A Happy Author

James Hannam, author of God's Philosophers: How the Medieval World Laid the Foundations of Modern Science has sent us a nice email:

"Sorry to write out of the blue. I just wanted to thank you for doing so well with my book.

I don't think I've ever seen it in a bestseller list before so it was great to be only one place behind Tony Blair!

Best wishes, James"

God's Philosophers has been shortlisted for the 2010 Royal Society Science Book Prize.

"The Cloud Man" visits Abbey's

Gavin Prettor-Pinney, founder of The Cloud Appreciation Society and author of The Cloudspotter's Guide and The Wavewatcher's Companion dropped into Abbey's today.

Gavin has just returned from the Melbourne Writer's Festival and was kind enough to call in at short notice and give a reading and chat to some of his Sydney-based fans. He also gave us a short history of the Cloud Appreciation Society, which apparently started out as a bit of a joke, and now has over 23,500 members in over 88 countries!

Gavin is a lovely man, with, dare I say it, a very sunny disposition and the only problem with his visit was that he couldn't stay longer than he did. And if you missed Gavin talking about waves on Radio National's Late Night Live in July, here is a link to the program.