LooseLeaves:Fans of Sebastian Faulks - and there are many - may not think they're devotees of James Bond, but the chances are they will be come next May when he brings out Devil May Care, the Bond novel he's been commissioned to write to mark the centenary of the birth of the spy's creator, Ian Fleming.
Set in the Cold War world of 1967, Bond will be damaged, more vulnerable and ageing - but thankfully still both gallant and highly sexed - "if you can be both," says Faulks (bottom right), who wrote the 007 novel in six weeks. "Although he is a great seducer, he really does appreciate the girls he seduces and he doesn't actually use them badly," adds the author, best known for his novels set during the two world wars, Birdsong, Charlotte Gray and The Girl at the Lion d'Or. The Bond novel will be published by Penguin.
Faulks has also worked as a journalist (among other things, he was literary editor of the London Independent) as did Fleming (who worked for the Sunday Times and Reuters), and while writing the Bond novel, Faulks followed Fleming's modus operandi - slightly modified. "In his house in Jamaica, Ian Fleming used to write 1,000 words in the morning, then go snorkelling, have a cocktail, lunch on the terrace, more diving, another 1,000 words in late afternoon, then more Martinis and glamorous women. In London I followed this routine exactly, apart from the cocktails, the lunch and the snorkelling."
Bond has travelled far from Casino Royale - the first book, written in the early 1950s - and Faulks has written the new one, commissioned by the Fleming estate, with a sense, he says, of "the return of the gunfighter for one last heroic mission".
Novel buzz about a prize
The Stinging Fly Prize, for a writer who has been published in the magazine during 2007 and who has yet to publish a book, is to be judged this year by novelist Emer Martin. Her most recent novel, Baby Zero, was published earlier this year by Brandon. Having lived abroad for years she has now settled with her family in Co Meath. The prize is run in association with the Tyrone Guthrie Centre and consists of €1,000 and a two-week residency at Annaghmakerrig. The winner will be announced in November. The current issue of the magazine includes work by AL Kennedy, Philip Ó Ceallaigh, Paul Durcan , Kerry Hardie, Patrick Deeley and Rita Ann Higgins.
The Stinging Fly. Issue 7, volume 2, Summer 2007. €7.
Pratchett and Picoult for Poles
The jury may be out on the exact number of Poles now living in Ireland - up to 150,000, some believe - but so sure is the bookchain Borders that vast numbers of them inhabit Dublin 15 and the surrounding area that its bookstore in the West End Retail Park in Blanchardstown is now attending to their reading needs. As of last week, the shop is stocking around 100 Polish-language titles. The Polish shelves have Stephen King, Terry Pratchett, Jodi Picoult and Dan Brown in translation as well as classics from writers including Jane Austen and Oscar Wilde, and children's books. Polish writers are also there: Ryszard Kapuscinski, Katarzyna Grochola, Andrzej Sapkowski and Dorota Maslowska. Meanwhile, Mills & Boon is starting to provide the Eason chain with Polish translations of some of its titles including Elizabeth Flock's Me & Emma (Emma i ja) and MJ Rose's The Halo Effect (Schemat zbrodni).
New century of Irish writing
What has 21st century Ireland done to Irish literature? That's what 300 scholars of the subject from around the globe will be discussing at a five-day conference, in University College Dublin, which opens on Monday. The International Association for the Study of Irish Literatures (IASIL) conference is held in Ireland once every three years. One topic under the spotlight next week will be what's seen as a real need to focus attention on several Irish women writers who have been marginalised or overlooked by the current record of Irish literature. www.iasil.org/ucd
Young pens run free
Everyone's going to creative writing classes this weather - so why shouldn't teenagers? From Wednesday for six weeks, Criterion - a free series of writing workshops for 12- to 15-year-olds - will be run in Cork by the Munster Literature Centre. Storytelling, the arts of rapping and haiku, and modules on acting and video-making are all on the agenda. And the best bit is that participants will perform publicly, for friends and family, from their own writing at term's end.