Authors Electric

The night before last, I was privileged to take part in the launch of the XPO North Festival in Inverness, at the Phoenix Ale House.  This event was hosted by the Highland Literary Salon, and was also a celebration of their work over the past 5 years. Testimony to the reality of the earnest and energetic hard work that Peter Urpeth of XPO North, and Tony Ross, Helen Forbes, and the other stalwart members of the Highland Literary Salon have been doing over the past 5 years on behalf of local authors, was the sense of interest and energy in the room 2 nights ago.  Up until that night, the reading I'd done at the Edinburgh International Book Festival in 2002, which I'll always remember as a wonderful, special day, going on really from 12 noon in Edinburgh til around midnight, and containing myriad fascinating interactions, unpredictable "in-betweens" scattered throughout the day - up until 2 nights ago that reading in Edinburgh which had been organised b...

After not being in London since last time I was there (!) (to appear on the Indie Author Panel at London Book Fair 2012 with Joni Rodgers, Dan Holloway, and Linda Gillard, which was the launch event for the Alliance of Independent Authors)...I once more find myself in possession of Train tickets south to the Metropolis...(and this time even a Hotel Room booking, instead of sitting up all night on a 12-hour train journey like last time!)... From 4pm to 7.30pm on Friday 17th April...(i.e. this Friday coming)...the XPONorth-sponsored Indie Author Fair at Foyles Bookshop on Charing Cross Road, London, will be open to the public FREE (including free drinks and even some free author swag from what I hear!)... You'll find myself and 6 other authors at the XPONorth table, and if acquaintances Auld or New would like to come over and say Hello, well, that is what we are travelling South for! This event has, at last, jolted me into producing paperback copies of The Survival of Thomas Fo...