Revenge Ink News
Update on Utopia
In 2010 we held a writing competition and never had the time or means to get round to judging it. Publishing being a brutal business, we got busy with staying alive and were not able to correctly acknowledge all the talented writers who sent in entries. BUT we will get back to it soon and be in touch with you all. Apologies for this delay but thank you all for your wondrous patience! Happy 2012.
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The wonderful Simon Maginn, author of Whitehawk (“sharp and witty throughout… a well-observed satire.” – Time Out) will be signing copies at Brighton Waterstones Saturday 21st January.
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Our very own superstar SEAN CONWAY will be in retrospective at the ICA, London – 11th Jan, 2012
On Wednesday January 11th the ICA in association with London Short Film Festival and ThinkSync Music present a retrospective of Sean Conway’s most celebrated work.
Described by Dazed + Confused founder RANKIN as “A FUCKING GENIUS” director Sean Conway’s work has been backed by Film Four, UKFC, Sky Atlantic and Domino Records and his films have appeared in galleries and at over 500 film festivals worldwide.
As well as directing, Sean’s writing credits include the critically acclaimed novella SON OF STEVE (Revenge Ink, 2010, £8.99), BIFA nominated feature film BRILLIANTLOVE and TV series HIT AND MISS starring Chloe Sevigny, Sky Atlantic’s first British drama, which is due to air in early 2012.
As Pinball Films begin to raise finance for WHORSES, Sean’s debut feature film, the evening will also include a discussion with the filmmaker, exclusive promo clips from forthcoming projects and post screening DJ sets from FabricLive artists in the ICA bar.
EVENT DETAILS AND TICKETS – click here
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“… engaging, entertaining …” The Bankruptcy Diaries, by Paul Broderick, never more pertinent, featured in London’s N16 Magazine …
Available here on the site, and as an eBook from Kindle – click here
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The Disciples by Gopal Mukerjee continues to get high praise, this time from Andrew J Kirby, author and reviewer (for the NY Review of Books and The Short Review)…
AJ Kirby has this to say about the book, which he selected as Book of the Month, on his blog… and on Amazon…
Revenge Ink’s showcase novel, The Disciples by co-founder Gopal Mukerjee gets superlative review from Time Out and FOUR STARS from Doug Johnstone at The Big Issue…
Our Halloween release of Revenge Ink co-founder Gopal Mukerjee’s second novel The Disciples, got two superlative reviews from Time Out (London) and from The Big Issue, which gave the novel four stars.
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An interview with Revenge Ink’s Simon Kearns
Click here to read an interview with Simon Kearns, author of the excellent Virtual Assassin.
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Erinna Mettler’s book launches at Waterstones, Brighton
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Paul Broderick interviewed
Paul, author of The Bankruptcy Diaries, was interviewed on BBC Radio Northampton. Listen to it below:
And Paul was also featured in the Northants News…
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Starlings reading at the Pelirocco
Erinna Mettler reading from Starlings at an Ace Stories Virginia Woolf commemoration held on Sept 25th at the Pelirocco Hotel, Brighton (a hotel that figures prominently in her novel). Erinna read the beautiful chapter “Burning Feathers” from the book about how the West pier burned down.
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Going Electronic
You can now get Revenge Ink titles for your Kindle. Here’s the first.
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Review Time
One one of Simon Kearns’ flash fictions is now being featured at Atticus Review. See here.
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Starlings – Reviewed
Starlings by Erinna Mettler has been getting some fantastic reviews. Click below to read…
Also look out for Erinna reading from Starlings at Ace Stories Brighton on September 25th.
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The Bankruptcy Diaries – Reviewed
The Hackney Hive recently reviewed Paul Broderick’s The Bankruptcy Diaries. Read the full article here.
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Revenge Ink Author Simon Nolan Proved Right in Tabloid Shocker
It turns out our very own Simon Nolan was right on the money when he wrote Whitehawk…
‘Ministers will personally ‘adopt’ problem families in bid to get them back to work’.
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Amita Interviewed for Indianwomenpreneurs.com
Revenge Ink founder Amita Mukerjee was recently interviewed and featured here (link), on a site set up for and by Indian women entrepreneurs. (link) is a non-profit website dedicated to profiling dynamic women entrepreneurs from India or living in India, who work in difficult and innovative areas of business. Check it out, and find other women who, like Amita, are incapable of taking no for an answer…
Brief about your business:
Revenge Ink is a very small, personally run UK publishing company I created with my brother Gopal Mukerjee. It is a company dedicated to publishing new and first-time writers, adventurous people who are anchored in this day and age, who aren’t doing what the ‘mainstream’ wants or expects them to do. The mainstream still uses outdated terms like ‘thinking outside the box’, not realizing there is no ‘box’ anymore. Revenge Ink is placed resolutely outside the ‘box’.
It is not modelled on the current publishing model, which tends to focus on big sellers and only handles new and adventurous material on the ‘side’ as it were. Revenge Ink makes its main business, what the others won’t touch or will treat as ‘niche’ books. We publish mainly fiction, but are also keen to publish edgy, revolutionary non-fiction.
Some Personal Information that you would like to share (qualifications, background, interests, what the real you is all about):
I am interested in pretty much everything except sewing, knitting, hunting and fishing. I like reading, TV, film, art. I enjoy cooking. I enjoy music and drawing. I like running and getting exercize. I like travel but am not obsessed with going places other people haven’t seen. I am more interested in things everyone sees but doesn’t notice. In other words, the truths that are hidden in commonplaces. I particularly enjoy being left alone to follow my thoughts and interests as they emerge. These thoughts and interests are focused on how limited the world currently is in its structures; what interests me is how to expand this limited framework by letting in what is currently considered anathema. To turn attitudes and behaviors on their head, this is what interests me. Most of the time I use a provocative style and extreme humor to do this. I tend not to resemble the popular category ‘feminine’ in this regard, although I don’t consider myself mannish or butch either.
When did you first start your business and how did the business idea come about?
My brother Gopal and I started Revenge Ink in 2007. We are both writers and artists and felt our sensibility was not being reflected in the publishing or literary mainstream, which isn’t really the mainstream at all, since even women are considered in it to be a ‘niche’ market… As Indians especially, we were being told what to write and I felt that if I toed this line, there was no point in my being a writer and artist at all. I had worked on other people’s words for ten years as a professional translator and interpreter; now that I had quit that, I wanted to be free to express myself as myself, not as some caricature of ‘woman’ or ‘Indian woman’ that some archaic and obsolete-minded Western publisher wanted me to be. I believe in a multi-polar world, filled with true individuals, and to publish or write what others wanted was out of the question. This is why I created Revenge Ink. To publish other writers like myself and my brother Gopal. Writers who reflect the world as it is, not as a few want to make it appear to be.
How much capital did you start with?
At the time, I used personal savings, about £10,000 to start with.
In how much time did the business turn into a profit making venture?
Revenge Ink is not yet a profit-making venture. It’s only been 3 years since we got out there, and two years since we’ve really figured out the nuts and bolts of the business. Publishing, especially the renegade type of publishing we’re interested in, is a tough business to be in. I don’t treat Revenge Ink as a business at all in fact. Even though we sell books in India, North America and the UK, even though we work with European publishers and sell and buy book rights, I think of Revenge Ink as building a community – not as a non-profit organization, no – but as a mission certainly, a personal stubbornness that I hope to share with people and that will some day also make a profit. To make money doing what I love would be great, although we’re not quite there yet.
What were the initial years like?
Quite frankly, the initial years haven’t ended for us (!), although this year we feel we are finally in control of what we’re doing. We love the risks and dangers associated with the business, but are only now starting to feel like we’re ‘surfers’ – that we’re riding the waves and not being overturned by them. Publishing, in spite of the terribly stodgy reputation it has as an industry, is all about human beings and art. And therefore, is and should be only and constantly about passion, risk and adventure. If it isn’t about those things, if you want it to be as predictable as a job in the civil service, well then there’s no point in it as far as I’m concerned. Life is freedom, business is risk and art is passion. To bring these three together is one the most phenomenal adventures you can have. So in a sense, I hope we continue to have ‘initial years’ with all the risks and gambles they bring. Without these, you learn nothing. You don’t advance, you don’t become strong. But I also hope to reach more people, build our community of passion and freedom. That (along with a gold-plated limo ) would be great.
What are some of the top challenges you faced and how did you surmount them?
The two main challenges for us in running Revenge Ink have been:
• to learn about the workings of a very closed business (publishing) without any previous experience,
• to get inside it, to make our way in, both into the sales networks and into the very exclusive world of the marketing of books and publishers.
The first challenge, well there’s no way around it but to throw yourself in, to take risks, to make mistakes. A tiny but very concentrated set of early risks and mistakes made me confident in no time. Now I know that to rush into something without a strategy is sometimes the best strategy. You learn as much as a cautious employee would in ten years.
Second challenge, to make our way in, to be heard and sell our books. This remains a daily fight, and here too, the best way is to not think too much and do everything you can. We work with our authors, they bring as much to the marketing process as we do. We also work with our distributors wherever possible and with the press, in new and inventive ways. We have to incessantly innovate, be smart, quirky, quick and confident. Not too cautious, not too bureaucratic. Above all, we have learned that publishing is all about how you fight the fight. It never stops. And it never should. To fight everyday keeps you tingling and fresh, it keeps you guessing, pushing, trying new things. We still fantasize about ‘the big break’ but we’re not as dreamy and adolescent about it as we once were. We have realized it’s all about each book. That each new book brings its own story of success or relative success. To try to predict anything is futile and a waste of time.
What challenges do you continue to face and what is your strategy to tackle them?
Like I said above, the marketing of each new book remains a challenge. Our strategy? The same. To not have a fixed strategy, to remain absolutely open to new possibilities, new approaches, new relationships. To remain absolutely and totally personal, passionate and driven. It’s hard and tiring, but there’s nothing like it!
What drives you?
My passion for books, for new and original talent, thoughts, ideas and individuality. My passion for a certain kind of life, lived with an almost extreme, obsessive emphasis on personal freedom. Every single day has to be different. I have very tough days and weeks, I can go for days without seeing people, when I need to be alone, to develop a mood or idea, or just to get over burnout! My own personal process in other words, is what drives me. And the beautiful challenge of sharing this very personal, daring vision with other people.
How many hours do you work per week?
Um… too many! Well no, the secret to doing it your own way is to work when you’re driven, to stop when you’re no longer driven. That’s when you should rest. I tried working all the time, I drove myself crazy. I also tried following the usual 5-day office week, that doesn’t quite work either. Sometimes, I work better on weekends. Other times, I’m relieved the weekend is finally here so I can relax! So I have now learned to trust the ebb and flow of my own energy and enthusiasm. It’s the great thing about running your own business. You don’t work when someone else asks you to, you work when your heart is in it. It doesn’t always mean you’re enthused when you have to work, and my personality means I tend to overwork… But knowing you can rest when you wish to, makes a huge difference.
What tips would you like to give to budding entrepreneurs? Can a budding entrepreneur reach you for guidance? If yes, how can she contact you?
I would say go after your dream if you have one, don’t take anyone’s advice unless it’s technically useful to you, and above all, be stubborn, don’t give up. We live in a time when the big lie of instant success looms over every new entrepreneur, making you feel like a failure even before you’ve had a chance to prove yourself. Don’t listen to that stuff! Persistence wins out over talent, brains and technical expertise, every single time.
Yes, she can contact me at amita@revengeink.com
To find out more about Indian womanpreneurs visit http://www.indianwomenpreneurs.com/.
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Revenge Ink in The New Statesman
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Revenge Ink 2011… Welcome! from Amita Mukerjee, co-founder of Revenge Ink
Hello and welcome to Revenge Ink 2011. It’s a space: you have to get into it, settle in, enjoy it. It’s a new space, with new titles and new authors, not all young first-timers but new authors for us at Revenge Ink. And they’re not even all here yet.
It’s my fault. I’m not done with our catalog yet, because I’ve been deep inside it, in myself, beyond myself. The conventional word for it might be burn-out, but whatever it was, I came out sublimated. I emerged fighting fit and ready, driven and excited, more than ever before, perfectly poised to take on the world’s mainstream publishing establishment by the horns and drive it into the ground.
Hah! Ambitious you say? Well they haven’t invented a word for what I am. Insane comes close to it, but it doesn’t quite do me justice.
The last two years have been horrifically tough: wrenching and exhausting – mentally, physically, emotionally, financially. I get personally involved when I do something. You can’t publish books in a world that doesn’t read, without getting personally involved. Without being utterly – some might say suicidally – deranged. But I love books. I believe they are the one thing that truly maps our evolution toward bipedal humanity. Chimps can sign, they can look at images, make sense of them, make and use tools. But they can’t read books. They cannot turn signs and symbols into narrative, into subtle, ungraspable wreaths of the imagination, into intricate architectures of thought, image and above all, emotion. We can. It’s a hardwon treasure that’s well worth preserving. It’s the victory of subject over object, pleasure over utility, joy over work, laziness over discipline. When the apocalypse comes and goes, it is words that will save us: to think as narrative, to form and communicate thoughts based on words, this is what will save us. Sure, it’ll help to know where the food is and how to grow it, but there too, only thoughts will save us. To be human will save us. When we have ceased to be unthinking, pleasureless robots living only for money, security and apparent deathlessness. Without words and their inviolable sacredness, we are worse than beasts. We are the turds that beasts turn up their noses at. This is what we are as a species today. Turds. And this is why the earth won’t hesitate about nixing us fairly soon. Because – and I don’t need to tell you this – turds exist only to be flushed away. They serve no purpose except to fertilize the future. With their flushedawayness.
But to get back to our books for 2011.
For now, we have our first two exciting titles and you can see them at the bottom of this page. We’re not done fabricating them fully, so no samples yet, but they’ll be here soon. And others will follow, I may have been out of it for a few months, but I’m back. And I’m fast. I work like a demon. No worries there…
UTOPIA
And those who wrote into our competition from last year – Utopia – don’t worry, we haven’t forgotten you. But since we didn’t get as many entries as we’d hoped, I don’t know if we’ll be able to fit them all into a book or whether we’ll feature them right here, on the website. Either way, we’ll be in touch, and I apologize sincerely for the delay. Once again, I must blame my truly incredible levels of fatigue, the likes of which I have never before endured.
So here you are… Revenge Ink is back, I’m back, and I hope this year fulfills all our dreams about becoming world-famous, massively wealthy and infernally ridiculously impossibly happy (apocalypse notwithstanding)…
Amita Mukerjee
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This is what Time Out made of Simon Nolan’s terrific Whitehawk.
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Our very own Sean Conway – Screenwriter for a hit TV Show
Paul Abbott takes aim at Sky Atlantic HD with
HIT AND MISS
6 x 60’ exclusively for Sky Atlantic HD
Sky Atlantic HD today (Wednesday 5 January, 2011) announces HIT AND MISS, an original drama created by one of the country’s most respected screenwriters, Paul Abbott for transmission in summer 2011. The series was commissioned by Elaine Pyke, Head of Drama, and is a co production with Paul Abbott’s development company AbbottVision and Nicola Shindler’s Red Production Company.
Multi-award winning writer and producer Paul Abbott is responsible for some of the most diverse and genre-defining dramas to appear on British television, from Shameless to conspiracy thriller State of Play. HIT AND MISS marks Abbott’s first foray outside of terrestrial TV and possibly his most excitingly unconventional offering to date. HIT AND MISS will be written by film writer Sean Conway (Brilliant Love, Kings Of London).
Meet Chloe, a contract killer with a big secret: she’s a pre-op transsexual. Chloe’s life is sent into a tailspin when she receives a letter from her ex, Wendy, who reveals that she’s dying from cancer and that Chloe has a son, ten-year-old Ryan. Travelling to a tiny village in West Yorkshire to see the boy, the assassin then discovers the rest of Wendy’s brood…
Ambitious and high concept, HIT AND MISS follows Chloe’s attempts to mix her killer instincts with maternal ones as she helps her new family, and indeed herself, mend and move on from a life-changing loss.
Huw Kennair-Jones, Acting Head of Drama, commented: “We’re delighted to have secured Paul for the first original scripted drama on Sky Atlantic HD, especially with a project as sensational as HIT AND MISS.We are already in talks with a host of other well known on and off screen British talent to follow Paul’s lead for future projects.”
Stuart Murphy, Director of Programmes, added: “Sky Atlantic is about bringing the most iconic, epic and creatively surprising content to Sky customers. Most of this will be from America, but every year there will be one or two big British pieces in there. HIT AND MISSwill be the first of the huge, and exciting, British dramas specially commissioned for it.”
Nicola Shindler, Executive Producer, commented: “- I’m incredibly excited to be making such an original, provocative drama series. Paul’s intricate idea combined with Sean’s fresh and, at times, shocking voice have created a strange and beautiful world. It’s odd and funny and violent and moving, all in equal parts. We realise that being on Sky Atlantic is a real challenge to match the quality of the American output and it’s one we look forward to working towards.”
HIT AND MISS is created by Paul Abbott, who is also Executive Producer alongside Nicola Shindler. The series is written by Sean Conway for AbbottVisionand Red Production Company. The series will exclusively air on Sky Atlantic HD and Sky Atlantic in 2011.
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After Shakepeare in the Park, here’s some Revenge in the Street…
JPC Malitte, author of ‘Klumbert’s Chair’ is going to do a ‘flashmob performance’ reading of his book in New York on Times Square both in French and English.
January 15 20113 pm to 4pm
Times Square between Marquis/Kodak and Loews Theatre
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Courting Controversy in Modern Fiction: Kia Abdullah Speaks at the Writeidea Festival at the Idea Store Bow, East
London
At the Courting Controversy in Modern Fiction discussion (part of the Writeidea Festival at the Idea Store Bow in East London), Kia Abdullah passionately discussed the idea of transgressive fiction and being considered a controversial author.
Kia talked about how her first book “Life, Love and Assimilation” had an extra onus, as it was seen to be that she was representing the Bangladeshi community and therefore it was automatically controversial. With her second book, “Child’s Play”, the subject matter alone- which deals with trying to catch society’s worst offenders: paedophiles – made the book contentious. Kia has never set out to be deliberately controversial, and therefore she finds it surprising when people feel that way about her writing. Kia believes that a writer’s responsibility is to stay true to one’s ideas, and in doing so, controversy has simply followed her.
As a writer, Kia feels that one has to push boundaries, while observing that there is still a line and that a writer should self-censor rather than have the line dictated by someone else.
Kia still gets a thrill from people reading her books. She was delighted to learn that of the 12 copies available for loan at the Idea Store, 10 copies were already checked out!
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Virtual Assassin Review on Booksquawk.com
Click here to read the latest review of Virtual Assassin on booksquawk.com.
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Virtual Assassin in Time Out
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Courting Controvery in Modern Fiction
How controversial is fiction writing today? Come along to this lively panel discussion with KIA ABDULLAH and GAUTAM MALKANI, author of the much-acclaimed Londonstani.
Other speakers over the 10-day WriteIdea Festival include Tony Benn and Julian Baggini along with a host of poets, philosophers and performers. The theme of the festival is ‘Our City’, and the flavour is definitely East London, but the appeal is universal covering past, present and future.
All our events are free because we think everyone should have the opportunity to engage with the best writers.
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More info: http://bit.ly/bJMdc8 (Idea Store site)
Full brochure: http://bit.ly/c6p5O9 (PDF)
Kia’s site: http://www.kia-abdullah.com/
Time: 20th November, 1430 – 1530hrs
Where: Idea Store, Whitechapel, 321 Whitechapel Road, London E1 1BU
Getting there: Turn left out of Whitechapel tube station and walk for 2 minutes. Idea Store is the big green structure (image: http://www.cae.org.uk/images/Idea.jpg).
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Dog-Send Launched in Mumbai
Dog-Send – The Story Of Simba by Gauri Sinh was launched in Mumbai on Oct 28th, at the Crossword Bookstore Kemps Corner, with star guest Sonam Kapoor, a rising star of Bollywood…
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Whitehawk Reviewed in the Argus Magazine
Click to read a larger version.
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Competition Closing…
Hi everyone,
The Utopia competition officially closed on July 4th 2010 and we’d like to thank you all for your overwhelming support in sending your stories in. We’ve got a large number of fantastic entries and they all confirm the tremendous originality of writing around the world, which was exactly what we wanted to prove and why we launched the competition in the first place.
So thanks and keep checking back for the results which will be posted here in October.
All the best,
Amita
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Book Signing
Kia Abdullah will be attending a book signing at The Idea Store on Chrisp Street, E14 London. More details here.
brilliantlove at Tribeca
The feature film brilliantlove, written by Revenge Ink author Sean Conway made its world premiere at Tribeca, New York, on Friday 23rd April.
It’s also screening on the following dates:
Thursday 29th April, 12:45pm, Village East Cinema
Saturday 1st May, 1:30pm, Village East Cinema
If you haven’t seen it yet, then check out the trailer by clicking here.
If you can’t make it to Tribeca, don’t worry, the film will be screening in the UK this summer, more details to come…
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HOLD UP Y’ALL! Utopia Deadline Extended!
Hey folks, we’ve decided to extend our Utopia Writing Competition deadline to July 4 2010 and announce winners in November, 2010, because entries have really begun to come in now and they’re awesome and we want as many folks to take advantage of this opportunity as possible. Also, thank you all for your incredibly supportive and warm emails. Keep writing and proving that the only way to save the world is to be free, happy and expressing ourselves without a care for money and those God-awful ‘rules of writing’! Amita Mukerjee
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London Book Fair
The London Book Fair opens its doors today and as visitors come in, they will receive a free copy of Bookseller magazine with Revenge Ink on the back cover…
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brilliantlove
Revenge Ink author Sean Conway has a film coming out in the spring, brilliantlove, directed by Ashley Horner, Pinball Films. Click here to see the trailer. and here to find out more about the film.
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It’s All Go!
It’s exciting times for us at Revenge Ink. Our authors and books are in demand, and we’re busy just trying to keep up.
For starters, Kia Abdullah gave another inspirational talk, this time at Idea Store Bow (in East London). Here’s an author who’s absolutely committed to spreading the message about the importance of reading, and how it led to her becoming an author. She also shared some exciting insights into her book, “Child’s Play,” and revealed useful tips to aspiring writers.
Kia will also be speaking at the upcoming Wisewords Bookfest on Saturday 13th March. Wisewords is a female-focused two-day literary event and will be held at the London Metropolitan University in Aldgate, E1. Click here for more information.
You can also catch Kia speak on April 30th at the launch event for Vaani. Meaning “the voice,” it’s a small Asian women’s writers group based in Ilford, East London, whose aim is to encourage Asian women to voice their opinions via writing in the English language.
The event will be part of the Redbridge Book and Media Festival. Kia will talk about her experiences as a writer and about the publishing industry, as well as the importance of using writing as a way to way for Asian women to express themselves.
Date: April 30th
Times: 18.30-20.30
Where: Valentine Mansion, inside the Valentine Park, Ilford
And finally, there’s a great article that’s recently appeared on Kia in Eastern Life. Check it out here:
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Brand New Titles for 2010
If you haven’t already, make sure you check out our new titles for 2010.
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For another chance to meet and hear from Kia Abdullah, join us at Idea Store in Bow (East London) this Saturday January 30th. Kia will be talking about her experiences as a writer and in developing “Child’s Play,” as well as sharing tips for aspiring writers. This is a great opportunity to connect with a writer known for her strong ideas and voice, as well as by her refusal to be categorised as “just another Asian writer.”
Details as follows:
Date: this Saturday, January 30th
Time; 2- 4pm
Location: Idea Store, Bow (in the café)
Address: 1 Gladstone Place, Roman Road
Bow, London, E3 5ES
For further details, contact: jobina@revengeink.com
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We’ve been incredibly busy over here at Revenge Ink, mostly with getting the word out to the UK public that there’s a different kind of publishing company that’s here to stay. Over the month of March, you’ll see Revenge Ink adverts in publications from Brighton to Newcastle and in-between. You’ll see us in magazines from Mslexia, the magazine for women who write, to lesbian mag Diva, and from the socially-conscious Big Issue to the fashionable Dazed, just to name a few.
Under the banner of ‘a Fiercely independent provocative fiction’, we’re promoting our four titles, including London-based Kia Abdullah’s new book ‘Child’s Play’.True to form, the authors on our roster aren’t afraid to speak their minds, nor tell stories outside of what others have decided is ‘safe’.
And if you’ve clicked onto our website, then you’re telling us that you’re bored with reading the same humdrum stories, and looking for a book to shake you out of your one-dimensional world. You’ve come to the right place, we have enough to keep you occupied and satisfied.
The response to our advertising so far has been fantastic, and our book sales are on the rise. We’ve always known that there’s been an audience for fiction with a bite, and it’s encouraging to find readers who agree. Even better are the number of submissions writers have begun sending us for publishing off the back of our advertising. Our mission has always been to support writers of provocative fiction, and we’re delighted you’ve chosen to trust us with your work. We’re reading your submissions as quickly as we can, so stay tuned to find out who we’re going to publish next.
Click here to see the full pdf.
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CHILD’S PLAY, by Kia Abdullah
We’re excited to announce that Kia Abdullah’s new book, Child’s Play was launched on December 4th, and its already getting lots of attention from readers and the media alike. Child’s Play isn’ t your typical sweeping romance from an Asian writer. Instead, Kia’s second novel is controversial, violent and sexually charged, and shatters the delicate sensibilities that seem to govern output from British-Asian writers. Kia’s not afraid to tell a challenging tale, and in Child’s Play she does it with haunting characters and a darkly addictive storyline. We’re delighted that there’s been a lot of great media coverage for Child’s Play. Click on these links to read and hear reviews of the book and interviews with Kia: Here is the coverage from Asians in Media Magazine. Click here to see it online.
Click here to see the piece online.
And click here to read the Ethnic Now piece online.
And Kia was interviewed on the BBC Asian network. Click here to listen.
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BOOK-SIGNING
Kia was invited to speak at the Idea Store in Whitechapel (London) on Dec 12th, as part of Reading Week. We were delighted with the turnout of so many people who came to hear her ideas in writing Child’s Play as well as about her experiences as a writer. Not to mention getting a book signed by Kia herself! If you missed that event, you can catch Kia again on Saturday January 30th at the Idea Store in Bow. Click here for details. More details to follow asap. Find out what all the fuss is about, and get your own copy of Child’s Play at your local bookshop or online.
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India: THE REVENGE INK ANTHOLOGY OF REAL INDIAN WRITING Edited by Gopal and Amita Mukerjee, Foreword by Shobhaa De
Authors: Hema Koppikar, Ketan Joshi, Varsha Pillai, Rochelle Potkar, Rohit Bhatia, Kinjal Banerjee, Eva Bell, Sandeep Shete, Pranab Mazumdar, Chandrima Pal, Shireen Bharucha, Gautam Mirchandani, Akanksha Aurora, Neil Fernandes, Ashley Suvarna
We’re also excited to share that the Anthology of Real Indian Writing was launched in India last month. The Anthology features the best submissions we received in response to our quest to prove that REAL Indians were writing REAL contemporary stories, and not just about caste oppression, arranged marriages, and Sati. This collection of stories is as diverse as the writers, who hail from all over India. The Anthology is already available in bookstores, and we’ve had some fantastic media coverage. In 2008 in the presence of cult Indian writer Shobhaa DE, we launched a competition whose goal was to prove that Indian writing is not all about caste oppression, arranged marriages and Sati. And that REAL Indians were writing REAL contemporary stories. Writers from all of India’s cities and of varied backgrounds sent their work in to the competition, and proved us right. We decided to honour their effort by putting together an anthology with a fantastic collection of the best writing we saw and which has proved as diverse as the writers themselves.
Revenge Ink announces the UK launch of its showcase books The Armageddon Mandala and Ugly Duckling in February 2009. Both books written by Revenge Ink co-founders and siblings, Gopal and Amita Mukerjee were launched in India in March 2008 in the presence of reputed Indian novelist Shobhaa De.
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Revenge Ink signs with cool young novelists
Revenge Ink signs with cool young novelists Kia Abdullah and Luc Richard. Kia’s crime novel about a young girl entangled in a bizarre investigation of a dangerous pedophile was released in December 2009. And Luc’s novel about the sexy and strangely melancholic life of a young professional seeking Nirvana in a reputed holiday resort will be released in July 2009.
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Revenge Ink signs with Luc Richard
Revenge Ink signs with Luc Richard, handsome young French professional sports trainer for a book about the sexy and depraved life of a young professional seeking Nirvana in a reputed holiday resort. Scheduled release : Summer 2009.