I must be the worst updater in the history of updating! It's February! It's snowing! And I've just come back from the open air swimming pool. It's all true, I am a bit nuts about swimming at the moment, and I am quite sure that if I don't go every day (or practically every day)  I will forget how to do it (swim that is) and I will swell up and eventually burst.

But apart from swimming I have been writing - honest! And even though I have been working like a maniac I only have one book out later this year, with the ever lovely Barrington Stoke, my first fiction with them, a horror called The Nightmare Card.There's no cover yet, I'll post it up when I know.

I'm currently back in the past again, 1819 to be exact, but this book is soooo close to my heart U don't want to say too much in case I jinx it!  

I'm visiting loads of schools this year, Sarah Bonnell in Stratford, where the girls all call you Madam (unless you are a man, obviously), Hadleigh High in Ipswich, Chorlton High in Manchester, and closer to home, Haberdashers, Walthamstow Girls, Cardinal Pole and Oaklands.

 I've been doing some primary schools, which is new for me and so far I've been to Tyssen, Whitmore and Lauriston.

I'll be doing the Southwark Schools Festival in the summer and I'm looking forward to that too! 

Some old but nevertheless interesting news.........
A NEST OF VIPERS has been chosen as one of Booktrust's Best Books! A lovely bit of news! 

Leeds Book awards news.... 

Big thanks yous to Leeds Librarians for organising the event and special special thankyous to my favourite   school in the world NINELANDS PRIMARY SCHOOL!!!
Ninelands Year 6 students did a fantastic presentation about Nest of Vipers that should have won an award itself so a big thank you to......drumroll please....

EMILY, LAUREN, ELIZABETH, HELENA, NATALIE, LOUISE, SARAH, CONNOR, STEPHEN and ANDREW, the best Year Six students in England! You made me feel like a real winner - even though the winning book was....SHADOW FOREST by Matt Haig. 

Birmingham KS3 news

Arctic Hero did really well in The Birmingham Chills KS3 award, many many thanks to The College High School who did a brilliant job championing it and keeping it in when many brilliant books had been voted out. The award went to Alan Gibbons' Scared to Death. 

I'm still blogging at An Awfully Big Blog Adventure, which is a joint effort with writers including Anne Cassidy, Susan Price, N.M. Browne, John Dougherty, Katherine Langrish  and many more, the website is at  http://awfullybigblogadventure.blogspot.com to have a look

all the best

Catherine