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INUVIK
The first night of a Northern book tour that launched in Inuvik was not as successful as author Kelley Armstrong and head librarian Beverly Garven hoped.

Bestselling Canadian author Kelley Armstrong spent a few days in Inuvik, visiting the school, the adult learning centre and the library. - Danielle Sachs/NNSL photo

However, it was to be followed by two days of successful presentations before the author continued on to Yellowknife.

Armstrong was to lead a public presentation at the library Monday night but no one showed up, although her presentation to the grades 5 and 6 classes on Tuesday was well received, said Garven.

"One boy came in after school and asked to see a book on Norse mythology," said Garven.

Armstrong's young-adult novels have elements of the supernatural in them and are set across North America.

Her first novel was published in 2001 and since then she has released more than 30 books.

During her talks in schools, Armstrong discusses everything from plot and publishing to characters and cover art.

"It's important to have some input into the cover art," she said.

"There are little things, like in the Darkest Powers series, the model on the cover ages over the trilogy but the books happen one after the other, not over a few years."

It's a problem that Armstrong fixed with the Darkness Rising trilogy – all the cover photos were taken at the same time so it would be more accurate with the timeline of the trilogy.

The organizers took the lack of turnout in stride.

"It's hard to get people out sometimes," said Garven.

"It could help if maybe the schools were visited first but flight arrivals don't really allow for that."

Kai Cardinal asked to find out more about Norse mythology following Armstrong's talk.

"She talked about it and it was interesting," he said.

"It's really hard to judge who's going to be engaged," said Armstrong.

"I've gone to some inner-city school where the kids don't read or write and there's nothing I can do to get them interested."

Armstrong's books are fairly popular in Inuvik, according to Garven, which was one of the reasons she was surprised no one attended the public event.

"I know for a fact there are a lot of kids over there that have read all the young-adult stuff," Garven said.

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