They say the important thing about blogging is to stick with it..Someone who occasionally looks at this blog mentioned that I hadn’t posted anything for a while and I said, ‘Must be June at least’, to which they said, ‘Try April’. I couldn’t believe it. Ah well, must try harder..
Much of the last three months had been taken up with finishing a follow-up book, due out at the end of October. We settled on the title Still On The Sound some months ago but there is more design involved in this one as it's illustrated throughout and the layout is quite complex; so the final stages are more protracted. The aim is to balance readability with the impact of the pics and to get a contemporary, uncluttered feel. The publishers have been good about consulting on the look and feel of both the cover and the inside (though the publisher always has the final say on the cover) - which I’ve appreciated as both Lynn and I are interested in that side.
It’s coming together and we hope to launch on or around 29th October – I will put the details here and on the website nearer the time.
While I was finalising the text and reducing a longlist of 2,500 photographs to a shortlist of 400, Lynn was working towards Pittenweem Arts Festival (from which we are just back) and a solo show in Belfast, also at the end of October. A large body of work in a short space of time, but the consensus this year was that her Pittenweem exhibition was her best yet.
Eddie behaved immaculately on his first Scottish trip. We had to leave him in the car for quite long periods at Pittenweem, and no doubt many a six-month old puppy would have eaten the car from the inside. V grown up. Made a lot of new friends, two and four-legged.
On the way back we stopped off for a couple of days in Edinburgh. I looked into Waterstone’s in George Street to talk about a reading event for the book later on, and when I told the manager we were launching at the end of October but that I didn’t have a final cover to show him, he laughed and said, ‘Are you sure about the launch?’ He seemed to be quite up for an event though – again, as this and any other events are sheduled I’ll put a note on the Events page of the website.
While in Edinburgh we spent an evening with Sara Sheridan, whose latest novel The Secret Mandarin will be launched on September 11th - details are on her website http://www.sarasheridan.co.uk/. Also on the website is a page of podcasts, including an author-to-author chat we recorded the same evening – I didn't know what to expect but we had a laugh. Whoever’s book hits the New York Times bestseller list first, pays the other commission..
