Last weekend, a very exciting and rare event took place at the Mission Viejo library.    Mr. Eoin Colfer, the author of Airman, the Artemis Fowl series, and the newly released The Reluctant Assassin, visited the library, and spoke to many eager and excited kids and adults.

Before Mr. Colfer came out to speak, a magician entertained the audience with a few funny card tricks. The magician was quite engaging and had the audience in stitches.  Mr. Colfer was then introduced. He began his presentation by telling an entertaining story about the Irish sport of hurling. One day, he was in America talking about his books, and a little girl asked him what he liked to do for fun.  He responded by saying that he enjoyed hurling. It goes without saying that the little girl thought Mr. Colfer was referring to something besides the Irish sport. The whole conversation between Mr. Colfer and the girl went downhill from there.

Once the audience was laughing, Mr. Colfer began talking about the famous Artemis Fowl, and how he got the ideas for the characters. Artemis was based on his little brother, who was always getting into troublesome situations, like the time his little brother got out of art class by drinking water mixed with paint. Then, he told the audience that even though his wife did not want Mr. Colfer to base the character of  Artemis Fowl’s mother on her, he did it anyway. Mr. Colfer would get the character’s traits by asking his wife sneaky questions from time to time. Beckett and Miles, the two little brothers in the end of Artemis Fowl, are characters based upon Mr. Colfer’s sons, Finn and Shawn, even though Finn is now a teenager. However, Mr. Colfer admitted that Butler, Artemis’ butler, is merely a character which was born out of his imagination.

Mr. Colfer also spoke about the background of his first book in the W.A.R.P. series.  While he tried to make it scary, it did not turn out as scary as he hoped, even though one of the main characters is a psychotic killer magician who makes his apprentice murder people. Mr. Colfer ended his talk by reminiscing about his childhood, and how he was always bullied for reading. Mr. Colfer answered questions, one of them being from this author. I asked him if it was easier to write his Artemis Fowl books after he had written the first one, and he answered yes.

Mr. Colfer’s interview was very exciting, and was one of the most exciting events that I have attended. Mr. Colfer is a very entertaining speaker, and I would definitely recommend going to hear him speak next time he is in town.

-Will R., 8th grade