Yesterday I had the pleasure of speaking to a wonderful group of students from St George Girls High School and Kogarah High School in Sydney. I was there on the invitation of two fantastic teacher-librarians, Helen Lee and Gail Johnston.…
Month: March 2016
Somerset Celebration of Literature
Last Monday evening I was sweating bullets. Still dazed and dazzled from five weeks in India, in less than a day I would be flying to the Gold Coast for the Somerset Celebration of Literature. Although I received messages of…
Middle Readers in Middle Earth: Reflections on the Fantasy Genre for Young Readers
To my delight, Erin Wamala recently asked me to pen some thoughts for The Kids’ Bookshop’s website. My brief was simple, to offer some reflections on the lure of fantasy for middle readers. Although I wrote this piece several months…
Posted in Empire of the Waves, Literature Tagged with: Empire of the Waves, Fantasy, Literature, Middle Grade, Schools, Writing
Varanasi
This train feels less hospitable than the last, and someone warns me to watch my bags. There seem a lot more twitching stares than smiles, and I start to see thieves everywhere. In fact, there are almost certainly nothing of…
From Calcutta to Bodh Gaya
In Calcutta, I wake to the news that my teacher and friend Roderick West has died, tearing a hole in my heart. Yet such was the man’s intellect and spirit that he always seemed eternal, so it is not so…