flying home today

Only the packing left to do. I’ve been staying with David Cornish and his wife Tiffany – perfect hosts! Thanks, guys. Here’s David poised over computer and breakfast –

Last night we wrapped up with an author’s dinner – with Ineke in the centre, of course.
Left to right, that’s me, David (D.M.) Cornish, Joel Garner, Colin Taber (my iPad wants to change you to Tabernacle, Colin!), Sean Williams and Ineke Prochazka.

Omigod, what happened to my mouth? Some fragment of food left over from dinner, maybe. The pic was taken later when we were having chocolate – hot chocolate, churros … it’s become a tradition. Jay Kristoff had to leave straight after dinner.

End of Supanova

Sunday gone, Adelaide Supanova over, alas! Here are some more of the best Steampunk costumes –

Stephen Starke above, and Stephen Baragwanath below

Now Cliff French

Followed by Shiralee Parkinson

And Daniel Cardinale

Last but not least, Mark Griffiths

Way to go, guys! And those were only the ones I snapped – I can think of more I missed.

Steampunk costumes at Supanova

First day – and here are three of the best at Adelaide Supanova.
Annie –

And Corinna –

And Glenn Jones –

I can count Glenn as my protege, because I influenced him into steampunk at last year’s Gold Coast Supanova! Now he’s influencing me – I want to get monocle attachments for my glasses same as he’s got!

Adelaide & second Supanova

Time to catch up on some pics. I stayed for three nights at the Tollgate motel in Adelaide – driving up the hills on the back way heading north, the view was spectacular, over the whole city to the sea –

I fitted in four school visits, to Seymour College, St Ignatius, Cabra Dominican and Kildare. Here’s Ruth Massie, Head of English at Seymour, getting into the Steampunk mood –

Here’s one of the prizewinners with her free giveaway copy of Song of the Slums at Cabra

And here’s Richard doing his shtick at Kildare –

Now I’m staying chez David Cornish and Tiffany, and Supanova’s half way through already. More anon!

Authors at signing

I took a couple of pics at the end of Sunday’s signing (when crowds had shrunk enough for me to get a clear picture!)

Left to right – Jay Kristoff (Stormdancer, Kinslayer), Joel Shepherd (Sasha, latest in the Trial of Blood and Steel series), Colin Taber (Ossard Trilogy, The Landing), Stacey (our guardian angel at Supanova, looking after us and shepherding us wherever we needed to be), and D.M. (David) Cornish with his wife (Monster Blood Tattoo).
Not included – Ian Irvine who’d left to catch a plane, Scott Baker, temporarily wandering, and Steve Worland installed at the Penguin counter.
And in reverse order –

Right to left – David, Stacey, Colin, Joel and Jay.
Great bunch of guys! George R.R. Martin was generally sitting round the corner from David, with his (very long) queue approaching from another direction – but not in the moment when I took the pic. (I was generally next along from Jay)

Supanova Sunday

More pics from the Brisbane Supanova – great Steampunk costumes.

I think that was Deone, but it might have been Mandy. I’m missing one photo, and I can’t tell which. Here’s Lynn (on right) and Nadine (on left)

And Tanya –

Brisbane Supanova Saturday

Flew into Brisbane yesterday. A quiet afternoon for all the authors in the signing area, followed by the Welcoming Ceremony. Yay, I got to play my steampunk guitar on stage, using my over-the-shoulder mini-amp.
Today was mostly signing. I got pics taken of a couple of the best steampunk costumes – Allison Mclelland and Ayano Itaba here

and Adrian Billiau here

There were others but I didn’t have time to produce the camera!
Only problem was that the bookshop sold out of copies of Song of the Slums – good in one way, I guess, but I wish they’d ordered more in!

Last week of Sydney schools

Super-size screen for my trailer and PowerPoint! This was at Rosebank on Tuesday. You can’t see it, but there was a waterfall-style fountain right behind the screen – in the library!

Today’s school was Fort Street (the famous Fort Street, alma mater to half of Australia’s most famous people!). So of course I had to show off Australia’s most famous steampunk guitar –

Supanovas coming up

I fly to Brisbane as a guest of the Supanova there at the end of this week, then Adelaide and Adelaide schools until the Supanova there the following weekend. All the guests and info are at this web address –
http://www.supanova.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Supanova-Nov2013_Mag_Complete.pdf
I was wrong about Tyrion Lannister, the dwarf in Game of Thrones (my personal hero) – instead it’s Cersei Lannister (i.e. actress playing her) who’ll be one of the international media guests.
The rest of this week will be non-stop Sydney school visits – today was Kincoppal in Rose Bay (actually closer to Vaucluse). One of the talks I did was in the library – and here’s the view looking out from the library

Whew! Similar views from all over the school …