Book launch: ‘A Hand of Knaves’ (in which our hero goes to a party)

Yours truly (in the glasses), along with Leife Shallcross, Grace Maslin, Simon Petrie (also in glasses, but not me), and a bunch of other lovely folks whose names I didn’t catch because I am a terrible human

Last night I went to the book launch party for A Hand of Knaves, the short story anthology that features a story of mine called “The Best Heist Yet”. I confess I was feeling a little nervous — my imposter syndrome was registering off the charts, and I didn’t know anyone there (except my bestie, who came along for moral support and took some pics for me — thanks, mate!).

I felt better when we first arrived and found the dealers room, where people were selling books they had written. I picked up the third book in the Antipodean Queen series (I reviewed the first one here if you want to check it out) and another that the author described as a sci-fi murder mystery. Whee!

I didn’t have to worry about the launch either — it was a lot of fun and everyone was lovely. There were three readings (which were amazing and didn’t help with the imposter syndrome any), plus champagne (which offset the effect of the readings). And I got to sign ALL THE BOOKS.

It was a ton of fun, and made me wonder why I haven’t done this sooner — all of my book launches for my own books have been strictly online affairs. It also drove home that I really should join the local author community and, you know, get out of the house more. I’ll definitely look into that.

After I finish this next book I’m reading. 😉

Rogues, thieves, pirates and ne’er-do-wells abound in speculative fiction. Sometimes heroic, sometimes villainous, often somewhere in between, rogues are as likely to steal one’s heart as one’s purse, and show little remorse while helping themselves to either.

So why do we love them? Because they’re imperfect, fallible, and even vulnerable under that carefully-maintained, world-weary exterior.

Rogues represent something we rarely see in our daily lives: ordinary people prepared to take on the “powers that be” by way of guile and subterfuge. But are they only in it for the loot, or are they–deep down–romantic at heart?