• I have been reading all sorts of stuff on the internet this morning, in search of ways to make school visits less tiring. It all seems to come down to dairy products. Talk about agendas! One camp are anti-dairy. They are generally vegetarians and come with lots of new-age baggage and then there are the pro-dairy guys. Strangely, if you dig through the pro sites they seem to be sponsored by dairy concerns!

    I don’t want to go into the minutiae of phlegm and pus cell counts in milk, but I’m going to give up dairy for a week and see if it has any effect. Everything I read about voice control and public speaking suggests that mucus build up is a big problem. Disgusting isn’t it? I will enjoy keeping the world updated with my experiment. Pass the carrot juice!

  • studiositeWell, people do read my blog! I heard from the author and illustrator, Ted Dewan, this morning. He famously works in Philip Pullman’s old shed. What vibes are stored in those walls?

    I thought I would bring things up to date on the project. I’ve cleared the site and dug the footings. I’ve ordered the materials to make the concrete pad that the “shed/studio” is going to sit on and I’ve got my eye on a door on eBay! The basic design is sorted but will adapt around the door that I eventually get. The photo shows the site, which is a bit tired from winter at the moment. In the foreground are timbers I’ve been looking after for nearly four years now, with just this project in mind. I might be in for the summer!

    My Mum told my Norwegian Aunt, Tante Nilla, about this project. She said it’s only right as both Greig and Ibsen both worked in garden sheds (or hutte as the Norwegians call them). Roal Dahl famously worked in a garden shed, but then he was Norwegian too. There must be some sort of macho Viking thing about working in sheds.

  • I had a great day in Ross on Wye Library yesterday. I’ve been there a few times now and there were one or two old faces that I recognised and of course, I’m getting to know the Librarians quite well now! I was, again, exhausted by the end of the day. My wife, Penny, has suggested that I should get some stage or presentation training to help me. I’ve been looking at various sites on the Internet about public speaking and some pieces of advice crop up again and again.

    Correct posture is number one. I’ve always held the book I’m reading up so that everyone can see the pictures. In reality I’m sure the back row can’t see, so all I’m doing is giving myself terrible shoulder ache by the end of the day. At the same time I’m hunching my shoulders and not allowing myself to expand my chest and breathe properly. Hydration is another big thing. I drank a lot of water at a school I visited recently, and stayed off the coffee and tea. Now I think about it, I wasn’t quite so tired that day.

    I’m off to Sandwell tomorrow and will have over 200 children in West Bromwich Town Hall in the afternoon, so I’m going to try something different. (Better do a bit of preparation today!)

    I’m not really sure what is expected from school and library visits. No one teaches you, there is no job description. Us authors do what we do in our different ways. It would be interesting to hear from anyone who has definite ideas of what they think an author visit should be like. In these days of measurable outcomes, I feel pressured to educate – to cram some measurable and testable information into children’s minds so that positive feedback can be entered onto appraisal forms. What I do best, is to entertain. I want children to go away thinking that books and stories can be fun – not just texts to be disassembled – and wondering who that strange man was!

    Some authors have very set talks and like to be in control. I’m a bit of a seat of the pants kind of person. My best sessions are always the ones where nothing is expected and I go where the mood takes me. Of course I have a collection of tales and anecdotes that I know work well, that I can drop in and use to suit the moment, but the really good sessions fly off into flights of fantasy and fun. They are always the ones that get remembered and, in the end, produce the best, if unmeasurable, outcomes.

    The really, really good sessions are when the teachers freely hand over their class to me and join in as part of the audience. Often I’ll end up with a class character wanting to get their two pennyworth in. This can be such fun – the equivalent of a comedian’s heckler. They can force me to do the unsafe thing – read a story I’ve never done before – have a discussion on deep and complicated subjects – talk about an idea I’ve just had and want to get an opinion on. Sadly, the sparky child is often told off or moved to sit next to the teacher. Please trust me to handle a crowd – I’ve not had a riot… yet!