Week 7: Libraries and summaries

I had to restrain myself in the library this week, which took a lot of doing. In fact I went directly to the shelf I was hoping to find book two of a series on, picked it up and took it to the counter. I know from painful experience that when my back is almost feeling better, carrying a thick hardback book for a couple of miles is a bad idea (you would think I could have worked that out without needing empirical evidence), so thankfully the second book in William Horwood's Hyddenworld series is much thinner than the first, and was a paperback. Proper epic fantasy with prophecies, immortals, Anglo-Saxon artefacts, and some great characters. And available in the library.

For some reason, whenever I spot a fantasy novel that looks interesting, it turns out on further investigation to be part two (or sometimes part seven) of a series. Volume One is not a concept my local library seems to handle well. However, such is the charm of libraries - the random availability, the not knowing whether the book you want will be there or not (yes I have come across the concept of catalogues, and inter-library loans, but they take half the fun out of it). Like a lucky dip for reading material.

It seems entirely fitting, then, that Ilkley Writers (for whom last week I wrote a summary of our 2016) are proposing a radio programme about randomness and libraries, for the Chapel FM Writing on Air Festival in a few months. We might be pre-recording part of it in an actual library, which is quite exciting. My week has been spent getting into the serious discussion and planning stages with Andrea and Roz (it's the same trio that did the programme last year), and thinking about unusual libraries. It's a hard life...