From the million-copy-selling author of The Roman Mysteries, Caroline Lawrence, comes The Time Travel Diaries, a nail-biting time-travel adventure in Roman London - where past meets present. Here she shares her thoughts on Hay along with her favourite reads.
1. What are you in Hay to talk about?
My new Time Travel diaries but also my best writing tips!
2. What do you want the audience to take away?
How fun and powerful stories are. Also, how lucky we are to be alive in this day and age!
3. What’s the best question you’ve been asked in an event and how did you answer?
A boy once asked me if I’d rather be a famous bestseller or make people’s lives better… of course I said the latter!
4. Which events, other than your own, have you seen and what stayed with you? OR Which events are you looking forward to seeing?
Kate DiCamillo! I loved hearing how she became a writer and that her “fave superhero” is Charlie Brown!
5. If you could sum Hay Festival up in one word/a sentence, it would be…
Enlightening!
6. What is so special about Hay-on-Wye?
It’s like going on a pilgrimage… You travel and find a book or idea that you could have got at home, but the journey is what makes it special.
7. What was the last book you read and loved?
I just read The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo… it was magical.
8. What is the book you’ve most often given as a gift?
My first book, The Thieves of Ostia. I’ve also given away many copies of Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari.
9. Which book has most inspired you?
The Last of the Wine by Mary Renault changed my life!
10. Which piece of advice do you wish you could give your 16-year-old self?
Fat foods are not bad for you, sugary carbs are!
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Caroline Lawrence took part in the Schools Programme at Hay Festival Wales on Thursday 23 May. Listen again on Hay Player shortly after here.