Frances Lynn: Blog March 2007

March 29, 2007

Quentin Kynaston school talk

I gave another talk about Crushed to a class of twelve year olds from Quentin Kynaston, a local comprehensive at St John's Wood Library today. The kids were extremely enthusiastic and well read. Although they all confessed they were hooked on MySpace, they told me they enjoyed reading out of school hours. A lot of them also wanted to be writers. One boy said he had almost completed writing his first novel. After my talk, during which I picked their brains for ideas for the Crushed sequel, they all surrounded me asking for my autograph! I begged them to e-mail me for research purposes. I want to know what their teenage brothers and sisters get up to in and out of school.

Posted by frances on March 29, 2007

March 28, 2007

A Fan

I was in the middle of giving a talk about Crushed to a group of advanced ten year olds at John's Wood Library this afternoon, when a girl from Saint Christina's school ran into the library and raced up to me. 'I've read Crushed and I think it's BRILLIANT! She finally got a boyfriend!' she exclaimed. I promptly told her she had made my day.

Posted by frances on March 29, 2007

March 19, 2007

St Christina's School

I'm thrilled! Further to my Crushed talk at Saint Christina's school, I received a packet of sophisticated and complimentary thank you letters from the girls in Year 6 today. They all said they loved the competition - I asked them to think of a title for the book's sequel. But the funniest letter was from the pupil who said, 'in our opinion we think you are a brilliant authoress and are loads better than STUPID J.K. Rowling (We want Harry Potter to die in the next book!!!!!!!!!!!).'

Posted by frances on March 19, 2007

March 7, 2007

Austin de Lone

Austin de Lone is a musician (keyboards), songwriter and producer who lives in the SF Bay area. I received his new CD titled "Soul Blues" (Broken Toe Records) today. It features musicians like Elvis Costello and Nick Lowe. Austin's music is INSPIRATIONAL to write to. If I can't plug my own brother-in-law, who else can I plug?!

Posted by frances on March 7, 2007

March 2, 2007

Crushed Talk

Gave my first talk about Crushed at Saint Christina's, an independent, Roman Catholic preparatory school for all religions in St Johns Wood. All the ten year old girls (almost eleven) in Year Six were extremely clever, and a lot of them wanted to be writers. One wanted to be a zoologist and a writer so that she could write about animals, which I thought was pretty commendable. Another girl wanted to be a doctor and a writer. I euphemistically told her she would have time to do both. When one of the pupils mentioned the Harry Potter books, I asked the class which two characters did they think would die?

'I hope Harry Potter dies. I hate Harry Potter books,' one of the girls blurted out, which I thought was hilarious.

I organised a little competition, asking the girls to come up with a title for Crushed's sequel. I told them whoever thought of the best title would win an autographed copy of the book. It was difficult to judge, as all their ideas were so inventive.

The school asked for a signed copy of Crushed for their library and Father Rudolf Loewenstein, the teacher who sat in on my talk informed me he writes children's book reviews, and said he would review the book for various Catholic magazines.

Helen Ralli, a Saint Christina's old girl and the designer of the book's cover, had come with me to talk about the history of her design. One of the girls asked me where did I get the twins' names, Door and Dee in the book from? I droned on that I abbreviated the name Dora (Helen's aunt) to Door, and added I didn't have a clue where the name Dee came from.

Father Rudolf suspected I got the names from "Tales Of Two Cities". I haven't read the book for centuries, but coincidentally, I'm just about to read it again, so shall look out for the characters that subconsciously inspired me to call the Crushed twins Door and Dee.

Posted by frances on March 2, 2007