Q: Did you always want to be an author?

Janis Mackay [JM]: YES! I have always wanted to be an author.

Q: How long did this book take to write?

JM: Probably a year in all. I finished it while spending a month on an island in Finland in the spring of 2012.

Q: When did you first get the idea to write about time travel?

JM: In 2011 I went to a theatre show about Marjory Fleming. She lived in Edinburgh 200 years before. At the age of eight she kept a diary and wrote poems and observations of life, and of herself. She was a wonderful writer. She died before her ninth birthday, but the diary was kept and later published. This gave me a Scottish child’s insight into life 200 years ago. It was Marjory that inspired the theme.

Q: This book is very different to the Magnus Fin books. What is your favourite thing about this new book?

JM: I love Agatha Black’s way of speaking, and her innocence and response in meeting the modern world.

Q: Do you have a favourite character in this book?

JM: They are all very real to me. Agatha and Saul of course are favourites, and Agnes, and the pet monkey –- and poor old Albert Black!

Q: If you met someone who had time travelled from the past what would you ask them?

JM: How they did it!

Q: What do you like best about being an author?

JM: I like teetering on the edge in front of possibilities then jumping in and making someone that didn’t exist before.

Q: What was the hardest thing about writing a story involving time travel?

JM: To make it seem like this could really happen. I like to write fantasy, but to write in such a way that this could be true.

Q: In the book Agatha has a performing pet monkey. Have you ever had unusual pets?

JM: I had a tortoise that never woke up from its shoebox under my bed. Then, when I lived in France, we had a yellow talking parrot called Jaco who was extremely annoying. Now I have a collie dog called Flora.

Q: If you lived in 1812 what job would you want to do?

JM: Well, to be honest, I think I would like to be a man and be a travelling player.

Q: If you could travel to any point in history where would you go?

JM: Way back, to Pictish times to see the land and the wild animals. And to sit around a crackling log fire and see what people looked like and how they spoke thousands of years ago.

Thanks, Janis!

James on stage in the Caird Hall

The ceremony took place in the stunning Caird Hall, filled with over 1000 school pupils (that’s a lot!) as well as other guests, coming to cheer on the authors. James had a lot of fun chatting to fans and signing copies of Soldier’s Game before the ceremony started and then we were in for a real treat. Pupils from St. Joseph’s Primary in Bonnybridge performed a short dramatisation of the three books in the Younger Readers category. The actors were all fantastic and all three plays were really fun to watch. For the Soldier’s Game performance, they even played a bit of football!

For the Bookbugs category there was even more entertainment! Julia Donaldson and her husband Malcolm did a musical version of Jack and the Flumflum Tree and everyone joined in on the very catchy chorus! When Catherine Rayner read Solomon Crocodile, a massive crocodile (cardbord, not real!) crept around on stage. John Fardell got great help from the audience to write a new book on stage, with the same storyline as The Day Louis Got Eaten.

James Killgore with shortlisted diploma

The authors in the Older Readers category were interviewed on stage. We found out that Barry Hutchison’s favourite pie is horsemeat pie (yum?), Elizabeth Laird loves travelling and Elizabeth Wein is very good at dancing Gangnam Style (she even showed us)!

The nailbiting moment when the winners were announced arrived! The whole of Caird Hall held their breath as the envelopes where opened and the names of the winners read out, to much applause. The winners were (drum roll please!) John Fardell and The Day Louis got Eaten, Jonathan Meres with The World of Norm and Barry Hutchison and his book The 13th Horseman!

Massive congratulations to all the winners and the shortlisted authors and a very well done to all the pupils who read and voted for the books!

If you would like to find out more about the awards, the shortlisted authors and the winners, you can visit the Scottish Book Trust website.

Posted by Benedicte at Discover Kelpies.

Lots of creativity at the craft table

There were lots of ballet-themed activities to keep everyone busy! Janey’s guests could enjoy their very own decorated cupcake, make bright, sparkly drawings at the craft table, and even take part in a very special ballet lesson!

A lovely decorated cupcake

To top it all off, there was even a performance by ballet students from Angela Watson School of Dance, who did a lovely dance to The Waltz of the Flowers from the ballet Sleeping Beauty, and swooshed and twirled away in front of us!

The Cloudberry Castle books follows ballet-mad Katie, who dreams of being a ballerina. In the newest book, Cloudberry Castle: Ballerina Dreams, Katie is given the chance to audition for a place in New York City Ballet’s production of the Nutcracker! But can she balance her dream ballet role with helping her old friend Mallie and taking her ballet exams? Janey treated her guests to a storytime with all three books in the series, finishing with a reading from Cloudberry Castle: Ballerina Dreams.

Janey reading from all three books in her series

Well done to all our competition winners on the day! There were many beautifully decorated tutus, tiaras, nutcrackers and ballet shoes and we wished that we could have chosen all of them. And a special congratulations to the winner of the raffle who won tickets to go and see the Scottish Ballet perform the Nutcracker ballet.

The many wonderful competition entries

Posted by: Claire at Discover Kelpies

P.S — Thanks to all the lovely students from Stirling and Napier Universities who helped out on the day!

Demons, Dragons, Monsters and Mayhem has extracts from dark and dangerous The Daemon Parallel by Roy Gill; award-winning adventure First Aid for Fairies and Other Fabled Beasts by Lari Don; spooky How to Make a Golem (and Terrify People) by Alette Willis; and Daniela Sacerdoti’s zany monster-hunting Really Weird Removals.com

So what are you waiting for, try out Demons, Dragons, Monsters and Mayhem today!

Available for free from your regular eBook seller.

Posted by Benedicte at Discover Kelpies