Monday 22 September 2008

Meg Cabot in Britain

Nobody told me Meg Cabot was in Britain. How did all those teenagers who turned up in their hundreds for a book signing at Waterstones find out?

It's a conspiracy.

Pictured right: Meg accidentally reveals the end of Princess Diaries 10 while on a school visit in England. Photo MegCabot.com

Anyway, Meg Cabot blogs very entertainingly about turning up in jeans at a black tie affair and measuring up to the wit and wisdom Richard Attenborough AND Anthony Horowitz:

Like I said I’m on my way to Bath now to speak at their 2nd annual book festival which I hope will go well. Or at least better than the speech I had to give last night, which was at a sales conference for some lovely book people who didn’t tell me it was a formal event (the men were in tuxes, the ladies in evening gowns), so of course I wore jeans. They also didn’t tell me the other speaker was Lord Attenborough (you might recall he directed the film Ghandi, among other things, like, oh becoming a lord). He waxed eloquently about his intimate friendship with Princess Diana and the deaths of his daughter and granddaughter in the tsunami whilst I sat at my table thinking, “*&%@! I have to go on after this, and talk about the Princess Diaries? Freaking shoot me now!” Sadly no one obliged.

Fortunately Anthony Horowitz, whom I didn’t even realize I was sitting next to, went on before (HE got the memo about formalwear, somehow), and gave a brilliant talk with many witticisms. Everyone laughed uproariously. Which just made it worse that I had to go after him because I had no speech prepared other than the one in my head which I’d written BEFORE Lord Attenborough, and so when I got up there I tried to change it around a bit to make it more full of pathos and witticisms, a kind of combination of Anthony’s and Lord Attenborough’s, which was of course a disaster. I found myself wondering, midway through as the lights beamed on me, and I was rambling away about Topshop (it’s a store in England kind of like a high end Express–I’m not joking, that’s really what I found myself talking about) what would happen if I just ran away. Or started to cry.

Since I've been posting a lot of random videos anyway, here's a relevant video, featuring Meg Cabot, dressed as a bride, talking about her book Queen of Babble Gets Hitched. It made me think my friend Fiona Dunbar (author of Pink Chameleon) really ought to do a video like this ... but dressed as a chameleon.


And yes. I'm still procrastinating.

10 comments :

  1. Hi! I've been subscribing to your blog for months, and it's only just occurred to me after reading this that I should introduce myself! Sorry - I should have done it sooner.

    I edit a book review blog called Chicklish, and we announced the Meg Cabot in Britain news a while ago (and I'm meeting her tomorrow to interview her for the site - wow! Perhaps you can link to our interview when I post it up? In any case, I should definitely link to your site.)

    So hi! And thanks for your great blog - I've thoroughly enjoyed reading it for a very long time!

    Chicklish is here: http://www.chicklish.co.uk

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  2. hi luisa, now i know that there is a conspiracy against me out there. i'm green with envy. have a good interview with meg cabot and yes, i certainly will link to this. please tell her i am very fond of her ...

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  3. p.s. i am excited for you, luisa. what are you going to wear? i recommend a bridal outfit or a princess outfit.

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  4. Hee hee, that would be great! But alas I have a three hour train journey to see her, and I don't know if I fancy being dressed as a bride or a princess all that time! On the other hand, it could get me a double seat to myself. ;)

    I've added a link to your blog on Chicklish now. About time too. :)

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  5. She's here next week - on Monday, I think - the lady certainly gets around!

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  6. >She's here next week

    in south africa? wow. meg cabot must be a very tired person.

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  7. Dressed as a CHAMELEON?! (sorry, not shouting; no italics available)
    Yeah, right...need to think up an angle I suppose; not there yet.

    Enjoyed the excerpt; I felt her pain. Oh, but someone needs to tell her how to spell GANDHI, she added, pedantically.

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  8. yep, in SA - and yes, tired and jetlagged sprang to mind. Will let you know how it goes.

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  9. You didn't know? Oh, well.

    She's meant to be in Gothenburg about now, too. Saturday or maybe Friday. Though I'm not there this year.

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  10. Went to Cabot's booksigning last night - story on the blog :-)

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