>Last Week's Roundup

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Just a round up of last week's events. Last Wednesday I had the pleasure of taking my Hunchback Assignments traveling show to the Chapters on Runnymede in Toronto. A beautiful bookstore, built in an old theatre. I spoke to students from the Canadian Children's Book Club Program and was able to chat with them individually as I signed books.

Then I was off to Ottawa for the Ottawa International Writers Festival. Rainy and cold, that first day, but the people were friendly. I spoke at 4 schools (Immaculata High School, Saint Frances Xavier, Queen Elizabeth, and Saint Patrick Intermediate).

Here's a shot at Queen Elizabeth. The students were brilliant and laughed at my jokes...err I think they were laughing with me...


Here's Saint Patrick school. 450 students and they were perfectly well behaved and all had IQ's of 180 or more (I'm just judging by the quality of the questions that I received).

Art

>Booked/Brampton Extravaganza!

>I had an absolutely wonderful time on Tuesday, October 20th. Caught a 6am flight from Saskatoon to Toronto (okay, the early flight was not so great), checked in to my fancy hotel, was picked up by the Harpercollins "posse" and taken to Cheyne School in Brampton for a surprise visit with BOOKED (B.O.O.K.E.D is a group of students who received advance reader's copies of The Hunchback Assignments and are the focus of a documentary that HarperCollins is producing). It was a surprise visit, so they appeared suitably shocked when I walked in the room. Here I am with the BOOKIES.


We had a chat about the book and I answered questions about the characters and the next book in the series (The Dark Deeps). I was absolutely impressed by this group of readers (and their teachers). I had seen the videos from the HarperCollins documentary, so I felt like I knew them all already. And it was a little like meeting movies stars for me. Really smart movie stars.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7eN3qKY4m1c&hl=en&fs=1&]
They had so many ideas about the book and about other characters that could appear in future books. Very impressive. And there was even a great series of posters on the wall (do notice what BOOKED stands for).


Then I was off to sign stock at Chapters and Coles Stores in Mississauga and to dine with the "Posse."

They kindly laughed at my jokes and I hid my jealousy when their jokes were funnier than mine.

Then we zipped back to Coles in Brampton for the main event--an audio video presentation. The place was packed (I even had some family who I forced to come).
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Several of the readers had dressed up as characters from the book. We started with a video presentation from the BOOKED students, then another vid presentation by HarperCollins and I followed with my audio/visual extravaganza (I just like to add "extravaganza" to the end of things, to make them sound cooler). It was so bizarre to look out at the crowd and see several characters from the book. It was as if it had all come to life (thankfully no one dressed like mechanical steam powered hounds, that would have scared me). And in the end the BOOKED students gave me a brilliantly designed scrapbook ?and a t-shirt (there are even more photos at this
link, including the groovy t-shirt). Then the "posse" spirited me away for donuts at Tim Horton's. It honestly was one of the best days of my long (in the tooth) career.

Art

>Odd Victorian Factoid 28: Don't Make Fanny Mad

>Hunchback Assignments Victorian Factoid

Odd Victorian Factoid #28

Don't get Fanny mad! The Great Train Robbery of 1855 was a dashing, amazing criminal event. Robbers somehow stole many gold bars, bullion, American Eagle coins and more bullion leaving behind the same weight in lead shot on the train (the safes were weighed at every station). They would have lived like kings, too, and never been caught, except one of them cheated a woman named Fanny, who knew they had done something against the law to do with the South-eastern Railway. She told on them. They got caught. Oops.

Art

>Riding Leviathan

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I am very thankful for the release of Scott Westerfeld’s Leviathan. Not just because it will be a dynamite read (I have just cracked open my copy and it is a gorgeous book--an object) but more so because of how its arrival onto the YA “steampunk*” scene will affect me. And, it’s all about me, as I like to say. : )

My sense is that “steampunk” has been gaining steam (ha--get it? forgive me, oh please forgive me) in the YAlit world. Yes, it’s been around since the ’80’s but these things sometimes rise very slowly. It seems to be referenced more and more in the public realm and in the mass consciousness cloud that surrounds us all. So, obviously, since there is this curiosity about the genre, it’s the perfect time to release a “steampunk” book.

The Hunchback Assignments is one.
So is Cherie Priest's Boneshaker (which I have not yet read, but will-I absolutely love the cover) and there are many others both recently released and from the past (Oppel’s Airborn and Reeves’ Hungry City Chronicles come to mind).
My sense is the genre needs a focal point. A beacon. And that’s where Westerfeld’s Leviathan comes in. He’s already extremely well-known and it pushes the genre further into the public realm to have his book out. And, like a passing zeppelin, it drags all the rest of us “steampunkers” in its wake. Hunchback has been listed on several “steampunk” lists along with Leviathan, appeared in stores on the “steampunk” display, and been mentioned in blogs, tweets, and songs (okay, not songs). So I’m thankful that Leviathan was released at the same time as my book so that my little Hunchback hero can cling to the landing ropes and wave hello!

So Modo is riding Leviathan! And hanging on for dear life.

I like that image. I think I’ll put an airship in the 3rd book. : )

Humbly yours,
Art

*Steampunk could be described as science fiction that is set in or inspired by Victorian times, especially the scientific advances of that age.