Happy Birthday Kristen!
There’s something been put in the post for you — it doesn’t come gift-wrapped or anything, unfortunately, so if you get a random delivery from the UK, it’s from us! x Neil and Andrea
There’s something been put in the post for you — it doesn’t come gift-wrapped or anything, unfortunately, so if you get a random delivery from the UK, it’s from us! x Neil and Andrea
Neil and I were checking out Ocean Terminal and we walked by Waterstone’s. I spotted China Cuckoo in the window display (I think the technical term is ‘front of store’) as we passed and I did a double-take.
“Mark Kitto… I know that name… that’s the guy who did the magazine!”
We made what’s called a beeline, and I got a look at one of the two remaining copies in stock.
I repeatedly make promises to stop buying books — I was at two BookCrossing events last week and picked up ten used books, but I really couldn’t resist getting China Cuckoo. This is the man who blazed the trail and made it possible for all of us crazy foreigners (who like to push shit uphill) to publish expatriate-focused magazines in China.
I’m fairly convinced that I corresponded with him over email when the shit hit the fan with What’s On Xiamen back in 2004 because I needed some advice and he was very nice. And that was before he got forced out of That’s… because he’d been too successful.
I hope book sales since publication have already covered his advance and my small contribution (by way of purchasing China Cuckoo for full RRP in Waterstone’s and not on Amazon) has gone towards his royalty earnings.
(Read the Danwei interview with Mark Kitto when China Cuckoo was first published. Especially about the ‘self-important brigade’, the main reason I couldn’t wait to leave China in the end.)
While we were having coffee in Costa, I took the opportunity to dip into the book a wee bit, and I think I’m going to enjoy China Cuckoo.
I agree with the judge that a breach of contract shouldn’t be criminalised — what Lori Drew did was completely shameful and she should live with the guilt of bullying a child into committing suicide, but the whole criminal element of it just doesn’t seem right. I reckon if enough people keep her name and what she did in the public eye, she’ll pay for it for the rest of her life, anyway.
Everyone’s seen There, I Fixed it, right?