Acclaimed Author Book Signing at Waterstone's, Hitchin

Ben Hatch, author of "Are We Nearly There Yet? A Family's 8000 Miles Around Britain in a Vauxhall Astra", will be book signing at Hitchin Waterstone's on February 11th 2012 between 10am and 4pm.

Bored, broke, burned out and turning forty, Ben Hatch and his wife, Dinah, were approached to write a guidebook about family travel in Britain. They rented out their house, packed their Vauxhall Astra with themselves, their children and everything they would need for 8,000 misguided miles around Britain over a five-month period.

Praised by many, including John Cleese who said, "Ben Hatch makes me laugh," and Terry Wogan who described it as, "An utter delight," the book is a memoir crossed with a travelogue that reads like a novel.

After 96 reviews on Amazon it is obvious that the book is a massive hit with 90 of those reviewers giving it 4 or 5 stars. Further confirmation of its success came yesterday (18th January) when "Are We Nearly There Yet?" was named the No1 Customer Favourite Kindle read of 2011.

Jokingly, Ben said he needs as many people as possible to come down to see him during the book signing so, "I'm not on my own behind a stack of books like Alan Partridge". On a more serious note, book signings are a great opportunity to talk to an author about their story and of course to get your book signed.

Below is an extract to give you some idea of what to expect from "Are We Nearly There Yet?"

 A week into their 8000 mile road-trip round Britain, as The Hatch family reach Birmingham, conditions are so bad Ben begins to feel jealous of Ray Mears because "OK, he might be hot and thirsty but at least he doesn't have to take two under 4s to Cadbury World."…

Dinah's with the hotel manager getting led around conference facilities, being informed of occupancy rates and other details we'll have no room for in our guidebook. Meanwhile Charlie's quietly ripping up the A Guide to Guest Services handbook. At the same time on the telly, Survival with Ray Mears is playing extraordinarily loudly because Phoebe, who's busy smearing face cream on the bedclothes, is sat on the remote's volume button. After packing our last case, I corner Charlie in the bathroom and yank the remains of the handbook from him like he's a gun-dog giving up a dead partridge.

'Please guys, behave for Daddy.'

Charlie throws his head back in a rage as Phoebe rushes in and upturns an open shampoo bottle onto the tiled floor that Charlie then slips in. They writhe in V05, giggling as the last of their clean clothes bite the dust before Charlie scuttles away to rifle the room's internet set-up box. In the outback Ray's draining moisture from a eucalyptus tree. I want to shout, 'Drive round England with under-fours. Sleep all in the same room, wake at 7am with the prospect of another 140 nights of the same – then discuss survival in your khaki f*****g shorts, Ray!'

Normally I'm at the wheel because when Dinah drives she presses her face against the windscreen like Mr Magoo and cannot look round when you talk to her – or else she gets lost, swerves into somebody else's lane or, scariest of all, tugs her hair while nervously chanting, 'Concentrate, Dinah. Concentrate.' But this morning she's driving meaning it's she who must merge onto the M42. Dinah's merging panics her. Her merging panics me. If we'd know there was merging, I'd have driven.

She breathes in.

'Go for it.'

She breathes out.

'Go for it,' copies Phoebe, laughing in the back.

'Phoebe, Mummy's merging so…'

And as I once, controversially, taught her, Phoebe crosses herself.

'Please, don't make fun of me, Ben,' says Dinah.

"PHOEBE!"

After several minutes stationary near the end of the slip-road being hooted at by other drivers, who swerve around us staring in to see who can be this incompetent, Dinah begins her mantra, 'Concentrate, Dinah! Concentrate!'

I offer encouragement. 'Remember, oncoming traffic doesn't want to smash into you just as much as you don't want to smash into it.'

Dinah revs, releases the handbrake and edges forward, each time stopping because of some speck on the horizon. Finally, when she begins reversing, 'because I need a run-up', I yank on the handbrake. "It's those lorry drivers who don't give a ****," she says, shuffling across to the passenger seat, as I reach her side. "They wouldn't let me in. You saw them.'