Spoken

The 2011 London Book Fair was incredibly hectic running from one meeting to another, and when we finally met Dmitri Glukhovsky it was at the end of a very hectic day for him and he was exhausted, but he still very kindly gave us a brilliant interview in a very noisy cafe in the Earls Court building about his fantasy book 'Metro 2033'

I very much enjoyed meeting and interviewing Sergei Luyanenko at the London Book Fair 2011 in the very noisy cafe in the Earls Court building, where he talked about his Night Watch fantasy series with the help of Masha who acted as his translator. Sergei even through translation had a terrific sense of humour which I hope you'll enjoy.

It is always a joy to meet someone who is so gracious to all the people he meets. I'm talking about Charley Boorman who  my daughter Gen and I met at the Epsom Playhouse at the beginning of his tour, when I did a catchup interview with him. He not only talked about his past exploits in travelling around the world By Any Means - both series but also about his cancer.

Here"s the link to his tour dates - the show is brilliant - very funny

I last met Len Tyler in 2007 when his 1st book 'The Herring Sellers Apprentice' was published. Then Len was still in his day job and was very rushed and harassed, but on Friday July 22nd I met an altogether different person. Len had given up his job - won the Last Laugh Award in 2010 for 'The Herring in the Library' and was now a full time writer! He looked very relaxed and happy - enjoying life to the full with his humour in full flow. He chatted about all his books - especially 'A Very Persistant Illusion' and his current release 'The Herring on the Nile'.

On Wednesday June 29th I met Dr Kristin Neff to chat with about her book Self Compassion. She looks very much like a young Ali Magraw from 'Love Story' and is very down to earth in what she had to say about being compassionate to one's self.

We discovered that we had much in common - especially in that we both have autistic children - her's is Rowan now 10 who featured in the book The Horse Boy and mine is Naomi 39 who lives in an adult autism specific residential home.

Kristine was a joy to meet and imparts much good advice on how not to beat yourself and be Self Compassionate in this interview.

Met Luke Gamble on Friday 10th June at his vet surgery in Fordingbridge, Hampshire to chat with him about his book 'The Vet'. We arrived 45 minutes early and Luke arrived 10 minutes later, dressed in mud brown shirt and knee length shorts! He's exactly as you see him on tv but much finer boned and a wicked twinkle in his eye!

His dog Leuwen is a massive gentle giant of a dog who slept under the table whilst his master enthused about his work and the Worldwide Vetinary Service.

I met Angela Donovan on July 29th at Hodder & Stoughton Publishers to chat with her about her book 'The Wish', and discovered a wonderful caring person who exuded old style glamour with a voice to match and was a joy to meet. Our interview should have been 30 minutes but public transport put paid to that, but she does have some golden nuggets of info from her book.

Having reviewed Annabel Pitcher's debut novel 'My sister Lives on the Mantelpiece' I wanted to find out more - what were her influences and why did she write her book in such an unusual way. She has a fascinating story to tell - enjoy.

You always know when things are going to go right when everything else goes wrong - and so it was on the day that my friend Christine and I went to interview Christian writer Philip Yancey about his latest book!

Our train got cancelled and then the bus got stuck in exceptionally heavy traffic - and having got off the bus at our destination, the wind then tried to blow us over it was so strong! But we did enjoy meeting Philip and hearing what he had to say about his book 'What God is God'.

On Monday 11th October I made a very slow journey by train and bus to the Orion offices to interview Michelle Paver. I thought that with a grid lock at Trafalgar Square I was never going to make it - but I did and Michelle was a joy to chat with about her ghost story 'Dark Matter'.