Rollercoaster.ie and Mercier Press are giving away copies of my book ‘Arthur Quinn and the World Serpent’ to five lucky winners. Closing date is November 7th. To win, just head over to this site and enter your details. Good luck!
School Visits – Longford Libraries, Oct 2011
Last week I had the pleasure of visiting four libraries in Longford. As well as reading from my book, I discussed story writing and then got the groups to create their own brand new Viking God and make up a story based on this character.
First up were the class from 124, St Mels College in Longford. They created a god called Tauro who could time travel, make faces melt off and had a fingernail that would shoot out to kill his enemies. Next the class from Ballymahon wrote stories about a god who was being kidnapped by a freak show. The group from Lanesboro came up with a Viking god called BillyBob. One of his special powers was the ability to eat as much Chinese food as he wanted. Finally, the class from Granard created a goddess called ‘UGLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE’ who loved giving flies electric shocks. Read the rest of this entry »
The River Poddle
For anyone who’s read my book Arthur Quinn and the World Serpent, you’ll be aware of the importance of the River Poddle in the plot. In one major scene, Arthur, Ash and Will explore the river under the city of Dublin.
Here’s a great clip from an RTE documentary a few years ago that tells you all about the Poddle, as well as giving us a glimpse of the river itself. Watch it to the end to see the grate that features in the book, too!
EDIT
And here’s the actual programme that inspired me to write Arthur Quinn. When I saw the Poddle in this, I just knew there had to be some sort of monster hidden there! (The Poddle part starts from the 4 minute mark.)
Book Trailers
There’s a great article over at Inis Magazine that discusses the book trailer, its effectiveness and the producers’ ways of showing enough but not too much.
It got me thinking about my own book trailers. Since I come from a film background, I was, of course, excited about having a trailer for my book. Even before I had discussed the possibility with my publisher, Mercier Press, I had an idea of what the trailer should be. Dark, atmospheric, creepy were some of the adjectives that came to mind.
I had quite a bit of experience with trailers like this, having produced short viral promos for various theatrical productions over the past couple years. These plays often faced a similar problem that books do – until the production is staged, there is a lack of actual filmed footage. So I would take photographs and text and animate them to suit the piece. These trailers seemed to be quite successful in getting bums in the seats so I was certain that something similar would work for my book. Read the rest of this entry »