Matthew Pearl's Blog

THE DANTE CHAMBER IS HERE! AND GIVEAWAY DETAILS!



Repent: The Dante Chamber is out! Don't use time up listening to me. Go to your local bookshop to grab a copy, or go to your favorite online store to order. I can't wait for you to be one of the first to read it. I hope this can be your beach read, your next guilty (Purgatorial-pun intended) pleasure, and your ready-to-go gift for loved ones' graduations or Father's Day. And if you grab a copy between now and Sunday June 3 I'm giving you a very special original manuscript page from The Dante Club! See below for details on this exclusive GIVEAWAY and my book tour details.

The story: Five years after a series of Dante-inspired killings stunned Boston, shocking deaths erupt across London, all in the style of the penances Dante memorialized in Purgatory. Poet Christina Rossetti fears her missing brother, the artist and writer Dante Gabriel Rossetti, will be the next victim, and she enlists poets Robert Browning, Alfred Tennyson, and Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes to decipher the literary clues. Together these unlikely investigators unravel the secrets of Dante's verses to confront a more profound terror than anyone had imagined.

THE DANTE CHAMBER GREAT PAGE GIVEAWAY!

We're giving away some of the earliest original manuscript pages still remaining from The Dante Club in honor of The Dante Chamber's publication! Three easy steps to get one of your own.

STEP 1! When you get your copy of The Dante Chamber between now and Sunday June 3, take a photo of the book however you prefer -- a selfie with The Dante Chamber, your cat with the book, your coffee table with the book, or a pic of the e-book screen or audio book listing on your tablet, be creative!

STEP 2! Post it to your social media of choice and tag me (Twitter @matthewpearl, Facebook & Instagram @matthewpearlauthor) and use #TheDanteChamber. If you're not on social media, simply email me the picture to mpearl [at] matthewpearl [dot] com and I'll post it for you. The goal is to celebrate you being The Dante Chamber's very first readers, and raise awareness of the book (no purchase necessary! if you can't grab your own copy, snap a pic of a copy at the bookstore or the library, etc.).

STEP 3! Once you've posted or emailed me, simply fill out the form at this web address...
http://eepurl.com/dvPH9f
... to have your manuscript page mailed to you. Feel free to share this giveaway news with all fans of The Dante Club!

HELP ME LAUNCH THIS BOOK!

Your support is the lifeblood of my books. Please post/tweet/gram/blog the news of The Dante Chamber's publication, or simply share this post! Know someone who enjoyed The Dante Club? Tap them on the shoulder for me. Part of a Book Club or know someone who is? Please forward this and encourage The Dante Chamber as an upcoming pick!

THE BOOK TOUR!

COME SEE ME TALK! I can't wait to say hi in person if I'm coming to you neck of the woods.
...
CAMBRIDGE, MA
Wednesday, June 6, 2018, 7:00 PM @ Porter Square Books/ 25 White St.

CHICAGO, IL
Saturday, June 9, 10:00AM @ Jones College Prep
Chicago Tribune Printers Row Lit Fest (visit link (https://www.eventbrite.com/e/matthew-...…) for $2 tickets)/ 700 South State Street, 3rd Floor Library

NEPTUNE BEACH, FL (JACKSONVILLE)
Thursday, June 14, 2018, 7:00 PM @ The Bookmark/ 220 1 st St.

HOLLYWOOD, FL
Friday, June 15, 2018, 1:30 PM @ Broward County Library (Stirling Road Branch)
3151 Stirling Road
Diane and Barry Wilen Jewish Book Festival/reserve tickets by calling 954-434-0499, ext. 336

CORAL GABLES, FL (MIAMI AREA)
Friday, June 15, 2018, 8:00 PM @ Books & Books/ 265 Aragon Ave.

NEW ORLEANS, LA
Saturday, June 16, 2018, 6:00 PM @ Octavia Books/ 513 Octavia St.

HOUSTON, TX
Monday, June 18, 2018, 6:30 PM @ Murder by the Book/ 2342 Bissonnet St.

AUSTIN, TX
Tuesday, June 19, 2018, 7:00 PM @ Bookpeople/ 603 N. Lamar Rd.

SCOTTSDALE, AZ (PHOENIX, AZ)
Wednesday, June 20, 2018, 7:00 PM @ The Poisoned Pen Bookstore/ 4014 N. Goldwater Blvd., Set 101

BELMONT, MA
Thursday, June 28, 2018, 7:00 PM @ Belmont Books/ 79 Leonard St.

COHASSET, MA (SOUTH SHORE)
Wednesday, July 11, 2018, 6:30 PM @ Buttonwood Books/ 747 Chief Justice Cushing Hwy

I hope you'll enjoy this post with a behind the scenes look at my book tour for The Last Bookaneer, just completed.

https://www.facebook.com/notes/matthe...

I hope you'll enjoy this post:

How this outdoor bookstand gave me an idea

I hope some of my friends from Goodreads can come say hi on my tour! Along the way, I'll bring some fun mementoes to show and some to give away. Here are the details:

BOSTON, MA
The Last Bookaneer Reading (Launch!)
Friday May 1, 2015, 7:00pm @ Harvard Bookstore
1256 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02138

SEATTLE, WA
Monday May 4, 2015, 7:00pm @ Elliott Bay Books
1521 10th Ave, Seattle, WA 98122

SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
Tuesday May 5, 2015, 7:00pm @ Vroman's Bookstore
695 E. Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91101

SAN DIEGO, CA
Wednesday May 6, 2015, 7:30pm @ Warwick's Books
7812 Girard Ave, La Jolla, CA 92037

DANVILLE, CA
Thursday May 7, 2015, 7:00pm @ Rakestraw Books
Iron Horse Plaza, 550 Hartz Ave, Danville, CA 94526

CORTE MADERA, CA
Friday May 8, 2015, 7:00pm @ Book Passage
51 Tamal Vista Boulevard, Corte Madera, CA 94925

HOUSTON, TX
Monday May 11, 2015, 6:30pm @ Murder by the Book
2342 Bissonnet St. Houston, TX 77005

ST. LOUIS, MO
Tuesday May 12, 2015, 7:00pm @ Left Bank Books
399 N. Euclid St. St. Louis, MO 63108

CHICAGO, IL
Wednesday May 13, 2015, 7:00pm @ Anderson's Bookshop
123 W. Jefferson Ave., Naperville, IL 60540

CINCINNATI, OH
Thursday May 14, 2015, 7:00pm @ Joseph-Beth Booksellers
Rookwood Pavillion, 2692 Madison Rd, Cincinnati, OH 45208

Dear Friends,

Today my new novel The Last Bookaneer arrived. I hope you'll run, or at least walk briskly, to your favorite store and pick up a copy or click the buy button of your favorite website.

In The Last Bookaneer, a golden era of literary piracy approaches its end as two rivals converge on Robert Louis Stevenson's island home to try to retrieve his final masterpiece. I really hope you'll be one of the first to read it. Bookpage Magazine writes the novel "seamlessly braids fact and fiction into an imaginative yarn that will enthrall bibliophiles and adventure fans alike," Newsday calls it "a seductive read," and the New York Post just labeled it "required reading" (is there some way to enforce that?). It's also an IndieNext selection (chosen by independent bookstores).

I'll be starting my book tour at Harvard Bookstore in Cambridge, Mass., this Friday, May 1 and then will be in Seattle, Southern California, Northern California, Houston, St. Louis, Chicago and Cincinnati. Tour details below… If I'm coming to a bookstore near you, I hope you'll say hi. I will have some manuscript pages to give out at my events, and I always give first dibs to the person who has traveled the farthest. If you don't live near any of the venues, most stores happily accommodate requests to purchase a signed book over the phone and have it shipped.

Please share this message with anyone you think might be interested and also any members of book clubs looking for a new pick. If you'd like to help me spread the word please tweet with the tag #thelastbookaneer or post on your Facebook page about the book. (If you would like to follow me on Twitter, please go here, and like me on Facebook here).

Yours sincerely,

Matthew
BOSTON, MA
The Last Bookaneer Reading (Launch!)
Friday May 1, 2015, 7:00pm @ Harvard Bookstore
1256 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02138

SEATTLE, WA
Monday May 4, 2015, 7:00pm @ Elliott Bay Books
1521 10th Ave, Seattle, WA 98122

SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
Tuesday May 5, 2015, 7:00pm @ Vroman's Bookstore
695 E. Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91101

SAN DIEGO, CA
Wednesday May 6, 2015, 7:30pm @ Warwick's Books
7812 Girard Ave, La Jolla, CA 92037

DANVILLE, CA
Thursday May 7, 2015, 7:00pm @ Rakestraw Books
Iron Horse Plaza, 550 Hartz Ave, Danville, CA 94526

CORTE MADERA, CA
Friday May 8, 2015, 7:00pm @ Book Passage
51 Tamal Vista Boulevard, Corte Madera, CA 94925

HOUSTON, TX
Monday May 11, 2015, 6:30pm @ Murder by the Book
2342 Bissonnet St. Houston, TX 77005

ST. LOUIS, MO
Tuesday May 12, 2015, 7:00pm @ Left Bank Books
399 N. Euclid St. St. Louis, MO 63108

CHICAGO, IL
Wednesday May 13, 2015, 7:00pm @ Anderson's Bookshop
123 W. Jefferson Ave., Naperville, IL 60540

CINCINNATI, OH
Thursday May 14, 2015, 7:00pm @ Joseph-Beth Booksellers
Rookwood Pavillion, 2692 Madison Rd, Cincinnati, OH 45208

Two weeks until the publication of The Last Bookaneer on April 28 from Penguin Press!

Some news updates:

… My website has been renovated. Hope you'll check it out! www.matthewpearl.com

… Don't forget I might be at a bookstore near you. Make sure to check this tour list: Friday 5/1: BOSTON, MA—Harvard Bookstore, 7pm... Monday 5/4: SEATTLE, WA—Elliott Bay, 7pm... Tuesday 5/5: LOS ANGELES, CA—Vroman’s, 7pm... Wednesday 5/6: SAN DIEGO, CA—Warwick’s, 7:30pm... Thursday 5/7: DANVILLE, CA—Rakestraw Books, 7pm... Friday 5/8: CORTE MADERA, CA—Book Passage, 7pm... Monday 5/11: HOUSTON, TX—Murder by the Book, 7pm... Tuesday 5/12: ST. LOUIS, MO—Left Bank Books, 7pm... Wednesday 5/13: NAPERVILLE, IL—Anderson’s Bookshop, 7pm... Thursday 5/14: CINCINNATI, OH—Joseph-Beth Booksellers, 7pm

… Finally for now, to (hopefully) whet your appetite for the upcoming novel, I'd like to share three more reviews with you, here below, which I greatly appreciate.

From The Library Journal
goo.gl/ZyRkPs
"Don't-Miss Fiction"
Pearl, Matthew. The Last Bookaneer.

“Fifteen men on the dead man’s chest. Yo-ho-ho and a trunk full of manuscripts!” At the tail end of the 19th century copyright law has yet to be established and publishers are making a killing by printing unauthorized editions. In this world of literary piracy the men and women employed to do the dirty work of procuring the unpublished texts are called bookaneers. When a young bookseller named Fergins is swept off to the South Pacific island of Samoa by his mentor Pen Davenport, he becomes involved in one of the last great adventures of bookaneering, involving dodging missionaries, cannibals, German settlers, and a dastardly competitor for a treasure of unknown value—the latest and, possibly, last novel of Robert Louis Stevenson. VERDICT This swashbuckling tale of greed and great literature will remind you why Pearl (The Dante Club; The Poe Shadow) is the reigning king of popular literary historical thrillers. His latest is guaranteed to delight lovers of history and mystery and will likely find an enthusiastic crossover audience among those who enjoy the works of Carlos Ruiz Zafón (The Watcher in the Shadows), Erik Larson (In the Garden of Beasts), and Katherine Howe (The House of Velvet and Glass). —Liv Hanson, Chicago

From Booklist
Issue: April 15, 2015
The Last Bookaneer.
Pearl, Matthew (Author)
May 2015. 400 p. Penguin, hardcover, $27.95. (9781594204920).

Writing mischievously clever novels about famous writers is Pearl’s forte. His first “bookaneers” or literary pirates appeared in The Last Dickens (2009), and they now command this entire tale of obsession and nefariousness. This passionately researched and ebulliently imagined yarn is narrated by Fergins, an unassuming English book dealer who ends up in cahoots with the bookaneer Penrose Davenport, culminating in a mad voyage to Samoa, where the ailing Robert Louis Stevenson is reportedly finishing a new novel. Intent on stealing the manuscript, the duo manages to ingratiate themselves with Stevenson and his outspoken wife, Fanny, only to discover that Davenport’s archrival, Belial, is also on the scene. As the bookaneers scheme, tall, gaunt, zealous Stevenson, coughing and smoking, serves as a veritable king to the Samoans in his employ and becomes embroiled in opposition to the German occupation. As the action erupts into the sort of significant cliffhanger exploits Stevenson specialized in, Pearl’s vividly descriptive and energetically plotted novel churns and charms with intriguing literary history, acid social critique, witty dialogue, and delectably surprising and diabolical reversals and betrayals.
— Donna Seaman

From Bookpage Magazine

The Last Bookaneer is a rollicking romp in which the publishing industry is depicted as a business as scintillating as mining for gold. Equal parts adventure on teh South Seas and literary fiction set in civilized and cerebral England, this story is chock full of sly remarks skewering the publishing industry. The questions of intellectual property faced in the 1890s are just as complex and engaging as those we encounter in today's technological world. As in his previous work, Matthew Pearl seamlessly braids fact and fiction into an imaginative yarn that will enthrall bibliophiles and adventure fans alike.

I've posted the fifth entry in my posts on the stories behind my book covers. Check it out!

Wanted to share the first advance review of the new novel, a really nice, starred review in Kirkus:

https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-re...

The website and book tour guide for THE LAST BOOKANEER is up and running! We'll probably still be tweaking it and correcting errors. You can read the synopsis and see some images relating to the novel.

www.lastbookaneer.com

(of course, also accessible from www.matthewpearl.com)

In the weeks and months to come, I'll be sharing some posts here and elsewhere on the story behind our cover design, choosing the title of the novel, some strange facts I found on Robert Louis Stevenson, and how I came to write about literary pirates or "bookaneers."

As for the book tour in May: If you are in or near one of these places, or have long lost relatives you want to visit, please mark your calendar now! (I'll be reminding as we get closer, too)

Friday 5/1: BOSTON, MA—Harvard Bookstore, 7pm... Monday 5/4: SEATTLE, WA—Elliott Bay, 7pm... Tuesday 5/5: LOS ANGELES, CA—Vroman’s, 7pm... Wednesday 5/6: SAN DIEGO, CA—Warwick’s, 7:30pm... Thursday 5/7: DANVILLE, CA—Rakestraw Books, 7pm... Friday 5/8: CORTE MADERA, CA—Book Passage, 7pm... Monday 5/11: HOUSTON, TX—Murder by the Book, 7pm... Tuesday 5/12: ST. LOUIS, MO—Left Bank Books, 7pm... Wednesday 5/13: NAPERVILLE, IL—Anderson’s Bookshop, 7pm... Thursday 5/14: CINCINNATI, OH—Joseph-Beth Booksellers, 7pm

I'm so glad to have Goodreads, Facebook and Twitter (@matthewpearl) as a way of staying in touch with you. This is a good time to ask that if you aren't also on my email list, please join by adding your email here. I am very conscious of inbox fatigue, so I keep this to really one or two emails *per year*. Mostly a reminder when a new book comes out or I'm coming to your neck of the woods.

Dear friends and readers,

I'm excited to share news of my next novel! But before we get to that:

I have a nonfiction story that is available to download starting today from the terrific storytelling online magazine, Atavist.com. My story is called "Company Eight." Though I have done a fair share of articles and essays in the past, this is my most extensive work of narrative nonfiction. It's a true story--and up until now an untold story--of a 19th century volunteer fire company in Boston that fought to overturn a corrupt and dangerous system. It was a kind of "Untouchables" for firefighters.

There are two ways to download "Company Eight."

The first comes with images and can be read on your computer, iPad or other tablet, phone:

download at The Atavist

The second way is text only for your Kindle:

download at Amazon

And of course the Goodreads entry: Company Eight

On to news of the next novel! It's called THE LAST BOOKANEER. It will be published in the US by Penguin Press on April 28, 2015, and around the same time in the UK by Harvill Secker. It's about literary thieves in the 19th century (fuller tease at the end of this blog entry). Because I like to keep my emailing to an average of 1-2 emails a year for those who prefer slim inboxes, please make sure to check back in on my site (www.matthewpearl.com) for further news, the cover, and also stay up to date by choosing to "like" my Facebook author page, ...and follow my Twitter feed

Want to be the first to get the book? Pre-order now! Here or your favorite book selling site.

And again, the Goodreads page:
The Last Bookaneer

As always, I'm honored to have you as readers.

THE LAST BOOKANEER

Mystery, celebrity, theft and a thrilling adventure set at the ends of the earth.

On the island of Samoa, in a house perched on a cliff beneath a smoldering volcano, a dying Robert Louis Stevenson labours over a new novel. It is rumored that this may be the author of Treasure Island's greatest masterpiece.

On the other side of the world this news fires the imaginations of the bookaneers, literary pirates who steal the latest manuscripts by famous writers to smuggle them to a hungry public. But a changing world means the bookaneers will soon become extinct.

Two adversaries set out for the south Pacific: Pen Davenport, a tortured criminal genius haunted by his past and Belial, his nemesis. Both dream of fortune and immortality with this last and most incredible heist.

THE LAST BOOKANEER thrillingly depicts the lost world of these doomed outlaws, a tropical island with a violent destiny, a brewing colonial war and a reclusive genius directing events from high in his mountain compound.