If you are anywhere near Dun Laoghaire, why not come along to the Monster March Book Bash on Saturday, March 10th. It’s going to be totally amazing, and if you don’t book soon, you might miss out. Hope to see lots of you there!

http://www.dlrcoco.ie/library/MonsterMarchBB.pdf

These are some of the details:

Monster March Book Bash

Check in at Assembly Hall, County Hall, Dún Laoghaire Monster Draw-Along with Don Conroy

Learn to draw some amazing animals with this master artist.

True Monsters of the Deep with Garrett ‘Monsterman’ Carr Garret will reveal some of the real and almost unbelievable creatures that live in the world’s deepest oceans, which inspired him to create his own Monsters of the Deep.

Refreshments

The Ideas Shop with Judi Curtin and Oisín McGann

Where do writers get their ideas? Find out with top children’s authors Judi and Oisín. If you’d like to ask Judi or Oisín a question about writing, there will be a special young writers’ Q and A – so be sure to bring your own story ideas along too!

A Few of My Favourite Things – Chaired by Tom Donegan

Judi, Garrett, Oisín and Sarah talk about some of their favourite things – it could be a toy, book, monster, video game, hat – anything goes! And do tell us about your favourite things – bring them along to show us if you like!

Meet the Writers

Signing session at the bookshop.

Assembly Hall, County Hall, Dún Laoghaire

10.00am – 1.00pm

Tickets available from Pavilion Theatre Booking Office – (01) 231 2929 or www.paviliontheatre.ie

€5 for children, €7 for adults (Family ticket of 2 adults and 2 children: €20). Price includes refreshments and a goody bag.

Suitable for age 8+. All young readers must be accompanied by an adult. This event is not suitable for younger children and we will not be able to admit them. We will have other events especially for younger children during the year!

Please bring a notebook/paper and a pencil if possible.

I’ve been very busy writing for the past few weeks, and the good news is that I’m almost finished the first draft of the third Friends Forever book. (Let’s hope my editor is reading this and clearing her desk in anticipation.)

The other good news is that on Friday I’ll be doing my first reading of 2012. I’m off to Cork, where I’ll be in Blackpool library, discussing The Time Spell. This is because the nice people in Blackpool have chosen my book for their One Book project. I’m very much looking forward to meeting everyone there. (And since they kindly sent me a map, I have no excuse for getting lost!)

Keep watching my events page, where I’ll be posting news of any other readings as soon as they are arranged.

PS It was a brilliant event. The pupils of Scoil Aiseiri Chriost were interested and enthusiastic, and the library staff, Mary and Pauline were great. Thanks to Pauline for taking enough photos that I actually found a few I liked!

Don’t all rush to the bookshop, but I’m happy to announce that Double Trouble is on the shelves today.

In this book, Lauren and her friend Tilly travel back in time to Ancient Pompeii. They make new friends and have a great time. In fact, everything is just perfect – until the nearby mountain begins to smoke!

As this is my fifteenth book, I could forgive my family if they get less excited than I would hope, but my daughter Annie surprised me. Not alone did she read Double Trouble when it arrived, but she also painted her nails to match! 

How sweet is that?

My new book has just landed and I’m really happy with how it looks:

My new baby

This is the second in the Friends Forever series. This time Lauren and her friend Tilly travel back to ancient Roman times. Everything is kind of ok, until they discover that they are in Pompeii, and the large mountain near where they live is starting to smoke……..!

Double Trouble will be in a bookshop near you on the first of February.

I’ve got other things on my mind too. Because of the way publishing works, I usually finish a book long, long before it arrives on the shelves. This means that if a book is published, and I don’t have a lot of the next one written, I start to get seriously nervous. Sometimes pressure is good, though – I started book 3 of Friends Forever last Wednesday. I know it’s early days yet, but so far, it’s going very, very well.

I’m really busy at the moment, but feeling guilty at how little I’ve been blogging here lately. So here’s a copy of my recent post from Girlsheartbooks.

(And by the way, that’s an amazing site with some brilliant posts, so be sure to visit soon.)

Happy New Year – hoping all good things will come your way in 2012!

BENEATH THE SURFACE

When I do readings, I’m very often asked the same question – ‘Are you writing a book at the moment?’

Almost always, the truthful answer is ‘yes’. I started to write seriously in 1999, and since then, I’ve always been pretty much ‘writing a book’. But this morning I woke up and had a few horrible thoughts:

* I’m not writing a book at the moment

*I haven’t written anything for a few weeks

My computer screen looks a lot like this lately:

(and a third horrible thought has just come to me – I hope my publisher isn’t reading this post!)

Anyway, the shock of all these thoughts drove me out to my back garden, which is where I always go when I need to calm down.

There I saw the broad beans and garlic that I sowed a few months ago. They grew really well at first, but for the last two months they haven’t budged – it looks like they are just sitting there, doing nothing.

Garlic, apparently doing nothing!

Broad beans, relaxing in the sunshine.

But then I realised that I was only looking at the surface. I know that, deep under the soil, my plants are building up strong roots, so that when the weather warms up again, they’ll be ready to burst into life.

So I’ve decided that’s also what’s happening inside my head. Even though I haven’t written a word lately, my mind has been busy. I’ve been planning a sub-plot for a third Eva book, and I’ve been thinking very hard about a time and a place to set the third Friends Forever book. I know that once I get back to writing, all of this mental groundwork will make my work much, much easier.

So I’ve decided not to panic ……… yet!