Sleep has arrived

Hello everyone. I'm very pleased to announce that my novel Sleep Before Evening, is now available. You can get a copy as of today at the following places:
Amazon US
Amazon UK
Amazon CA

Or just go to your local Amazon and type in either the title (Sleep Before Evening) or my name (Magdalena Ball) and the book should appear, as it's also available locally from Amazon in Germany,
France, Japan and China (I'm afraid I did check).

The book will also be available from SeekBooks and Angus & Robertson in Australia from the 24th, and can be ordered from any bookshop, anywhere in the world – the ISBN is: 978-1904492962, format is paperback, 296 pages.

I’ll include details of my mostly virtual book tour (which includes a range of guest blogs, features, podcasts, and interviews) along with an invitation to the book launch at Angus & Robertson in my next blog entry. If you do buy a copy, please let me know, along with your postal address, and I'll gladly send you an autographed bookplate.

If you have any questions, want samples, or any more information, please don’t hesitate to drop me a line. Otherwise, thanks very much for all your support.

Maggie The Compulsive Reader

Sleep Before Evening

Marianne is a young woman teetering at the edge of reason. A death in the family has sent her brilliant academic career and promising future spiraling out of control. Growing resentment towards those who shaped her past sends her on a wild, desperate search for the truth about herself. Set in and about New York, this gritty, relentless story unfolds with the same cool detachment that motivates the central character to peel back the layers of her life and expose the painful scalding within. There are lonely vigils in Washington Square Park and subway journeys to oblivion. In the city she meets Miles, a hip musician busking the streets, playing low-rent venues with a rock band, auditioning for record companies. This is a new, exciting, dissolute world that challenges Marianne’s preconceptions about art and life. Here, in contrast to her prescribed upbringing, she finds anarchic squalor, home grown music and poetry, substance abuse, sex, and above all, exhilarating personal freedom. Addictions of all kinds, the redemptive power of art and music, love, loss and beauty
are all explored as we follow the protagonist’s difficult journey from sleep to awakening.

“The dialogue is solid and believable, and the characters live and breathe and scratch themselves. The drug scenes and the horrors of dependence are especially well-rendered.” CHAD HAUTMANN, author of Billie’s Ghost

“There is so much beautiful writing here, soaring passages.” RUHAMA VELTFORT, author of The Promised Land

“Sleep Before Evening is music. Magdalena Ball weaves the sounds of poetry with an important story, compassionately ‘sung.’ CAROLYN HOWARD-JOHNSON, author of This is the Place, and Tracings

“The writing is exquisite, without ever calling attention to itself, which is a real feat. It is a pleasure to read. The pitch is perfect, and the characters are so beautifully developed and very intriguing.
JOAN SCHWEIGHARDT, author of Virtual Silence, Island, Homebodies and Gudrun’s Tapestry