Hewitt (NJ) Author's New Novel To Appear As Online Serial
01/08/2004 . Source: Jessica Martin 

With about 60 titles already published on both sides of the Atlantic, award-winning NJ author John Grant thought he'd seen every way there was of his books being published ... but he was wrong!

With about 60 titles already published on both sides of the Atlantic, award-winning NJ author John Grant thought he'd seen every way there was of his books being published.

But then along came international op-ed website Blue Ear (www.blueear.com) with a new proposal.

Blue Ear editor Ethan Casey wanted to commission an original novel to appear as a serial on the website, and he wanted John Grant to be the one write it.

"There was a novel I'd started playing with three or four years ago," recalls John, "but I'd never had the time to do much about it. My wife Pam read the few pages I wrote, and she's been nagging me ever since about it. And it was a book I wanted to write myself. So this seemed a golden opportunity - to finish the novel, and to stop Pam pestering me!"

The novel is called The Dragons of Manhattan, and it's a fantasticated satire rooted in an ultimate conspiracy theory - that most of the positions of importance in the world have been taken over by immortal shapeshifting dragons who look just like us.

"In a way it's a very silly idea," says John, "although of course it would explain a lot of things . . . But I thought it was perfect as the basis for the plot of a humorous satire."

He suggested The Dragons of Manhattan to Ethan Casey as the proposed Blue Ear serial novel, and Casey commissioned the book at once.

As soon as the project was announced within the trade, there was a movie agent on the phone. "I can't talk too much about that at the moment, for obvious reasons," the author says, "but things are looking good."

Of John Grant's 60 books, about one-third are fiction, mainly fantasy. He has won the Hugo Award, the World Fantasy Award, the Locus Award and other international awards. As an editor, he has won the international Chesley Award.

In addition, in the UK, from which he came to these shores on marrying Pam, a New Yorker, four and a half years ago, he has won a British Science Fiction Association Special Award.

The "illustrated fiction" book Dragonhenge, which he did with world-renowned artist Bob Eggleton, has been shortlisted for a Hugo Award this year; the result will be announced over the Labor Day weekend.

His best-known nonfiction book is probably The Encyclopedia of Walt Disney's Animated Characters, now in its third edition. Other well known books are The Encyclopedia of Fantasy, which he did with John Clute, and Masters of Animation.

Last year he wrote the text of Perceptualistics, the book of paintings by NJ artist Jael, a dear family friend.

"But I've never been so terrified going into a new book before," he says. "Always I've had a chance to revise my text once I've finished it, so that the book I hand over to the publisher isn't too embarrassing. And, of course, I've known that my editor will doubtless find any horrors that I've missed. But this time, with me writing the novel in episodes just before they're published, there'll be no chance for second thoughts. One day I'll be writing it, and the next it'll be there online for all the world to see. Help!

"Well," he adds, "at least it means readers will have a nearly unique opportunity to see one of my novels in its raw state as it's being written, almost as if they were watching over my shoulder. And, if nothing else, I hope the jokes will make them laugh a lot."

The serialization of The Dragons of Manhattan starts on July 1 on Blue Ear at www.blueear.com.

Although Blue Ear is a subscription site, the novel will be made available free to all.

Jessica Martin