Author John Mayhew was the proud recipient of The Warwickshire Secondary Schools Book Award which he was presented with recently at Kenilworth Books by Alice Wyatt. The winner of this award, which all authors love to receive, is selected by the secondary school children in Warwickshire

Kenilworth Books

Book Club

Meets at the Virgin and Castle Pub, High Street, Kenilworth,

4th Tuesday of every month 7.30 p.m. till about 9.30 p.m.

19th April:       The Morville Hours by Katherine Swift                

(NB: date change)  Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

24th May:        South Riding by Winifred Holtby

One Day by David Nicholls

28th June:        The Glass Room by Simon Mawer  

We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver

26th July:        Kenilworth by Walter Scott

The Suspicions of Mr Whicher: or the Murder at Road Hill House by Kate Summerscale

We are an informal and friendly group. Do come along and join us! Ring Victoria Lee on 0790 8899250, Kenilworth Books on 01926 855784 or see www.warwickbooks.net

for more information.

You are warmly invited to meet

Jon Mayhew

Winner of the

Warwickshire Secondary Book Award 2011

Jon will receive his Award and sign his books

   at Kenilworth Books

                                 on Fri 15th April at 11.30am – 12.30pm

Thursday 14th April 7.30pm at The Bridge House Theatre Jodi Picoult talked about her new book ‘Sing You Home’ with musical accompaniment from Ellen Wilber

NEARLY 400 people packed the Guy Nelson Hall last Thursday night to hear Jodi Picoult talk about her latest book Sing You Home. Although without a doubt most of the audience were confirmed fans, there couldn’t have been a single person present who didn’t thoroughly enjoy the evening.

Jodi’s books are always centred around issues and Sing You Home raises lots of talking points concerning same-sex marriages, the Christian Right, embryo fertilisation, and much else besides.

But it is also very unusual in that as the main character, Zoe, is a musical therapist, the book is divided into musical themes which the reader can listen to on the accompanying CD. On Thursday night the audience had the added treat of being able to listen to a live performance of some of the music from special guest musician Ellen Wilber.

All of this and the fact that Jodi was happy to answer a huge range of questions from the audience made for a very memorable evening indeed. She is something of a ‘Wonder Woman’ getting up at 5am every day to exercise before getting the kids to school and then starting her writing day, and unbelievably she answers all emails from her fans personally – sometimes hundreds a day.

With a genuine warmth and loads of enthusiasm shining through, everyone agreed with me when I said: “Jodi, we can’t wait to get you back”!

The event was organised by Warwick Books bookshop as a Warwick Words Xtra event.

Every life has a soundtrack…

For all the years of her marriage, Zoë Baxter thought that her husband, Max, wanted children asmuch as she did. She thought he was in there for the duration — happy to share her suffering and longing. It never occurred to her that he might want to jump off the train before they managed it.But Max had had enough of the endless trying, and the single-minded pursuit. He had had enough of watching Zoë mentally and physically crumple, losing herself in misery every time the pregnancieswent wrong. And then, after he divorced her, he lost himself in the bottom of a bottle.

Zoë, however, threw herself into her job as a music therapist. Amongst her other patients, she started to work with a suicidal student at a nearby school. Vanessa, the school’s guidance counselor, who had suggested Zoë as therapist, found herself intrigued and drawn to her. Their working relationship suddenly became something more intense — and permanent. In love, surprised and truly happy for the first time in years, Zoë allowed herself to think again of children. She remembered that she and Max froze a few embryos, and asked him if she and Vanessa could have them.

Max, saved from the darkest depression and alcoholism by his evangelical brother, his wife and their pastor, had become extreme in his opinion and there was nothing in the world that would make him give up the embryos to a same sex couple. In fact, he had his own ideas about what to do with them,but it would involve a vicious and damaging court case to bring the matter to a conclusion.

Jodi Picoult asks the questions few other authors do…what does it mean to be gay in the modern world? How has reproductive science outstripped the legal system? What are the questions to ask in deciding what is fair and just when dealing with the future of unborn children? Why can love between two same sex people not be allowed the same freedom as two of opposite sex? As always, Jodi represents every side of the debate, her characters make their own cases, and black and white becomes the many shades of grey.

Jodi Picoult, 44, is the bestselling author of seventeen novels. She grew up in Nesconset, New York. She received an A.B. in creative writing from Princeton and a master’s degree in education from Harvard. She has worked as a technical writer for a Wall Street broker, a copywriter at an ad agency, an editor at a textbook publisher, an English teacher and – most recently – as the author of five issues of the Wonder Woman comic book series. Her novels are translated into forty languages in forty countries. Three have been made into television movies and My Sister’s Keeper was released as a major motion picture starring Cameron Diaz and Alec Baldwin in summer 2009. Jodi and her husband live in New Hampshire with their three children.

 We are really grateful for the support of Hodder in making this event happen….

On Tuesday April 12th 7.30pm

at The Bridge House Theatre

Lord Jones will be talking about his new book

‘Fixing Britain : The Business Of Reshaping Our Nation’

Digby Jones’ early years were spent in his parents’ corner shop. So you could say he was born into business. After working his way up to be senior partner in a firm of lawyers, he joined the CBI and became one of its most well-known and vociferous Director-Generals. When he left the CBI he took a number of roles in private industry and became the UK’s Skills Envoy. In July 2007 he was appointed Minister of State for UK Trade & Investment and became a life peer taking the title, Digby, Lord Jones of Birmingham. He was energetic in this as in everything else, promoting Britain across the world, travelling to 31 countries in 45 overseas visits. In 2009 he decided to “pull it all together”. Now, in addition to his role as an active crossbencher in the House of Lords he serves as Chairman of the International Business Advisory Board at HSBC, Chairman of Triumph Motorcycles Limited, and is Corporate Ambassador for Jaguar Cars and JCB. He advises in a number of other paid and unpaid roles, fulfilling his vision of promoting socially inclusive wealth creation.

All of his hard-won experience is reflected everywhere in his new book ‘Fixing Britain’ which he launches at this talk. Reflecting on his experiences as a Minister in Gordon Brown’s Government of All Talents, and his time at the helm of the CBI, Digby offers a common sense approach to government and business leaders for steering the UK back onto a winning course. This is an important talk for all of us who are concerned with Britain’s future, and we are proud that Digby has chosen Warwick as a platform to champion UK PLC.

This event is arranged by Warwick Books as part of the Warwick Words Xtra series. We are grateful for the support of Lord Jones’ publisher Wiley. Tickets £10 (£8 concessions) available from Warwick Books, Kenilworth Books, and BridgeHouseTheatre (01926 776438).