"It's Friday so it must be Warwick." Well, it was starting to feel like that, but then I arrived at the fabulous Bridge Theatre at Warwick School, to a wonderful welcome and a really brilliant, enthusiastic, book-loving audience. I had something special for this audience and the one in Cardiff - a new story about Unshockable Hans. As I've mentioned elsewhere on my website, all the legends in The Vanishing of Katharina Linden are genuine Bad Münstereifel folktales, collected by Father Krause and published in the Eifel Club Newsletter from 1910 onwards. When I was researching for the book, I went to the Eifel Club HQ in Düren to get copies of the original published versions. Most of the stories about Hans feature in the book, but one didn't - so I retold it in English for the two bigger audiences.
It's been a fabulous week and a wonderful opportunity to meet readers. Since I live in Belgium, I don't have the chance to do so very often, so it's great to listen to their views, get feedback and answer questions. There were some very interesting questions at Warwick. Someone wanted to know whether I had any particular music in mind when I was writing my books. The answer is: when I was writing The Vanishing of Katharina Linden I don't remember having any particular music in mind, but when I was writing The Glass Demon it was Bach's Weihnachtsoratorium, and especially Nun seid ihr wohl gerochen. It's dynamic, passionate, and it's sung in German. Whenever I listen to it I think of angry angels. Perfect.
Big thanks to Angela Ballard for inviting me to the Warwick event. I'm back in Brussels for a few days now, but next week I'll be back in London for a final shadowing scheme event in Hackney, before the actual Carnegie award ceremony on Thursday 24th June. Can't wait!
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