CornflowerBlue

I was going to mention rose veal too - it's sold at a lot of farmers' markets. It's a far better option than ignoring the fact male dairy calves are born, it's wonderful eating, tender but flavourful, like the most tender steak. I have no objection to odd meats, I love ostrich sausages (we have them so often they're known as sostriches here), though like any dark meat sausages they benefit from a rich, fatty sauce or casserole. I do wonder about the ethics of their sourcing though, particularly some of the rarer animals.

I think everyone's said what I originally thought, that it's cheaper if you're careful. Once you've become a confident cook, it's easy to start adding in things that can make it expensive, but careful use of ingredients and some forward planning are really helpful. I was raised cooking at home and am always a bit horrified by the cost of pre-prepared meals. The nearest I'll have to that now is breaded fillets of fish or the very occasional readymade pizza. Food that is cheap makes me question why - how can a pizza be profitable if it costs a pound to buy? Where does the meat on it come from? I choose to eat far less meat and dairy, and pay the extra to have organic and free-range instead. I do an online shop every couple of months and buy heaps of basics tinned tomatoes and chickpeas, and H&B do dried soya mince for a pound or so, which easily lasts me a couple of months. Bread really isn't expensive to make at all. Doves Farm yeast is usually

I'm feeling fatnacious because my lunch was a huge vegetable bake with a slice of gammon I'd marinated overnight in treacle, orange juice and mustard. It was wonderful, but there really was quite a lot of it! Then I made cinnamon rolls to take over to my sister's, and ate loads of the dough because it is just deeeelish. I haven't even been able to look at dinner yet, I'll probably have some smoked mackerel with salad in a bit.

It's probably my favourite books, though sometimes when I'm not concentrating I notice the Regeneration trilogy and Jeffrey Eugenides' Middlesex teaming up with Angela Carter's The Magic Toyshop to bring it down and form a rag-tag coalition. I loved the character of Shadow: he reminds me of a very good friend, someone who only knows themselves by the things they have experienced, and is deeply wary of experiencing any more. I have a particular affection for stories about gods and superstition, particularly Norse gods, and I did think Wednesday was as brutal and cunning and manly as expected, and rather enjoyable for it.

Paperback: 293 pages Publisher: Point; New edition edition (20 Sep 2002) Language English ISBN-10: 0439979439 James Cameron needn't wait another decade to make his next blockbuster. I have it next to me; or Peter Jackson could make it. I'd rather Tarantino didn't, but you never know. I have the book. The one that children will dress up for, the one that will see as many adult fans as children, the one with three more books to follow, a potential goldmine. Philip Reeve's Mortal Engines is so visually gorgeous that kites flutter from the snowy mountains as you glide above in your airship, oblivious entirely to the reading of words, the turning of pages. A grimy jewel of steampunk artistry, airships and cities floating in the air meet the intensely creepy Guild of Engineers, with their chemically hairless skulls and long white rubber coats. Luckily for such a fantastic, imaginative book, Reeve's narrative voice is so coherent and so subtle that you are allowed to tumble straight into the action of the book. The entirely familiar (we are in the Natural History Museum when the book begins) meets the astonishingly strange

This is what my MA and PhD are in! There's a book just come out, I read a proof copy and loved it, called The Sky is Everywhere, by Jandy Nelson. It's funny and charming and really entrancing, but have some tissues handy, too. I had to come inside because I was sat in the garden, reading and sobbing. I know it's been briefly mentioned, but Philip Reeve's Mortal Engines is a superb book. It's incredibly visual, and for a short book packs a lot of punch. It's just been optioned as a film, and done well I think it could be spectacular. One of my promises to myself when I decided to do a PhD was that I'd put time aside to read further along the series. Geraldine McCaughrean's authorised sequel to Peter Pan, Peter Pan in Scarlet, is wonderful. The writing is so beautiful I actually text my friend an excerpt from the train, and it's got a wonderful magic to it. There's a sense of melancholy to the book that really rings true, the children all falling silent when Peter asks them to play war has stuck with me.

I loved this book! One of the best opening lines ever, and the character of Todd's dog Manchee has really stayed with me. I still imagine my dog looking at me, saying 'Good poo, Nona'. I think this is one of those books that suggests Philip Pullman's phrase is right - that some subjects are too big for anything but children's fiction. I have The Ask and the Answer in hardback, but just can't find time to read it.

I've had the amazing honour of being at two children's book awards this week: The Leeds Book Awards, and the Lancashire Children's Book Award. I only saw the primary level of the Leeds one, but at the Lancs award we got to sit in and watch a panel of children sit and judge the books, and award a winner. The children were all 13 or 14, they had all read the ten books in the shortlist and most of them had read a considerable portion of the longlist too. They referred through the day to loads of other books, and talked about which of the books they had re-read. There were four children we considered offering a place at uni straight away Children's book borrowing is still massive, I've got a feeling it's 19.4 million books a year. I think it's harder to get teenage books to reach them, especially now Borders is gone.

I think that sounds brilliant! I hope it's done well, it could be catastrophic.

The Anansi books are not half bad. My favourite book is American Gods, I think it's a supreme bit of characterisation and such a wonderful concept.

Hullo! I'm Fiona, I'm an avid reader. I'm also an MA student, studying Writing for Children at UCLan. For the course I have to study literature theory and some of the major issues in children's literature, but I also have to write. I'm a bit of a Neil Gaiman fangirl, and will happily settle down with anything by Colm Toibin, Angela Carter, Jeanette Winterson, Pat Barker or Douglas Coupland. I worked as a children's bookseller in my first gap year, and still dream of opening a children's book shop. It also reignited my love of teen and YA fiction, and my PhD is going to be in crossover fiction. When I'm not reading I love to bake, have a little vegetable garden, and I can often be found at our local real ale pub. Hullo!