Warning: May Have Side Effects

School/library/bookshop/festival visits - I still don't know what the generic name for these things should be - would, if prescribed, probably come with a long list of possible side effects. There are the obvious ones, like:

May cause insomnia, unsettled stomach and a raised temperature beforehand, and lethargy, a need for chocolate (preferably injected) and shaky chills afterwards. (Also mood swings. garrulousness and a tendency to want to adopt passing children or any adult who says nice things to you.)

But the label would have to also include:

Euphoria.

It's an enormous buzz talking to kids. I love getting them to laugh, getting them on my side, getting them excited about what I'm excited about. (Teachers have to do this all the time, and I know I would be in a gibbering puddle by the end of my first term if I tried to do their job. I'm in the middle of a two-week stretch of 14 events and I'd have said that was about my limit.)

The moral of the story is: some side effects are worth it.

Cheers, Joan.

P.S. I should have said - the events are about The Wickit Chronicles, as a launch for the third book in the series, Ice Road, which just came out.