It was in Publishing News last year that I first found Oliver Jeffers, in an interview with, I think, Graham Marks. I was left with an impression of handsome biker, who was also the “in” illustrator of the moment, responsible for the World Book Day posters. I wasn’t all that interested, to be truthful.

By the time Oliver materialised at Simply Books on Friday, I’d worked up more enthusiasm, and by the time he was done, the enthusiasm level was really quite high, and not just because of the biker looks and the designer stubble. I even had the opportunity to start by translating Oliver’s request for a USB pen into something more intelligible, rendering me an aura of being almost useful.

His appeal must be fairly universal, as the people who turned up to hear him talk were of all ages, and whereas my tolerance for slide shows and power point presentations isn’t that great, this was interesting. How a picture book is made and why they are often 32 pages and how the text comes last in the printing process. And how the Americans will change his words if they don’t like them. Now, how could little boy running out of rocket fuel near the moon possibly be seen as too unrealistic?

I’d made several visits to Oliver’s website, and had had considerable problems with all the insects, until I finally worked out what’s what. And then he said he was thinking of changing it, to make it easier. I said no, not when I’ve actually got it, at last. Anyway, I’d had a good look at some of his “proper” art, and if the witch household had any spare walls, not to mention some spare cash, there would soon be a Jeffers on our walls.

Being slow (me that is), I didn’t make the connection with Hopper until Oliver mentioned it, but that will be why I loved “my” favourite painting instantly. And look, there is Hopper in the books as well. Couldn’t be better. Quite liked Michael Sowa, too, who’s another of Oliver’s favourites.

Oliver uses whatever paint feels right at the time, but seems to prefer acrylics, at least now. He also uses water colours, Dulux One Coat, and finds his white pen extremely useful. With the water colours he sloshes on too much water, adds colour and then tilts the paper from side to side, letting the colour slide this way and that. And I think Oliver said he rests the paper on a toilet roll, until the colour settles as he wants it.

He has, or had, two work areas in Belfast; one for making a mess vertically and one for making a mess horizontally. Makes sense, when you think about it. Right now he is living and working in New York, so his visit here is a short one, and supposedly so he can see his uncle. Oliver was born in Australia, grew up in Northern Ireland, which is why he has that lovely accent, and has lived in Sydney, before New York. So, very cosmopolitan. At one point he and some friends also kept posting a work of art across the Atlantic. They started with an empty book, and then added a picture, before posting it on, and on, for 36 weeks. Surprised it didn’t go missing.

His interest in how words and pictures go together made him experiment, and before he knew it he had made a picture book without meaning to. Among his favourite books by others are Maurice Sendak’s Where The Wild Things Are, and Quentin Blake’s Clown. Oliver feels young children make the best critics, because they get bored easily.

I’d say he is rather like an overgrown child himself, with his ideas. For one page in The Incredible Book Eating Boy, he photographed books which he and his brother threw into the air, to let them fall in the right way, before Photoshopping them onto the page.

After meeting a quantum physicist he thought about how people become intelligent, and took to combining oil paintings of people, with equations. Another unusual idea is to leave his mug of coffee on the paper, letting it leave a ring and then doing a picture round the coffee ring.

Oliver did typography at university, so is very keen on doing all the lettering in his books, even when it involves writing the copyright page in Spanish by hand four times because he kept making mistakes. When asked whether it’s important to have gone to university, he says it is, because then you know all the rules, before you go on to break them.

Among things he has done that aren’t picture books, is a poster for Starbucks, an ad for the big bookshop chain, cards that the Government sends to all new born babies, and something unintelligible about Orange priorities. And a Darth Vader helmet.

It doesn’t sound as if Oliver is man who struggles, but when he does, coffee helps. That and knowing there’s a mortgage that needs paying.

His next book is, supposedly, called The Great Paper Caper, and has something to do with FSC paper, but he won’t say too much. “A children’s detective thriller”.

Lost and Found is being animated, using CGI, and Oliver got his Mac out to show a short piece from the film. Absolutely adorable, are words that come to mind. However, putting his own nephew (Henry, I think) in the penguin compound at Belfast Zoo, doesn’t strike me as very nice. Henry was helping illustrate Lost and Found, but what they did find, was that he’s scared of penguins.

Well, so much for the man who wins everything or is shortlisted for everything. Good artist, but is he a good uncle? And he uses books from Belfast Central Library to paint on. Hang on; that’s what I was complaining about a couple of months ago, in regard to Daughter’s school…

And have I just lost an opportunity to interview Oliver properly in the future? This blog post is too long.

What an interesting name! And it makes for a good book title, too.

Linda Newbery emailed me months ago to say she had read this new book by Jan Page, and she thought I would like it. She pointed out it wasn’t so horribly mermaid-ish as the blurb might suggest, and Linda’s right. It’s about a young girl in Cornwall during the war, who thought she was a mermaid.

The story is told from several points of view, and in the present as well as in the past. Twins Jack and Ellen are evacuated from London to Cornwall, and their lives are changed forever.

It’s an interesting story, but I’m puzzled as to why anyone feels this is a children’s book. It’s not scary or complicated, but I would not expect most children or teenagers to have the patience required to read it. Personally I feel it’s an adult book, which just happens to deal with young people in the past. Think Rosamund Pilcher, or similar. Much of the tale is seen from the point of view of a woman of 77, looking back, and also about her problems with young people today. Adult, I think.

As Daughter and I watched, yet again, one of her favourite episodes of our favourite NCIS, I was reminded of how easy I have it. There, poor Agent McGee who writes crime novels in his spare time, found that the characters from his as yet un-finished next novel were being bumped off. So, who had access to his top-secret manuscript? We were assured that the really keen fan will search through authors’ rubbish bins for clues as to what they are writing.

The witch didn’t have to do anything as crude as that. Declan on Crime Always Pays emailed to ask if he could (!) send me his next novel as a Word document. I allowed him to do this, because I’m a kind witch. Also, because I was fairly desperate to read the new book.

The Blue Orange, as he calls it, is a continuation of The Big O, with all the same characters, except those who may have died in the first book. Plus a couple of new ones. The Big O was very funny, if rather full of four-letter words, and had endearingly inept, mostly minor, crooks.

In The Blue Orange we meet them again, and this time I found myself quite fond of even the less charming ones. It’s a mad-cap race across the Continent, with everyone ending up in Greece, where Declan has totally taken over his favourite holiday island, which I understand was quite nice before this.

As is to be expected, there are so many double-crossings that the witch developed a squint trying to cope. The best thing is simply to sit back and enjoy, while laughing quite a lot. The story is crying out to be made into a film, and I know which part I can play.

And as Mother-of-witch so rightly said, crime is not nice. But this kind of crime is as nice, and as funny, as it gets. The worst baddies are killed or have lots of blood removed in interesting ways, and maybe the rest lived happily ever after. I’m hoping for more. And sooner rather than later, Mr Burke.

Anyone who by now has the slightest inclination to read The Blue Orange, will want to murder me. The book will be out in the US in the autumn of 2009. If he gets round to it, Declan might just publish it in Ireland in the spring. 2009 again, I’m afraid.

And he is checking I’m not selling it on ebay, so I’m sorry, but there’s nothing I can do. But I just felt I had to rave about it now. I can always re-rave when the time comes.

I once started a mental list of “journey books”. By that I mean stories that are one long and difficult journey, usually walking, from A to B, done by a lone child or a group of children. These books generally require hankies, both during and after.

Linda Press Wulf’s The Night of the Burning, which is now out in paperback, is a journey book. It’s about two Jewish sisters going from Poland to South Africa. While many Jewish stories are connected to the second world war, this one starts in 1921.

Another journey book is Last Train From Kummersdorf by Leslie Wilson. This is set in Germany during the war, but it’s not primarily about Jews. So again, that makes it a little bit different. Sometimes it feels as if all war stories set in Germany are about the persecution of Jews, when in actual fact there must also have been many other children suffering hardship.

The boy Hanno and the girl Effi end up in each other’s company, and they slowly make their way to Kummersdorf, to catch a train. It takes on a sense of not being real, and you somehow doubt that they’ll ever get to Kummersdorf, or if they do, there’ll be no point in having arrived. The story is based on real events, which makes it much more poignant.

I don’t feel you can have enough of these stories, whether about Germany, the war or simply as journey books. I can sense a whole series of journey posts coming on…

I love Michelle Magorian’s books, and her new one after an exceedingly long ten years doesn’t disappoint. Just Henry continues in the same vein as Michelle’s earlier books. It’s post-war, 1949, and it’s set in the world of cinema goers.

14-year-old Henry is in his last year at school, and lives with his mother and stepfather and his little sister Molly, and his gran. It’s a house fraught with bitter disagreement, added to which you have post-war rationing and hours of queueing. There’s also the added complication of popular prejudice in those days, which is hard to understand now.

Henry’s salvation lies within the cinema. He goes several times a week, which might seem extravagant by today’s measures, but then they didn’t have television or computers. Even the radio is seen as a luxury. Through his massive interest in films, Henry makes new friends, which is lucky for him, as he soon stumbles across a mystery, which threatens to tear apart life as he knows it. He needs his new friends.

There’s a fascinating background of popular films and the history of film making, and it’s a wonderful story about woman power. The fairy godmother character in the book teaches Henry to look for diamonds in dungheaps, and there’s plenty of dung before the story ends. It’s quite a nice way of looking at things, I feel, and more people should look for diamonds. Daily, if necessary.

And I really, really don’t feel up to waiting another ten years for another book from Michelle.

My heart felt as if it was a lot further up than its normal position, as I raced through Blade, two new books by Tim Bowler.

The quality of his writing is as good as ever, but Tim is going in a new direction with these books. They are short, and for a confident reader they’ll be over in no time. It doesn’t say anywhere, but I’m guessing Tim wants to reach less able readers, and slightly older ones, too.

I’ll call him Blade, because we don’t know his name, and he is only fourteen, but very good (or should that be bad?) with a knife. Tim confesses to a terror of knives, which I probably share with him, but to be honest, I had no time to think about knife crimes per se, because of the pace of the story.

Blade, Playing Dead is first, with an almost introduction of the main character and his life on the sidelines of society. He’s already in trouble, and just ends up deeper in trouble still. But there’s something decent and likeable about him, nevertheless. Blade, surprisingly, has a love of reading, which sometimes gets him into trouble. More trouble.

In Blade, Closing In the story continues and worsens. Whatever he does and no matter how much he tries, Blade just gets deeper and deeper in his black hole. I’m a bit concerned that I felt so strongly for him, that I almost egged him on to kill a man.

I’m wondering a bit, how Tim, who is a very nice man, can even write like this. And I’ll confess here and now, to not understanding all of the slang.

The story is told in the first person, present tense, with no chapters. This adds to the reader’s agitation, and makes you go on an on. Like Blade himself, who can’t stop.

There’s to be more of these, but a cliffhanger ending, and a year to wait, Tim?

And don’t even get me started on Christmas Day. That deep seated sense of insecurity, has me look closely at my statistics. Often. Saturdays make for the Alp look. During the week, when you all should be working, you read this blog. On Sundays, apart from yesterday, you also often read the witch’s scribbles. But what do you do on a Saturday? Shop? Clean? Talk to people?

I’m thinking of letting myself have a day off every week. Looks like it should be Saturdays. And maybe Christmas Day. Nearly all of you appeared to be doing other things that day. On the other hand; were it not for the Saturday dips, the stats wouldn’t display that encouraging rise during the week.

This would be a good time to ask if in the rest of the world you also have a “different” kind of weekend this weekend? In England we have Bank Holiday Monday today, which may well account for the sluggishness yesterday. And last Thursday and Friday I had to allow for the fact that many sensible countries had not just the First of May to consider, but it was Ascension Day as well. Followed by a Friday when no sensible person would work. If you knew how many times over the years in exile, that I have tried phoning businesses in the old country on a public holiday, forgetting, because the English don’t have it. Good thing blushes can’t yet be seen over the phone.

Time to walk Daughter to the “new pencil case” shop. Progress is when you can shop till you drop on Bank Holidays.

Have you ever stopped and considered the books displayed in the Ikea bookcases in the shop? I sometimes find I start browsing the shelves, instead of admiring the rooms.

We went looking for some garden furniture the other evening, and as I just had to sample a sofa on the way, as an extra, the Resident IT Consultant started musing over where the books come from. I’ve always assumed they are remaindered books, that didn’t find a caring home even in the Swedish annual book sale. For one, there are always several copies of most books. This time I could have had a Julian Barnes in translation, without anyone noticing, as there were so many. Should perhaps invest in a garment with poacher’s pockets.

What do you think Ikea staff would say if I explained that I really, really wanted one of the books?

Some years ago the unkind corner of the witch’s heart smiled when she found books by someone she was at university with. If he had been slightly less sure of himself and been willing to talk to people other than the “in” people, except for that time when he was lost in Gothenburg and needed help, I might have felt sorry for him when seeing his books displayed in great numbers at Ikea. At least he made it internationally…

Needless to say two of the four chairs we bought were faulty.

The Derek Landy interview is now available, as some eagle-eyed readers have already discovered. I like sneaking things in to see if people notice at all. Lack of confidence, probably. This one is slightly different, with a straight Q &A part, which I don’t normally have, but which seems to work well. Many thanks to my wonderful helpers, Phoebe and Charlie. You can come and interview with me anytime. In fact, this ties in well with the mention of Hannah Pool the other day. It was Hannah who thought it was a very good idea to go round accompanied by children, when I was afraid it’d look more like a lack of babysitters. And then the dratted children grow up. But borrowing works just fine. Rather like the urge to borrow a young person to be able to use the Family Railcard discount.

I wanted to pick up The Truth About Forever again, as soon as I finished reading it. Not sure what I could do with it, but couldn’t let go. I’d spent a couple of days reading Sarah Dessen’s latest book from Puffin, resenting anything of real life that got in the way; family meals, washing machine and other stupid things. Maybe just read it again, or another book just like it. Something.

It was the same with last year’s Just Listen, so it must be a Sarah Dessen thing. Maybe I was a deprived teenager, and I’m getting what I always craved, at long last.

The Truth About Forever is about having a dead parent and needing to strive for perfection. Sarah seems to go for good girls and somewhat “bad” boys. The mothers are a bit wrong, but only so they can see the light, and always for a reason.

There are some very likeable minor characters in this book, and the way Sarah knits together meatballs and junk art and Armageddon is really quite fun.

Nice, too, to see summer holidays feature rather than the standard US High School scene yet again. Though I wouldn’t mind knowing roughly where, geographically, to visualise Sarah’s stories. This one, not too far from Atlanta, I’d guess. It might not matter, but I like to know these things.

Some of Sarah’s books were published in Britain before, by another publisher, but with not very attractive covers. I love what Puffin is doing, and the two covers so far are so sixties, flower power and up to date, that I can’t get over it. Last year I suspected that with a cover like that, the story wasn’t going to be up to much.

How wrong can a witch be?

Read Sarah Dessen!