Sunday 26 August 2012

Diavolino Arrives at Waterstones!

Steve Emmett, Julia Kavan, Catherine Cavendish



August Bank Holiday with its usual mix of sunshine and showers, coupled with one of the biggest weekends in the city's (horse) racing calendar, saw Waterstones welcome horror writer Steve Emmett to its York store yesterday (Saturday).

Steve was there to sign copies of his novel, Diavolino, which, following on the heels of a highly successful ebook, is now available in print. In case you haven't caught up with it yet, here's the blurb:

 "The chance to build a dream home on a private island in Italy's most beautiful lake offers architect Tom Lupton the fresh start he's been yearning for. But when he arrives with his family on Diavolino, he finds the terrified locals dead set against his arrival. The island, whose very existence has been shrouded in secrecy for half a millennium, has a dark history that no one cares to remember, and as their opposition to Tom grows, so grows a brooding evil that will lead them to the very doors of hell..."


Author,Julia Kavan and I came along to add our support and were soon joined by Louise Cole from Firedance Books. It was the first time the four of us had met up (having enjoyed a 'virtual' friendship for over three years), so we had a great time. Even better, customers came along and bought the book! By the end of the day, with most of the stock sold, Steve pronounced the event a resounding success.

If you missed him there, you can still catch Steve in person at Booqfest
in Northampton on Sunday 16th September, where he will be delivering a talk on horror writing and reading extracts from his novel.

You'll find Diavolino related links here: Diavolino


Ghostly Goings-On At The Golden Fleece

 

Julia and I, along with my longsuffering other half, Colin, met up at the multi-haunted Golden Fleece pub on the evening before Steve's booksigning. Typical of two writers, Julia and I were soon engaged in animated conversation while Colin - himself a published author (Accountancy in Banking)- amused himself with the pub's various eccentricities. Suddenly, he drew our attention to something a little odd.

Behind the bar, coffee mugs were suspended on inidividual hooks and, while the others remained static, one was swaying and continued to do so, never varying its rhythmical swing. Normally if you set a mug (or anything for that matter) swinging on a hook, it will slow down after a relatively short time and then stop. Not this mug. It just kept on...and on... and on. But nobody was touching it.

Then, to cap it all, a glass on an unattended table next to us suddenly crashed to the floor and smashed. We were the nearest people to it and were sitting about four feet away. It was, by now, fairly quiet in the bar and nobody had gone past for some time. OK, this is an ancient pub with uneven floors, so you might think it simply slid off the table. That makes sense, doesn't it? So, if we were to place another glass on the table, it too should slide, shouldn't it?  Except another customer, who had witnessed the whole thing, tried that repeatedly with a similar glass. It never moved...


Unable to get a word in edgeways, Colin makes a friend in the Golden Fleece
Don't you just love a haunted pub that lives up to its hype?





4 comments:

  1. I'm so glad the event went well - Steve deserves to do well.
    I'm not surprised that things went "bump" when you two writers of spook got together.

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  2. What with flying glassware in The Golden Fleece and disembodied laughter in The Red Lion, Avebury, I'm thinking I should visit a few more haunted pubs ;-) I had a great evening, Cat - and so pleased the day went well, Steve!

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  3. It was great to meet you at last, Julia. No orbs on my photos this time but it'll be interesting to see what happens when you come to North Wales and I show you our spooky cupboard... Sue, I swear all we were doing was just chatting. Maybe the ghost is a fan of 50 Shades?

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