As Daughter left the house yesterday morning she realised she was under-equipped, so came back for the forgotten mobile. Good thing she did, or she couldn’t have texted me during lessons. (Ahem, you didn’t read that here.) The glad tidings was that Caroline Lawrence, our favourite Roman is coming to Daughter’s college today. Some quick Facebooking on my part and the message from Caroline was that her train was just pulling into Stockport that very minute.

As I was getting ready to dig into my lunchtime porridge (no need to feel sorry for me) the phone rang. ‘Caroline Lawrence for you’, said the Resident IT Consultant. Oh. ‘Would we like to have tea with her?’ Yes, we would. More texting to Daughter. (Sorry, Aquinas!) Hot on the heels of all this came the very timely press release from Orion with the news that they have bought Caroline’s new book series. The Western Mysteries: The Case of the Counterfeit Injuns will be published next year (that’s a long time to wait…) and there will be four books altogether. We can’t wait.

Anyway, we took ourselves off to Caroline’s hotel for when she had finished her school event, and got there just as Caroline emerged from her taxi, looking as fresh as anything. Daughter went along to inspect Caroline’s room and both came back in raptures, which is why we all trouped up for a look after finishing two large pots of tea between us.

Two baths. One in the room and the other on the deck outside, but we felt it was a little too cold for the al fresco one.

I don’t think the hotel knew what had hit them, with requests for more tea, lemon slices and cake. We only stopped short at licking the plate clean. The tea was so good even Daughter liked it, and the lounge was very nice and did all right for photos.

We talked Westerns, obviously, with lots of info from Caroline’s many research trips. I really feel for her with all that tiresome travelling. I had another look at her Western blog, full of gun powder and other stuff on how to kill people. Can’t wait. I know I already said so, but repetition is good.
Nice gossip from the Dubai literary festival, which Caroline had just returned from, hobnobbing with Jacqueline Wilson, Garth Nix, Darren Shan and Martin Amis. That’s the life.
Her trip up north is for a couple of events at Manchester Grammar School, one yesterday and one today. And as a bonus Caroline’s number one fan James has arranged for this morning’s talk at Aquinas College, where by pure coincidence another number one fan, Daughter, can also be found. We have actually already met James at another event, which goes to show how fans keep bumping into each other. The teacher involved is so popular that he has a fan page on Facebook, or so I understand. It’s the English department who are hosting this talk on how to write novels and getting published. Daughter will leave Physics and venture into foreign lands to hear what Caroline has to say, and to take photos. So there will be an update later.
Make sure you come back.
Monday was going to be the day when I recovered from a very busy week. But then it’s not every day a real American cowgirl steps off the noon train as it draws into our little town.
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Later, as promised. I gather from Daughter that Caroline’s talk was interesting and that a good number of students had turned up for this first period of the day. Judging from the slides I’ve seen in the photos, Caroline covered some of the Roman Mysteries as well as things on writing in general. I’m hoping for some inspired future novelists, here.

(Photos by Helen Giles)