Diary - May/June 2009:

Hi,

We're still touring with The Immortals visiting many of the wonderful literary festivals that take place all over the country, and introducing fans - both old and new - the final book in the Edge Chronicles.

The Brighton Festival event took place on Sunday, 10th May, in a lovely old theatre, in Hove actually. Although it was a beautiful sunny day, the place was full of readers who had come to hear us talk about how we've concluded the Edge Chronicles series. Paul did a reading from the book about a curious handsome starnger in shining white robes who comes to a woodtroll village and leads the villagers off to the promise of a new life in a distant city: '...a place that had been destroyed, but has now been renewed.' Chris drew pictures of some of the creatures from the Edge, including a banderbear, a gabtroll and a wig-wig, and gave them to some of the kids who were waiting to have their books signed.

In question time, a boy asked a very good question. 'Where does the metal in the Edge come from?' We've never dealt with smelting in detail, although, of course, Old Undertown was an industrial city, with forges and foundries. In the Edgeworld, although there is some use of metal ores, most metal comes from the trees. Ironwood pines, leadwood and copperwood... For centuries, metals had been extracted from the timber in these great foundry works. In Forden Drew's blog, entry 25 we write about the small forge that has been set up in the Western Woods, where the sap of ironwood pinecones is extracted and turned into ironwood metal.

If you haven't yet checked out the blog, do have a look. Hedgethorn Lammergyre and the roost marshal have just encountered the strangest creature ever to emerge from an Edge lake, while on the other side of the Farrow Ridges, Forden Drew has just set off on a fateful prowlgrin ride with Alcestia, the roost marshal's beautiful daughter...

But back to the festivals...

On 27th May, we went to the book festival at Hay-on-Wye. We talked in a huge marquee to more than 300 people. While we were up on stage describing the mighty phrax-driven sky vessels of the Third Age of Flight, the skies outside opened up. The rain beat down on the canvas roof, roaring and hissing like a phraxchamber. It was almost as though we were all inside a sky tavern, travelling from one side of the Edge to the other!

Our next festival will be the Edinburgh Festival on Saturday, 22 August. Hope to see lots of you there.

Keep reading!