Authors Electric

Last year I joined a delightfully old-fashioned debating society. New members are voted in by the black ball/white ball system, where the appropriate ball is put in a box, and the results counted (origin of the term to blackball someone). Speeches are strictly limited in time, and no one is allowed to speak more than once other than the proposer and opposer, and no one is allowed to interrupt. In these days of unbridled rudeness on programmes such as Question Time, when the whole panel may be clamouring to get their point across, this is refreshingly civilised. This term we have a topic that may be of interest to those reading this – This House believes that the best children’s books have been written in the last fifty years. I would be very interested to have some replies here, to see what other people think. Of course, in true debating style, first we have to establish what is meant by best , by child , by written and then, in these electronic times, what is meant by book . ...

A Sterkarm Tryst by Susan Price The first reviews I ever had were for a radio play, and it was a salutary experience. At twenty-eight my self-confidence was not of the highest order, and the column and a half of invective I had in the Times was devastating. Fortunately I had a middling review from The Guardian , and a brilliant one from the Financial Times , otherwise I might have stopped writing altogether, like someone I knew who never picked up a pen again. Rule one for a writer: develop a thick skin. It was good training for online reviews, though, although how objective I manage to be is another matter. I had two kids conducting an online battle for their favourite books, and rubbishing the opposing one. This can seriously affect your ranking. You also get reviews by people who clearly haven’t read it, and say something totally untrue. The one that most annoyed me was when someone complained of a blatant coincidence, and said that two people had “just happened to meet by ac...