Craigour Park: Young Sherlock Holmes

In September, Scottish Book Trust brought schools in Edinburgh a self-confessed Sherlock Holmes addict, Andrew Lane. During two sessions with hundreds of pupils, we discovered the boy and the cases that turned the Young Sherlock into the detective. This week, we have pupils from Craigour Park to talk about the event.

On a chilly September day, we all excitedly piled on to a coach to take the short trip to George Heriot’s School to meet Andrew Lane. Our teacher had told us all about the author of the Young Sherlock books and we were very excited about meeting him.

From the front cover of the book we knew it was going to be a good read. We arrived at the school first and were really lucky as we got to meet him and each of us got the chance to have our books signed. He was very friendly. It was awesome to meet a real live author! We also got to sit on the front row so we had a fantastic view of Andrew Lane and the amazing pictures he showed us.

It was clear that Andrew Lane really loved Sherlock Holmes and he made him sound like a very exciting character. He was really interesting to listen to and told us so much about his stories.  He even told us some funny jokes! At the end we were able to ask questions and ask his advice. Andrew gave us tips to improve our writing. Lots of us have already started to read his book and think that it is great. Some of us even want to be an author one day.

Thank you very much to Craigour Park for supplying a fantastic blog about the Andrew Lane event. We're very happy that you had a brilliant time!

You can find out more about Andrew and the Young Sherlock series on his website.

You can see some more pupil feedback from the event by going to our events page. You can even check out a brief interview we filmed with Andrew on the day.

Watch the trailer for Death Cloud below!

You can pre-order your copy of Andrew's second book Red Leech.

Early Years Residency:

Alison Murray, Glasgow-based author and illustrator, is Scottish Book Trust's first Early Years Writer in Residence.
Over the next nine months, Alison will work with a Home-Start group in Renfrewshire, in an area of socio-economic deprivation, to support parents’ reading and writing skills and embed a love of book sharing with young children within the community.
Read all about the residency in Alison's blog.

Other news:

Alan Garner's The Weird Stone of Brisingamen turned 50 at the beginning of the week. To celebrate it's 50th anniversary Harper Collins have created a lavish hardback edition. The edition features a beautiful new design, and a foreword by Alan himself, it is a must-have collector's item for any lover of great children's fiction.

Are you stuck for something to do over the October holidays? Well, don't despair! The Scottish Storytelling Centre has a host of events to keep you busy over the holidays. Check out their website to plan for this weekend and get your tickets now! You can also book tickets for any event by calling 0131 556 9579.

Next week, Chris and Candy are out on the Scottish Friendly Children's Book Tour with the excellent writer Cathy MacPhail. They will be visiting a number of schools and libraries in the Exeter area so have a look out for them. 

Are you between the age of 14 and 17? Do you write or want to write? Would you like to find out about the realities of life as a writer? Then the Young Writers Conference is for you. This will take place in Edinburgh  on the 13th of November, check our website for more information.

Don't forget to follow us on Twitter and Facebook to get all the latest news from Scottish Book Trust. Have a lovely weekend!