Edinburgh

 It's August so it must be time for Edinburgh International Book Festival!

This year we went for four days and tried to pack in as much as possible (along with seeing the sights of Edinburgh and catching a variety of shows at the Fringe Festival)

Having won tickets to the event Protest! with Phil Jupitus, Hollie McNish, Hannah Silva and Elvis McGonagall we went along to see what performance poetry was about.

Phil Jupitus was the "anchor" that brought them all together and he told us a little of performance poetry in the UK and how he got into it. I was intrigued that bands on tour used to have a supporting poet rather than, as now, a supporting band. But these poets were generally delivering protest poems - protest being the 'thing' to be into throughout the 60s and 70s. Phil Jupitus, who 'supported' the likes of The Style Council, gave us some of his poetry from then and also some of his more recent work.

Elvis McGonagall then followed and had the audience laughing along to some of his older poetry as well his more modern stuff. His style was extremely different  and entertained in a different but just as compelling.

Hannah Silva's work was extremely different and frankly I was sceptical at first. Using a foot operated sound machine she recorded, played back and edited her own voice to create poetry - and there can be no other name for it - that really blew me away. It was poetry that can only be listened to, not read, and it left a mark on me like no other poetry ever has. It was fantastic and a completely new experience.

Last, and certainly not least!, was Hollie McNish. Her poetry, although more conventional, was fast, modern, highly topical and still very entertaining.

All these poets left me wondering.. If I had attempted to read their work would I have got as much from it?

Meanwhile Maryom headed to the other side of town to see author/illustrator Jackie Morris at The Golden Hare bookshop in the Grassmarket. This was a joint story-telling and painting session, with Jackie reading her own Song of the Golden Hare and children colouring in their versions of the book's illustrations. Lots of Jackie's books were there on display - even early copies of Something About a Bear (published in October '14 by Frances Lincoln) and Cat Walk (September '14 by Graffeg) both of which will be launched at Solva Woollen Mill in Pembrokeshire. Jackie also talked about her current project involving feathers which are being sent to her from all over the world - see here for how to join in.

We find that the book festival is a great place for meeting friends and authors whose work you have appreciated and this year The Mole came face-to-face with Kirkland Ciccone whose book Conjuring The Infinite won Catalyst Book Award this year. Kirkland does quite a few school visits and is known for his spotted shirt - something that helped me find him amongst the throng of festival goers. Sitting in the bookshop cafe, drinking tea and enjoying a scone, he explained a little about his much awaited second book, The Endless Empress, and told me that the genre of young adult fiction fantasy is not one he is likely to desert in the near future and if Conjuring The Infinite is anything to go by then he certainly shouldn't. Good luck Kirkland!

Maryom had hoped to catch James Mayhew's Big Draw event on the Sunday - but it was just too popular with children and parents queuing to get in. She managed to meet up afterwards though for a very brief chat. James was at the Book Festival as Illustrator-in-residence to celebrate 25 years of his Katie books which introduce art to children by stepping through the picture frame.

Monday was time for another brief meeting - this time with Linda Strachan, author of several YA novels (Don't Judge Me, Spider, Dead Boy Talking)  and the Hamish McHaggis series for younger readers. Unfortunately Linda's Bookfest events took place after we'd left but it was lovely to catch up and hear a little insider gossip about her up-coming projects.


On Monday evening Maryom made her way to the joint Michele Forbes/Donal Ryan event, which she'd been looking forward to since the holiday was booked. Michele Forbes was a bit of an unknown quantity but Donal Ryan's novels have made a huge impact on her. Both writers are from Ireland - Michele Forbes' debut novel, Ghost Moth, is set in Belfast, alternating between the 1960s and 1940s; Donal Ryan's two novels are set in a small country town around the time of the Celtic Tiger economic boom of the late '90s and the subsequent crash. The writers talked,of course, about their books and the inspirations behind them - it was interesting to discover that Donal Ryan's first published book The Spinning Heart had actually been the second to be written, which explains the plot spoiler within it for The Thing About December. Then there were questions from the audience followed by the all-important chance for a few private words with the authors while books were signed.

And in between all this there was also time for soaking up the sun in a deckchair or two...










.....catching sight of Nicholas Parsons, Chris Brookmyre and Tom Rob Smith signing books after their events, and spotting Phil Jupitus again, browsing in the bookshop.

James Mayhew at The National Gallery of Scotland

James as "Van Gogh"

post by The Mole

In parallel to the Edinburgh Fringe and the Edinburgh International Book Festival there are other events running and each year in Edinburgh and the National Gallery generally put on an event. This year, once again, they invited James Mayhew to come along and tell stories while painting a picture from the story.

This year he was sat beside a painting that included Cupid and this was the theme for his first story - a story that was totally new to me. The story was of Venus' (Cupid's mother) jealousy of Psyche who was judged to be more beautiful than her. The gallery was busy and despite the relatively quiet voice that James has the gallery became almost silent as people listened, totally captured by his telling of and and fascinated as the blank page came to life.

He then told the story of the Firebird... one that I was more familiar with but not with this rendition. Once again the room was captivated and silent except for James' storytelling. Afterwards James explained to us the origins of the story and how the number of variations came about. Not only is James an extremely accomplished artist and story teller but extremely well versed on myths and legends too.

His latest book in the 'Katie' series is Katie and the Starry Night. I cannot sum the Katie books up better than in the synopsis for his latest book "James Mayhew created Katie as a way to make art accessible to all children. He has been bringing art to life for over twenty years and is a much-loved author/illustrator".

If James is in an event near you at anytime then take the opportunity to go along and be dazzled. Even if you have no children - but if there are children you can take then they will be sure to enjoy it.

Read more on James Mayhew, his books and events over at his blog

Edinburgh International Book Festival 2012

This year we timed our annual holiday so as to spend a week in Edinburgh to take in events at the festival as well as meet people and step outside a bit and enjoy fringe events too.

The first week was to be our week and we set aside just 3 days to attend the festival but what we didn't realise is that the festival is actually addictive and that we quickly changed that to 6 days, so if you plan on attending the festival at all then be warned!

We met and made a lot of friends and attended events and book signings and here are but a few.

i) Alan Bissett - Maryom chatted about Pack Men and how it is not just for male football fans. We also saw Alan at the Festival Cafe (a BBC Scotland radio show) where he talked about and performed a brief excerpt from his one man fringe show for arachnophobes - extremely funny, catch him if you can.

ii) Barry Hutchinson - We talked with Barry and other Scottish authors about the difficulties caused by branding books as 'Scottish' and how buyers in England avoid such books for some reason perhaps in the belief that they are "all haggis and tartan".

iii) Linda Strachan - We chatted about many things and had a sneak preview of the cover for Don't Judge Me, her next teen novel to be published by Strident in Autumn.

iv) Keren David and Cat Clarke talked about motivations for writing, methods of writing and other things and read from their latest books and The Mole discussed with Cat Clarke the character with which she identifies and although we disagreed on choice her father was in agreement with The Mole.

v) Keith Charters  - We chatted at length on many subjects surrounding publishing and many NOT publishing related.

vi) Matt Cartney - We chatted about several things... but more on this meeting in a later post.

vii) Edward Wilson talked of his route to writing spy thrillers and read from his  book.

viii) James Mayhew - We saw him story telling and painting in a way that he does so well.

ix) S J Watson signed Maryom's copy of Before I Go To Sleep and chatted about it and the publicity campaign surrounding it.

And one of the great things is that at the festival you can meet so many people by chance..while in the yurt, apparently Neil Gaiman walked past and we missed him, we brushed passed and chatted with Nicola Morgan in the bookshop and we met and chatted with Victoria Campbell as well as brushing past an Archbishop.

The problem is that you cannot do everything you want to do and we missed many people. There were also so many authors and friends we would like to have met in the second week, but sadly due to the GCSE results day in England then it had to be the first week only.

Katie In Scotland by James Mayhew

A Scottish Treat
review by Maryom

We were wondering where to start our little series relating to the Edinburgh Book Festival - and decided on something that wasn't actually part of it! Although James Mayhew was appearing at the Book Festival, the event I wanted to catch was a story-telling session at the National Gallery, where he held the audience entranced and I bought myself this little souvenir afterwards.

Many of you may have encountered Katie on her adventures around - and through - famous paintings. This time though, Katie is off on a different sort of adventure - to Scotland where she encounters the country's most famous resident, Nessie! Along with Katie's brother Jack and Grandma, they journey round Scotland, seeing the sights and having lots of fun!

My special interest in this Katie adventure comes from having watched it develop on James Mayhew's Katiespictureshow blog - from preliminary pencil sketches, through roughed out paintings to finished article. I just wish Katie has been able to visit my favourite areas of Scotland - the West Coast and Hebridean Islands with their turquoise seas, white sands and Scotland other famous beast - the Highland Midge! Maybe another time she will.....

Publisher - Orchard
Genre - children, picture book

Buy Katie in Scotland from Amazon

Edinburgh Book Festival 2011

We had planned a Road Trip around Scotland for our holiday and when we realised that with a bit of tweaking to our holiday plans it would be possible to catch a James Mayhew story-telling event live in Edinburgh, we decided we had to!

As this was taking place at the same time as the Edinburgh International Book Festival, we found that several author and publisher friends would be there on the day so put together arrangements to meet up and say "Hi" to as many as possible. It is a frustration that the timetable of events is not publicly announced for the book festival earlier as that would have given us the ability to re-plan more of our holiday to catch some of the events and maybe meet more people.

The first thing on our itinerary was to go to the National Gallery to see James Mayhew and quite a crowd was gathered to watch as James told the story of Baba Yaga and her house on chicken legs followed by the tale of St George and the Dragon. James was every bit as spell-binding in real life as on the web as he told the stories. He not only tells the tale but illustrates it as he goes - and upside down (the illustration that is, not James). I wish we'd been allowed to video him but the gallery's rules forbid photography of any kind.

After this we ambled up to Charlotte Square where the Edinburgh International Book Festival was in full swing, passing street performers for the fringe and collecting flyers for other events as we went. Now, when I first talked about going to Edinburgh International Book Festival as part of our summer road-trip, the teen (14) wasn't too impressed - standing around while I talked to people is NOT her idea of fun - but when one of her friends asked her to collect autographs and writing tips for him, she got a lot more enthusiastic.
We'd arranged to meet with Linda Strachan and Nicola Morgan at the authors' yurt - which proved a little trickier than we'd expected as it's location is kept secret from the general public! Fortunately there were helpful stewards around to send us in the right direction. Both Linda and Nicola are writers of YA fiction (amongst other things) which we've both enjoyed. I've met Linda before, when I was in Edinburgh at Easter, and Nicola was someone I felt I knew from many conversations with her through Twitter - though I would say she wasn't as crabbity in real life as she claims to be! - and she presented me with one of her special 'crabbit old bags' which I will use at future book festivals. (Many thanks, Nicola) Also with them was Emma Barnes (Author of Jessica Haggerthwaite: Witch Dispatcher and How (Not) to Make Bad Children Good).
Nicola, Linda and Emma were the first authors to be cornered by the Teen in her autograph hunt and Teen started to find people who talked to her like she wasn't a child and became rather more involved. We could happily have spent much longer chatting about holiday plans, midges, what reviewers do when they really dislike a book etc but everyone had events to go to.
Leaving the Mole checking out one of the festival's bookshops - where he'd found some of his reviews posted (4) - The Teen and I went on an Author Hunt to see how many autographs we could bag. Now, rather unfairly perhaps, we hadn't had time to go to anyone's event and we hadn't bought their books but just tagged onto the end of the 'author signing' queues but everyone we approached was most welcoming and willing to pass on their writing tips for the Friend. A special mention must go to Simon Puttock who I disrupted full flow when a friend I'd been hoping to meet walked past - sorry, Simon. We also were privileged to catch an impromptu re-run of Jasper Fforde's event, performed along with Philip Ardagh, for some unfortunate New Zealand fans who'd arrived 5 minutes too late for the real thing and not been allowed in - I'm not sure how much resemblance this held to the original but certainly deserved an award for Best Comedy Performed By Children's Authors.

We finished the day by meeting Keith Charters, children's author and, like us, a grow-your-own enthusiast and getting thrown out of Pizza Hut because the staff had homes to go to apparently. While we asked a lot of questions it was also nice to answer questions about our minor contribution in the process. But it was also nice to talk about other things that make people people!

Many thanks to everyone for their time in the day and it's a shame we couldn't have spent more time in Edinburgh!

Reading for Babies.

Maryom's Top Three Books to read and share with babies - and one that got away.

All of these are available as board-books. A wonderful picture book can be lovely to look at but sometimes a book needs to be able to withstand a bit of hammer - being chewed, thrown around, dropped from the buggy, having to be wiped down.. which is where baby friendly board books come in.

Top of my list just HAS to be
Guess How Much I Love You by Sam McBratney and Anita Jeram.

I bought this as an alleged 'first Christmas present' from my daughter , then 7 months, for my husband (along with an 'I LOVE DADDY' bib) I actually hadn't expected it to be READ as a book - I thought it would just get chewed and mauled, but my husband sat down with her and read it and then started doing the 'actions' along with little nut brown hare - I love you this much - stretching his arms wide .. I think at first it was these actions that caught my daughter's attention - she was just at the age when babies start to copy. By the time she could toddle my daughter would fetch this book thrust it at people and expect to have it read then and there.

Peepo by Janet and Allan Ahlberg

is a different sort of book - no actions here but filled with rhythm and rhyme, and of course pictures of the Baby! I'm sure someone knows why, I don't, but babies are fascinated with pictures and photos of other babies - in books, on TV. With each verse, there's a hole to peep through at the Baby - great for a child of 6 months or so, just learning to play Peepo with Mum or Dad.

Peace At Last by Jill Murphy

the tale of poor Father Bear who is unable to get to sleep for all the noises he can hear at night. There's lots of opportunity with this book to have fun making the noises - Mrs Bear's snoring, Baby Bear's aeroplane noises, brrr of the fridge, tick tock of the clock. Some of them your baby may start to join in with.

And the one that got away
Can You See A Little Bear? by James Mayhew and Jackie Morris

This one I've only discovered since my daughter has grown too old for baby books. Lots of bears to hunt on the pages, the repetition of 'can you see a little bear?' as he gets up to all sorts of things and the most gorgeous illustrations for a baby's book ever.

Buy Guess How Much I Love You from Amazon
Buy Peepo! (Viking Kestrel Picture Books) from Amazon
Buy Peace at Last from Amazon
Buy Can You See a Little Bear? from Amazon