'm on my hols this week, but when you get to see a great writer like Anthony Horowitz you've got to talk about it and I'm only scratching the surface of what was discussed when my son, who's an avid Alex Rider reader and I went to see said writer at the Library Theatre in Birmingham Library, as part of the Young Reader's Birmingham book festival. He was brilliant, humorous and full of information as he spent most of the hour he was on for answering questions from the audience.So what did we learn, well for those that don't already know his books Anthony Horowitz writes the Alex Rider series of spy books, featuring a fourteen year old schoolboy who gets to become a continent crossing spy with super cool gadgets. The latest and eighth book in the series, 'Crocodile Tears' has recently been published. His first, Stormbreaker was turned into a film and is also a graphic novel. There are two more to come with the final one not even featuring the main character! Alex Rider's character name is a cross between a friend's son's name who's called Alex and a very famous actress, Ursula Andress's character name, Honey Ryder, from the very first James Bond film, 'Dr No,' which Anthony loved watching when he was a child and inspired him to write books featuring a younger spy.
My son was even lucky enough to get his copy of 'Crocodile Tears' signed and get this, he also got a treasure in the form of a handwritten page which Anthony gave him, one torn straight out of his writer's notebook which features a page from his next Alex Rider book, 'Scorpia Rising,' a title that's yet to become a published book. Wow!!!
Anthony's also the writer of The Power of Five, The Diamond Brothers and a variety of Horror books, as well as work for TV such as Foyle's War and Collision. In total he's written 33 books (blimey he's prolific!!) In fact the only genre he hasn't covered is Romance, which is good apparently after he told his wife and she commented how could he write about something he knows nothing about!
Anthony did say loads more, things like inventing gadgets for Smithers by creeping into his kid's rooms and seeing what they had stored in them, which is where the Zit Cream and Bubble07 ideas came from. Also, his favourite children's book is 'Holes' by Louis Sachar, but he loves Private Peaceful by Michael Morpurgo as well. I think it'd be great to get an interview with Anthony Horowitz as I can't do his answers justice in such a small piece like this. However he's very supportive of writing and in closing suggested that for all you budding writers out there you should take five minutes before you write just to jot down a series of ideas which you can then turn into a story.
Thanks Anthony for putting on such a great show. We're looking forward to reading, 'Scorpia Rising' when it's published.
2 comments:
Holy mum!
I didn't know there were more Alex Rider novels after Snakehead! I am eager to find out what happens in Crocodile Tears and I think my cousin will be equally as eager when I tell her about it because she is a big fan of the Alex Rider Series (she has been "borrowing" my copy of Snakehead since last year!). I might even buy a copy of Crocodile Tears for her rather than myself since she is a bigger fan than I am.
I think the last novel in the series (the one that doesn't even feature Alex Rider) is going to be Yassen Gregorovich's diary. The reason for my thinking this is because I have the Alex Rider Mission Files book and in it there is a profile on Yassen and in the profile it says; "It is rumoured that Yassen kept a diary all his life".
Is that a hint or is that a hint?
I don't know if this is just me wishing and willing it to be Yassen's diary but it certainly sounds suspicious!!
I love the Alex Rider books! I read an excerpt from Stormbreaker and was immediately hooked. I got every published book in the series out of the library and read them all in two weeks - my favourites are Point Blanc and Ark Angel.
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