This Season’s Events for Grown Ups!

Whether you want to find out more about how your favourite authors get their ideas or you want to pick an illustrator’s brains about their creative process – we have something for everyone this season.

How to Be Bad with E.Lockhart

Sunday 21 June

6pm

Starbucks at Malmaison Hotel, Newcastle Quayside, NE1 3DX

YA author E.Lockhart (We Were Liars, The Boyfriend List) will be visiting Newcastle on Sunday 21 June as part of a 2,000 mile tour to celebrate the release of How to Be Bad, her new book with Lauren Myracle and Sarah Mlynowski.

Join us at Malmaison Hotel on Newcastle Quayside for the chance to meet E.Lockhart herself and find out more about her popular novels. Ask questions and enjoy an evening with E.Lockhart herself.

How to Be Bad follows the story of three girls who go on a roadtrip to escape their homes in Niceville. Each of the three authors – Lockhart, Myracle and Mlynowski – each wrote a different character and each chapter is written from the voice of one of the girls.

Bring along your books from home, this event will be followed by a book signing (pre-signed bookplates from Lauren Myracle and Sarah Mlynowski will also be available)

Find out more about the event on our YA blog.

#lockhartroadtrip.

BOOK NOW

Free event, booking recommended. Please purchase beverages from the venue.

 

Illustration Master Class with Jonny Duddle

Wednesday 19 August

9.30am – 4pm

16+

Jonny Duddle is the illustrator of The Pirate Cruncher, The Pirates Next Door and dinosaur fable, Giganotosaurus. He spends most of his time drawing and busily creating worlds based on his time as a pirate…arrrh!

Don’t miss this exclusive opportunity to work alongside Jonny Duddle and find out more about how he began his varied illustration career and the steps of his creative process before developing your own skills. Come along and learn how to use different artistic techniques, inspired by Jonny’s vibrant style, to create your own artwork.

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Booking essential. £45 per person, no additional admission fee required. Includes lunch. Suitable for ages 15 and over.

 

An Evening with Sarah Crossan and Jenny McLachlan

Thursday 17 September

6pm

Meet  Sarah Crossan (author of Carnegie shortlisted Weight of Water and Apple and Rain) and Jenny McLachlan(author of Flirty Dancing and Love Bomb) in conversation with their agent Julia Churchill.

Hear how teaching has influenced their writing styles, their career routes into becoming YA authors and why having the right agent is so important.  Fans of Sarah and Jenny can ask questions about their work and favourite characters while aspiring authors can find out more about a career in writing for young adults.

BOOK NOW

£5 per person, no additional admission fee required. Show your ticket in the Bookshop to redeem £5 off any of Sarah or Jenny’s back catalogue.

Supported by Bloomsbury

 

An Evening with Patrick Ness

Wednesday 11 November

6pm – 8pm  

“On the day we’re the last people to see indie kid Finn alive, we’re all sprawled together in The Field, talking about love and stomachs.”

Don’t miss two time Carnegie Medal Winner and YA favourite, Patrick Ness as he discusses his brand-new book The Rest of Us Just Live Here (released November 2015). Hear Patrick talk candidly about his writing process, where he finds inspiration for his dystopian novels and what he thinks the future for the genre holds.

BOOK NOW

Booking essential. £15 per person includes a copy of The Rest of Us Just Live Here, posted out to you on the date of publication.

An Evening with Patrick Ness this November

We could not be more excited to announce that the brilliant Patrick Ness will be with us this November for an event celebrating the release of his new novel The Rest of Us Just Live Here.

“On the day we’re the last people to see indie kid Finn alive, we’re all sprawled together in The Field, talking about love and stomachs.”

Don’t miss two time Carnegie Medal Winner and YA favourite, Patrick Ness as he discusses his brand-new book The Rest of Us Just Live Here (released November 2015). Hear Patrick talk candidly about his writing process, where he finds inspiration for his dystopian novels and what he thinks the future for the genre holds.

Talking about his new book, Patrick said, “What if you lived in a world a lot like a YA novel? Where people you know have already battled vampires and zombies and soul-eating ghosts and whatever this new thing turns out to be? What if you just want to go to prom and graduate before someone goes and blows up the high school again? I wanted to write a novel for anyone trying to live a normal life in a world gone mad, for anyone who actually has bigger problems than this week’s end of the world, for anyone who needs to find out that there are many different kinds of extraordinary.”

10 Things You Probably Didn’t Know About Patrick Ness:

1. He has a tattoo of a rhinoceros.

2. He has run two marathons.

3. He is a certified scuba diver.

4. Patrick wrote a radio comedy about vampires.

5. He has never been to New York City but…

6. But has been to Sydney, Auckland and Tokyo.

7. Patrick was accepted into film school but turned it down to study writing.

8. Patrick was a goth as a teenager (well, as much of a goth as you could be in Tacoma, Washington and still have to go to church every Sunday).

9. He is no longer a goth.

10.Under no circumstances will  he eat onions.

Click here to book your tickets and find out even more about one of the outstanding YA author of this generation at Seven Stories this November. This event will be followed by a Q&A and book signing.

E. Lockhart is Coming to Newcastle!

NEWCASTLE!

THIS IS NOT A DRILL!

E.LOCKHART IS COMING TO NEWCASTLE IN LESS THAN TWO WEEKS!

She’s written about liars, written about having a disreputable reputation and now she’s teaching us how to be bad. Her newest book is a classic teenage American road trip, written with Lauren Myracle and Sarah Mlynowski. Three authors, three girls, 3 stories, one car. Jesse and Vicks have always been best friends but they’re drifting apart, Vicks has become distant and Jesse is keeping a BIG secret from her. Desperate to keep things together Jesse comes up with a plan, a road trip; an escape from her current reality, the problem? They have a guidebook and a “borrowed” car, enter Mel the new girl, she’s fast becoming friends with Vicks but Jesse’s disliking her on principle. She has family money though and might just be the solution Jesse needs.

The purpose of the trip was to visit Vicks boyfriend who’s moved away to college and has since become increasingly absent, and hopefully bring Vicks and Jesse back together but along the way they’ll meet cute guys, adopt a duck, break into a museum to visit an ancient gator, spend the day at Epcot and fight A LOT.

In the end though….well I can’t tell you that. But I can tell you that it’s a great summer read. The authors write for a different girl and blend the stories together beautifully. I think Mel was my favourite but honestly, that kept changing. Having been trapped in a small car with friends while travelling, the struggle is real. The fights over the music, the tension when two of you fall out and the really, really  needing to pee but not wanting to be the person to stop the car…again.

To celebrate, Hot Key Books are taking E.Lockhart on a whirlwind tour of the UK, and they wanted to bring her to Seven Stories. Unfortunately for the first time in ten years we’re actually closed for a make-over SO the lovely people at the Malmaison on the Quayside are letting us take over Starbucks for the night on Sunday 21^st June from 6pm to bring E to Newcastle to meet all of you!

This is not a speedy book signing, because Newcastle fangirls are the best we’re getting to spend actual time with her, you just have to PROMISE you’ll buy coffee. Lots of coffee, and maybe cake. And hey, with all of the coffee and the sugar we can have the most hyper event EVER!

So click on this link and book a (free) ticket, then turn up, bring lots of questions buy a coffee and a book!

We’ll see you there!

Lorna x

An Evening with Sarah Crossan and Jenny McLachlan

In September this year Seven Stories will have the pleasure of welcoming two YA superstars to Seven Stories. Sarah Crossan (author of Carnegie shortlisted Weight of Water and Apple and Rain) and Jenny McLachlan(author of Flirty Dancing and Love Bomb) will be in conversation with their agent Julia Churchill and answering all of your burning questions.

Both Sarah and Jenny started their careers in schools. Hear how teaching has influenced their writing styles, how they became the award-winning YA authors they are today and why they think having the right agent is so important.  Fans of Sarah and Jenny can ask questions about their work and favourite characters while aspiring authors can find out more about a career in writing for young adults.

The Weight of Water has been shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal as well as being selected for Seven Stories Hooks into Books packs and used as part of our Diverse Voices project in 2014. Told entirely in poem form The Weight of Water is an innovative and poignant read – telling the story of Kasienka and her mother who have travelled from Poland to Coventry in the hope that they will find Kasienka’s father.

Sarah’s second book Apple and Rain was also shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal and Hooks into Books and follows Apollina (who goes by the name of Apple). She is determined to ask her mum why she gave her such an unusual name, if she ever meets her again. Apple and Rain explores family tensions and loneliness through a mixture of poetry and prose and cleverly articulates Apple’s true feelings. Did you know that the jacket covers for Apple and Rain and The Weight of Water have been illustrated by two well-known illustrators Yasmeen Ismail and Oliver Jeffers – Seven Stories has the preliminary sketches for other works by Yasmeen in our archive!

Fans of Geek Girl by Holly Smale will love Jenny Crossan’s smart and funny Flirty Dancing (the first book of a series of four!) and Love Bomb. Flirty Dancing is the story of Bea Hogg who is shy but fiery inside and was also chosen as one of Seven Stories’ Hooks into Books reads. Starwars, the national dance competition has arrived at Bea’s school and excitement is in the air! Bea cant wait to enter with her friends, only they have other ideas. Shunning Bea, her friends create a group without her, leaving Bea out in the cold. Bea decides to fight back,  by entering the competition with the hottest boy in school. A laugh out loud story of friendship and dancing, Flirty Dancing is book 1 in the Ladybirds series.

This warm, nuanced, hilarious story about friendship, fortitude . . . and dancing is impossible not to fall in love with. Jenny’s voice is fresh and convincing, and she handles both darker and lighter elements of the story with equal panache.We were surprised to find out that when Jenny McLachlan was editing the book for the U.S. market, she had to remove and replace words minger, natch, snogging and nibbles!

Tickets are only £5 per person and no additional admission fee required. Plus, show your ticket in the Bookshop to redeem £5 off any of Sarah or Jenny’s back catalogue. Bargain! CLICK HERE to book your ticket today. Supported by Bloomsbury.

 

Lauren x