Penguin Orange Readers' Group: Fowey
Going back to the town you grew up in makes you feel like Gulliver in Lilliput. Everything seems so much smaller! Suddenly I could see over the church wall that loomed over my head as a child; the beach where I first swam lengths seemed tiny, and everything was so much closer at hand than I remember it being, when a walk to St Catherine's Point seemed a trek to the end of the world. But some things were very familar: there was my old house on the Esplanade, looking just the same as ever, but a whole lot more expensive. Jaw-droppingly so, in fact.
Fowey Library, now down at Caffa Mill, was certainly not there in my day: it was a great honour to be invited as a guest of the Reading Group there to celebrate its 8th birthday. The last story I wrote in Fowey was also an epiC, entitled THUNDERBOLT: THE ADVENTURES OF A DARTMOOR PONY. It stretched to over 30 pages of biro-scribbled handwriting and illustrations in a feint-lined notebook, and earned me a gold star from form teacher Miss Hunkin. I came away from my two-hour session with the reading group, who seem to have genuinely loved CROSSED BONES, with the same warm glow of achievement. So thank you to Helen and Deborah, Pam and Rick and Dave for inviting me and making my day so memorable: it was tremendous fun (and very grown-up).
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