Two pieces of exciting good news. Well, I’m excited.

The one thing is that, at long last, I’m allowed to spread the word that I’ll be participating in the Edinburgh Book Festival. On Monday 24 August, at 2 pm, I’ll be interviewed abut Lingo in the Baillie Gifford Corner Theatre. I’ll share the honour with fellow author and journalist Ann Morgan, who wrote Reading the world. Later that day, I’ll participate in The Revolution Will be Tweeted, an event organised by Amnesty International, where four authors will be reading some work (not our own) around the use of social media in social activism. I’ll spend several days in Edinburgh, so I may be available for a chat about language over a cup or glass.

Second, there is a new edition of Lingo in the making, the fifth in all: an audio book! Audible have bought the rights. I happen to have an Audible subscription myself, so I know that they have lots of great and well produced stuff. I’m awfully pleased to see my Lingo mingle there with other books that I’ve enjoyed, by writers ranging from P.G. Wodehouse to Steven Pinker and from Jasper Fforde to Anton Chekhov.