On February 11th I made my way to Leeds for another book event at their Albion Street Waterstones store. It rained, it hailed, it snowed and I was four hours early… Was it worth it? Of course it was, I was on my way to meet Graeme Simsion author of best selling novel The Rosie Project.
I’ve attended a few of these ‘An Evening with….’ events and generally they all work in the same way, as a few of use were early and so was Graeme, he introduced himself and had a chat while signing our books before the event had started, you also had to pick which colour you wanted it signed in before knowing if he had a pen in your chosen colour. He didn’t have a generic black sharpie like most but instead an array of colours lining his jacket pocket, an entire rainbow just for signing books. I loved this and not a single person was let down on their choice of colour.
To my surprise and via the power of twitter, Graeme knew who I was before I had chance to introduce myself. The entire evening was hilarious and Graeme Simsions humour is constant, when an entire room of strangers spend an hour and a half grinning like cheshire cats and laughing non stop it shows that your host knows what he is doing.
The way Graeme shared stories from his own life while comparing some to those of Don Tillman was my favourite; you couldn’t even make this stuff up. This is where we found some of the best scenarios within the book are actually lightly based around real life events that Graeme has encountered via a friend during his days of being an IT nerd, honestly this is a man with such a plethora of skills and qualifications behind him I could hardly keep up. The Rosie Project was initially written and intended as a screenplay because of course Graeme is qualified in screenwriting amongst many other things.
It was interesting to find out that the character of Don wasn’t written with Autism or Aspergers in mind, this however is how the majority of Graeme’s readers have perceived him to be. Don has also been compared to the likes of Dr Sheldon Cooper (who I love!) from The Big Bang Theory many times, and for this reason Graeme hasn’t watched an entire episode as he doesn’t want another personality of the same characteristics to influence his future with Don.
Graeme’s book was one of my favourites in 2013 and if you’ve had the pleasure of reading it you’ll understand why, this isn’t ‘just’ another romance novel. The Rosie Project has the ability to appeal to a variety of people and I wouldn’t place it in the women’s diction category at all; The Rosie Project deals with a series of complicated and sometimes awkward situations whilst being abundant in humour!
The moment you’ve been waiting for…
Win a signed copy of The Rosie Project!
Follow the steps below for your chance to win a copy of The Rosie Project.
Whats up for grabs?
1 – One copy signed by Graeme Simsion. In pink, incase you wanted to know which colour I chose!
This prize is in no way connect to the publisher and was purchased for the event by myself, good luck!
Winners will be announced on the 29th of March at 2:00pm
The Blurb:
Don is getting married.
He just doesn’t know who to yet.
But he has designed a very detailed questionnaire to help him find the perfect woman.
One thing he already knows, though, is that it’s not Rosie.
Absolutely, completely, definitely not.
Don Tillman is a socially challenged genetics professor who’s decided the time has come to find a wife. His questionnaire is intended to weed out anyone who’s unsuitable. The trouble is, Don has rather high standards and doesn’t really do flexible so, despite lots of takers, he’s not having much success in identifying The One.
When Rosie Jarman comes to his office, Don assumes it’s to apply for the Wife Project – and duly discounts her on the grounds she smokes, drinks, doesn’t eat meat, and is incapable of punctuality. However, Rosie has no interest in becoming Mrs Tillman and is actually there to enlist Don’s assistance in a professional capacity: to help her find her biological father.
Sometimes, though, you don’t find love: love finds you…
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