Brenda Chapman

So much to do and so little time.

My weekend ahead has a number of things I need to accomplish: update my website, send a book off to a reviewer for a podcast in September, write to our foster child in Bolivia, update my expenses for my tax return next year, get groceries, work on a manuscript . . . and read The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest (because my friend Ken is waiting to read it on his holiday in a weeks' time).

Hornets' Nest is an interesting read - I'm just over half way through. It's less action than the previous two books by Larsson in this series, and the plot intertwines and folds back on itself with lots of political shenanigans. Steig Larsson died before any of the trilogy was published - I wonder if he imagined the universal success these books would have - I doubt it.

I met with a New York agent at Bloody Words. The idea is to pitch a book and hope they will ask to see it. I wasn't really prepared but had signed up weeks ago and figured it was a chance to get an agent's take on my work. She said that they are just looking for the next blockbuster and middle-list mysteries were dead. Books need 'a hook' to reel in readers. What do you think? Do you like formula-type blockbusters or do you prefer something more subtle?