Ghosts of Belfast TwitFic Contest: Scare me in 124 characters or less for prizes!

As you may be aware, THE GHOSTS OF BELFAST will be published in the USA by Soho Press this Thursday, the 1st of October. I'll be embarking on a US tour (details here) to celebrate the launch, so please come and say hello if you're near any of the venues.

The other thing that happens in October is, of course, Halloween, when our thoughts turn to the ghostly and ghoulish. We all have our own personal ghost stories, so how about you share yours as part of a special Twitter contest? Here's how it'll work:

Go to your Twitter account (you do have one, don't you?) and tweet your own experience of a ghost, along with the hash tag #GhostsOfBelfast so I can find it. That leaves you 124 characters to tell your story. The shorter the better, the scarier the better, the funnier the better.

The contest will close at midnight on 31st of October 2009, and I will choose ten finalists. Each of those tweets will be re-tweeted by me and the good folks at Soho Press (or linked to a special page on my website if they're too long). The finalists will then be put to the vote on via Twitter, and the top five will each win a signed copy of THE GHOSTS OF BELFAST, as well as be featured on the home pages of StuartNeville.com and GhostsOfBelfast.com. What's more, whoever gets the most votes of all wins one of the last remaining copies of THE SIX, my limited edition signed and numbered short story collection - only fifty of these will ever be printed!

So, here are the three simple rules:

1) Tweet your scariest, funniest ghost story in 124 CHARACTERS OR LESS.

2) It's VITAL that you remember to include the hash tag #GhostsOfBelfast or your entry won't be seen.

3) Tweet it before MIDNIGHT 31st OCTOBER.

You can enter as many times as you like, but each tweet must be a different story. So, get tweeting, and good luck!

CONTEST - Win signed copies of THE TWELVE and THE SIX!

To celebrate the fact that I am two days away from my official publication date, I'm giving away two signed copies of THE TWELVE, and as an extra special prize, the two winners will also receive one of only fifty paperback copies that will ever be produced of my short story collection, THE SIX. These limited edition paperbacks will be signed and numbered, and will soon be collector's items.

To be in with a chance of winning, just read the excerpt from THE TWELVE on my website, and answer these two questions:

1. In Chapter One, what is the barman's first name?

2. In Chapter Two, what Belfast entertainment complex do Gerry Fegan and Michael McKenna see across the river?

Please don't leave your answers as comments; instead, email them to contest@stuartneville.com, and remember to include your postal address. Two winners will be selected at random from those who answered correctly on Friday July 17th. Good luck!

A Crazy Day

It's coming up on midnight, and I've been sat on this chair (aside from meal, toilet, and exercise bike breaks) since around 9:45am. And how much progress did I make on the new novel?

None. Nada. Sweet Fanny Adams.

Not that I'm complaining, really. I got a lot of promo stuff done today, not least of which was revamping my home page and getting THE SIX, my free downloadable short story collection, online. I also set up a contest while I was at it. Simply by entering your email address at the point of downloading the collection, you could win one of five of the limited run of fifty signed and numbered paperback editions of THE SIX.

There was also some good news today from the publicity folks at Random House, namely that THE TWELVE was named as one of fifty best summer reads in Saturday's Independent. This might explain the sudden spike in my Amazon sales rank that happened over the weekend. The publicity department tells me there is more good news to come, so I shall keep you posted.

Oh, and there's that fabled extra special giveaway I've been bleating on about here for a while. That took a step nearer reality today, so I'm hoping I can post about that towards the end of the week. I've been thinking about the contest - it's going to be something extra challenging, as befits the prize.

And speaking of the end of this week - it may have escaped your attention, but this Friday evening, 26th of June, THE TWELVE will be officially launched at No Alibis, Belfast's famous crime bookstore, on Botanic Avenue. It's a joint event with none other than John Connolly, who will read from his latest sure-fire best seller, THE LOVERS, which Declan Burke reckons is his best yet. Although it's a free event, high demand for seats means it will be ticketed. To be honest, I don't know if David Torrans has any tickets left, but you could always give him a try on 028 9031 9601.

If you can make it, do say hello.

Reviews et al

Just a quick filler post this evening. My short story collection THE SIX is almost ready, and I hope to have it online within the next twenty-four hours. There are new reviews appearing all the time, including the string of 5-star comments on Amazon, and a stellar write-up at Eurocrime.co.uk that is scheduled for this week - highlights are: "Grabs hold and doesn't let go ... frighteningly assured ... a tough, uncompromising thriller ... in the best, tragic, noir fiction tradition."

I'm also revamping the home page on my website to reflect all that's going on at the minute, so a link will be forthcoming.

The Six

As I've already mentioned, I have a small short story collection coming up. It will be available as a free e-book download from my website at some point next week, but there will also be a limited run of fifty signed and numbered paperback editions printed. Some of these have already been promised for little promos I've been running here and there, but a few will also be given away here and on my website. Question is, what do I do for competitions? Any ideas? Also, although I can't quite 100% confirm it yet, there will also hopefully be an extra special and exclusive prize up for grabs soon. It'll need a suitably extra special competition, so I'm going to give that some thought.

In the meantime, here's the cover design for THE SIX, as created by Julie Chalmers, an extraordinarily talented graphic designer I work with as part of my day job. Isn't it pretty?