15th November 2009

Long Beach Long List

Should I be excited? Perhaps I should.

I got back from a wonderful holiday where I spent a great deal of time padding up and down a beach called Turtle Beach looking for turtles but the turtles were obviously on holiday. They were probably sitting at my desk writing my new book. I am not complaining. I expect turtles are really good at writing my stories…

I didn’t mean to mention turtles. What I meant to say was that the news I got when I came home was that ‘Two Good Thieves’ is on the long list for the Carnegie Award. I think that is pretty cheerful making but I do wonder if the long list is as long as Turtle Beach, because that is a very long beach.

Note to me: Find picture of beach. It looks a lot better than the photograph below.

12th October 2009

12th October 2009

A strange man, claiming to be the author, Will Gatti, was spotted in Hoxton Square last Friday holding a knockabout question and answer and funny voices session with Year 6 students from Whitmore School. The real Will Gatti claimed he could never look as daft as the man in this photograph and anyway, last Friday, he was in Mexico. Then he said maybe it wasn’t Mexico but somewhere like that.  We stopped talking to him because he suddenly ran off down the street to buy an almond croissant.

17th September 2009

And after The Two Good Thieves

I’ve spent the summer padding up and down wet and windy beaches on the west of Ireland trying to peer over to the other side of the Atlantic and see this little, scruffy fishing village, just down the coast from the city where Baz and Demi did all their running. It seemed to me that there was a story in that village, maybe one that tells us a little bit about where Fay came from, before she became the mother of thieves…

So that’s what Daniel is up to. The other one, Will, he’s pitching up to a festival in Hackney. It’s called the Starlit festival. Maybe he’ll see you there. I’m not sure if you’ll recognise him though because he says, he’ll be the one in disguise. It’s that Pimpernel thing again, isn’t it; everyone pretending to be someone else. It’s so confusing!

13th July 2009

Hello

Welcome to my website. Come in and have a snuffle around.

My new book Two Good Thieves has just been published. It always seems like an age between the time I have finished writing a story and when it finally emerges clad in its crisp, shiny jacket. My first signing session for the book was in Harrods which was good fun, especially since I was only about twenty paces from the pet department where I saw a puppy called a ‘cairnoodle’. What a name…

I am now in the west of Ireland writing a prequel to Two Good Thieves. In fact I am not sure that strictly speaking it is a prequel – more like a first cousin, but there you are, I am not so good at the technical terms. Anyway, thank God for the summer holidays – even if it is lashing with rain right now …