Month: February 2010
-
The arrival of the first properly printed copy of a book is a sweet moment indeed. After years of work, it’s been fired, glazed and is as good as I could make it. Hard covers, embossed dust jacket, author photo … it’s finished! For the first time, I can read the text for pleasure, not…
-
I moved to Turkey in 1987, somewhat accidentally, since opening a Reuters news bureau in Istanbul was the first job I found after claustrophobia got the better of me in Beirut. But I have never left the country for more than a few months since then. Dining alone in Ankara one evening last week, I…
-
What’s an author to do when he hears that, before his new book is even printed or presented, it’s been sold in the charity shops for a couple of bucks? I love being a writer. I wouldn’t want to be anything else. But sometimes my trade feels like an uphill struggle. My first commercially published…
-
David Byrne’s endorsement of Dining with al-Qaeda
Hugh Pope 