A Pie for Martin Millar

The last time I was in London I went to a book reading at the Bookseller Crow (I think that's the right name, I've just had 2 glasses of wine and I can't be bothered to check) in uh....oh man the alcohol really messes with my memory huh? God it was something castle. Some place with Castle and Light or something. CRYSTAL PALACE! Okay. Deborah 1 Alcohol 200 million.

What was I saying? Right. The book reading. It sounds easy right. Just go to a book reading. I asked my cousin to follow me. And she said ok and even found a bus that would take us from North London to Crystal Palace.

Easy. No. Not easy. Why? Because the reading happened to be on either on the day of the horrific London bombings or around that time. Oxford Circus tube station was closed. Traffic was hell in London. It actually looked like KL traffic.

Our bus was literally in a standstill for five, ten minutes. We weren't going to make it to the reading if we stayed on the bus but we couldn't get off til we got to the next stop. Until...this woman sick of being on the bus reached out to press the emergency stop button.

My cousin's automatic reaction was to say,

'Don't!' in her usual authoratative and firm but still polite tone of voice.

The woman turned and asked in a perfectly inquisitive way, 'Why not?'

In the end the bus driver let the woman off and we soon got off. We decided to take the tube to Elephant and Castle and then the bus from there to Crystal Palace.

So we do. We get off at Elephant and Castle and it's probably the dodgiest bit of London that I have ever been to. There was a woman on the tube with us who I swear was on drugs. Her eyes were closed and she was dancing and walking and talking to herself.

Then this guy who had been hitting the bottle a little too hard came up to my cousin and says,

'Wot's your name daaaahlin?'

Uhoh. I got us into the mess didn't I? I was feeling kind of bad. I guess most people would have given up around then. We didn't. And guess what? I had never read any of the author's books. I had been reading his blog but that was it. Yet, I was determined to go.

So we asked around and then this lady kindly told us where to take the bus from so that we could go to Crystal Palace. End of story, right? Not quite. So were taking this bus that is supposed to stop at Crystal Palace.

It's just me, my cousin and another lady. Then a couple of stops before Crystal Palace the bus swings around and starts going in the opposite direction. We ring the stop bell frantically and the maniac finally stops. We climb down to the first floor of the double decker and my cousin says all genteel like to the bus driver,

'You really shouldn't have done that. You should have told us this was the last stop.'

The other lady decided to use the more effective,

'Fock you!!!!'


I wanted to start laughing at the two contrasts. So we got off that bus and tried looking for another one. This resulted in us running across the street (my cousin in her work shoes, pumps) to catch another bus and finally reaching Crystal Palace. After a bit of looking round we finally found the place.

Phew!

And we listened to Martin Millar read from his newest book Lonely Werewolf Girl. And it was worth it. I got two books signed. The Good Fairies of New York and the aforementioned book. Both excellent books. Exactly my type of book.

Ever since I have been reading Martin's blog and I love it. He is funny, talented, and can be self deprecating about himself. He's the kind of author that Holden Caufield was talking about when he said there are some authors you just want to call and talk to.

I can't wait to read more of Martin's work. And in honour of Martin and that fateful bus and tube ride I made this strawberry rhubarb pie (recipe here). He loves rhubarb you see. Rhubarb crumble in particular.

So if you have some free time, a lot of rhubarb and strawberries then you should make this pie cos' it's absolutely delicious.

Pie Love to You All