look at the cover for Thirteen Years Later – I hope the text lives up to it.

Fantasy Book Review focuses, in the main, on the fantasy genre. It’s all about finding the very best that the genre has to offer. Are there any fantasy books that you have read during your lifetime that you would heavily recommend?

Well, starting right back at the beginning, there Gulliver’s Travels. Moving on to the nineteenth century, I’d recommend Frankenstein, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, anything by Poe and, of course, Dracula. More recently I’d go for Terry Pratchett (particularly The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents), Jasper Fforde (we Jaspers must stick together) and His Dark Materials.

What does the remainder of 2009 hold for Jasper Kent?

In the New Year I’m starting work on book three of The Danilov Quintet, but in the meantime I’m hoping to get a proper job. C# programming, anyone?

Jasper Kent biography
Twelve book review
Official Jasper Kent website

Posted: July 23rd, 2009
Author: Lee
Categories: Interviews, Jasper Kent

Jasper Kent to write third historical vampire novel

Simon Taylor of Transworld Publishers in London has concluded a World Rights deal with John Jarrold for a third historical vampire novel by UK author Jasper Kent.  This follows on the successful publication of Kent’s debut, Twelve, earlier this year.

Read our full review of Jasper Kent’s Twelve

The third book takes up the story at the time of the Crimean War, after the second novel in the sequence – Thirteen Years Later, which is coming from Bantam Press early in 2010.  This third volume will see publication in 2011.

“Jasper’s debut has already been a remarkable success, with four reprints of the trade paperback within a few months of publication and over thirteen thousand copies now in print,” said John Jarrold.  “Simon and his colleagues at Transworld have done a wonderful job, and word of mouth has obviously been very strong.  It’s great to have this deal in place for an author who is already going places.”

Jasper Kent was born in Worcestershire in 1968. He has co written several musicals, including The Promised Land, written and performed to mark the 3000th anniversary of the foundation of Jerusalem and Remember! Remember!, the story of Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot. He currently lives in Brighton.

Posted: June 1st, 2009
Author: Lee
Categories: Jasper Kent