THINGS CHINESE

When a large New Year card arrived through the post from my Chinese printer WKT, with names printed on the back –Alex Yan, Frankie Chan, Niki Wong and others – suddenly there were real people behind the rather anonymous ‘printed in China’ on the imprint pages of Selkie and Zoe’s Boat.

    WKT will never have the personal touch of Lavenham Press who printed The Little White Sprite but they have been a very reliable, high quality printer and have helped cut the unit cost of my books.

 

Also arriving through the post from China via my publisher Bloomsbury was the Chinese edition of Tom Finger which left me admiring the Chinese characters of the title and wondering whether the Scottish Mc in McClure had ended up as just a dot.

CAKES, VICARS & BOOK LAUNCHES

Heffers Children's Bookshop, when it existed, hosted some great book launches for my Bloomsbury and Frances Lincoln books. I remember Bloomsbury had a cat cake specially made for the Tom Finger launch. A lot of books were sold on these occasions and it was a good opportunity to get to know the book reps.

Earlier book launches were often hosted by a school, following a term's residency. The launch of Tog the Ribber was at Great Chesterford Primary and again there was cake - a chocolate skeleton cake. The children had made shadow puppets and put on a magical show for that launch. 

I had one disaster - the launch of Witch Watch at a Primary School in Saffron Walden in 1989 when the vicar completely stole the show:

 

 "A few years ago I would have thought it was all innocent fun but the climate is different now," he told the press. "There is an increase in involvement in the occult in this area and I have had reports of witches coverns and black magic practices..."

Well, the advent of Harry Potter has changed all that. Let's hope the vicar is no longer troubled by the occult and his parishioners have been able to put away their broomsticks and settle down to a good read.