The signing tour gets longer with more dates added. Zoë confirmed to me today extra dates at new venues Stockport (Saturday 28th of May) and Knutsford (Sunday 5th of June). Both will be held at the branches of Waterstone’s. It’s certainly new ground as I’ve never actually been to the town centres in either of these places before.

I also received in the post today a copy of a magazine called ‘The Bugle’. It’s the magazine that gets sent out to people who used to go to the fee paying school that I went to between 1990 and 1995. It was a little surprise to flick through and see the review of my book in there! It was a very favourable review too, which is always nice for massaging the ego. I’ll have to remember to add the magazine to my ever-growing press-cutting pile for future reference. The inclusion of the review may break a few people, on account of the fact that I was in the curious position of having gone to an all-boys (almost!) school. One of those little quirks of fate, that saw two girls in an otherwise all-boys environment. I wonder if any of the other ‘old boys’ will work that one out? (Probably in between wondering why they didn’t make our acquittance more when we were there!)

I’ve also been told by Zoë that we have started receiving out of the blue invites for doing signings at Waterstone’s branches more further afield. This we suspect is partly due to the increased sales, media coverage, and – last but not least – the fact that ‘Bringing home the stars’ has been taken into Waterstone’s core catalogue list of sci-fi titles. At the end of this tour I think that I will have become an expert on cheap or free places to park a car all day on a Saturday and Sunday in far too many towns and cities in the UK!