As I contemplated the third anniversary of my becoming a published man of letters, there was one thing that stuck out as being ‘not quite right’ amongst my back catalogue. A black sheep, you might say. Welcome to Discovery Park, the years-long chronicle of my idiotic attempt to listen to every single album on Rolling Stone Magazine’s top 500 albums of all-time list. It was an endeavour started for the sadly-defunct masterpiece of musical criticism that was the Demon Pigeon website, then continued when there really was no point in doing so beyond my own endless obsession and completist’s brain.
It’s not a black sheep because I’m ashamed of it, far from it. I am stupidly proud of some of the writing in it. I think it’s really funny and insightful and a bit brilliant, much like my Mum always thought I was the most handsome boy in school.
No, the black sheep element came from the cover. It’s had two covers so far, both exceedingly dull affairs. The first looked like a child’s GCSE mock-up of a magazine cover, the second looked for all the world like a textbook on managing the macroeconomics of responses to malaria outbreaks amongst middle-income voters, or something equally as tedious.
So, to celebrate the three year anniversary of my author career, I’ve given the cover a makeover, a new lick of paint, a fresh pair of lace panties, for no other reason than I’d like it to have the cover it deserves.
Look how lovely it looks! The book itself remains the same – still the same silly, idiotic, enormously fun jaunt through some of the best records of all time, and some of the most overrated. It looks at why we feel the need to quantify and rank art, revels in the complex musical world we live in, and wonders why anyone would voluntarily listen to Bono (with apologies to anyone who does). If you’ve yet to give it a read, I highly encourage you to check it out. It’ll cost you less than a Big Mac and will be endlessly more satisfying.
Paul Stephenson is a writer of horror and science fiction novels. Blood on the Motorway: An apocalyptic trilogy of murder and stale sandwiches is out now in ebook and print from Amazon and all other good bookstores. You can get the first book free by joining the mailing list or reading along at Wattpad. Oh, and he’s got a Patreon. Sign up for free books, a free weekly short story, and much more.
