Scarlett Thomas at Chandlings

On the afternoon of 12th September, 100 excited year 5 & 6 pupils piled into the Lantern Hall at Chandlings School to be greeted by acclaimed author Scarlett Thomas.

After a brief introduction by librarian, Elspeth Greig, and our very own Sarah from Mostly Books, Scarlett took to the floor.

After starting off with an introduction to all things magic and the characters in her new book Dragon's Green, Scarlett soon whipped the children into a frenzy when she started asking them questions such as whether they had magical powers, what those powers were and whether they would take the place of a friend who was going to be eaten by a dragon(!).

Scarlett introduced all of the Kharakters that exist in Dragon's Green and asked

the children to nominate one of their teachers to go up to the front to be analysed!!  Mr Hancock was the (un)lucky volunteer and after a number of questions were answered by the children (our favourite being 'Is Mr Hancock nice or scary?'), it was decided that he was a Bard with a smattering of Witch (yes, it's true, boys & men can be witches too).* 

The children were then asked a bunch of questions about themselves and the answers helped Scarlett identify five pairs of pupils to come to the front of the hall.  Based on the answers that they were given, each pair was aligned to one of the five main characters in Dragon's Green: Euphemia Sixten Bookend Truelove (otherwise known as Effie), Maximilian Underwood, Wolf Reed, Alexa Bottle (known as Lexy) & Raven Wilde.  All 10 children were given magic crystals to take away with them as a reminder of everything that Scarlett had talked about.

When Scarlett opened the floor for questions, the children interrogated her on a range of topics including the stories, the process of writing and what made Scarlett become an author. 

 After the talk was finished, a long queue formed for the children to meet the author and to give them the opportunity to have their book signed. 

It was a brilliant afternoon and a great way for the pupils at Chandlings to start their new school year.  A huge thank you to Scarlett and the team at Chandlings for making it such a great success.

Dragon's Green by Scarlett Thomas was published in paperback on 7th September.  

* If you would like to find out which Kharakter you are, you can take a quiz on the WorldQuake website (click here to go to the quiz).