3, 2, 1... Launch!

There were some points on Tuesday that I thought the launch was not going to actually be a launch, more a reading, as getting pamphlets ready is a lengthy and laborious process. Not just on my part either.

These are not my hands


However, approaching the hour and Mr T was ready to collect Alan Gillespie from Sanquhar station. I was putting a pizza in the oven for small boys whilst putting covers on the pamphlets and make-up on myself. Then I flooded the bathroom. However, by 7pm we were at Thomas Tosh awaiting an audience.

Luckily, one came.

Some of the audience, from a distance, in the dark

MC Paul, of Thomas Tosh, opened the evening

Hugh McMillan was up first. One of the things about Hugh is that it always feels an absolute pleasure to be in his company when he's reading. He is a master of 'professional relaxed'. You are, above all, entertained, often educated, sometimes provoked and frequently made to laugh out loud. His gift is far beyond comedic though - as Tessa Ransford has said, "we laugh and laugh but are left well aware that life isn’t funny.”

And he read new poems! His New and Selected, or possibly Collected, Poems will be out in 2012.

Alan Gillespie then read his story from A Thousand Cranes (you can see the book just underneath the desk lamp in the photo below). It was called 'When I was a Ninja Turtle', and, now I'm reflecting, there are congruities between Alan's and Hugh's work. The emotional scars of a boy's life are very finely revealed and embroidered around with humour in the story. Plus he got the 'best reader on the night' vote from T1 and T2, which means we're never inviting him back again.

I closed the first half, and was dark, dark, dark, a bit Romford, and made a lot of a faces. I didn't actually realise I made quite so many faces.


Then we had a break for wine and Bessie's Platters, which were whole cake-stands full of homemade nibbly things, and I opened the second half with more Grave with Lights. Grave, with more faces, no doubt.
Alan read his seagull story, Wrath of a Gull, which you can find here: http://glasgowtosaturn.com/latest-issue/fiction/

And Hugh finished us off.

For a quick visual representation of how the evening went, here is the face of an audience member.

It really was that good.

Grave with Lights is obviously available to purchase at Thomas Tosh, but I'm not putting it on sale online until Poetry Bus 3 is funded. So go here now!

http://www.fundit.ie/project/pb3-the-poetry-bus-mag-issue-three