Jonathan Stroud - Lockwood & Co: The Screaming Staircase - Book Trailer & Publication Tour

20th August 2013: Edinburgh International Book Festival

Jonathan will be launching his new series in the UK exclusively at the Edinburgh Book Festival this summer. It will be the first public outing of Lockwood & Co: The Screaming Staircase anywhere in the world, and there are exciting plans afoot (whispers of ghosts, video trailers, kit bags and more). For details and tickets, click the following links:  Public Events  |   School Events

29th August 2013: Lockwood & Co UK publication tour!

London – Thursday 29th August (publication day)
London bookshop signings

London – Wednesday 4th September
Launch event in London venue

Cheltenham Literary Festival – Sunday 6th October
Event details TBC

London – Monday 14th October
School events with Tales on Moon Lane bookshop

Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire – Tuesday 15th October
School events with Chorleywood bookshop

York – Wednesday 16th October
School events in York

Ipswich – Thursday 17th October
School events and an evening FCBG event

Leeds – Friday 18th October
Schools events in Harrogate and Leeds

Windsor – Monday 21st October
School events with Waterstones Windsor

London – Tuesday 22nd October
School events in north and east London

Birmingham - Wednesday 23rd October
School events and an evening FCBG event in Dudley

Worcester - Thursday 24th October
School events in Worcester

Newcastle – Friday 25th October
School events set up with Newcastle libraries

Birmingham - Saturday 26th October
Event at the Youth Libraries annual conference

Also check out my Book Review here.

Floris Kelpies Children's Prize Shortlist 2013

Every year as part of the Kelpies Prize, we look for the best unpublished children’s fiction with a Scottish twist. Since February, our editors have been working their way through a record number of entries to find our three finalists for this year’s prize – and they certainly weren’t disappointed.

We’re delighted to announce that the books shortlisted for the Kelpies Prize 2013 are:

• Never Back by Barbara Henderson
• Attack of the Giant Robot Chickens by Alex McCall
• The Great Moon Mission by Shona McQuilken

Never Back is an exciting Scottish thriller about a dangerous journey to remember who you really are. TJ and Levi have no memory of their life before New Dawn, brainwashed to forget by the Authorities. Can they discover their past before their present catches up with them?

Barbara Henderson has taught English and Drama, and started her own small puppetry business. She won the Nairn Festival Short Story Competition in 2012.

It’s an age-old question, but why did the chicken cross the road? To start the giant robot chicken apocalypse, of course. In Attack of the Giant Robot Chickens, there’s something fowl going on in Aberdeen as the city is terrorised by giant robotic chickens. But Jesse and his friends aren’t going to let the chickens rule the roost any longer …

Alex McCall grew up in Aberdeen, which may be why it is the first city he has destroyed in print. He has published several poetry and short story anthologies.

It’s an out-of-this world experience in The Great Moon Mission. Jimmy and his friends were expecting canoeing or sailing for this year’s class trip, not the chance to blast off into space! But as they begin to wonder what this mission is really about, Jimmy and his friends find themselves in a race against time, and slime, to save Earth from some little green men.

When her school careers advisor told her that being an author wasn’t a proper job, Shona McQuilken decided to become a scientist instead. The Great Moon Mission combines her two passions.

It won’t be long until you can find out which will be the latest addition to our Kelpies list. The winner of the Kelpies Prize 2013 will be announced at a ceremony at the Edinburgh International Book Festival on Thursday 22nd August 2013.

Want to enter next year’s Prize?

Manuscripts are now invited for submission to the Kelpies Prize 2014. The deadline is 28 February 2014 and for full rules and guidelines, you can read more here.

Guest Post: Roy Gill - The Daemon Parallel - (Kelpies)

The original idea for The Daemon Parallel came to me in a dream… 

I saw a boy who was staying with his Gran in Edinburgh – as I had sometimes done when I was small. She sent him out to buy something, but the world beyond her front door was all twisted and strange – both like the city I knew, and very different. When he’d made his way home, and successfully dodged several scary monsters, she didn’t seem that pleased to see him. In fact, she seemed a little cold.

When I woke up, I wanted to know why the boy had to live with this odd old woman, and what had happened to the city. It all went into a notebook, and lurked there for a while. One day I sat down and wrote - ‘It was over coffee and biscuits that Grandma Ives offered to return Cameron’s father from the dead’ - and the whole mad, creepy story unfolded from there… 

I guess I had always wanted to be a writer. Growing up, I was usually scribbling away on some story, or trying to draw a comic strip (badly), or plotting how to make my own episode of Doctor Who if I could ever get my hands on a camera.

I went to university to study English and Film – and stayed there a very long time! I mainly wrote academically for a while, trying to discover how and why people fell in love with certain stories. In an odd way, I became a little sidetracked from my original goal. When I was about to hit 30 – one of those milestones where you take stock of your achievements – I realised it was time to get back to my first love of writing fiction.

The Daemon Parallel is my first novel. It sometimes feels like my second and third as well, because it took a lot of drafts to reach the final version! In 2011, it was submitted for the Kelpies Prize for new children’s fiction, and made the shortlist. I was delighted when Floris said they would like to publish it.

It’s got twists and turns, thrills and monsters, and hopefully quite a few laughs along the way. You definitely don’t need to know Edinburgh to enjoy it – although those who have visited this gothic city might start to see it differently. You’ll certainly never look at the shadow on a crumpled curtain, a rundown cinema, or a rambling department store in quite the same way again… 

Welcome to The Daemon Parallel!

If that post doesn't have you hooked and chomping at the bit to read it, then I think you might need your head testing! The Daemon Parallel is due to be published on the 22nd of March by Kelpies (great little Scottish publisher). So don't wait and get your order in now. 


Many thanks to Roy for taking the time to write such an insightful post into his debut book and for giving us a taste about the man himself.