Great fun at the Chipping Norton Literary Festival this weekend - everyone from Baroness Trumpington - who took the conversation where she wanted it to go - to Sheila Hancock, who remains a strong, political and a terrifically entertaining speaker.

We sponsored two events: Jesse Armstrong, a script writer from The Peep Show, The Thick of It and The Four Lions, talked about his new novel; and Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan talked about their book group, their novels and their lives. 

However,...

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1. Eat - this may sound elementary but it's easy to rush past the long lines at cafes thinking you don't have time. Running on empty means you're not thinking properly. Keep snacks in your handbag - savoury and sweet.
2. Drink - and I don't just mean beer and wine. It's a dry old environment at Olympia and running from floor to floor can feel like a mini-marathon. Carry a water bottle - with water in it!
3. Breathe - it gives you time to think about what people are proposing. In fact, don't ans...
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The London Book Fair begins next week - a trade fair devoted to books. It's a joy to be there, and my wee head spins at all the book covers, spread surely over several acres. But before you think it's all fun - browsing blurbs, talking about authors and seeing what's new - let me tell you that there is serious work to be done. For the London Book Fair is less about day to day sales between publishers and book shops (although I wish some of it were), the event is more about meeting foreign pub...
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Guest blog by Vicky Delderfield. Her novel Effects and Belongings will be out later this year.

I remember the precise moment, driving out to lunch with my in-laws, when I first floated the idea of doing an MA in Creative Writing. Yes, I told them, it would involve quitting my job as a Marketing Manager, relying on Mark’s, my husband’s income, and making sacrifices as we saved up the hefty tuition fees. Er, no, I admitted, the MA was no guarantee of publication. But it was a sign of my seri...

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Sometimes a book comes into your life that you know will be special. 
It happened in a book shop overseas. We were browsing through English language holiday reads, when my son brought me what looked like a library book - old, hard-backed, a biblio sticker on the spine, it even had library stamp dates on the fly leaf. 'Look,' he said, and pointed to the title: The Ship of Theseus. We grinned at each other - Theseus had been popular in his bed time stories.
Between the pages were newspaper cuttin...
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