Unusual tour stops

Ian Rankin was recently in South Africa to promote his Rebus novels, and he tells the South African Sunday Times about some of the more bizarre experiences he had during the trip:

Rankin related, wide-eyed, his weekend as a guest author on one of Jenny Crwys-Williams’ book club breakaways. Jenny runs a very smart and lively book club which normally features lunches or dinners with visiting writers.

Twice a year she takes over an out-of-town hotel for a book weekend – she insists it is not a literary weekend. Things are known to get somewhat high-spirited on these weekends, like the time the members hid the car keys of a fetching young writer so that he couldn’t leave.

It seems this weekend at the Critchley Hackle Lodge in Dullstroom was no exception.

“I wish I’d had a tape recorder,” says Rankin. “At one stage in the wee hours the conversation was completely surreal. There was some story about a naked woman signalling a helicopter in to land,” he laughs. “Unbelievable.”

Alexander McCall Smith will be visiting the country in a few days, and lord knows what accidental mischief he’ll get up to…