As those of you who read this blog regularly will know, we spent most of last weekend at the Ullapool Book Festival. Right now there seem to be book festivals of one kind or another springing up all over the country. Surely a good thing – any chance to celebrate books and reading is something to be applauded. Little by little at Two Ravens we’re trying to expand our presence at book festivals. We started last year with an event on what it’s like to be a new published novelist with Peter Dorward and Tom Lappin at the wonderful Wigtown Book Festival. Unfortunately we couldn’t stay long enough to soak up the atmosphere but from what we heard it was wonderful – Wigtown is a very small place with quite cosy venues and a disproportionately large number of bookshops – and I think this gives a festival a relaxed and pleasantly intimate feeling, where the authors are not too divorced from the audiences but mingle quite freely with them. Ullapool was especially successful in this regard – it lasts only a weekend, and so most people seem to come for the whole thing. You can wander round the village and run into people that you recognise from the events; the authors and the audience all eat and drink together (if members of the audience are smart enough to choose to) at The Ceilidh Place (now surely that IS the centre of the universe … if you’ve never been there, rush at once to Ullapool – http://ceilidhplace.com/ceilidhplace/default.asp – it also has one of the best small independent bookshops in the entire country with a unique, thoughtful and literary selection of books) and you go home feeling enriched rather than exhausted. People in Ullapool don’t seem to know the meaning of the word ‘hype’, and so there is none. There’s simply a love for art and books and writers.
On the other hand and at the other extreme, five of our authors are at the Edinburgh International Book Festival in August, with another two giving readings at the book fringe festival. Edinburgh in August is an entire city full to the brim of visitors for the many arts events that dominate the place during that month. It’s a completely different atmosphere – but then it has a completely different aim. We’re really looking forward to seeing the difference.
Given the large number of book events out there, it can be hard sometimes to identify the kind of festival that Two Ravens Press would fit cosily into, so any suggestions will be gratefully received – as will any comments about what you like and don’t like to see from authors at a festival.
Sharon
