Finchley Literary Festival - Main Event

My dad came all the way over from Bristol to hear my reading at this main event. I don't think that did my nerves any good. In addition to that, I'd been up a 6.30 that morning to clean my flat top to bottom, minus the vacuuming, of course, which I would never do at that time in morning out of consideration to my neighbors. I finished the cleaning just before 8am which is when the Wildstar head start went live. To fix the tiredness, I started with the caffeinated fizzy drinks which seeing as I'm caffeine intolerant always come back to bite me later in the day.

Anyway, the main festival was really interesting. The other authors reading told some very good story, not just from their fictional works but with stories about their real lives, growing up, and about the research they did for their novels. I'm a bit of a history junky, which I think shows in my own novel, so I love all this extra detail. I find the story behind writing a novel is quite often just as interesting as the novel itself. The downside all these interesting lives the other speakers talk of it that it highlighted just how boring mine is.

During the break halfway though, we had tea and pastries. Yes, I had caffeinated tea to add to fizzy drink consumed earlier. I could have had decaff coffee but I was in a tea mood so thought, to hell with it.

During the break the museum room, for the venue, was open. I really enjoyed walking around it a learning yet more history, this time local history. I even tried out the quill with the ink well. Then it was back to event and the looming shadow of my imminent reading.

My reading did not go the best it could. A note was passed to me just before my turn saying "Speak slowly" as I clearly must have read a little too quickly at the anthology launch the previous week. I started slow but made a few mistakes, so after the first page I just sped back up again and, strangely enough, I made less mistakes. How that works, I have no idea. I stopped earlier than planned as, to me, it felt like my reading was taking a long time, but that was probably just nerves warping my perception. Anyway, once that was done, I breathed a sigh of relief. There was only one reader left after me and then the panel discussion which was also enjoyable. Then I made a quick exit, relieved my ordeal was over.