The Official Matthew Reilly Homepage

As I write this, I am preparing to hit the road for Books Alive, a truly great Australian Government-funded initiative to promote reading. Nice to see my taxes going to a good cause! But more on that later.

Several other things have been on my mind lately, so...

I have to admit it, I am a fan of The Block - an Australian reality-TV show in which four couples each renovate an apartment in a block of units. The apartments are ultimately sold at auction and the couple who adds the most value to their unit wins. For those overseas readers, this show has become a bit of a phenomenon here in Australia (we're kinda obsessed with property!). It's the highest-rating show on TV right now.

In short, it's great reality-TV! The producers have chosen great contestants, and the best moments come when you know that the contestants (they are all married couples, except for two really funny gay guys, who, if gay folks could wed in Australia, probably would be married) have forgotten that a camera is watching them. It's truly odd to see couples argue and disagree in a way that they would normally only do when in private.

Strangely compelling.

As for movies, I have found the movie world a little light on good stuff lately: Charlie's Angels 2 was fun if not all that comprehensible, T3 was wonderfully self-deprecating, but I've seen some shockers too: including the truly dreadful View From the Top and the pretty lame The Italian Job. Am waiting for the cinema release of Finding Nemo. I love all of Pixar's stuff and this looks utterly awesome, and I hear it was a huge hit in the US. And hey, it's about the good old Aussie clown fish! How could it possibly go wrong!

Well, folks, for the first time in nearly two years, I am hitting the promotional trail... this time for Books Alive, a wonderful government initiative designed to get lapsed readers back into bookstores.

I'm pleased to say that my novel, Ice Station, was one of six Australian novels chosen to be sold for the bargain price of $5 (when you buy any other book). As such, Ice Station has been re-released here in Australia in a whole new edition and I will travelling from Sydney to Melbourne and all the way to Perth, Albany, Alice Springs and Darwin - I'll be doing book-signings, talks and Q&A sessions all over the country! Check out the Appearance Dates section on the site to find out where I'll be and come along!!

I was absolutely thrilled when I was told Ice Station had been chosen for this. Every week I receive emails from people who say that they had stopped reading and that Ice Station or one of my other books got them reading again. I also get emails from mothers of 15-year-old male non-readers (a notoriously difficult group to get reading) who write to me to say that their non-reading son picked up Ice Station and now has gone on to read all manner of other books. I'm not vain enough to think that my books are the best literature ever to hit the earth - but I do know that they are fun and fast and filled with action, and it's fun books that get young people reading. Give them the classics later, just show them that reading is fun first. If my books get people reading then they are doing something positive and I love that.

In the end, Books Alive is all about reading... so if you know someone who (for whatever reason) doesn't read anymore, go to a bookstore, get yourself a book, and get one of the six $5 books for your friend! All were big bestsellers when they were originally released, so they are designed to get people back into reading. The selected books are:

Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks [literary fiction]
An Anzac's Story by Roy Kyle [non-fiction]
My Place by Sally Morgan [indigenous literature]
Toad Heaven by Morris Gleitzman [children's]
Tashi and the Giant and Tashi by Anna Feinberg [children's]
Ice Station by Matthew Reilly [action, thriller, escapist entertainment, all round blockbuster, good fun!! Hey, it's my website, I'll write what I please!]

Whenever I do a speech, one of the most frequently asked questions I get is: "Where do you get your ideas from?" The short answer is this: I read a lot of weird and wonderful non-fiction books - books about code-crackers, humanity's greatest inventions and the most mysterious places on earth. I also read the newspaper every day, especially the "World" section.

The reason I thought of this topic is that just this week, I saw an article in the paper (it was also on TV) of a guy who sky-dived all the way across the English Channel... using a Buzz Lightyear-style pair of carbon 'wings' attached to his back. I tore the picture out of the newspaper and stuck it on my wall. That is going in a book... if James Bond doesn't do it first! And that, folks, is how you get ideas, just by reading the newspaper!

Getting quite a few emails these days from people asking me if I will be touring their country sometime soon. So I figured that I would tell you where I'll be travelling internationally over the coming months.

August: all round Australia for Books Alive;
Late September: Hong Kong for Scarecrow;
Early October: England for Scarecrow;
November: Australia again, with Scarecrow.

And in the new year, possibly the US (Scarecrow is set to be released there in Fegruary 2004). When I have concrete dates, I'll whack them up on the Appearance Dates section of the site.

If you're like me, you probably love those 'Special Edition' DVDs out there - with all the commentaries and making-of extras. So, for the movie buffs out there, here are some excellent special edition DVDs I've seen recently:

The new Dances With Wolves Special Edition has commentary from Kevin Costner (and many others, including the amazing cinematographer, Dean Semler) and it just awesome. As are the DVDs for Dog Soldiers and Brotherhood of the Wolf, two films I mentioned in these pages when they came out at theatres (although the Australian/international edition of Brotherhood is weak on extras - get the UK version).

It also took a while, but Black Hawk Down now has a kick-ass 3-disc set which has commentary by everyone involved, including the incredibly generous Ridley Scott.

Make no mistake, Ridley Scott does the absolute best DVD commentaries. His talks on Gladiator and Hannibal were just sensational; golden for any would-be film-makers. I love the way he says, "I have no secrets. I'm happy to tell you everything I know because I have 20 years experience behind me to back it up. So if you can use my tricks, good luck to you!"

I'm told that the Indiana Jones series will finally be released on DVD this Christmas, in widescreen, with new digital sound, and with tons of extras, but - so I'm told - no commentary. God, I'd love to hear Steven Spielberg talk about his films (especially Schindler's List, one of top five favourite films and Jurassic Park).

Oh, and by the way, speaking of movies, I have my fingers crossed that I might have sold my screenplay of Altitude Rush... it was a short story I did a few years ago which I adapted into a feature length screenplay last Christmas. The original short story is now on this site, so if you want to see the story in its raw form, check it out in the Exclusives section.

Well, better go. Got some packing to do. Come and say hi if I'm visiting your town soon!