The Gospel of Loki by Joanne Harris

This week I was lucky enough to have two tickets to an event being held at Oldham Library where Joanne Harris was visiting.  So off I trekked – through extreme rain I might add, to see and hear one of my favourite authors.  (Okay, I admit, I was driven by the lovely hubby so no real hardship was involved).

I do love Joanne Harris, I’ve read most of her books and, in fact, given when I started reading these you could almost say that it was reading her books that helped to encourage and sustain my love of fantasy.   My favourites are Coastliners, Blackberry Wine and Holy Fools.  Oddly, I haven’t read Blue Eyed Boy – which seems to have been one of those books that has a divided opinion.  I was very happy to go along and sat right at the front like a big teacher’s pet! (I defend myself by saying that I was trying to get a good view and I certainly achieved that!)  So, did this event live up to my expectations.  Hell yes.  Joanne Harris is a wonderful speaker, incredibly articulate, interesting and amusing.  Now, you probably think ‘hello! author’ – but that doesn’t necessarily give you the ability to stand up in front of a room full of complete strangers and talk to them with confidence, without props, without prompts,  without notes and be interesting and captivating.  I literally felt like she was talking directly to me, of course she wasn’t, but that’s how it felt and I related to all her stories – particularly about the library.

Now, of course, there’s a slight incentive to these events in that Joanne has recently released her latest book – The Gospel of Loki – but nothing wrong to incentives.  The book was on sale of course with the potential for signatures at the conclusion (and JH was happy to sign any books that were brought along) – and, I must say the book looks absolutely gorgeous.

Basically JH gave us a few stories – starting with a recounting of how she first joined the library and discovered the world of fantasy – in spite of the fact that she was only supposed to be reading books that were ‘improving’.  (I actually maintain that fantasy is improving – and I really mean that – they feed your imagination and lead you to experience wild adventures!)  Anyway, JH joined the library.  Dark and dusty, up a rickety staircase and watched over by a protective guardian (who I imagined with eccentric horn rimmed spectacles and a bun! – I’m recounting a story here!!).  Long story short, one of JH’s favourite books proved to be a book of norse mythology and this in turn fed her interest and imagination.  Year’s later we have the Gospel of Loki – of course there were plenty of little stories in between but I won’t go into them all here.  We were then treated to a reading of the book and on the back of that I came straight home and purchased a copy (I wanted the kindle version).  I haven’t read this yet but from the reading at the event it seems to be told in that wonderful story time voice that JH has perfected whilst also managing to sound refreshing and amusing.  I can’t wait to get to this.

We then moved to a Q&A.  I can’t remember all the questions and I’m kicking myself that yet again I didn’t take some notes – but there was a discussion about characters.  How, sometimes in a story ,some of the characters are fairly flat and one dimensional, there to serve the plot really but then, without realising, the author breathes more life into these characters and they become unruly, refuse to behave and end up taking over the story!  There was discussion about ‘the shed’ and ‘twitter’ which was really amusing because I do follow JH on twitter and she is very entertaining to say the least. How, once an author, always an author – you can’t switch off.  The ideas arrive at inopportune hours, unrestricted by the 9-5 of a regular job.  And then there was the ‘what’s next’ question.  Again, my memory isn’t spot on for this (for which I blame the excitement of the moment) – BUT, I do remember some!  There’s a piece being written/worked up for JH’s fantasy author, really exciting is a short novella which is being worked on for a future Doctor Who episode – I think some time November/December and there was definitely another project (at least or maybe more, yes definitely more – damn my peanut sized brain!).  Sorry, I can’t remember it all but the news about the Doctor Who episode and the fantasy novel is very exciting!

Anyway, I had a lovely evening.  My esteem for JH has risen even higher and I have a new book on top of it all! (No doubt I will eventually buy the hardback because the cover is so lovely – but don’t tell the husband!  I think he thinks the house is sinking under the weight of books!  Personally I think we just need to move out to somewhere bigger – perhaps an old unused library – and make it our mission to fill it with books again – but, shhhh, you didn’t hear that, seal your lips and throw away the key).

This is my third of this type of event and Joanne Harris is in good company now with Robin Hobbs and Neil Gaiman.  I think I could become quite addicted to such evenings.  I read, reading is my passion and therefore for me authors are my superstars – unfortunately this does turn me into a massive pool of dribbling nonsense, unable to speak or ask questions and with the memory of a sieve- but I will get better, and I will take notes.