Launch of the Cutting Edge website!

The brand new Cutting Edge website is now LIVE! 


Check out www.ransom.co.uk/cuttingedge for exclusive author interviews, reviews of all 17 titles, book teasers and much, much more! 

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The Bookseller's Forecast on the Future of YA Fiction...

Young adult fiction has never been bigger. Find out what the future holds - check out The Bookseller's feature here. 

YA gritty reads - "In the past five years the young adult fiction market has grown by a whopping 170%"  

The Guardian reviews Scarred Lions!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/data/book/unclassified/9781841677521/a-scarred-lions-v


Check out The Guardian's fantastic review of new release, Scarred Lions! 

Part of "The Cutting Edge series", "Scarred Lions", is a gritty, honest and hard-hitting quick read for teens and young adults who find conventional fiction irrelevant to them or too hard to read. Buyisiwe feels like a stranger in the place where he grew up. He simply cannot shrug off the feeling of dread following him through the streets of London. And then he receives the terrible news. His mother can't take care of him anymore; he has to go and live with his estranged father, Themba, in Africa. Africa is not what Buyisiwe expected it to be. It is a place of great beauty and splendour, magnificent animals and terrible danger. And now a scarred, man-eating lion prowls the game reserve, waiting for his next victim. The hunt is on. Who will survive? And will Buyisiwe finally find a place where he really belongs? 


"The Scarred Lions" is a moving story about alienation and the magic of friendship. The fast-moving, character-focused narrative delves right to the heart of a tougher side of life. "Packed with drama and adventure from one page to the next, readers will be truly compelled by this gripping and satisfying story." Carefully chosen fonts, simple layout and controlled vocabulary help carry readers from beginning to end without any hint of chore-factor creeping in.

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Guest blogger Fanie Viljoen, author of Scarred Lions, on his research and inspirations for the novel

Where do you belong?

Fanie Viljoen

There are some concerns all teenagers have, no matter where they are in the world. These universal issues include the questions: “Who am I?” and “Where do I belong?” This is exactly what Buyisiwe struggles with when his whole life is uprooted and he has to move from England to Africa to start a new life with his estranged father. Imagine that – packing up your life, your belongings and leaving all else, even your mother, behind.

Whilst in the grip of this emotional rollercoaster, Buyisiwe clings to the thought that if his father is an African, then surely there must be a bit of Africa inside of him too … But what if there isn’t, and he becomes a stranger in a strange place? Add to that the thrill and danger of a man-eating lion on the loose in the wild life reserve where his father lives and works, and you’ve got the ingredients for a great read.

A view of the reserve from Picnic Rock

While doing research for Scarred Lions I visited a game reserve near Bela Bela in South Africa. An experienced game warden, Hannes Haasbroek, drove me around in the veld, teaching me about the wide variety of animals and plants. Having grown up in South Africa one might think that every South African would know all there is to know about the animals and the plants, but the game warden unlocked a wealth of amazing facts for me. These I tried to weave into the fabric of the story, giving the book a realistic backdrop. I then merely had to add a great story and some interesting characters that would capture the attention of readers. Because I also enjoy some fun amidst the tension, I included a generous amount of humour – mostly supplied by the fun loving and free spirited André, a game warden’s son.

In the end I hope that readers will have as much fun reading Scarred Lions as I had writing it! My wish for them is that they too might find their place in the world.

This zebra probably knows his place in the world, but can you spot him?

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Cutting Edge on Publishing Alley

We are very pleased to note that Cutting Edge has been given pride of place in the book listings on Publishing Alley, the independent bookstore for independent authors and publishers.
13 out of the 17 titles are currently available to purchase online, individually or as a value pack, which is currently on sale.

See which Cutting Edge titles are available on publishingalley.com.

The Publishing Alley Indie Book Blog is definitely worth a look too, not least because two of its four contributors, Peter Lancett and A.C. Flanagan, are Cutting Edge authors.

Author Interview: Peter Lancett talks about Gun Dog

Does having a gun make you someone? Does it make you strong or does it actually make you weak? Stevie is about to find out.



Gun Dog is a novel by the series editor of Cutting Edge, Peter Lancett. Peter authored a great deal of material for Ransom Publishing, such as the popular Dark Man series. He has also written two other Cutting Edge novels: Seeing Red and Hanging in the Mist.  



As well as writing full-time, Peter writes for film and has directed his own feature film. He divides his time between the UK, New Zealand and Los Angeles.

Gun Dog is Peter's second Cutting Edge novel. After its release, he gave video interview about it. 

 

Click here for an interview on Gun Dog with Ransom Publishing.

Find Peter's website here.

GUEST BLOGGER - EDWINA SHAW - AUTHOR OF THRILL SEEKERS

Thrill Seekers is dedicated to the memory of my brother Matthew who was twenty when he killed himself after battling schizophrenia for many years.

Edwina Shaw

He was about fifteen when he first started showing symptoms, getting paranoid, hearing voices and so on. It was terrifying for all of us(I am the eldest of five siblings) but most of all for him.

One of the worst things was that even though we knew he was dangerously crazy, we couldn’t get him into a hospital until he made a suicide attempt. These were frequent so he was in and out of institutions until he died.

The most painful days were when his medication was working enough so that he realised how sick he was and the likely future he had to look forward to as someone with a serious mental illness.

Through it all Matty was incredibly brave, often escaping from locked wards, going out and trying to have a good time and be happy. The line, “I’m going to sing a happy song,” in the “Douggie and the Paparazzi” chapter is from one of the poems he wrote during that time.I wrote Thrill Seekers so that some record of my brother’s courage in the face of this illness survived.

As Stephen King says, “Fiction is a lie, and good fiction is the truth inside the lie.” Thrill Seekers is heavily autobiographical so that although names and characters and details have been changed, the essential emotional truths are the same. The best part of writing this story and making it fiction was that it gave me the power to change the ending.

Even though Matty’s been dead twenty-one years I still miss him very much. We were good mates.

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