This pic courtesy of The Paper Princess, Yasmine Hussain.
Wednesday 28th - the first ever reading, nay, the World Premiere of The Coward's tale, courtesy of Damian Barr and the Aubin & Wills Westbourne Grove Literary Salon. Playing to a packed house, with chairs set among the jumpers, suits and hacking jackets, Eleanor Moran and I both read and then had a natter with Damian, took questions form the floor. It all seemed to go down well, I had a smashing time, dinner afterwards with some ardent followers (not of me, of Damian!) and back to my club. Ahem. Thank to the Bedford Four too, for coming down special!
I got to meet and natter to an artist I have admired for a long time - Greyson Perry. We met at Bloomsbury's 25th Birthday bash, which, in true style, covered the centre of Bedford Square in London in a marquee and filled it with over 1000 authors past present and future, publishers, agents, printers, literary reviewers, illustrators, and oodles more.
For Dutch courage, the lovely Claire King met me at The New Cavendish Club (I have associate membership thanks to my membership of SWWJ) and we downed a G and T before heading off eastwards in a taxi. I regressed, unashamedly, into a teenage celeb-spotter. Lovely to see my buddy Andrew, my agent Euan, my editor Helen, the paperback editor Tram-Anh (which means Wise One), and to meet Jane Rusbridge and Precious Williams for the first time, Marika Cobbold for the second time, Selma Dabbagh for the at least third time, Jeremy Osborne of Sweet Talk for the first time, to eat finger food by the best (including haggis in a roll - which for a hot evening, was amazing!) -drink endless champagne. Happy Birthday Bloomsbury, and here's to the next 25. Who knows, with luck and a following wind, I'll be there at the 50th. In my zimmer.
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And here is the paperback cover sent to me by Tram-Anh. With a few tweaks, including adding Rhymney Beers to the hotel signs, its smashing!
