Thursday 28 March 2013

Easter reads!


Escape from the cold biting winds this Easter to a more regent time with Stephanie Burgis' Unladylike Adventures of Kat Stephenson series. 
All three adventures are currently only 99p on Kindle - what better way is there to spend a bitter Easter weekend than to curl up with Kat's magical story?

Book 1: A Most Improper Magick

Book 2: A Tangle of Magicks

Book 3: A Reckless Magick

Read more about the series in this guest post with author Stephanie Burgis:
http://templarpublishing.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/stephanie-burgis-guest-post.html

Wednesday 27 March 2013

Not Bad for a Bad Lad artwork

Not Bad for a Bad Lad is a gorgeous tale by Michael Morpurgo about a young lad who is so bad, no-one is surprised when he's sent away to Borstal. But then he starts work in the prison stable and something begins to change . . . 
And you can get it on your kindle for only 99p this Easter! And so you  don't miss out on Michael Foreman's beautiful colour illustrations, here's a showcase of some of our favourites:






Tuesday 26 March 2013

Guest blogger! Daphne finds herself in Me, Suzy P

Today we'd like to welcome Daphne from Winged Reviews onto our blog!
We asked her which character she is most like in Karen Saunders' Me Suzy P and here is her fab answer!

http://d.gr-assets.com/users/1284635319p8/365664.jpg
I was thrilled to be asked to write a guest post on Me, Suzy P on the Templar blog. As I've tweeted before, Templar are my go-to publisher for books that I know are fun, well-written and I'm going to enjoy.

One of the reasons I loved Me, Suzy P by Karen Saunders is that she wrote such heart-warming and realistic characters. I saw a little of myself in the characters in the book (both good and bad), which is why I loved it so much.

In Suzy, I saw my bored teenage self. When I was 13, I had someone who I was perfectly happy with, but when someone better came along I jumped ship. Thank goodness I now have more sense 15 years later!

In Harry, I saw my mischevious side, the prankster who took pleasure in teasing my loved ones.

In Milie, I saw the supportive best friend who loved and was there throughout all the bad break-ups and new guys.

In Jade, I saw the snooty girl, who gossiped about others behind their backs (something I'm not proud of).

In Amber, I saw the slightly crazy bride-to-be, panicking over each wedding decision (although not, thankfully, dressing my bridesmaids in lime green)!

In Danny, I saw someone who didn't give up, who found someone perfect and fought to win them back.

To read more about these amazing characters, pick up Me, Suzy P now! To quote my own review: I absolutely flew through this book. I salute you, Karen Saunders, for making me laugh and giving me a true taste of teenage woe.


Me, Suzy P is still 99p on Kindle until the end of March!

Be sure to check out Daphne's blog, or follow her on Twitter @wingedreviews.
Keep up to date with all Karen's news on Facebook or her twitter account: @writingkaren

Monday 25 March 2013

Meet the Characters: Pendragon Legacy - Part 2

In part two of the Pendragon Legacy character fact file, it's time to meet the girls! 
Introducing Rhianna Pendragon and Arianrhod - want to get to know them better? 
Lance of Truth is still only 99p on kindle  


 


Name: Rhianna Pendragon
Age: about 12 (I grew up in Avalon where time is different)
Favourite colour: green
Best friend: Prince Elphin
Worst enemy: my cousin Mordred
Biggest fear: that Mordred will kill my mother
When I grow up, I want to be… Queen of Camelot. 


Name: Arianrhod  
Age: not sure
Favourite colour: red  
Best friend: Rhianna  
Biggest fear: that Morgan Le Fay will come back for me  
When I grow up, I want to be… a Grail maiden.



 Keep up to date with the series news by following @PendragonGirl or visiting Katherine's website: www.katherineroberts.co.uk 

Monday 18 March 2013

Meet the Characters: Pendragon Legacy

Since Lance of Truth by Katherine Roberts is available on kindle for 99p for the whole of March, we thought that we would introduce you to some of the characters... 


Name: Prince Elphin
Age: 12 fairy years
Favourite colour: purple
Best friend: Rhianna
Biggest fear: water
When I grow up, I want to be… leader of the Wild Hunt














Name: Cai
Age: 11 and three quarters
Favourite colour: gold
Worst enemy: Gareth
Biggest fear: bring roasted to death by a dragon
When I grow up, I want to be… a champion knight




Join us next week to find out about Rhianna Pendragon and --> Arianrhod!
Keep up to date with the series news by following @PendragonGirl or visiting Katherine's website: www.katherineroberts.co.uk 


Gemma O'Neill on St. Patrick's Day

 In the aftermath of St. Patrick's Day, Oh Dear Geoffrey author, Gemma O'Neill talks to us about her St. Patrick's Day traditions and how growing up in Ireland has influenced her work

Hello there! It’s my pleasure to be a part of the Templar blog again and this time it’s to tie in with St. Patrick’s Day. Incase you didn’t know, I’m actually from the tip of the North Coast in Ireland!

I absolutely love St. Patrick’s Day. It’s one of my favourite days of the year, if not my favourite. It’s right up there with Christmas, Easter and birthdays. Since childhood it has always been an eventful one. I always used to go to Portstewart (my neighbour town) with my family to watch lots of very brave people jump into the sea dressed as leprechauns, shamrocks and all sorts of other wonderful costumes.

As an adult it has always been a whole long day to catch up with my oldest friends at the local pub. It means a lot to me and it’s definitely a lot more special than the average day. It begins with Irish stew, we’re all dressed in green and it’s one of those days you really don’t have to feel guilty about taking a break from work.

Apart from when I studied Illustration in Falmouth I’ve lived on the North Coast of Ireland my entire life. It’s a really beautiful spot and I’ve always spent a lot of time outdoors because of that. If I could live on the beaches I would!

The outdoors and nature have definitely had a really huge influence on my work. Even as a child nothing made me happier than rolling out the blank side of wallpaper the full length of the garden and drawing all day long in the sunshine (if we were lucky enough to have sunshine!) Designing and crafting mini zoos strangely took up a big part of my childhood too.

My art teacher at school must have shared my interests in nature as he set lots of nature based projects. I worked on an African themed project the year before my GCSEs. Then my GCSE projects focused on local harbours and packaging design with a bird theme. Nature also dominated my A-levels and my art and design foundation year focusing on forests and the seaside again.

If I’m outside I’m actually a lot more likely to have a camera in my hand than a pencil. I’d much rather be exploring, but a camera still manages to capture what I see, without losing too much time. I really enjoy taking photographs though. It wasn’t until my degree that I realised all the textures I’ve been focusing in on with my camera all these years are the very textures I use subconsciously in my illustrations!

 I recently moved to Portrush, just across the road from one of my favourite beaches, so I don’t see nature taking a back seat with my work anytime soon. Infact, the sea is playing a big part in a current project! I’ve been very lucky to be able to move to one of my favourite places and it’s my first home away from home outside of university too! It’s also the first time I’ve had a proper little illustration studio of my own.





I’m so excited to see the work I produce in such a lovely part of the world over the next year.

Visit Gemma's website or follow her on Twitter @GemsONeill to keep up to date with all her projects 

Thursday 14 March 2013

Templar's on the lookout for an editorial intern!

Templar is dedicated to providing high-quality internships across our departments that give the publishing stars of the future the opportunity to ask questions, gain experience and hit the ground running in a busy children's publishing house. We're delighted to offer a six-week internship in our busy editorial department, starting on the 15th April.

Working in editorial is exciting and varied – whilst here you’d be undertaking project work such as picture research, fact-checking, Americanising and proofreading, as well as general editorial work such as reading submissions. You'll also become familiar with industry-standard software like Quark Xpress, Adobe InDesign and Biblio3.

So if you've got a love for children's books and a keen eye for typos, we'd love to hear from you! To apply for the position, please send a covering letter and your CV to liza.miller@templarco.co.uk with the subject heading ‘Editorial internship’. We can offer travel expenses of up to £15 per day and a small amount of subsistence.

Deadline for application: 28th March

To find out more about what it's like to intern at Templar, check out these blog posts:

Tara's editorial internship

Tara has been our editorial intern since mid-January. Now in her penultimate week, she shares her thoughts about gaining experience at Templar... 

Nine weeks with the Templar team have flown by. I've been involved with everything from proofreading to herding the editors in their prep for the Bologna Book Fair.

If you're thinking about spending a little time with the Templar team to learn, or brush up on your editorial skills, I'd highly recommend it. The team is absolutely lovely. They'll listen to what you're interested in learning, take the time to answer any questions you have (or go out of their way to explain anything they think it's important you learn) and keep you busy with a full publishing workload! There's no making copious rounds of tea, days of Xeroxing or spending all your time on data entry. You might end up doing a little of this, but more of your time might be spent proofreading, conducting book research, handling AIs and maybe a bit more proofreading ;)

If you're interested in being in publishing, you'll be interested in all the tasks you're assigned. The team makes sure that interns have a valuable experience, and treats them as part of the team. Everyone is incredibly nice, and the company has an incredibly comfortable culture, though everyone is working hard.

And now that I've buttered them up, I'm off to ask if I can do a particular task. Always adding to the CV!

Introducing Maja Hermansson

The lovely Maja Hermansson from Bonnier owned Swedish bookseller Adlibris, is working in the Templar marketing team for 3 months. So we asked Maja six quick fire questions to get to know her a little better:

How do you take your tea/coffee? 
Very strong and with milk.

Who should we be following on Twitter?
@adlibris_com, @margretAtwood, @lenadunham, @SarahKSilverman

What super power would you have? 
Time travelling! Then I would go back to 1 June 1974 and go to Kevin Ayers, John Cale, Brian Eno and Nico's concert at the Rainbow Theatre in London.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_1,_1974)

6 things you couldn't live without:
- Running shoes
- iPhone/music player
- Notebook
- Head phones
- Pen
- Pyjamas (this pretty much sums up my life)

What would your last supper be?
Liquorice and coffea

What's the biggest secret that you're willing to reveal on our blog?
I am bonkers at math, totally worthless at cooking and I talk in my sleep

Thank you so much Maja, you can read more about her experience working in the UK here!

Thursday 7 March 2013

Claire McFall's Favourite Teen Titles


To celebrate World Book Day, we've asked Ferryman author, Claire McFall, to give us her top five favourite teen books

 So... my top five favourite books. Wow. This was hard! There are way too many books to choose from. Old favourites, new favourites, I-read-you-a-million-times-and-still-love-you-favourites... but I was only allowed five so - with just a teeny tiny bit of cheating – here are mine:


1. Noughts and Crosses Malorie Blackman  


I can’t help it, I cry. Every time I read the ending. I’ve actually taught this novel a couple of times with classes because I love it so much, but I discovered it at University. It made me laugh, squirm, bawl... feel. The concept of reversing racial roles is really interesting, and the way that Blackman shows the changing ideas through the generations (especially if you follow it up with the rest of the series, which you should!) is fantastic. But mostly, it’s just a great story. The characters are real people and the twists and turns of the plot mean you will be up at 4am to finish it. But it’ll be worth it. And then there’s Callum. I can’t help it: I love him. Oh poor Callum. I may have to cry again now.

 2. Harry Potter – All of them! JK Rowling

 

This is cheating because there are seven of them and this is meant to be a top five, but oh well! I’m a little too old to say I grew up with Harry... but then I still don’t think I’m a grown-up, so maybe I did! I’ve read the whole series at least ten times. The world J K Rowling created is so real... I can’t tell you the amount of times I’ve day-dreamed my way into it. I would, of course, be a kick-ass auror with awesome skills. Maybe I could get a job at Hogwarts, because, okay, apostrophes and inverted commas may not be quite as important as potions and transfiguration, but witches and wizards need to be able spell in both senses of the word!

3. Goodnight Mister Tom Michelle Magorian 


Everyone should read this book. In fact, I think David Cameron should declare it a new law. Not only is it rich with WWII detail, but it just warms your heart. Willie is sent to stay with the terrifying Mister Tom during the war a thin, sickly, abused little boy. Only Mister Tom isn’t scary – he’s the granddad every child ought to have! I first read this book when I was at school, then I studied it at university, and I’ve taught it too. But mostly, I just read it because I love it.

4. Crossing the Line Gillian Philip  
http://img1.fantasticfiction.co.uk/images/n61/n309932.jpg

This is a brilliant book. I read it with a class a couple of years ago as part of the Royal Mail Book Awards. It was one of those where I read it and thought: Man, I wish I’d written that! The main character, Nick Geddes, just grabbed me from the very first page. He’s a big, brutish thug with an absolute heart of gold. The narrative is really interesting, intertwining the present with the back story so that your understanding unfolds with the action.

5. The Famous Five – Five Go off in a Caravan Enid Blyton 


Okay, so this book totally doesn’t go with the rest of the list, but I don’t care. I LOVED the Famous Five books growing up. And when I was done with them, I read my way through the Secret Seven before going back to the Famous Five. There were corny VHS tapes in my local library too (Julian, Dick and Ann... George and Timmy the do-o-og. We are the famous five...Yup, I still know the tune). This was my favourite of all of them, though. They went in a horse drawn gypsy-style carriage (how cool is that!), on their own with no parents, gallivanting about the countryside rounding up baddies. Can you imagine mums and dads doing that nowadays? Mine certainly wouldn’t have let me! Oh, but I dreamed...

Saturday 2 March 2013

BLAST OFF - With Jonny Duddle and The King of Space!

It's time to tether those Moogs and crank up your intergalactic dung-blasters for today citizens of planet earth we are celebrating the triumphant publication of the newest picture book masterpiece written and illustrated by Jonny Duddle 




ISBN 9781848772267    |  hardback |  £10.99
36pp    |  287 x 247mm

Our hero Rex may look like a standard average 6 year old, living on his parents' moog farm and going to mini galactic citizen school, but he is convinced he is going to be
King of Space




With the help of unsuspecting friends, Rex creates an army of warbots with dung-blasters and begins his conquest of the known worlds. But when he goes too far, only one person can save him from the wrath of the Galactic Alliance his tough-talking mum!



This particularly spectacular adventure comes with a stunning fold out poster which will be coveted by aliens large and small, and if you pop to Waterstone's you will find a special sheet of character stickers in your hardback copy!






So, if you like...
 

Aliens [  ]
Alien cow type things [  ]
Spaceships [  ]
Dung-blasters [  ]
AND BIG robots (or you know someone who does) [  ]

 'The King of Space' is is all good book shops NOW!


Read more about the creation of The King of Space on Jonny's fabulous blog - HERE

You can see more wonderful work by Jonny on the 
Arena Illustration website  and blog 


Friday 1 March 2013

Guest post from Emma Yarlett!

Today we have a guest post from the lovely Emma Yarlett, whose debut picture book 

Well hello there! I’ve somehow wandered from my studio at home in Cornwall, onto your screen as Templar’s guest blogger of the moment… and what a pleasure it is to meet you! My name is Emma Yarlett (well almost, I get married in exactly 33 days), but before all that fun, my very first authored and illustrated book will be published by the wonderful folks and folkettes at Templar; Sidney, Stella and the Moon! 

It’s all about a miniature twin duo called Sidney and Stella, and their escapades with the moon, a very bouncy ball and a length of extremely stretchy skipping rope. Together they get up to lots and lots of fun and mischief until… disaster strikes! And something very big, very important and very noticeable is dislodged from the sky and smashes like a dinner plate outside their window. Oops.

Needless to say, this book wasn’t inspired by my own accidental adventures smashing the moon, but it has been very inspired by the moon itself in a funny kind of way. My dad absolutely loves astronomy, and when I was a kiddiwink he would set up telescopes in our back garden and show me and my sister the moon and all of it’s craters, the stars and their constellations and the beauty of the night sky. My mum would then make up stories with us as we went to sleep, and I would have wonderful dream adventures flying around the starry night. Since then, I have always loved the beauty of nighttime and the captivating magic that it holds… So much so, that when I decided that illustration was the thing for me, the night sky became a real focus in my illustrations (something that you will notice even more in my second authored and illustrated book with Templar, which I have just began working on!).

However, this book began way back in 2010 as a university project whilst I was in my final year studying at Falmouth University. Since then is has been to London, New York, Bologna Book Fair, Leicester and then back to Cornwall where it has grown, matured, dramatically altered, been took to pieces, rejiggled then and put back together again… And finally culminated in the book that you see today, ready to be read by you and (hopefully) lots and lots of little people! Made with paint, collage, magic, pencil crayon, typography and love this is very much a book for little people, created to take them beyond the realms of the ordinary and into the excitement of an adventure in the comfort of their own imagination.

And here we are! This book has been a complete labour of love, and I feel as though I have achieved a whole new level of perseverance (if you are an illustrator just starting out…. Keep going! It will all come together and be worth it in the end)… Sidney, Stella and the Moon! Finally published this month, with a million man-hours behind it; A book created to take little eyes and little hearts on a magical misadventure through the world of a troublesome duo…. Sidney and Stella cannot wait to meet you.

For more about the creation of Sidney, Stella and the Moon, please check out Emma’s blogging mini series at www.emmayarlett.tumblr.com or on her website at www.emmayarlett.com