Tag: author tour

Review | Yours Sincerely, Giraffe & The Fire Horse by Megumi Iwasa & Mayakovsky, Mandelstam, Kharms

“A room without books is like a body without a soul,” Cicero.

borka the goose john burningham bookblast marketingLittle children do what grown-ups do. So when mother and father read aloud to them at bedtime and enjoy doing it, a positive precedent is set. As books and ideas become a staple of home life, the pleasures of discussion and debate continue into adulthood. Reading also alleviates boredom and loneliness, which I remember from my own childhood: books were my first friends.

Home learning is one thing, school learning another. As the curriculum gets more and more intense, packed with demanding schedules, the fun of learning dissipates. In her exclusive interview with BookBlast®, Siân Williams, the founder of The Children’s Bookshow says that a core aim of the tour is “to bring the children joy”. Writers and illustrators who go to schools to do workshops and work with the children on their own creative writing are bringing with them the gift of storytelling. Once learned it is never forgotten – a bit like riding a bike – even though exams, and then life, take over. After all, as adults, we are surrounded by every imaginable kind of storytelling, in myriad forms. Continue reading Review | Yours Sincerely, Giraffe & The Fire Horse by Megumi Iwasa & Mayakovsky, Mandelstam, Kharms

Interview | Cathy Hirano | Translator of the Week

Tell us a little bit about yourself.
I grew up in Canada and came to Japan when I was 20 without knowing any Japanese. After a year of studying the Japanese language in Kyoto, I entered a university in Tokyo where I majored in Cultural Anthropology. My first job after graduating was translating project reports from Japanese into English for a Japanese-based consulting engineering firm. I worked there for 3 years, learning how to translate on the job. During that period, I got married to a Japanese architect and, just after our first child was born, we moved to the island of Shikoku. I began translating freelance while raising two children and have continued translating in a variety of fields ever since.

When you were growing up, what books had an impact on you?
From a fairly young age, I read anything and everything I could get my hands on, which in our house was a lot as my grandmother was once a children’s librarian. Books were my escape from the reality of school life, which I found quite unkind at times, so I read a lot of fantasy, adventure stories and historical fiction. Books I particularly remember and that I kept going back to include The Chronicles of Narnia, Lord of the Rings, The Earthsea Cycle, Alice in Wonderland, especially all the crazy poetry, The Last Unicorn and The Once and Future King. I also loved things like Ann of Green Gables, Emil and the Detectives, Heidi, Paddington, Who Has Seen the Wind by W.O. Mitchell, and Russian Fairy Tales, as well as such authors as Margaret Lawrence, Farley Mowat, Gerald Durrell, Rosemary Sutcliffe, Madeleine L’Engle, and Patricia McKillip. I could go on and on so I will stop here!! Continue reading Interview | Cathy Hirano | Translator of the Week

Get a flavour of The Children’s Bookshow LIVE!

Michael Rosen will be kicking off this year’s bookshow on Friday 22 September, 10.30am & 1.30pm, Theatre Royal, Newcastle NE1 6BR.

Here he is presenting Jean-Francois Dumont’s book The Geese March in Step in 2015.

Continue reading Get a flavour of The Children’s Bookshow LIVE!

Breaking News | The Children’s Bookshow 2017 | 15 years on the road!

 “The Children’s Bookshow takes children’s authors to meet tens of thousands of children, introducing children to how and why writers write, illustrators illustrate.  They give children insights into how they too can transform thoughts and feelings into words and pictures.  This is not simply a matter of it being enjoyable, it’s a necessary part of what we understand by the word ‘education’.” Michael Rosen

children's bookshow 2003 bookblastThe much loved and hugely popular national tour of writers and illustrators of children’s literature brings the joy of books and reading to children across the UK each autumn. The series of free workshops runs alongside the performances in the theatres. Past participants have included Quentin Blake, Michael Rosen and Judith Kerr from the UK, and from abroad, Tomi Ungerer, Fabio Geda, Satoshi Kitamura and many more. 

BookBlast® is delighted to be celebrating The Children’s Bookshow and its 15 years on the road! We are running exclusive interviews with visionary founder, Sian Williams, publisher Julia Marshall from Gecko Press, feature review(s) and there’s a competition . . .  Continue reading Breaking News | The Children’s Bookshow 2017 | 15 years on the road!

Interview | Julia Marshall, Gecko Press | Indie Publisher of the Week

Are (were) your parents great readers? Tell us a bit about yourself.
Everyone reads in my family: we are omnivores, and eclectic. At 86, my father still alternates a thriller with something more substantial. When I grew up on the farm we used to rush back to our books to read at lunch, and we often ate dinner on our knees, with our books. My mother says she would do that differently if she could do it again, and have us all up at the table.

Did you want to work in the publishing industry from the start?
I did. There wasn’t a publishing course in New Zealand at the time, so I became a journalist instead. I wanted to work with books right from when I was at school. Continue reading Interview | Julia Marshall, Gecko Press | Indie Publisher of the Week

Spotlight | Georgia de Chamberet at Ways With Words Book Festival

Ways With Words Festival of Words and Ideas in Devon has been held annually for about two decades. It is extremely well run by friendly staff and the surroundings are idyllic. I stayed in a comfortable double room to one side of Dartington Hall, overlooking glorious trees and the garden, away from the central, medieval, listed courtyard. My well-attended talk about Lesley Blanch, ‘a bohemian abroad’, was held in the 14th century Barn Cinema.

On the evening I arrived, news reader and war reporter, Michael Buerk, talked about Reality TV. He was engaging, funny and ultimately pretty depressing about the future of ‘quality’ TV. Budgets for ‘traditional’ drama, documentaries and investigative current affairs programmes − Panorama and Dispatches are all we have left − are derisory, whereas around 750 producers were out in the Australian jungle for the particular show in which he featured of I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! Thousands of hours of filming end up on the cutting room floor. Reality TV is more ‘fixed’ now than when it first began and is not as ‘real’ or cutting edge as you might imagine. Watched by 16 to 30 year olds it offers a modern twist on people being tested and mocked as in a morality play, or freak show. People are pushed to their limits in increasingly humiliating ways for fast shock results. Instead of being pelted with rotten eggs and vegetables in the stocks, nowadays contestants grapple with their phobias of creepy crawlies, rodents and serpents. He was honest about the lure of the sum of money he was paid for taking part, (naturally he did not divulge the amount!). Bad behaviour is rewarded and ignorance is cool. Celebrity is a goal in itself, without achievements or virtue being involved in any way. The ultimate punchline from the younger members of his own family was lighten up granddad it’s only a TV show.

Continue reading Spotlight | Georgia de Chamberet at Ways With Words Book Festival