Past speakers at Weegie Wednesday include: James Robertson, Maggie Swinburne, My Weekly Features editor; Rally and Broad; David Ross, non-fiction writer; Alan Grant, comic book writer; David Greig, playwright; Chris Brookmyre, crime writer; Michael Malone, crime writer; Sara Sheridan, fiction writer; Shari Low, journalist and fiction writer; Barry Gornell, fiction writer; Kirsty Logan, fiction writer and poet; Jean Rafferty, fiction writer; Eleanor Yule, film maker; Caron MacPherson, bookshop manager; Sophie Cooke, fiction writer; Rosemary Goring, literary critic and non-fiction writer; James Aldridge, bookseller and events organiser; David Simons, fiction writer; Marion Sinclair, Chief Executive of Publishing Scotland; Gordon Brown, fiction writer and marketing specialist; Duncan Furness, bookseller; Richard Warden, film producer; Alex Gray, crime writer and poet; Iain Banks, fiction writer and Ian Rankin, crime fiction writer, Linda Strachan, The Society of Authors, Sue Reid Sexton, Sinclair and Kim Macleod of Indie Authors World.
Terrace Bar, CCA, 350 Sauchiehall Street, Glasgow G2 3JD.
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Keith Gray, author of The Return of Johnny Kemp, Ostrich Boys, You Killed Me, and The Last Soldier, will be talking to us in March.
For over 20 years teenage fiction and Young Adult fiction has been on the rise - from questions in the Houses of Parliament raised against Melvin Burgess' 'Junk' in 1996 to mega-selling Hollywood adaptations in more recent years.
Why? It's claimed YA is currently the only growth market in the publishing industry and that it outsells all other books by 7 to 1. What is it about these books that are attracting larger and larger audiences? And why are they still so contentious? Parents condemn them, schools ban them, the literary elite look down their noses at them. While this year even the authors are planning on boycotting the industry's highest honour and most prestigious award, the CILIP Carnegie and Kate Greenaway Medals. Keith will attempt to make some sense of the current state of affairs.
Keith is a writer, reviewer, editor and reader of Young Adult fiction. His first book, 'Creepers', was published when he was only 24 and it went on to be shortlisted for the Guardian Fiction Award. Since then his novels have been translated into over a dozen languages and include 'The Last Soldier', 'Malarkey' and 'Ostrich Boys' which was shortlisted for the Costa Children's Book Awards, the CILIP Carnegie Medal and won the Scottish Teenage Book Award. He's edited two ground-breaking anthologies for teenage readers: 'Next', which explores imaginings of the afterlife and 'Losing It' which deals with the prickly subject of first sexual experience and has been banned by several schools across Scotland. He lives in Dunfermline with his partner, their daughter and a parrot called Bellamy.
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