Here’s how it works. Every week for the next four weeks, I’m going to hold a contest here on my blog. You, the anonymous denizens of the Internet, will send me your contest entries. And every week, I’m going to pick one winning entry who will win the stack of books pictured to the right, namely:

• One copy of the Solaris edition of Infoquake
• One copy of the Pyr edition of MultiReal
• One copy of The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction, Volume Two (containing my story “Mathralon”)
• One copy of Overlook Press’ new edition of Mervyn Peake’s Titus Alone (containing my introduction to the book)

Yes, that’s right: I’m giving away four sets of four books each. That’s a total of… uh… hold on, let me dig out my calculator… forty-two sixteen books! And not only that, but you’re winning the entire David Louis Edelman ouevre to date. The “DLE Canon,” as it were.

So here’s the first contest.

You may be aware that I’ve gotten some nice advance blurbs from authors. Kate Elliott said that Infoquake was “inventive and provocative, with a surprisingly emotional kick.” Peter Watts called MultiReal “a thoroughly-successful hybrid of Neuromancer and Wall Street.”

But did you know that there were a number of author and celebrity endorsements that my publisher decided to turn down? For instance, President George W. Bush weighed in on Infoquake with this advance blurb:

“David Louie Eldermint’s Info-Quake just might be a weapon of mass destruction all by itself. If Eldermint was out to eliminate all my free time trying to finish his book, then mission accomplished! All I can say is, heckuva job, Davey!” — George W. Bush, Presimadent of the US of A

Pyr wisely decided that they didn’t want to publish an endorsement from such a controversial public figure. Likewise, they turned down this one from DNC Chairman Howard Dean:

“Edelman’s gonna sell books in Borders! And then he’s gonna sell books in Barnes & Noble! And then he’s going on to Books-a-Million, Waterstone’s, Powell’s, Waldenbooks, and B. Dalton… AND ALL THE WAY TO WAL-MART! YEEEEEEEEHAAAGH!” — Howard Dean, Chairman of the Democratic National Committee

I can understand why my publisher decided to turn down blurbs from such political figures as Bush and Dean. You don’t want to go around alienating half of your potential audience. But why would they have turned down this perfectly acceptable blurb from lovable ol’ Jar-Jar Binks?

“Meesa bustin’ with happiness at readin’ dis-a book, MultiReal! My afraid that my not been reading such good tings for a long ol’ time! Infinito possibiliteez is only a state in da mind, indeed!” — Jar-Jar Binks, Irritating Orange Asshole

So your mission for this week is: email me some more blurbs that were too controversial to print on the jackets of my books at dedelman@gmail.com. Whoever submits the best, funniest, most offensive, most shocking, or just plain weirdest blurb between now and 11:59 PM Eastern time on Sunday, June July 6 will win the complete David Louis Edelman book set. Put “Summer Giveaway Contest 1″ in the subject line so I know what you’re emailing me about.

You can enter as many times as you see fit, but you can only win one set of books. I’ll be the sole judge, jury, and executioner (but let’s hope it doesn’t come to that). I’ll post the best blurbs here on the blog. Unfortunately, due to the prohibitive cost of shipping, I’m going to limit this contest to the United States and Canada.

(And no, in case you’re wondering, I’m not going to use your email for nefarious marketing purposes. Unless, I suppose, you count this contest as a nefarious marketing purpose, which is fair.)

Ready? Go!

Update, July 7 @ 10:06 PM: The winner for this week’s contest has been announced, and details of the next giveaway contest are available.

Nick Sagan, author of Idlewild, Edenborn, and Everfree, screenwriter for Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Voyager, and former child ambassador to the universe on the Voyager Golden Record, has read and blurbed my novels Infoquake and MultiReal. Here’s what the esteemed Mr. Sagan has to say:

David Louis Edelman’s vision of the future is so alive and full of energy the pages are practically buzzing. Wonderfully intricate with smart, satisfying complexity, Infoquake and its sequel MultiReal serve up a world where mindbending technologies promise a freedom nearly as endless as the Machiavellian ambitions of those who would control them.

Blurbs don’t get much more sophisticated (and laudatory) than that. Together with the existing blurbs from Robert J. Sawyer and Peter Watts, the front matter for MultiReal is going to look pretty nice indeed.

I first met Nick almost exactly twelve months ago, at least year’s Penguicon (you know, the one before open source breast fondling). We spent an afternoon dishing and drinking, and then drinking, and then drinking some more. After that, I think we did some drinking. By the time evening stumbled blearily around, we had talked so much that I think I was ready to take a bullet for the guy.

My deepest thanks to Nick Sagan for this. Now y’all go out there and buy some of his books, y’hear?

Well, here’s a concrete example. In one of my blogs about my World Fantasy experience, I mentioned that I had finally met Hugo Award-winning SF author Robert J. Sawyer (author of Hominids, Rollback, and many others). Rob and I were both in a group of about ten people who dined at the local pub on the first official night of the con. And then I got a chance to talk with him face to face for a few minutes at the Tor party on day 3. I said on my blog that Rob was “very generous with his time and advice.” What I didn’t mention at the time was that he agreed to read my upcoming novel MultiReal for a possible blurb.

Today, Mr. Sawyer has come through. Here’s his blurb for MultiReal, and boy, it’s a beaut:

Just when we thought cyberpunk was dead, David Louis Edelman bursts on the scene with defibrillator paddles and shouts, “Clear!” If there’s any web more tangled than the World Wide one, it’s the Byzantine networks of high finance; Edelman intermeshes them in a complex, compelling series. This DOES compute!

Damn, I love this. I’m bursting onto the scene! With defibrillator paddles, no less! And I even like the cutesy “this DOES compute” at the end, complete with exclamation point. I think this one’s going to be riding high on my books for years to come, provided you all keep my career going for years to come by purchasing multiple copies of my books.

There’s nothing quite like a colorful blurb from someone who really knows how to give a good compliment. Take, for instance, one of my all-time faves, written by Wallace Stegner for the great Robert Stone: “Stone writes like a bird, like an angel, like a circus barker, like a con man, like someone so high on pot that he is scraping his shoes on the stars.” Then there’s Thomas Pynchon’s famous blurb for his old buddy Richard Fariña: “This book comes on like the Hallelujah Chorus done by 200 kazoo players with perfect pitch, I mean strong, swinging, skillful and reverent — but also with the fine brassy buzz of irreverence in there too.”

Including Sawyer’s blurb and the one by Peter Watts, I’m now two steps closer to achieving my goal of getting praised by every single Canadian on the planet. Robert Charles Wilson and R. Scott Bakker, you’re next!

And thanks again to Rob Sawyer.

Peter Watts, Hugo Award-nominated author of Blindsight and the Rifters Trilogy (Starfish, Maelstrom, and Behemoth), expert in the ecophysiology of marine mammals, Canadian, and just all-around nice guy, has given an advance blurb for my upcoming novel MultiReal. Here’s what Peter has to say:

A thoroughly-successful hybrid of Neuromancer and Wall Street, MultiReal is the kind of thought-experiment we need more of around here: rigorously backgrounded, tightly plotted, and built around one of the most intriguing neurotech conceits I’ve encountered in years. William Gibson once observed that the street finds its own uses for things. David Louis Edelman reminds us that both boardroom and back room do as well — and the people who lurk in those places are a lot scarier…

I invite all of you to visit Peter’s website and Peter’s blog (which currently bears the title “No Moods, Ads or Cutesy Fucking Icons (Reloaded)”), and throw the man some love. Go buy Blindsight. Go build monuments in the man’s honor.

I’m very, very pleased with this blurb. I especially like the ellipses at the end. And being compared to William Gibson (twice!) is a high honor, considering that the man is one of my favorite authors, period, in any genre.

If I can convince people like Peter Watts, Ian McDonald, and Norman Spinrad — people who are much, much smarter than me — that I know what I’m talking about, I must be doing something right. Spinrad even said in Asimov’s that I have “convincing and convincingly detailed knowledge of the physiology and biochemistry of the human nervous system down to the molecular level,” a quote I never, ever get tired of repeating because of its sheer, unmitigated untruthfulness.

Remember, folks: MultiReal hits the stores in July of 2008. That’s plenty of time for you to buy copies of Infoquake for all your friends this holiday season and get them hooked on the trilogy too.

Thanks, Peter.