So.

We are in the new house.

It is a lovely house, and it is going to be fab. Right now it is fab in spots. The kitchen is doing quite well, mostly unpacked. I write this sitting at the table, on hano's new laptop, which he bought this morning and for which I am exceptionally grateful, because mine died on Thursday. Our bedroom is a beautiful blue ( Read more... )

A while ago now oursin gave me my top five school stories to list. Of course I could fill up most of the slots with Antonia Forest, but have decided to limit myself to one per series. I've also been fairly strict about sticking to stories which are almost entirely set at school.

( Cut for spoilers, just in case )

Off for a weekend with frankie_ecap and ankaret (after the small matter of attending a conference and giving a paper). I leave you with a few useful thoughts from Diana Wynne Jones's Skiver's Guide, which arrived yesterday.
Never let people quite notice you are in the room when work is being done... A good skiver can stay quietly in the same room for hours, without ( Read more... )

Happily alerted by a message on the girlsown mailing list, I listened to Woman's Hour this morning, which included an item on girls' school stories, with Clarissa Cridland and Sue Sims. The discussion was interesting, if a bit stilted at times, largely I think because the presenter didn't really know anything about the subject, but at least she ( Read more... )

Have been having a writing week, and a bit of time off before term starts next week.

Red wine Monday, hangover Tuesday. Good time had with ajhalluk, clanwilliam, lexin and oursin, so entirely worth it ( Read more... )

'Ro, d'you remember that gorgeous book we had once - The Test Match - by someone who played himself, I think it was - '
'Jack Hobbs. Well, that's a reasonably accurate description-'
'D'you remember the hero - Geoffrey?' ... 'Who made fifty - fifty - in a Test Match against the Australians ( Read more... )

In case anyone reads this who (a) likes Antonia Forest and (b) isn't a member of new_atalanta, there are going to be two events celebrating her life & work, one in London on 21 May this year, and a conference in Bournemouth on 30 June-2 July 2006. I've been sent a flyer about both of these, though the booking form is just for the London day, and have managed ( Read more... )

Met up with ajhalluk, sollersuk, cuvalwen, clanwilliam, greythistle, liadnan and m31andy (I think that's everyone) last Friday night, and had an excellent time. A bloke called Dave sat at our table for a while, and was a little thrown when asked (we checked he'd read HP), did he believe that Neville and Draco were destined for each other? (The right answer is yes, we hissed.) Much red wine was drunk, far ( Read more... )

jonquil recently wrote about Peter's Room, by Antonia Forest, which she'd just been reading, and how she disliked Forest's dismissal of both the Brontes' fantasy/role-playing and that kind of fantasy life in general ( Read more... )

Having dinner with some friends last night, and we started talking about the DNB and putting together an entry for Josephine M. Bettany (life, works, posthumous reputation; one of the sources no doubt the papers of Sir James Russell, held at the Wellcome). Am now thinking about a future edition which should of course include 'Nicola Marlow: the ( Read more... )