Midweek trek 1b – or Professor Dame Jackie

Yesterday’s second event was the grand launch party for Hetty Feather, where Jacqueline Wilson celebrated in the company of friends, plus the witch and Daughter. This wonderful affair took place at the Foundling Museum in Bloomsbury, which is a thoroughly nice venue for something like this.

The various lovely Random ladies helped look after us all, and the dainty little canapés were so nice that even Daughter could eat them. She snapped a lot, but primarily with her camera. She made me throw myself at Nicholas Tucker, at long last, to introduce myself. The poor man didn’t know what hit him, but was most charming and polite, while being given the megastar treatment from my own paparazza.

It being a Nick sort of day, we also launched ourselves at Nick Sharratt, who was the one to make Daughter a Jacqueline Wilson fan, many years ago. She ‘read’ his Tracy Beaker pictures for a long time before any other reading could take place.

And, needless to say, we tackled Professor Wilson herself. Jacqueline looked beautiful in a black dress with colourful embroidery round the neckline. Being a true professional she kept a signing pen in her pocket for those of us who were sufficiently overcome to beg an autograph. All we needed to do was hold her champagne.

Grand speech from Philippa Dickinson and another from Jacqueline, and flowers changed hands. There were thanks to Bob, Jacqueline’s driver, but we didn’t see him anywhere. And a most well deserved thanks to Naomi, doer of all things.

Then we fled, Cinderella style, on account of the trains running funny, and witches do need to get home.

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Before all this, we had a great time with Meg Rosoff, who turned the tables and interviewed me, made the loveliest meringues with cream and berries, gave Daughter a DVD, made a fire (of the intentional kind), was patient with the neighbourhood children, let the dogs in and out and in and…

Then she insisted on driving us to the Hetty Feather launch, which we survived. No road rage tendencies this time. And we didn’t get lost. Or wet.

(Photos by H Giles)

Midweek trek 1a

Having adhered to an almost normal timetable for several weeks, it’s time for some gallivanting. Daughter’s services in the blogosphere have been requested by me, and her college said that it sounded like a very good idea (yes, really), so she isn’t skiving off. It just feels like it. Must learn not to be so incredibly law abiding.

A witch should learn to go places without a photographer occasionally, but it’s hard when you know how much better it is with illustrated travels. So today we head south to meet up with Meg Rosoff. This is long overdue. I know why I haven’t made this trip earlier. I’m scared. Maybe that’s why having a little witchlet along seems good. OK, so she is taller than me, but still little.

I hope we won’t cause too much interruption to the writing of There Is No Dog. (There will be two, I imagine, if we’re to be literal.) I’ve been so much of a pain that Meg simply had to say she was free. Last time I did this, Meg came up with this really weird idea that I should start a blog. So what might happen today I can’t even begin to speculate on. (Virgin Trains running late is a good bet.)

Once we have ruined the Rosoff routines, we’re off to another literary event, but you’ll have to wait until tomorrow to find out what. The eagle eyed among you will be able to make an intelligent guess.

Hetty Feather

I had my doubts. Would it work when Jacqueline Wilson tackles a ’serious’ historical topic? Hetty Feather is very clearly a Jacqueline Wilson story. If I’d read it with my eyes shut (OK, that would have been a little difficult but, setting that slight problem aside, you know what I mean) I’d have known whose book it was.

And to be perfectly honest, for a page or two Hetty felt too much like a modern girl. But then you sink into the story and all is as it should be. Hetty is feisty, and we need feisty in this Foundling Hospital. What Hetty Feather isn’t, is another Coram Boy, which, all things considered, would not have been wise. This way the history of the Foundling Hospital will become known to just about every girl of a certain age.

It’s quite clever, in fact, because bad as the Foundling Hospital seems to Hetty, and will seem to any modern girl reader, there are things that are much worse. Much worse. Jacqueline has put together an interesting series of events, which in the end will work out for Hetty. It’s not a fairy tale end. That would have been unnatural. It’s at the same time logical, and very sweet.

Super Thursday

How super is it? I’ve been considering having a good long moan about this for a while. About today, and all the books that are published on this one day. I suppose it’s rather like moaning about your family; you love them, but something is driving you demented.

Even while being ruthless about what I want to read – and let’s face it, that’s hard to be – Super Thursday has got me on my knees, and they weren’t very good knees to begin with. For weeks I’ve been muttering a prayer that ’surely after early October there will be only a very small number of books being published for at least three months’. Please?

They started arriving in early summer with Jacqueline Wilson in the lead, and at that point I felt there was plenty of time. Just a few August and September books to read. Not too bad. Months turned to weeks and then there were days and then there was nothing.

Anyway, if I don’t end up reading a particular book, that doesn’t mean it’s bad or that I wasn’t interested. A large number of books lie waiting; either for a little love and attention a month or two late, or maybe hoping to become the surprise read next summer, or at the very least that I will love it in my retirement in the far off future.

As I didn’t start this blog just to review books, or to write exclusively about new books, I feel the time has come to have rules about how I read. On the basis that many books will have to wait for me to read while baby-sitting the great grandchildren one day, I will allow myself to read old books, and books for purely personal pleasure on a more regular basis. I just can’t decide whether to have a monthly plan, or whether to go for four of one category followed by two from another?

This way I could soon be reading I Capture the Castle and Harriet the Spy and Nesser and Theorin and all the Adrian McKintys. I have three interesting looking story collections by Chris Priestley sitting looking hopeful. Plus all the rest. Oh yes, I understand I must read The Secret Garden. Black Beauty. And one or two more.

Shorter and less frequently published books will always be appreciated.

Nominations for the 2010 Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award

The ALMA people have a long longlist of 168 nominations for next year’s award, and I won’t write them all down here. I had a little look for individual authors that you may know and be interested in:

David Almond, Quentin Blake, Aidan Chambers, Morris Gleitzman, Margaret Mahy, Michael Morpurgo, Walter Dean Myers, Axel Scheffler, Kate Thompson, Tomi Ungerer, Jacqueline Wilson and Diana Wynne Jones.

There are absolutely masses of Scandinavian writers, as well as others from countries we rarely pay attention to in the English speaking world. And then there are the organisations. Boring as it may seem to vote for a group that brings books and reading to many children, I wonder whether that is what they should do after all.

The above writers are all good and worthy, and as Sonya Hartnett found last year, five million kronor will do a lot for a person. But the good the money will do through an organisation is very different.

I also wonder why these particular authors are on the list. Presumably because they have someone who campaigns for them and who are allowed to nominate. I need to find out who does get to nominate. I can see myself nominating, you know.

Some more photos for you…

if you haven’t already had enough. In fact, here are more photos even if you have.

And that’s it. So called ‘normal’ service will resume here really soon.

‘This boy will never amount to anything’

Well, he did. Last week he received the Medal of Freedom from President Obama, accompanied by his daughter whose ‘charm is no substitute for hard work.’ I’ll get back to this father-daughter team later.

I will never ever get teenagers. Ever. Given the choice between seeing Jacqueline Wilson or Steve Cole on Sunday morning, Daughter went for Steve’s talk about his Astrosaurs. She enjoyed it a lot, although she felt she was the oldest child there. Wrong thinking I said; she was the youngest adult. Steve was so noisy I heard him through the walls. The press people apparently wondered what was going on next door to their yoghurt pod.

Meanwhile, the witch went to see Jacqueline, along with a vast number of girls and mums, and a sprinkling of dads. Jacqueline wore black jeans and a black and turquoise top, and the famous rings shone along with the bangles on her arms. She talked mainly about her teens, because the subject for the day was My Secret Diary which was out in the spring. And she did say that she might write a third autobiographical book about her time in Dundee, writing fake horoscopes and readers’ letters, as long as she can censor her diary notes a little. Sounds good to me.

As I raced along to the talk by the ‘lazy’ girl from paragraph one, Daughter was anything but lazy. Her task was to shoot Per Wästberg, part of the Meeting Sweden programme (How did they know I was going to be there this year?), when he emerged for his photo call. Except he didn’t, so when she saw a likely Swede she inquired, in Swedish, if he was Per. The poor man said he wasn’t, but took her all the way into the authors’ yurt ( a real no-no) and put her in front of this famous Swedish writer, who was even more confused with the idea of the Bookwitch blog, but posed anyway.

When the witch goes back to school, she wants to have Lucy Hawking for her science teacher. I can’t think of anyone who can talk so well and so sensibly on physics and space and anything else related. Lucy kept the attention of her roomful of children, while explaining dad Stephen’s ideas, which they have turned into two books for children. George’s Cosmic Treasure Hunt is new this year, and there will eventually be a third book about George. Lucy and Stephen are, of course, the people mentioned above. I think they turned out OK in the end.

We got to see how (not) to gargle in space. Asparagus will be a suitable crop on Mars, when the time comes. Comet’s go ‘very fast’. Robots don’t get homesick in space. The questions from the children were really very good, but not many people can say what went before the Big Bang or why it happened. Not even Lucy. And look out for the toothbrush in orbit round earth, if you happen to be up there. I asked Lucy if she wants to travel in space, and she does. Preferably to the moon. I was too shy to ask for the phone number for her co-writer for book one.

Lunch was gulped down fast, in order to catch Henning Mankell’s little publicised signing in the childrens’ bookshop. In fact, there was hardly a soul there, but I don’t think that was why he was pleased to see me. (Anyone would be pleased to see me, wouldn’t they?) He looked so morose that I addressed him in his own language, though his English is very good. The ‘mini interview’ went something like this:

‘Hello, we’ve met a few times in Gothenburg.’ ‘ Yes, I remember you.’ ‘Uh-oh, that sounds ominous’, said Daughter. ‘What do you mean?’ asked Henning. ‘Only that you may remember me for all the wrong reasons. I could be one of those bl***y old women you get everywhere.’ ‘I don’t think so. I’d have remembered. But there are a few of them around.’ ‘Yes, and I’m often one of them.’ He looked remarkably happy after this exchange. But you would, wouldn’t you, when ‘one of those’ leaves him in peace.

Next victim for a photo shoot was Klas Östergren, except he didn’t show, initially. Just as we were leaving for our next rendez vous he turned up in the rain, and as we departed he had someone’s lens half an inch from his nose. The man’s quite good looking, but that’s ridiculous.

The two witches had been invited to afternoon tea at the Roxburghe Hotel by the very, very kind Theresa Breslin, so the road was crossed, and the comfortable lounge was found. Daughter has clearly been deprived, and was very excited by the posh surroundings. Thank you Theresa, it was wonderful. The perfect respite to a busy day. And I’m not averse to similar offers, if anyone is feeling generous. Not all at once, though.

Back across the road to see Adèle Geras, and photograph her. We enticed her round the back, where all the big names get shot. As she left again, Theresa turned up, so we all trotted back to the ’studio’, whereupon the paparazzi fell out of their little pod and descended on Theresa big time.

Resting in the yurt, Klas Östergren appeared, looking for a place to be interviewed, so we offered our seats. He was also quite grateful to be encountering Swedes in a Mongolian tent in the middle of Edinburgh. He’s been brought up properly, so we shook hands.

In case nobody has noticed, my social calendar for Day 5 was quite full, really. We met up with Clare from Random (a really Randomy weekend), and apart from the fact I thought she’d have blond hair, it was as good to meet her as I’d thought. Clare brought out Bali Rai for a short chat. And more photos round the back. Predictably the paparazzi emerged again, just needing reassurance that Bali was indeed a real writer and a little famous. Even my copy of his book, City of Ghosts, was photographed. Don’t think Bali knew what hit him.

We breathed for a few minutes before trotting off to the talk by Adèle Geras and Jonathan Stroud. Really liked the way the two of them had planned it, with short introductions, followed by a reading, and ending with them asking each other questions, before letting the audience loose. Good way of doing it.

Our final port of call for the day was back in the same tent again, for the much awaited discussion with Rachel Ward, Melvin Burgess and Anne Fine. Daughter said she didn’t want to miss the Anne-Melvin encounter for anything. I wanted to see if they’d both survive it, and I think Melvin had wondered the same thing. There were one or two references made to the blasting Anne did of Melvin’s Doing It some years ago.

They were all alive and well when we left for the day. And the discussion was good.

(Photos by H Giles)

Keeping them interested

‘Children aren’t polite, they won’t finish a book if they find it boring’. The man who says this is Mårten Sandén. He has just had his 11th novel about the Petrini twins child detectives published.

I have to agree with him. Daughter and I have read half of his first Petrini book. I had this bright idea when Daughter swapped French in Y8 for ‘Swedish with Mother’ for a year, that to read modern children’s fiction would be really helpful. You know, on the same basis that I enjoyed Blyton, and later learnt English courtesy of Agatha Christie.

After extensive research I found Mårten and his books. Children’s crime, set in Lund right now, with detectives of a similar age to Daughter. Simple enough to understand, but exciting enough to persevere with.

I thought.

She didn’t have to read the book on her own; I read it aloud, a chapter a week. But whereas she probably saw it as relaxing and time away from verbs and stuff, it failed to grab her. The reading tailed off, and by the end of the school year we were only halfway. And somehow, without her I never bothered to read to the end.

I’m not saying Mårten’s books are bad or boring, but they weren’t right for us. We fared a little better with translations of Jacqueline Wilson’s The Cat Mummy and Louise Rennison’s Angus, Thongs and Full Frontal Snogging. I just had this purist idea that an original language book would be better than a translation. In this case it was clearly better with something familiar.

Maybe I’ll get back to the Petrini twins one day. To have eleven books in about as many years isn’t bad going. Swedes do like their own literature. And from what Mårten says, he will listen to criticism and change if his fans get bored.

The 2009 Branford Boase photos

Many thanks to Paul Carter, who took these photos at the Branford Boase evening at Walker Books on Thursday, and to Mary Byrne for her dedication in sending them on to the witch so very early on a Friday morning. No thanks at all to the witch, who being seriously handicapped on dial-up has had to restrain herself to only a few photos, because it would have taken most of the holiday to access many more.

There is also the embarrassing fact that while looking over all the photos, there were an awful lot of well known faces – to me – but what are their names? I went completely blank, and can’t blame it on dial-up, so it will be age related… (But I did recognise you. Honestly. We have met. And you don’t remember me either, which is only fair.)

So, here are the two winners; B R Collins who wrote The Traitor Game, and Emma Matthewson, who edited it. I wonder what it’s like to do a job where the less you are noticed, the better? I rarely think of editors. (Sorry!) Because if they’ve done a good job, you can’t tell they were ever there. When they haven’t, or when it looks like they might have been on holiday that week, that’s when I moan about editors.

This lovely man is the lovely man who sent me The Traitor Game in the first place, and who then sent lots more to people on this blog who entered a competition to win a copy. Thank you Ian Lamb!

Here is Jacqueline Wilson, back in her own shoes. I hope Philip Pullman didn’t stretch them too much last year when he wore them. Jacqueline certainly looks very radiant in all the photos from Thursday, and this isn’t the first time now that I’ve seen her not wearing black. Nice! (Not that black isn’t nice.)

Speaking of big shoes I’ll move seamlessly on to Philip Ardagh, who not only has the same taste in ties as Philip P, but who wears big shoes. For a reason.

(Photos © Paul Carter)

The Traitor Game wins the Branford Boase award

I could have been rubbing shoulders with the great and the good again, at the Branford Boase award event last night. Instead I was sitting in the Swedish sunshine, but never mind that. I’m pleased to find that another of my sudden witchy thoughts last week proved well founded, with B R Collins winning with The Traitor Game.

Having been too rushed to blog about the shortlist when it turned up, I’d half forgotten who was on it, until I went and had another look. And it’s really such a marvellous selection of first novels that I couldn’t have said which one I preferred to win, but as people may remember, I did like The Traitor Game very much.