John L. Murphy has completed a mammoth review of just about every book written on Bhutan. He understands the value of a book written by locals and residents. There are many more books about this amazing country than I knew of, and I’m delighted to see he rated some of my favourites highly – see… Continue reading PopMatters Review
Category: Getting published
Australian Himalayan Foundation
I received a letter from the Australian Himalayan Foundation thanking me for my donation of the royalties from Dragon Bones. It confirms that the money will go entirely to the RENEW project to enable disadvantaged young girls from Bhutan to attend school. As I know some of the people involved in the project, I hope… Continue reading Australian Himalayan Foundation
Dragon Bones Supports Education of Bhutanese Girls
The first royalty cheque for Dragon Bones was for 502 copies sold over 6 months. That’s about 10% of my big goal of 5000 sales. My main driver for selling so many copies (it is a lot for an unknown writer) was to ensure substantial support for Bhutanese organisations. To put this in perspective, my… Continue reading Dragon Bones Supports Education of Bhutanese Girls
Bhutanese Belief in Shangri-La Naive
Could the Bhutanese belief in their Shangri-La status be naive? Bhutanese lama Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche asked this question in the Bhutan Observer on Friday. It’s very similar to one of the central themes of Dragon Bones and he raises many of the points that I describe anecdotally. There’s a snake in this garden of… Continue reading Bhutanese Belief in Shangri-La Naive
Dragon Bones For Charity
I’m very excited to say that the first copies of Dragon Bones have been shipped. This is a good time to announce that 50% of the royalties for all editions of Dragon Bones will go to Bhutanese organisations. Two years living in Bhutan convinced me that local people are best placed to identify and address… Continue reading Dragon Bones For Charity
Dragon Bones Has Arrived
video of the opening When the woman behind the post office counter asked me what I was picking up, I said, “Books.” One day in the future, it may be such a common experience that I stop there. Not this day. I knew that the small box she brought out from the back room contained… Continue reading Dragon Bones Has Arrived
Free Speech
I knew when I wrote Dragon Bones that it wouldn’t be loved by everyone. My collection of people’s perspectives was meant to be holistic, not good or bad, but some people were bound to object. It was likely that I would never be able to return to Bhutan – that they would never issue me… Continue reading Free Speech
Dragon Bones Not Yet Shipping
Amazon US was scheduled to start shipping Dragon Bones this week, but it’s still being printed. They sent out a message to everyone who’d pre-ordered, apologising that they hadn’t been able to find the book and asking them to confirm if they still wanted Amazon to track it down. If the reader didn’t confirm within… Continue reading Dragon Bones Not Yet Shipping
Gone To Print
Dragon Bones has gone to print. Thank you to everyone who pushed and supported me along the way. A special thanks to the people who kindly offered their photos for the cover. The designer chose to use other photos, but that doesn’t reflect on the photos you shared. They were all fantastic.
Reviewing the Edits
My publisher sent me the edited version of my manuscript last week. It came as a pdf locked with a password and the formatting all as it will appear in the final version. It looks beautiful. I’m also glad that the endless knot image I chose as a section break has stayed in the print… Continue reading Reviewing the Edits