Robin Stevens's Blog, page 66

The SCBWI conference – and a love-letter to libraries

This weekend, I went to the annual SCBWI (Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, pronounced like Shaggy’s crime-solving doggy pal) conference in Winchester. I love the support network SCBWI provides to writers and illustrators and I love the conference – it’s a chance to connect with other authors, all in different stages of their careers, share wisdom and writing tips, and generally talk about the thing we love best: children’s books. (And wine. And cake).

Because Murder Most Unladylike launched this year, I got to be part of the annual Mass Book Launch at the Saturday night party.

The Mass Book Launch – photo by Candy Gourlay

I got to see my book on a cake, which is a particularly exciting lifetime achievement in my head.

The book launch cake!

Murder Most Unladylike on the cake!

I also had the pleasure of meeting Zoe, the very first ever Murder Most Unladylike scholar: she’s using it as an example in her MA essay on lessons in children’s fiction!

With Zoe and her bookmarked copy!

As part of the Conference, I listened to incredible, inspirational talks by some of my own writer heroes: Sally Gardner, Nick Butterworth, and my newest favourite author, Cathy Cassidy. I’m ashamed to say that I’d never read any of Cathy’s books before I heard her speak on Saturday, but she was so incredible about books and writing that as soon as she was finished I leaped out of my seat and dashed to the book stall to buy Cherry Crush, the first in her Chocolate Box Girls series. I read it on the train home yesterday, and it’s brilliant. It’s smart and thoughtful and brave, just like Cathy herself – which brings me to the second (and more important) part of this post. Cathy spoke wonderfully about how she became an author, but she also talked about what books mean to her, and what they mean to all of the children who read her novels.

Books, said Cathy, give children belief. They let them see themselves as they are and imagine ways in which their lives could be different – and that’s why libraries, purveyors of free books to any child who wants them, are so crucial. Reading is not a luxury, it is essential – and because of this Cathy asked us all to join her fight to stop Mayor Anderson from closing down 11 Liverpool libraries. I absolutely support the campaign, and I want to use this blog to tell both the Mayor and the rest of the world why what she and so many other authors are already doing is so important. So, Mayor Anderson, I hope you’re listening. This is what I want to say.

I’m not a member of a library. That may seem ironic, given what I’ve just said, but that’s not the whole story. What I mean when I say that I’m not a member of a library is that I’m not a member of a library now. And that’s because I’m lucky. I’m lucky to have a job that pays well enough to give me a disposable income that I largely spend on books. I’m lucky that my job is in the book industry, so I’m surrounded by books all day and encouraged to take them home in the evening. I’m lucky because I’m a (relatively) wealthy, educated adult.

But, like all of us, I used to be a child. My disposable income used to be £2 per week, which was enough for several Refreshers bars or a very small Sylvanian but did not, obviously, cover a £5.99 paperback. Again, I was disgustingly lucky, as children go – my parents owned a large number of books, and often let me buy more. But that didn’t fill up the yawning hole inside me that needed more stories, and more, and more, all the time and every day. So I went to the library. My mother helped me get a card for the Oxford public library, and we visited at least once a week. Just stepping through those doors sent me absolutely dizzy with excitement: the whole place smelled of books, there were more books than I could ever read all around me, and they were all mine. So many of the books that made me who I am, both as a person and as a writer, I first encountered in that building: Diana Wynne Jones, Terry Pratchett, Lucy M. Boston, Noel Streatfeild, Dick King-Smith … It’s a neverending list. I read those books and suddenly saw my ambition as a real possibility: to have my book on a shelf next to them one day.

As I grew up, I kept on using libraries, for school and university, and again I was lucky to have access to them. I couldn’t have got the A-levels or the degrees I did without them. But that wasn’t when I needed libraries the most. That moment came after I had finished my MA. I was looking for a job in publishing, every single day, and getting nowhere. For the first time ever I was trying very hard and failing, which was strange and scary and utterly demoralising. I didn’t know what I should do, whether I was on the right track or not. I didn’t really have a reason to get up in the morning. And then I joined my local public library.

Suddenly, I had a nice, warm, free place to go every day. I had a reason to leave the house. I had something to aim for, something to occupy my time, a place where I could get new ideas for the writing I was still doing when I wasn’t jobhunting. It made me feel as though I had value, it made me remember what a day with structure in it was like, and it was one of the little things that kept me clinging on, even when I couldn’t see light at the end of the tunnel.

Several months later, I got a job, and now I am one of the happy, striving taxpayers that this government is so very fond of. But I don’t know if I could have got to this point without my local public library, and that is why I cannot understand why it is even thinkable to deny the millions of people still struggling with poverty and joblessness a place of refuge, a place that keeps their dreams alive, a place where they can gain the skills they need to move into work.

Libraries are not for me. They are not for the rich and the powerful. They are there because some people are not rich, or powerful. They are there because those people need to have dreams, and they need to see that those dreams could become a reality. There is always budget for what is truly important, and libraries are exactly that. They deserve to be valued. Please, please, don’t close them down.

And if you agree with me and Cathy, please contact the Mayor on his website. We may not win out, but we have to try.

A Carnegie nomination and a cover reveal!

A Carnegie bunbreak

On Monday I had some really incredible news: Murder Most Unladylike has been nominated for the 2015 CILIP Carnegie Award!

I’m absolutely over the moon, and completely amazed to be part of a list that contains so many of my own very favourite authors and books. I’m so proud of all of my fellow nominees – everyone is so deserving – and just delighted about my own nomination. Thank you so much, librarians! I’m in your debt forever.

And that’s not all! The design team at my lovely publishers, Corgi, have been hard at work, and they’ve just shared the absolutely phenomenal cover for the third Wells & Wong Mystery, First Class Murder, with me. And today, they’re letting me show it to you!

Are you ready?

Here goes!

My love for these covers grows with every new one I see. I think this is phenomenal – the dagger in the lettering! The train! The girls’ poses! – and the red is so bold and beautiful. It’s going to stand out amazingly well in its own right, and connect perfectly with the first two covers. My cover artist Nina Tara, and Laura Bird and the Corgi design team have absolutely outdone themselves, and I couldn’t be more delighted.

I can’t tell you much about First Class Murder yet – although if you want to find out a bit about my research process (ahem), visit this post here – but I do know that current plans are for it to publish some time in late summer 2015. I can’t give a more specific date, because schedules move a lot in publishing, but that’s what we’re working towards at the moment. I’m excited already!

 

October News Round-Up – Awards, Blogs and Appearances

Hello readers! I have lots of exciting news to tell you about. On Monday, Murder Most Unladylike won two Book Blogger UKYA Awards – for Best Crime/Mystery and Best Friendship.

I’ve also been blogging:

– At Mugglenet, discussing why I think that Harry Potter is a crime series.

– At Girls Heart Books, talking about why we love reading detective novels so much.

And if you’d like to see me in person, you’re in luck!

– On October 14th, I’ll be speaking at a SCBWI Professionals event, about what authors and illustrators should expect from the publishing journey – what their publishers will do for them, and what they should be doing for themselves.

– On November 8th, at 1pm, I’ll be at Waterstones Cambridge to talk about Murder Most Unladylike, sign copies of the book and help you create your very own top secret Detective Society.

– On November 15th, at 4pm, I’ll be at Tower Hamlets’ WriteIdea Festival to introduce Tanya Byrne, author of Follow Me Down and Heart-Shaped Bruise.

So please, come see me if you’re in the area! Happy October to you all.

Murder Most Unladylike is the winner of two UKYA Book Blogger Awards!

I’m absolutely delighted to announce that Murder Most Unladylike has won an incredible two UKYA Book Blogger Awards.

It has won Best Crime/Mystery and Best Friendship (for Daisy and Hazel). I am so grateful to everyone who voted, and so impressed with all of the brilliant UK bloggers who organised the awards. And I’m delighted to be in the company of so many of my own favourite authors and books. Thank you all! You’ve made me a very happy author.

Author on the Orient Express

Being the author of a series means constantly living in the future of your books (which, for me, still happens to be the past – I’m very temporally confused). The next Wells & Wong Mystery that you’ll read is Arsenic for Tea, out in the UK and Ireland on 29th January 2015 and available for pre-order now. For me, though, Arsenic for Tea has already happened, and the book I’m currently working on is Daisy and Hazel’s third adventure, First Class Murder.

Murder Most Unladylike is a boarding school murder mystery, Arsenic for Tea is a country house murder mystery, and First Class Murder is a train murder mystery . . . and not just any train. It takes place on a certain rather famous 1930s train, the Orient Express. And that’s the reason why yesterday I took the world’s best author research trip.

No, I didn’t go to Venice. But what I did do is take a five-hour tour of the Kent countryside, departing and arriving from Victoria Station, in Pullman dining carriages that have been restored to their original ridiculous 1930s beauty as part of the Venice Simplon-Orient-Express. The Orient Express itself would have been blue and cream rather than brown and cream, with three dining carriages to 11 Wagons Lit (sleeping cars), but what we saw was otherwise pretty much what my characters would have experienced. I’m enormously grateful to train manager Jeff Monk, who very kindly responded to my bonkers author questions (‘But would there have been ice cream?’), and to the train staff, who let me take hundreds of photos of window locks and curtains and their uniforms.

The train arrives!

I prepare to board our coach, Minerva.

Minerva was originally built in the 1920s and ran throughout the 1930s. Perfect!

Our table. The chairs were real, moveable armchairs.

Minerva carriage

The marquetry. Oh, the marquetry. And an instruction about what to do in case of an unexpected emergency…

Off we go!

The beautiful place setting. The crest was always at the top, and the knives and forks and crystal glasses were ALWAYS rattling as the train moved. Pouring a drink was a difficult activity!

Serving soup. Everything came in large tureens, and nothing was spilled, which was amazing.

Oh, the food. This was a creamy apple and blackberry pudding. The Orient Express would have had a chiller, but not a freezer – no ices for Daisy and Hazel!

Exploring – the rather fancy bathroom!

The BEAUTIFUL Art Deco lighting in carriage Audrey.

More marquetry, and a window.

Very tight squeeze in the corridors.

The door outside. So secure . . .

Dancing to the band

Authoring

A peaceful afternoon photo.

We had a completely brilliant time, and I have learned some very important things, such as: 1930s trains have weird suspensions. They bounce. They are also very loud, and when you move through them you have to constantly re-adjust the way you’re standing so that you don’t fall over. I’m now going to go back to my manuscript and add in a lot of people staggering about and not being able to hear each other. Authoring really is an enormous amount of fun.

Woman’s Hour: hooray for boarding school books!

Yesterday, Woman’s Hour ran a piece on the enduring popularity of boarding school fiction. In an unlikely but delightful turn of events, I was asked to be one of the guests (Amanda Craig was the other), and now the whole episode is available to listen again online. We’re on at about 35 minutes in, but if you’d like to skip straight to the piece, here’s a link to the section itself.

It’s so brilliant that we got to have a discussion about children’s books on national radio, and I’m delighted that I was able to take part. The whole thing went bewilderingly quickly – Amanda managed to squeeze in a few recommendations, but even though I had a long list of contemporary twists on the genre I wanted to mention, I talked about . . . er, none of them. So if you’re now looking for some boarding school novel reading inspiration, here are our recommendations in full.

The books that Amanda mentioned:

BESWITCHED by Kate Saunders

This is a boarding school novel that’s also a time-travel novel. This and Kate’s new book, Five Children on the Western Front, has been highly recommended to me, and I’m very much looking forward to reading them.

THE MOUNTWOOD SCHOOL FOR GHOSTS by Tony Ibbotson

A lovely, batty and delightfully ghastly book about a boarding school for ghosts, this is by Eva Ibbotson’s son Toby, based on an idea she was working on before her death.

THE GLASS BIRD GIRL by Esme Kerr

A contemporary thriller set in a strict all-girls’ boarding school – sort of an edgier Noel Streatfeild for the 21st century.

 

And the books that I had on my list:

FOLLOW ME DOWN by Tanya Byrne

A very murderous, very noir YA take on the boarding school novel, I love how Tanya problematises the genre. Her narrator, Adamma, is from Nigeria, and her boarding school is a terrifyingly dangerous and uncertain place. Full disclosure: I think Tanya and her books are brilliant, and I’ll be introducing her at the Tower Hamlets WriteIdea Festival on the 15th November. If you’re in the area, I strongly encourage you to come along!

SAY HER NAME by James Dawson

A cracking YA ghost story (in the Point Horror style) set in a strict boarding school. James gets the cliques and rules of a girls’ school absolutely right – one to buy this Hallowe’en.

 

THE LIVES OF CHRISTOPHER CHANT by Diana Wynne Jones

I picked this because it backs up one of the points I made – that boarding school fiction is essentially fantasy. The main character, Christopher, can travel between worlds. He finds one that’s our idea of the perfect fantasy setting (magic! Gods! Danger and excitement!), and in it he discovers a girl who’s the living aspect of a goddess. And she’s obsessed with Angela Brazil novels. She’s a powerful magic-user, but all she wants to do is to go back to Christopher’s world so that she can go to boarding school.

PEA’S BOOK OF HOLIDAYS by Susie Day

Susie Day writes the most brilliant updated Enid Blyton stories for the 21st century – cosy, jolly adventures that are also quite sharp critiques of some of the bigger issues with Blyton’s fiction. Can you enjoy Enid Blyton books when the only characters who look like you are the golliwogs? What if you don’t have a father – or you have two mums instead of one? Pea’s Book of Holidays also contains a very funny second-hand account of an absolutely dire performing arts boarding school. Clever and fun.

 

 

 

 

 

 

And, of course . . . my books. We all talked about MURDER MOST UNLADYLIKE, my own take on the 1930s boarding school novel (and the 1930s crime novel – as I mentioned, there is a murder in it, although quite a polite one). It’s the first in a series, and the second book, ARSENIC FOR TEA, will be out in the UK in January and is available for pre-order now.

Thank you to all who tuned in yesterday! I’d love to hear about your own boarding school favourites, both new and old. What books did you read growing up, and what books do you love now?

Newsflash: have a bunbreak with Woman’s Hour!

I have some very exciting news to tell you about!

On Thursday 2nd October at 10am, Woman’s Hour will air a piece on the enduring popularity of boarding school fiction. They’ll be interviewing Amanda Craig, and they’ll also be interviewing me.  I’ll be talking (hopefully coherently) about Malory Towers, St Clares and Deepdean – so if you’re free, please do listen in, and make sure you bring tasty supplies. You’ll be able to have a bunbreak with me!

US and UK giveaways!

As you may have heard, Murder is Bad Manners (the American edition of Murder Most Unladylike) has been chosen by the ABA as one of its Indies Introduce picks for spring 2015. I can’t get over how brilliant this is – I am genuinely honoured, and a bit overwhelmed.

So, to celebrate this, I’m holding a special giveaway for my American and Canadian readers. Up for grabs is one copy of Murder is Bad Manners, not available in the USA until April 2015. The lucky winner will be able to read the book six months before the rest of North America – and I’ll even sign and personalise it (just don’t ask me to draw anything for you).

All you need to do is comment below with your favourite sweet treat (it could be cake, cookies, pie, candy or anything else) – as Hazel and Daisy will teach you, good detectives need to boost their little grey cells with regular bunbreaks.

The competition is open now, and will close on 1st October at 12pm EST. Only Americans and Canadians may enter – I reserve the right to pick another winner if it turns out you’re from Walthamstow.

But if you are from Walthamstow, never fear: I have something for you as well! I’m currently blogging at Girls Heart Books, and the wonderful people at Random House have given me three copies of Murder Most Unladylike to give out as part of the GHB September giveaway. Head over to the site now to answer a question and put yourself into the running to win a copy of the book!

Event announcement: Demystifying the Publishing Process

*puts editorial hat on*

Are you a soon-to-be-published author? Have you just signed a contract with a publishing house? Has your book just been released? Are you working on that difficult second novel? If so, you may be unsure of what to expect, what you should be doing now and what your publisher should be doing for you. But never fear! Help is at hand!

On Tuesday 14th October, I’ll be appearing as part of a SCBWI Professional event, alongside Rosi Crawley, PR Manager of Hot Key Books, and Joanna Moult, agent and founder partner of Skylark Literary, to help demystify the publishing process.

Our panel, chaired by Non Pratt (author of Trouble and previously editor at Catnip Publishing), will try to explain an author’s rights and responsibilities, and lay out the long and slightly bizarre journey from signed contract to books on shelves.

The event will cost £12 for SCBWI members (£18 for non-members) and it will take place from 6:45pm to 8:45pm, in

St James Piccadilly Conference Room 

197 Piccadilly

London

W1J 9LL

If you’d like to book, please email profseries@britishscbwi.org.

I hope you’ll all come along!

Author events and school visits!

What a week it’s been! On Thursday I went to Oxford and signed stock at Waterstones and Blackwell’s. I also held my first ever author event, at Waterstones Oxford. I’m very pleased to be able to say that it went swimmingly – the young detectives I met were all absolutely worthy of membership in the Detective Society, and we had a very interesting discussion about murder, ducklings and biscuits.

Four young detectives show off Murder Most Unladylike

And here they are with me! We are plotting terrible things . . .

They reminded me that I really should get on and create a Facebook author page – and so I did. You can now like RobinStevensAuthor on Facebook to keep up to date with my author news, events and giveaways.

They were also very interested in where I went to school, and whether it was really like Daisy and Hazel’s school, Deepdean. Well, it just so happens that on Saturday, I was lucky enough to be invited back to look around my real school, Cheltenham Ladies’ College.

I have to point out for the sake of legality (and also truth) that none of the teachers or girls in Murder Most Unladylike are at all real, and that Deepdean School is not the school I went to. But there are certain similarities between the real place and what ended up on the page that I want to share with you here . . .

Here is the playing field. Behind me you can see a pitch that bears great similarity to the place where Hazel has her argument with Lavinia, and my face is the face that Hazel makes when she thinks about games lessons.

My fifth form boarding house . . . which, incidentally, looks rather a lot like Hazel and Daisy’s.

Town entrance (which might double as North Wing. Miss Bell’s car not pictured).

West Wing (also known as Old Wing) Entrance (beware of the girls)

The Marble corridor (do you recognise those black and white tiles?)

The horrible corridor between the Hall and the Gym . . .

. . . and the Gym itself! But what’s that stain on the floor?

Luckily, there was an author on the case.

Then I went up to the balcony to look for further clues . . .

And it all went wrong.

Happily, I was revived. Here I am with Amanda Silk, my English teacher (you may recognise her from the book’s dedication).

And here’s one of the music rooms, rather similar to the room where Inspector Priestley holds his denouement.

And (this was the most exciting) as we were leaving, we found a real bunbreak in progress!

Then we went into Cheltenham itself – and if you happen to be looking for signed copies of Murder Most Unladylike and you live near Cheltenham, you’re in luck! Waterstones Cheltenham now has signed stock – quick, go grab one before they’re gone!