In Bed With Books

Last night I came home with a sore throat - just what I need when we're taking Year 8 to the State Library tomorrow! We've been planning this for months and it's arranged with the library and I'll be going unless I have a broken leg. So here I am in bed with the radio on(Radio National discussing Rupert Murdoch)and books on the bed. No breakfast yet. I have bought a ticket to hear Christopher Paolini speak at the Atheneum on June 21st, so thought I'd better read at least one of his books before I go. Eragon was going for $8.99 on iBooks, so I downloaded it yesterday and have got stuck into it. You can tell it's written by a very young man who has been reading Tolkien, possibly Anne McCaffrey and watching Star Wars, and somehow it works - must have, with all the sales it's had! And a movie too. What can I say? I thought lots of our students would want to go, but so far I can't even interest Kristen, who has been reading and rereading his books. Maybe she's wise enough to understand that just because you love someone's books doesn't mean you'll find the author interesting when you see them. I'll see soon enough and write about it here. I'm rereading, for the umpteenth time, Harry Turtledove's Ruled Britannia, the alternative universe novel in which the Spanish Armada conquered England and, nine years later, Eliabeth is in the Tower, Christopher Marlowe is still alive and Shakespeare has been commissioned to write two plays - one propaganda play for the Spanish, one propaganda play for the British, an underground movement led by Lord Burghley. The novel is told from two viewpoints - Shakespeare's and that of Lope De Vega, a Spanish playwright and soldier who came over with the Armada. Lope is such a strong character, I looked him up, knowing he was basically Spain's Shakespeare. I found he was even more. He wrote 1500 plays, as well as novels, novellas, poetry. There was even a portrait of him in the Wikipedia article,so when I read the novel now I can imagine him as well as Shakespeare. Apparently, he did go over on the Armada and was lucky enough to be on a surviving ship that got home. And yes, he did like women as much as the Lope in the novel. Mr Turtledove did a great job with him. I'm going to read Kathy Reichs' Virals,(having already read the sequel,see my review), which is parked in my bag. When I first heard of these books at SheKilda, it was with a grumpy, " how dare she!" as in "she can't go giving Tempe Brennan a niece, she should stick to adult crime fiction". Thing is, Tory Brennan and her friends are the Goonies, a fantastical Famous Five. They're delightful, the adventure is non-stop and I thoroughly enjoyed that book and expect to enjoy this one too. I do agree it probably wasn't necessary to make her Tempe Brennan's niece, especially since this is fantasy, but never mind. I'm also pleased to announce that I have finally managed to get beyond the writer's block on my second novel set in the Wolfborn universe and I did it yesterday on my beloved iPad, between reading ebooks. Will you guys ever be able to read it? That depends on you. Buy a copy of Wolfborn, whether on ebook or hard copy, and you might persuade my publishers to buy my next manuscript when I offer it. ;-)