Hello, and happy November! Somehow, it’s already TWO WEEKS since I completed my book tour for The Huntress: Sky, and I’m still reeling from the experience. The tour was a whirlwind of schools, libraries, bookshops, train journeys (and cake), and I LOVED meeting so many amazing readers. Thank you for being so inspiring! BIG thanks also to Egmont, Authors Aloud and the teachers and librarians who made the tour so successful. Here are a few of my tour highlights!
- First on the list has to be meeting so many wildly creative young readers and writers, at *deep breath* Durham Waterstones, Park View School, Durham High School for girls, Scientia Academy School, Sutton Coldfield Grammar School for Girls, Willow House Education, Farley Hill School, Gorse Ride Junior School, Prae Wood Primary School, Our Lady of Muswell Catholic Primary School, Wokingham Library and Burton Library (phew!) The children and young people I met were, as usual, absolutely incredible people – full of positivity, creativity, kindness and enthusiasm. Your imaginations were epic! You were all so enthusiastic and inventive, and I loved having photos with you & signing books. You inspired me so much and I hope you were inspired, too. Some of my favourite quotes from the writing exercises we did were: ‘My special power would be to eat time‘ (!) ‘My power would be infinite stomach‘ (YASSSSS!) ‘Why would I want to grow up? It’s just cabbages and work and lightbulbs and socks.’ Indeed – unless you rebel and become an author. We hardly ever eat cabbages, change lightbulbs, pair our socks or have ordinary working lives. Score!
- Leo the corgi – probably not a reader but an absolute angel! We met at a signing in Durham Waterstones and he stole my heart (the sneaky thief.)
- Librarians! They helped me make origami cranes as part of National Libraries Week, showed me their jaw-dropping meme walls (courtesy of Sutton Coldfield Grammar School for Girls library, which was THE BEST!), recommended amazing tapas restaurants (ahem – it was a bit of a food tour as well as a book tour, tbh), and were generally warm, welcoming, creative and passionate about books. I was even lucky enough to hang out with the 2016 LIBRARIAN OF THE YEAR at Wokingham Library.
- Meeting actual real-life Huntress fans – including the lovely Ellen who asked me to sign her slightly dogeared copies, after reading along while I did my reading – it is such an AMAZING feeling to sign an already well-loved book! HUGE thanks to those of you who are already heart-strong, loyal members of Mouse’s crew. I feel like I’m sharing this journey with you all as it unfolds.
- Cupcakes/cakes/ice-cream/etc – me and my Egmont publicist singlehandedly raided almost all the purveyors of cake in England, including a school bake-sale, which yielded these beauties…altogether now – FOOD TOUR!
