What's Up Doc?

It's been a quiet week in Lake Wobegon...

Whilst the Christmas preparations have moved up a gear, my writing slots have become fewer and further between, so apologies for the long absence.

I'm cheered to see The Bookseller report that the UK book trade enjoyed its busiest week of the year last week, with sales passing £50m for the first time, as retailers report what was described as a "genuine uplift" in trading.

However, the tale at HMH seems to have taken on a twist, following the widely report hold on adult fiction acquisitions, the senior vice president and publisher of adult trade books at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt has resigned.

As I've spent much of the last week preparing advent calendars for friends and family, I enjoyed a laugh at the literary stocking fillers over at Vulpes Libris.

I've also had some family time which included watching the film of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe for the first time. I'm interested to see the documentary reported by The Guardian coming up in 2009, which claims to reveal a new third level of meaning hidden in Lewis's writing, medieval cosmology. "This is a piece of Lewis which has remained untouched for 60 years – it blows the dust off, brings him into the light of day with Dawkins and the neo-atheists Pullman and Hitchens," he said. "It's fresh Lewis, as if he was standing up in the debating chair saying 'this is my worldview'. Lewis's stance was incredibly different to that pushed by [today's] bleak populist view."

Although December will be a down month for me, whilst I manage the home front, I just want to share what was in my post box today all the way from Australia. Two discs of exciting ideas for an upcoming book trailer I might be involved in making in early 2009...watch this space.