'The annual BookWorld Awards (or Bookies) were instigated in 1063 CE and for the first two hundred years were dominated by Aeschylus and Homer, who won most of the awards in the thirty or so categories. Following the expansion in fiction and the inclusion of the oral tradition, categories totalled two hundred by 1423. Technical awards were introduced twenty years later and included "Most-Used English Word" and the "Most Widely Mispelt Word", witch has remained a contentious subject ever since. By 1879 there were over six hundred categories but neither the length of the awards nor the vote-rigging scandal in 1964 dented the popularity of this glittering occasion – it will remain one of the BookWorld's most popular fixtures for years to come.'

CMDR TRAFFORD BRADSHAW, CBE –

Bradshaw’s Guide to the BookWorld

I stood offstage at the Starlight Room, one in a long line of equally minor celebrities, all awaiting our turn to go and read the nominations. The hospitality lounge where we had all been mustered was about the size of a football pitch, and the massed babble of excited voices sounded like rushing water. I had been trying to avoid Tweed all evening. But whenever I lost him Heep would take over. There were others about, too. Bradshaw had pointed out Orlick and Legree, two other assistants of Tweed's that he thought I should be wary of.

Of them all, Heep was the most amateur. His skills at unobserved observation were woefully inadequate.

'Well!' he said when I caught him staring at me. 'You and me both waiting for awards!' He rubbed his hands and tapped his long fingers together. 'I ask you, me all humble and you an Outlander. Thanks to you and the mispeling incident I'm up for "Most Creepy Character in a Dickens Novel". What would you be up for?'

'I'm giving one, not accepting one, Uriah – and why are you following me?'

'Apologies, ma'am,' he said, squirming slightly and clasping his hands together to try to stop them moving. 'Mr Tweed asked me to keep a particular close eye on you in case of an attack, ma'am.'

'Oh yes?' I replied, unimpressed by the lame cover story. 'From whom?'

'Those who would wish you harm, of course. ProCaths, bowdlerisers – even the townspeople from Shadow. It was them what tried to kill you at Solomon's, I'll be bound.'

Sadly, it was true. There had been two attempts on my life since Deane's arrest. The first had been a tiger released in Kenneth's office. I thought at first it was Big Martin catching up with me – but it wasn't. Bradshaw had dealt with the creature; he sent it on a one-way trip to Zenobians. The second had been a contract killing. Fortunately for me Heep's handwriting was pretty poor and Thursby from The Maltese Falcon was shot instead. It was only because I was an Outlander that I was still alive – if I'd been a Generic I could have been erased at source long ago.