It's very hard for parents to judge how well their children are doing, so it was with some apprehension that yesterday afternoon Mary and I went to the Apple Store to see Will's production of Regent Street, an 8-minute love story commissioned by the Crown Estate (which owns every building on Regent Street). The first surprise was to find there wasn't a spare seat in the place, the second was to see just what they were able to put on the screen for so little money, and the third was how many people are involved in an 8-minute short with background music and no speech - forty. Now I begin to understand why the credits roll on and on at the end of a major motion picture.
After the screening, I travelled down to Battersea to see Bear Grylls on his houseboat and seek some advice. Bear of course was the youngest Brit to conquer Everest, and as part of the research for my next book, Paths of Glory, I wanted to hear about his experiences during the last 2,000 feet of the climb, and in particular the last 600 feet. Amazingly vivid stuff. When doing research for a new book, there is nothing quite like being able to talk first-hand to someone who's been there. I left him to pack, because tomorrow he's off to the jungle to fight crocodiles and eat mosquitos, and do whatever else he does that sets him apart from us normal beings.
After the screening, I travelled down to Battersea to see Bear Grylls on his houseboat and seek some advice. Bear of course was the youngest Brit to conquer Everest, and as part of the research for my next book, Paths of Glory, I wanted to hear about his experiences during the last 2,000 feet of the climb, and in particular the last 600 feet. Amazingly vivid stuff. When doing research for a new book, there is nothing quite like being able to talk first-hand to someone who's been there. I left him to pack, because tomorrow he's off to the jungle to fight crocodiles and eat mosquitos, and do whatever else he does that sets him apart from us normal beings.
2 Comments:
Arrrghhh... I'm so annoyed with myself. I meant to have gone to see that. I'm glad it went well!
As far as I know, Freddy Forsyth gleans the same first hand info, and it hasn't done him any harm either.
I think the author of this blog had a friend for life, especially after I read The 11th Commandment; the book finishes at a US Pro Football stadium, and, the impressive thing was, a programme shown later about the astrodome (with Lord A doing research) showed he had done a really good job in the novel describing what the place looked like.........
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