On being inspired by writers

Last week I had lots of fun.

I spent most of Thursday with Michael Wagner, author or the Maxx Rumble books as well as The Undys series of children’s books and listening to him speak to students in three of our libraries. He was entertaining, the kids loved him and to top it off he’s a really nice guy.

Then on Thursday night, and all day Friday & Saturday I attended the Reading Matters conference put on by the lovely folk at the Centre for Youth Literature at the State Library of Victoria. Speakers at this conference included John Green, MT Anderson, James Roy, Bernard Beckett, Mal Peet, Anthony Eaton, Isobelle Carmody, Alison Goodman, Randa Abdel-Fattah, Tim Flannery, Armin Greder, Tristan Bancks.

The whole conference was wonderful and without wanting to downplay any presenters or sessions, some of the highlights that really stayed with me are:

• John green’s opening address arguing against the parallel import legislation,
• MT Anderson accompanied by a violinist to aid his description of 18th century sentence structure,
• Anthony Eaton describing his research trip to Antarctica. I now plan to write a book set there. Or to at least research one,
• James Roy, who seemed to pop up regularly throughout the weekend and was always interesting and entertaining. The closing session featuring James in conversation with John Green was funnier than some comedy shows I’ve been to,
• Bernard Beckett who pretty much made me laugh or think really hard every time he said something,
• Mal Peet’s funny, laid back approach to pretty much everything, especially research,
• and let’s be honest, pretty much every session.

So thanks to the Centre for Youth Literature who did a splendid job of organising & running the conference, the City of Boroondara Library Service for sending me, and to all the authors who entertained us & made us think. I also managed to increase my signed book collection by four books. Adding John Green, MT Anderson, James Roy, and Bernard Beckett to my signed copy shelf, as pictured below.