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Today I was given a particularly wonderful reminder of just how much I love comics. I volunteer at The Story Museum in Oxford, which, today, held a comic festival in partnership with The Phoenix Comic, a fantastic children's weekly comic which I'd heard a lot about, but never read before. I am so glad I went and helped out. Hundreds of people, of all ages, turned up and joined in with buying comics, reading comics, drawing their own characters and coming up with their own stories. There were three huge boards in the courtyard, covered in blank panels, and several artists filled up one panel each, making a collaborative story about pirates, Vikings and mermaids taking a conflict resolution class. There was ice cream and pizza for sale, and the entire atmosphere was buzzing with excitement - everyone seemed to have caught the comic bug. On top of that, I got to meet a lot of fantastic writers and artists.

Hanging out with other comic and story lovers is one of my favourite parts of writing, whether it's Footloose or my prose stuff. Writing can be a slightly isolating job (although when you're in the middle of scribbling down some epic battle or adventure, you often forget that it's just you on your own in your room) - so meeting new people is always a great way to bounce ideas around and see how others work. And in a few weeks, I get to do it all over again at London MCM Expo!

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