Writers Everywhere

I'm about to make a serious attempt at packing for Hong Kong. I have all my class materials ready (I'm teaching a range of classes and PD sessions) and am at the point of making a list so I can stop panicking that I'll forget something. I'm the person who, on the way to the airport, is trying desperately not to imagine I have forgotten something crucial. After all, if you have tickets and passport, most other things can be "managed". Still, I've been working on the list for the past 45 minutes and adding something new and vital on a regular basis.

Regardless of my packing paranoia, I know I will have a great time. Susanna and I meet dozens of wonderfully keen writers every time we visit Hong Kong, either at our YWCA classes or with Women in Publishing. We feel a bit like butterflies, touching down and then flying off again, but this time we will be making serious efforts to network more, and find ongoing connections. Last year, we were there during the Australian elections and were quite astonished at the level of enthusiasm. The Kevin 07 brigade were noisy and cheered loudly!

I'm taking my novel, my lecture notes from Margie Lawson, and my highlighters. I'm expecting some focused rewriting time, if only because I can't bear to watch more than two minutes of Fox News or CNN, usually the only TV channels we can get on our hotel TVs. That's a good thing for a writer! I won't have time on this trip for tourist things, but I will have blocks of hours where I have the opportunity to focus on my own work without interruptions. I just have to be firm with myself and stay off the internet.

It might be a good reminder to think about all the people doing NaNo, for a start. But also I will be taking some time to meet up with writers and talk about writing. I've been fortunate to be able to travel quite a bit in the past few years, and the biggest bonus is the writing friends I've made around the world (Hi, Kristi!). The writing community is special - SCBWI members meet up all around the globe, writers of all kinds are happy to chat over a glass of wine or a coffee and just talk about what they're doing. It is a community, one to value and nurture.

What's In a Title?

These days - a lot! It's part of the marketing, and if you can't come up with a snazzy, jazzy title that will just zing your book off the shelf (note the ZZZs) then the publicity department will do it for you. I first got clued in to the whole title thing when I was writing poetry. If you know anything about poems, you know all the things that a title can be: it can act like the first line of the poem; it can act like a label to signal what the poem is about; it can be like a line of the poem that adds more meaning; it can clue the reader into other layers of meaning. In short, a title for a poem is important, and if you call your poem Untitled you are either missing out through ignorance, or you're lazy, or you're trying to be obscure or clever (duh). At least, that's what other poets will think, because we all spend a lot of time on titles. It's important. It's worth the time.

What made me think about this topic? A visit to Borders. I love my independents but when you want to wallow in a huge range of choices and spend ages just looking, Borders is it. And the coffee helps too. But I found myself in front of the New Releases shelves, and in particular, the new Nonfiction section. Which in this part of the store, was 90% memoirs. I don't read a lot of memoirs (although I am reading Truth and Beauty by Ann Patchett right now and loving it) but even so, a scan of the books made me shudder. Because of their titles.

I should have gone back with a piece of paper and written them down, but this is kind of what I saw. Six shelves of display copies, many with pastel covers and foggy photos. And the titles went like this: Shattered, Lost, Beyond Hate, It Wasn't Me, Left Behind, Scarred, Child No More, Not My Child, No Mother For Me, etc etc. I had never seen them all lined up like that before, and it was awful. I am sure that every single person who has written a memoir like that has important, heart-wrenching stories to tell. But I'm not going to be reading them.

A couple of years ago, a critic called them "misery memoirs". Can't you tell by the titles? So I went onto Amazon and did a search on "memoir" and what a much cheerier list I found! Are You There Vodka: It's Me, Chelsea, Half-Assed: A Weight Loss Memoir, When A Crocodile Eats the Sun, Running With Scissors, and Never Have Your Dog Stuffed. How jolly are they?

Sometimes my titles just come out of the blue before I even start the story. The Too-Tight Tutu was one, Tracey Binns Was Trouble was another. As for Sixth Grade Style Queen (Not!) - I couldn't have developed that afterwards - it was another one that popped into my head and wouldn't go away. But i do think that years of writing poems and being aware of what a title can do has made a big difference. My current novel has been without a title for several months. Then someone asked, "Doesn't it have a title yet?" And after a few minutes of serious thought, now it does.

A title is important. A genius title can help to sell a book. It's part of that instant attention/ gratification thing we have going these days. If you're not sure about your book title, there are a few things you can do. Brainstorm ideas, look on Amazon or B&N for books similar to yours and try to come up with something different, look at anthologies of poems and see what poets have achieved, make yourself write down 20 possible titles and test them out, use your thesaurus and your friends and anything you can find to come up with word associations. Imagine seeing your book in a catalogue or in publicity material. How do you want it to sound? Look at other book titles and say them out loud. What appeals to you? Does it convey the tone of your book? Try whatever you can to find a great title - it's worth the effort.

Renovate Your Writing Life

Right now, thousands and thousands of people are having a go at NaNo - writing their hearts out to try and get down 50,000 words in a month. I'm totally into revision mode and my head couldn't come up with a novel-length idea if my life depended on it, so I'm passing this year. But I have plenty to think about as I pull my first draft to pieces, dissect it with pens and coloured markers, and then attempt to rewrite based on notes, new ideas and what I see are gaps or soft spots. This is a slow process. Apart from anything else, it's adding around 20% extra words (I'll be in big trouble if I end up with 50,000 extra words!).

You might be thinking So what? You do that kind of rewriting all the time. Do you? Everyone seems to rewrite in a different way. I'm beginning to think that just fixing what your critique group picks up is maybe not the best way to go. It's the easy, fast way, for sure. There have been times when I have sat down and started a whole novel all over again, from scratch, barely referring to the first draft. While this has got me closer to making the novel work the way it needs to, it hasn't been a "cure all" process. Sometimes all it's done is introduce new problems!
So this process I am learning is exciting, different, intensive and needs a lot of perseverance.

Which brings me to the Renovate Your Life workshop I attended last Sunday. A few people I know read Craig Harper's website articles and email posts regularly, so they have an idea of what his thoughts are on things like goals and motivation. That was one of the interesting aspects for me - the discussion about staying motivated. Basically, he says the feeling of being motivated and enthusiastic never lasts (true), that you might attend a workshop or read something great and feel motivated by it, but that will fade and then what do you do? The people who achieve stuff, who get where they want to go, don't rely on motivation.

I have days when I think my writing is going so well, that it will last for weeks and weeks, and I'll finish my wonderful novel and it will be brilliant. Ha! Within a day or two, doubt sets in. The novel concept is stupid, I can't write, no one will want to read it. Why am I bothering? At times like that, it's very hard to feel motivated. And telling yourself that your goal is publication and won't that be wonderful doesn't help at all. The brain, in its infinite pessimism, just mutters, "Yeah, what about the bad reviews." So Craig is right. When motivation disappears, what is left?

For a start, what Bryce Courtenay calls BIC. Bum in chair. Setting small goals, such as 500 words a day. Bribing yourself. Re-inspiring yourself with writing books. Everyone has their own "tricks". Work out what gets you moving, and use it. Some of the things Craig talked about included:
* we get in our own way - over-think and under-do.
* we shut doors on ourselves, and say things like "that's not me - I couldn't do that".
* we sabotage ourselves, and talk ourselves down, or out of possibilities.
* we don't plan our lives, we just let them happen (he suggested would you just get in a car and let a trip from Perth to Sydney happen? without planning for money, petrol, maps etc?).
* we look at our history and let it stop us from trying new things or changing.
* we play the blame game.
* we look for shortcuts and quick fixes.

There was a lot more than that, of course. Plenty of positive ideas for change and achieving what you want. I think he's planning to release a DVD of the session at some point. But while all of those things are about life in all its aspects, I couldn't help applying them to writing in particular. And a point about hours hit home with quite a few people there - we often use the NO TIME excuse (I know I do). Count up how many hours a week - honestly - that you spend watching TV. Then take four of those hours and write instead. That's a starting point to think about.

Whether you're doing NaNo or not, maybe take some time to consider the whole motivation and perseverance idea. NaNo is excellent motivation for getting that novel down that's been inside you for months or years. But what will keep you going afterwards? If you're not doing NaNo, like me, what is keeping you writing right now? And next week? And next month? On a good writing day, when it's all humming along, is there anything you can capture and nurture, to use on the bad days? What motivates you for the long distance?

Still Learning...

It's been quite a week. I have worked every day on the course, and subsequently my current novel (applying the various bits to the work in progress), and am quite astounded at what I am seeing. There are times when I truly think "Why was I writing like that? It is awful! Why couldn't I see what was missing?"
Ah, grasshopper (as Mr C would say), that's because it is far easier to see what is wrong in front of you than work out what is not there. Obvious mistakes are easy to fix. Gaps, holes, missing links, shallow characters - they're not so easy because in your head, they are there. It's just that you have to learn to see they're not yet on the page.

After 20 years of writing, you'd think I'd know that. And I do. But I had got out of the habit of being able to pick it up. Not sure why. Something more to think about. But I am now on Chapter 3 of my current novel - the coloured markers have been getting a thorough workout, and I can see every day how the words on the page are getting stronger. After the mark-up, I then have to rewrite.

As for Mr C - better known as Craig Harper - today was the day for the Renovate Your Life workshop. It's going to take me a few days to digest it all. I will come back when I've got it all sorted through in the mental intake and filing system. Suffice to say, when I came home, I ate, and then I got stuck into the study and marking up of my novel. The painting of my door frames didn't happen. Priorities, grasshopper, priorities.

Learning and Learners

I'm working hard on my course right now, and learning heaps. There's nothing like being able to take a chapter of your novel and apply all the exercises and coloured markers as you go, then return to the manuscript and rewrite. What comes out can be a revelation. For a start, I've ended up with an extra 500 words, a 15% increase. That's because the course is about developing character emotions and depth, and if you've done any work on showing-not-telling stuff, you'll know that at high points in the story, showing works so much better, but takes more words.

So ... I'm still working through it all (the course is called Empowering Character Emotions by Margie Lawson), and realising that I will need to go back and re-read and re-do the exercises several times. Is it because my brain is getting old? I don't think so - I think it's more a case of I've settled into certain patterns of learning (skimming and taking what I think I need), and I'm having to deliberately slow down and concentrate and go over things to get top value.

All this has got me thinking about ways of learning, or not learning, that I've seen over many years of teaching writing. You may not have taught, but I bet you've seen one or two of these in a class you've attended:

* I already know everything. I'm a fantastic writer, I'm brilliant, but undiscovered. You are here to acknowledge my brilliance. And that means that boring stuff like grammar and punctuation is irrelevant in my case. Besides, the editor will fix that.

* I'm here to learn but you're wrong. Never mind that I've paid good money and am spending valuable writing hours in this room, and just because you are the teacher and you're widely published doesn't mean you know anything about what I write. Because I'm special.

* I don't want to show anyone my writing. Yes, this is a workshop and that's what you do, but someone might steal my ideas. No, I can't send my workshopping by email, because people steal stuff on the net too.

* I only want to write what I want to write. Why are we doing these stupid exercises in class? How will an exercise on writing dialogue help me write better dialogue? Why do I have to listen to what other people have written? After they've listened to me, I'll have a snooze, thanks.

* What do you mean - I need to rewrite this? Everything I write comes out perfect first time. I put a lot of thought into it. So it's fine as it is. OK, I'll fix the apostrophes. And the bit where the character with one eye is looking through binoculars. That was meant to be funny. Didn't you get it? It works for me.

* I was up really late last night. Not writing. At a party. So I'll just put my head on the desk and have a quiet nap. I'm not disturbing anyone. What's your problem?

* What do you mean, my novel sounds like a re-run of Buffy the Vampire Slayer? I think I've been really original. No, I don't read horror or vampire novels. Or any other novels, really. I watch TV though. Yes, I've seen every episode of Buffy. How did you know?

* Yes, this is science fiction (or romance, or horror, or middle grade). No, I don't read that genre. But look how much money you can make from it.

Thankfully, these students and writers are very few and far between. Over the years, I have had the great pleasure of working with/teaching hundreds of keen, enthusiastic people who really do want to soak up every single thing they can, and improve their writing as much as possible. That's why I'm still doing it. And I love being a student, too. Better get back to my homework.

Back to "School"

In Saturday's Age newspaper, there was an article about US novelist, Francine Prose, who says she believes writing can't be taught. Now, for someone like her who has been teaching writing on and off for twenty years, I find this an odd thing to say. Does she mean that in twenty years, she has never seen a writer grow and improve, and finally get published? Hmmm, she is either a bad teacher or she has no interest in her students outside the classroom (and they haven't bothered to tell her of their successes).

In the past six months, I've received wonderful news about my former students who have had novels and stories accepted, including one who was shortlisted this year for the Vogel Award (hi, Demet!). These are all writers who we have seen take huge steps forward while studying our course. I'm sure you could argue that they would have made those improvements anyway, if they had just kept writing and reading, but I'd disagree with you. To me, being a writer is always about learning and improving, and working on your craft. Do we hear this said about artists who go to art school? Or musicians who go to the Conservatory of Music or similar schools? No. Why on earth people have to continue to "service" the myth that the only true writers are those with some kind of magical, special talent is beyond me.

Yes, talent helps. I've also seen people that want to write who put words on the page which are unreadable. Either they are unable to get a grip on language and sentence construction (and are often unwilling to learn) or in the translation from brain to page, something falls flat. Those people may never write something publishable. I've also seen talented writers who don't want to put in the hard yards. They don't actually love the act of writing enough to stick at it for years and years. So perseverance is a key factor.

But so is the utter willingness to learn and grow, and the determination to improve. When it comes right down to it, if you feel that every story or every poem or every book you write needs to be better than the one before, or every draft must be better than the one before, you're on the right track. A writing course helps enormously. Suddenly you are surrounded by other writers, thousands of ideas, hours and hours of advice and information, deadlines, workshopping - it's an experience that, if you fully engage, can't help but make you a better writer. So as well as being taught, you are also learning to teach yourself. Courses don't last forever.

This week, I am going back to school. Totally self-imposed, but at my own pace. A while ago, I paid for Margie Lawson's course (lecture notes) on Empowering Characters' Emotions. I must've read the first two lectures about four times, but to be honest, I wasn't in the right place to undertake it seriously. Now I am. Now I have two novels that need major revision, and that revision, in both cases, has to focus on character. So before I start either revision, I'm going to sit down and work my way through the course. I already know what's in it, I know what I want to get out of it, and I'm ready. Is that the school bell ringing?

The Littlest Pirate Sails On

Way back in 1998 or so, I was writing a large historical novel about pirates. I'd done hours and hours of research and I was halfway through what would eventually be 120,000 words. I needed a break. So I decided to put the novel aside and write something completely different. Maybe fairies or animals or something ... What came out was a story called The Littlest Pirate. Originally I thought it was a picture book, but Penguin accepted it and published it as an Aussie Nibble (after I added some more words).

Three more stories about the Littlest Pirate have followed - The Littlest Pirate and the Hammerheads, The Littlest Pirate in a Pickle, and now The Littlest Pirate and the Treasure Map (out next year). All are chapter books in the Aussie Nibbles series. Along the way, the books have gone to the UK (published there by Happy Cat Books) and a couple to the US (Running Press). Then one was picked up by a Spanish publisher, and another by a Serbian publisher. The little guy was sailing far and wide!

Now, ironically, The Littlest Pirate has just been published here in Australia as - you guessed it - a picture book (cover above). The editor and I trimmed and tidied, and the illustrator, Tom Jellett, created Nicholas Nosh's story in full colour. It looks fantastic! Dare I say - it's on sale now, perfect for Christmas gifts. $19.95.
The one thing I have learned from Nicholas's voyages around the world is this - you just never know where a book might go, or what might happen to it. Next time you want to sign a contract for your new (or first) book without carefully considering the terms or getting advice, think again. Like I said, you just never know...

Editor/Publishing Insight

Quick post to direct you to this interview with Chuck Adams - one of the most insightful interviews I've read in a long time about what it's like to be an editor with both a large and small publisher, and some inside thoughts about the publishing industry.

Are Readers Fickle or Set in their Ways?

My cats drive me crazy. One day they'll eat only fresh meat, the next they turn their noses up at it. I try one brand of canned food that they like - a week later they refuse to eat the same thing. I end up feeding cat food to our chickens every now and then (and boy, they don't complain!). But I feel like I'm locked into this expensive guessing game about what they'll eat this week and what they won't. And yes, I've tried the kid's version - Either eat this or go without. They go without. And then reproach me with ribs showing. (Actually, they're probably sucking up to the neighbours...)

Are book buyers the same? We have this series craze going on in Australian children's books at the moment. If you don't have a hot series idea, you're kind of on the outer. Not because you can't write, but because the perception is that kids buy more series books and the stand-alone novels are only bought by "serious" people like librarians and teachers. Series have become a kind of collectible. My daughter was doing the series thing 18 years ago, but back then it was a case of "find a book I like and I want another one". Series still buy into that notion, but there's more to it now.

There's the TV show, for instance. Saddle Club. Old Tom. Spongebob Squarepants (I still don't get that one!). And the trilogy that morphs into more and more books, as long as there's a demand. There's also the Magic Treehouse, the Aussie Bites and Nibbles, the Go Girls - the collectibles. How many have you got? Which is your favourite? More and more, it seems like novels that are shining little beacons of originality, without any brothers or sisters to make them into a series, are struggling. Maybe that's the way the marketplace works right now, but it's a great pity if series are all we are left with.

But to answer the subject question - personally, that is - I'm in the middle somewhere. I love series where the main character is engaging and the voice is strong. A good example is Michael Connolly's latest - The Brass Verdict. His viewpoint character featured in The Lincoln Lawyer, but Connolly also includes, as a major character, Harry Bosch who has been the MC in many other books. We get another, diffferent look at Harry, which is fascinating in itself. But at the same time, I also love a novel which is about ideas and language and story, like The Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Houses in New England. I wanted to slap the main character, and I don't want to read about him again, but the rest of the novel was great.

I think, as good readers, we all like variety. I can go from a literary novel to a crime novel to an in-depth feature article to some history and enjoy all of it, for different reasons. If I didn't read widely, I'd be bored. Everything informs everything else. I read Kate Mosse's book Labyrinth (and then saw many of the places that feature in the book) but I actually like the factual history books better. That's not usual for me, but so what?

I think what bothers me a little about the mass market series books for kids is the idea that they might stop there and never discover what else is out in the wide world of books for them. That's where librarians come in. Public and school. We're fighting the battle here to keep school librarians, and not winning. It shows, in our levels of literacy and engagement with reading. On the news two nights ago, they talked about the new curriculums for schools. One news service actually mentioned that part of the new approach is to encourage teachers to read books out loud to their students.

Whoo-hoooo! If there has been anything that I have heard from teachers in the US, complaining about No Child Left Behind, is that this school draconian testing system has killed reading to the kids. And teachers everywhere over there have seen the terrible consequences of a program where all that matters is tests. At least here it looks like the testing over the past couple of years has shown that we have an awful lot of kids who can't read and write very well. Fingers crossed that the new approach might start to produce confident, enthusiastic readers at last. And really, I guess, does it matter what they start with?

Word Counts

You may not have heard of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) which is in November every year. It really should be International NoWriMo, as thousands of people all over the world now join in. The idea is that you write 50,000 words in the month of November, which means around 1666 words per day, plus a couple of extra (your title?). On the NaNo site, you can join up for free, and you get your own page where you can log in, record the number of words you've written and watch the graph rise.

I haven't done it for a couple of years, mainly because November is our major time of year for marking and providing feedback on student work, and writing creatively just doesn't work in the available brainspace left (which is usually zero). I would love to attempt it this year, except for one thing - I don't have anything of 50,000 words to write. I'm working on something at the moment, and am about 28,000 words into it, but as it's a children's novel, I'm thinking it'll be finished by another 8,000 words or so. I could revise something else, but the idea of NaNo is that it's new work.

Mind you, the requirement that it be a new novel is not supposed to stop you. You're supposed to just write and write and write, and see what comes out. It's why there is a companion book called No Plot? No Problem. But I don't really work like that anymore. I've stuffed up too many novels by not working out first what they are going to be about. All the same, it's tempting...

NaNo or not, word count tallies are useful at any time. Although I bribe myself to write by saying "Just one page", I'm disappointed if I end up with less than 1,000 words. It's a mental target that makes me feel good when I reach it. 2,000 words makes me feel brilliant! When you're in the middle of a novel and starting to flag, wondering if you'll ever finish, and what on earth were you thinking anyway, looking at your word count can make you feel so much better. Wow, have I written that much?

Setting a word count target per week can be useful too. Some days we just can't get to the computer when life butts in, but if we can catch up the next day, and head for that word count, we don't feel so bad. The trick is to find the right target for you. 10,000 words a week may well be too many. 500 is way too few (you knew that, right?). I aim for 4,000. It's realistic, it's an amount that will get me many steps closer to a finished draft, and it's also a number that I know I can exceed, all going well.

Do you have word targets? Or do you count hours? Or pages? Are you doing NaNo this year? Why? Share some thoughts with us.

I'll Deal with my Procrastination Tomorrow

Over on Kristi Holl's blog this week, she's been talking about procrastination, and what's known as writer's block. Mostly they are the same thing, I think. And although there are many reasons why we procrastinate about writing, I'd say the biggest one is fear. Fear that what we are putting our hours and heart and energy into will be criticised or rejected. Fear that when we sit down to write, nothing will happen and we'll never write again. Fear that we are just not good enough - for anything. Fear that something or someone will give us a big fat F on our story.

I know of many people who stopped writing (or drawing) in school because of a snooty or critical teacher's comments. Often these were people whose work didn't conform; they didn't colour inside the lines, so they were told they were no good. It can take forty years to get over something like that, and find the courage to start again. That's why so many people in their 50s rediscover their art - they finally realise it's up to them.

This photo above is not a book (it'd have to be a pretty grubby book!). It's a large slab of concrete. Intended to be the foundation of a house. And it will, maybe not as soon as I want it to be, but I hope I'll get there one day. But I have found that the process of trying to get this house built has filled me with as much fear, and caused as much procrastination as any book I have ever written - probably more. Mainly because of all the people (read: bureaucrats) who have tried to stop me or put huge obstacles in my way. They've all contributed to that horrible gut-churning feeling of "Why am I doing this? How can I continue against the odds?"

The bureaucratic nightmare has mostly consisted of either changing the rules without telling me (and then saying No, you can't do that now), or being unreasonably slow and obstinate about petty things, or literally going back on previous agreements. But I haven't given up yet, although I've used many words in private that I wouldn't use in public!

But it reminds me in so many ways of writing - that is, writing for publication. I'm all for writing because you love it and it enriches you. Writing for publication is different. It brings out all those fears we have about "are we good enough?" No matter how often we tell ourselves, "It is the work that is being rejected, not me", it still cuts to the bone. And it can cause that procrastination bug. If you don't write, nobody can criticise or reject you. While one part of you is saying "I want to write, no matter what", a secret - or not so secret - voice is saying "But it won't be good enough and someone might tell you so".

All I can say is: Do it. Sit down and do it. Just like every now and then over the past three years (and probably more years to come) I have had to tell myself, "Make that phone call, write that letter, complete that paperwork - make it happen". I have a big piece of concrete now. It's lovely and smooth, and I like to run my hand over its surface and marvel at it. Just like I love to see a pile of manuscript pages grow, and the word count on a piece of notepaper next to my computer grow too. This week, along with developing my plot and deepening my characters, I'm getting my bricks delivered. What about you?

What's Different About This Story?

I won't go into all the gushing descriptions again about the hot chocolate I had at the Cafe Francais in Place de Bastille in Paris. Suffice to say, I doubt Angeline's could've done much better. This lovely cup of chocolate above, although it looks amazing (and the inside of the glass was coated in chocolate that melted as I drank it), still came third in my list of great chocolate in France. Second was in a small cafe/bar in Gruissan.

My point is: isn't chocolate just chocolate? Aren't they all made from the same ingredients? True, but to me chocolate becomes a metaphor for stories. Aren't all stories the same? Aren't there all these writing books that say there are only seven/twenty/thirty-six plots, and every story uses the same ones? The obvious answer is that chocolate (in a cup or in a packet) does differ enormously, depending on the quality of ingredients and their mix, just like the quality of a story differs depending on the skills of the writer.

I would take it one step further. It's also about how the writer sees their story and their characters, and how aware they are of the possibilities, as well as what has already been done. Does the chef at Cafe Francais know about Angeline's chocolate? How could s/he not, given the publicity and word-of-mouth it gets? Did the chef set out to better Angeline's? And having very likely succeeded perhaps (especially on price), why aren't they publicising theirs more widely? Perhaps the chef went to Angeline's and said "I can do better". Perhaps not.

As writers, one of our key "jobs" is to read - we need to know what has already been done (and done to death) in our genre or area. We need to read with an eye to working out how that story worked and why it was different. And then we need to come up with a story and characters that stand out from the crowd. Yes, there are many similar stories, but it's how you approach it that counts. And if you do so armed with the knowledge of what to avoid, you'll be better off.

Which brings me to Simon Beckett. I love discovering a new writer - as my friend K says, then you hope they've already written twenty books so you can have a wonderful time reading them all. Beckett only has two to his credit so far but they are great. His main character is a forensic anthropologist. Sound familiar? Like Kathy Reichs? Ah yes, but Beckett has done something different with the FA genre, mainly with character and great setting. I recommend both of his books - The Chemistry of Death and Written in Bone.

The Next Book

This is a topic that doesn't come up very often in general writing conversation, and it has several different aspects to it. Often, it's published writers who talk about it, and unpublished writers don't want to hear that after your first book is accepted, printed and out there, it doesn't all magically fall into place and become easy. I've heard it said many times: Getting published doesn't solve all of your problems, it just gives you a new set of problems!

I was reminded of this when reading Cynthia Leitich-Smith's blog today. As she is celebrating ten years of her website, she has been asking writers the question - Over the past decade, what are the most important lessons you've learned about your craft, the writing/artistic life, and/or publishing, and why?

Today's answer was from Nancy Garden, and among other wise and helpful things, she said: I think the most important lesson I've learned about my craft--or at least about myself as a writer--over the past decade is to slow down!
By that I don't necessarily mean to write less, and I certainly don't mean to take more time off (what's that?), but what I do mean is to be sure to give each new book or story all the time it needs before sending it off to one's editor or one's agent.

This is one of those aspects of 'the next book' - the feeling that, once you have one run on the board, you have to keep producing those books at a good rate, and not let a time gap open up. After all, you're building a reputation, a publishing track record, and if you take too long, publishers will forget who you are. But as Nancy says, handing over an under-cooked book won't do you any favours either. You have be sure every book is the best you can possibly make it. I always feel my next book has to be better than my last one. Maybe not always possible, but good to aim for. And it does take time.

Another aspect of this is genuine pressure from the publisher when your next book is part of a series or trilogy. I heard a fantasy writer say once that her first book took ten years. No one was waiting for it, and she could re-work it to her heart's content with no one looking over her shoulder. When it was accepted, suddenly the second one had to be finished within a year, and when she looked at her draft of it, she realised nearly everything had to be thrown out. To get it in on deadline, she spent many, many nights and weekends on it, always conscious that it was "expected" by someone. Sometimes that kind of pressure can cause major writer's block!

Series are similar, but different. Because you are faced with not just one more book, but maybe four or six or ten. What happens if you get to Book 4 and decide you now hate your main character? Or that the original series concept bores you to death? Sometimes a publisher will put impossible deadlines on you, in order to get the series established in the market. How would you feel about writing four books in eight months? What if you make your name with a series but desperately want to write 'the book of your heart' and the publisher says No?

There is an up-side to this, of course. Expectation of the next book can fill you with confidence, while the first book filled you with the fear that no one would ever want it. A contract does wonders for making you feel justified (especially to scoffing family) about all that time and energy you spend on writing. A solid series concept can make you feel more secure about writing the next one and the next one, because you've done all the hard groundwork and you know what you want to do with it. However, these days the next book is never 100% guaranteed to be published, so at least make sure you get some money up front!

Literacy in the Workplace

The Age featured a large article this weekend on literacy in tertiary institutions and the workplace, citing Monash University as one uni that has come out and complained about having to teach their first year students grammar and punctuation, saying this is the kind of stuff they should have learned at high school. How true. But how to fix it? Or more to the point, how to get the students to care about it, so they also want to fix it?

The grammar stuff can be pretty boring, I admit. I used to teach it in my course. But we have two great editing teachers now who do their best to make the classes interesting and engaging, along with trying to instill the basics into people (young and older) who didn't get it at school. I have my own personal theory, based on some linguistics stuff I've read about, that the years from about 11-14 are the ones where this kind of basic knowledge best sinks in. Research has shown that children who have been isolated from language (the extremes are the ones kept locked up in cellars and attics) can recover and learn correct sentence construction and grammar if they start before about 14. After that, something in the brain, presumably to do with maturity, stops "taking it in".

Our course is about writing and editing, in all its various forms and genres, from business writing to picture books and poetry. We have a simple grammar and punctuation test for applicants that very quickly sorts out who has a grasp of the basics and who hasn't. Someone who has no idea where to put a fullstop in a sentence (never mind a comma) may well fail Editing 1, a core compulsory subject. It makes a big difference to us how an applicant performs in this test (there are other selection criteria as well) as we don't want to accept people knowing they are likely to fail.

However, the other big component in this is how much they want to learn. It constantly amazes me how often students will say things like, "That's the editor's job to fix my grammar after they've accepted my story." Not. Poor grammar and punctuation in a piece of writing means automatic rejection 99% of the time, and very few people write brilliantly enough for this to be overlooked. Many older students, who felt they didn't learn the basics at school, and understand how important they are, put in 120% in Editing 1, and get there by sheer hard work.

But a lot of younger students find they know even less than they thought, and also find they can no longer get away with Spellcheck and guessing. When they discover that the only way forward is to work really hard and learn it all properly, they can't be bothered. A 51% Pass in Editing 1 means you are still getting 49% of your grammar wrong!

In The Age article, they also quoted a number of employers who said they can tell just from letters of application for jobs who is OK with grammar and who isn't. One said that errors in a letter tell him that the applicant didn't care enough to make sure it's correct. It's all about first impressions, and if the first impression you give is that you don't know how to spell or write a decent sentence, that doesn't bode well for you getting the job. That's a big bonus for students who complete our course successfully - they may never write a best-selling novel, but they are going to be way ahead of many other job applicants in terms of their language ability.

Last Days in France

I only had one day in Toulouse, but found two museums of interest (and lots of nice shops). The first museum focused on very early Toulouse, with a lot of Roman remains and history. It's interesting to see how a city can be built on a city that was built on a city, etc. Many of the artifacts in this museum were discovered when they were digging out a new underground metro station. Romans settled and lived and built in Toulouse from about 100BC to 450AD, when the Visigoths and Vandals invaded.

Given that the Visigoths and Vandals were on the move from the Germanic areas, pushed out by other invaders, I thought it was quite astonishing that the Romans were overcome, given that they were solid fighters and had built virtual fortresses. But maybe complacency had crept in? The other astonishing fact I learned at this museum, thanks to a helpful guide, was that the Romans invented concrete. The other thing I saw was the Via Domitia, the original Roman road - in a big square in Toulouse, part of the original road is exposed underneath. I expected it to be smooth (for horses and carriages) but it was pretty rough and rocky.
Of course, on my last day in Paris, I had to make up for missing Notre Dame, thanks to the Pope. My mountain climbing in Languedoc, to look at Cathar castles, was good training for the 387 steps right to the top of the North Tower. The bell started ringing on the way up - some people behind me seemed to think it was their death knell as they struggled ever upwards! I must have about 20 photos of gargoyles from different cathedrals and churches around France, but this one on the top of Notre Dame has to win the prize for being the most gross.

Inside the cathedral, the morning mass was taking place. Several hundred people sat in the middle section and tried to listen, while many hundreds more wandered in and out, took photos, talked, took more photos... They must be used to it, I guess.
And finally, I have to agree with the various websites that rate airports. Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris is truly terrible. And airlines like BA that provide eight staff to help people do e-check ins, and two at the bag drop make it more abysmal.
But I am home again, feeling like I could sleep for a week, and sorting through my 561 photos.

Photos from Land of the Cathars

I took around a hundred photos! These are just a sample.

In the Land of the Cathars

Carcassone on Sunday - a walled city on the hill above the modern city. Walls, moats, wells, turrets, chateau, and lots of souvenir shops and cafes. For some reason, entrance to everything was free, which was a bonus. We spent about 5 hours there, wandering through the winding streets, and we also went through the chateau from top to bottom. Imagined being up the top, firing arrows at the people below, and living in the stone rooms. Cool in the summer but no doubt freezing in the winter. Much of the old city has been restored, but there are still original elements everywhere.

I loved Carcassonne - until I spent the whole day yesterday climbing mountains (literally) to see three Cathar chateaux (castles). Queribus, Peyerpeteuse and Puilaurens. All the stairs I climbed in Paris and Menton in no way prepared me for the rock clambering up to each of these 12th century fortresses. But each one was worth it. As I drove along the valley below and looked up, they appeared on the ridges just as they would have hundreds of years ago. Stunning. And seemingly impenetrable, unless you laid seige to them, I guess.

Peyerpeteuse is probably in the best condition (all are just remains now) but in each one there is enough of the original walls and rooms and stairways to imagine how it would have been to live there. I loved every minute of it (OK, I didn't love the last thirty metres or so of each climb, when I thought my heart was going to fall out of my chest and lie gasping on the rocks). I've taken a million photos, but can post none of them yet as the internet cafe doesn't have the capacity to upload stuff. Will put some up next week.

As for research for my novel, you can't beat it. All I have to do is close my eyes and I am back at the castles, wind whistling past my ears, as I gaze down across the valley...

In Katherine Mansfield territory

One of the reasons I came to Menton was because this was where Katherine Mansfield, the New Zealand writer, lived and wrote for some years. On the street map Avenue de Katherine Mansfield looks big and important, but when I trekked up there, it was not so. The avenue was a small hilly street that quickly turned into what was more like a driveway, and then actually became someone's driveway! But I did find the house where she lived, and this is the memorial. Two plaques, one which is about her birth and death dates and a quote from a letter to Middleton Murray.

The other plaque lists the books she wrote while living there. Of course, I wanted more. But this is all there is. And in the neighbouring street, Rue Webb-Ellis, there is no statue of Webb-Ellis that I could find, just a train station. Webb-Ellis, by the way, is credited with "inventing" the game of rugby union (go All Blacks!). Despite these two minimal tributes, which were the initial inspiration for coming here, I love Menton and can recommend it to anyone at all for a visit.

On the one hand, this is an awful photo - out of focus and hard to discern. On the other, I love it. On the way home from dinner last night, on impulse we decided to follow some stairs up from our street and see where they led. It turned into a fascinating journey through a labyrinth of steps, archways, twists and turns, unexpected doorways and more steps, and finally the church at the top. In the dark, despite some lighting along the way, I felt that sense of life in much earlier times, when narrow pathways and tall houses with barred windows were the essence of the village. Mysterious, evocative and entrancing.

Writing at the Coast

With a view like this from the window as I type, there really is no excuse for not feeling inspired, is there? Except there is so much to see and do and wonder over... and eat, of course. I am in Menton, right near the Italian border, and the weather is lovely. We are in an apartment high above the bay, but in the old quarter, so that to get to where we are staying, we climb up through a dark, narrow passageway of many steps, then a little way up our winding street, then through an iron gate and up four flights of stone steps that have felt probably millions of feet over the centuries.

So I am inspired, and have written more in my journal, and a new poem, and today I went to Nice and saw some Roman ruins that gave me more ideas. It's all about feeding the creativity, in many different ways, right down to the elderly men playing boules in the park who tried to persuade me to throw a few boules with them (I said no, thinking they probably couldn't move fast enough to get out of the way of my missiles!).

This is someone else's inspiration - an installation, for want of a better word, outside the Monte Carlo casino in Monaco. It's a huge shiny mirror (convex? or concave?) that shows both the fountain below it as well as the entrance to the casino. In front of the casino, where I managed to lose E10 on the poker machines, just so I could say I'd been there, you might be able to see a lot of tourists, but also a Bentley and an Aston Martin and a Lamborghini. None of which belonged to me.

Naturally, wherever I go I will find a pirate if there is one to be found. This handsome buccaneer stands outside the Pirate Lolly Shop in Menton, and very kindly allowed me to have my photo taken next to him without demanding any gold. Mind you, as he is a statue, he would've had a hard time getting his hand up to grab my money anyway.

The Pope takes over Paris

We had Friday planned as the day to visit Notre Dame and the Crypt beneath, except the Pope arrived and was holding services at ND, so it was closed. All day and half the night. And the streets were filled with gendarmes standing on corners, blowing whistles in the middle of intersections, and roaring up and down the streets in small cavalcades of cars and vans with sirens going full volume. Luckily, Sainte Chappelle was not closed (possibly because it is inside the Conciergerie) and we were able to get in. It was the one place I really wanted to see, because I had heard so much about the beautiful stained glass windows.

The photo above - in fact, all of my photos - fail to do it justice. The whole chapel is stained glass, three walls of it plus a huge round window above the entrance door. Each window is a slightly different design shape, and each one tells a different part of the story. There are no pews inside, just chairs around the perimeter for you to sit and stare, mouth open.

I have managed to visit quite a few bookshops in Paris, and this is the most famous - Shakespeare and Company was operating before WWII and the original shop, so the story goes, was closed down by a German commander when the owner refused to sell him a book. This shop is opposite Notre Dame, near St Michel metro, and has a library of old books upstairs which is just for sitting and reading, not for sale.

I also visited Abbey's Bookshop (the smallest in the world?), and several other larger shops. And found The Red Wheelbarrow bookshop as well. It seems like the smaller the shop premises, the more books they cram in, so there are towering piles everywhere that threaten to topple over as you pass. In one shop, a woman did in fact knock over a huge pile, then apologised profusely, but the assistant just said, "Oh don't worry, I do that myself at least twice a day." I guess if you work there you would either have to have a very good memory of where books are, or be excellent at finding things!

Montmartre and the Arc

The first thing you discover about Montmartre is that it's on a hill. Which means either lots of steps, straight up, or steep streets. We found a street that curved around the back, a lot easier slope, and also found some other interesting sights as well. There's no way you can avoid the artists on the the hill, and in the main square, they are all wanting to draw your portrait.

This young woman here (like quite a few others) was sitting patiently being recreated on paper, while her boyfriend/husband stood behind the artist, filming it all. Made me wonder how I would be, writing while someone looked over my shoulder or filmed me. Actually, it would look pretty boring on film. There were many different styles of art for sale but a lot of the paintings were Montmartre street scenes, which didn't interest me at all.

Sacre Coeur was beautiful inside and out - they don't allow any photos inside the church itself, no doubt because nobody ever took any notice of the NO Flashes signs. I resisted the urge to climb up 300 more steps to the top of the dome, and contented myself with photos of gargoyles.

Later in the afternoon, we walked along the Champs Elysee (my brother has now joined me), which was filled with people on the footpaths and cars in the street. Lots of cars. At the Arc de Triomphe, there were more cars. And no lanes. People drove around and stopped when they thought they needed to wait their turn, or so it seemed. Nobody hit anyone's car, and things kept moving, but driving around there would be a nightmare to me.

I haven't been in a bookshop for three whole days - am starting to feel withdrawal symptoms! At the moment, I'm reading An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England by Brock Clarke, and although I enjoyed the first 50 pages, it's starting to feel a bit wearing. I'm not a big fan of main characters who freely profess they are bumblers and then bumble their way through a whole novel. The urge to give this character a kick in his rear end makes me have to put the book down every so often. Must be all this walking I am doing...

Is This Art?

Today was Versailles day, and after accidentally getting on the wrong train (with a little quick backtracking) we arrived at the famous Chateau, stood in the queue for quite some time, and entered the building. We started with the Dauphin's quarters, which were quite plain and mostly held old paintings. Gradually the rooms became more and more ornate. The ceilings in particular are fantastic, with gilt carved architraves framing paintings that make your neck hurt to look up at them so far above you.

We'd kind of ignored a weird yellow thing in the front courtyard, but upstairs, there were more of them. Huge shiny objects that looked like helium balloons made out of aluminium, and plastic statues of things like Michael Jackson, and a bear with its arm around a policeman. I wouldn't have cared much, but they were in the king's and queen's rooms in the chateau, the ones we'd specifically come to see, and instead we had to crane around bits of bizarre plastic. Lucky us. We'd arrived on the first day of the Jeff Koons exhibition. Read all about it here.

In the article they talk about this: Last November Koons' "Hanging Heart" -- on show in Versailles -- became the most expensive work by a living artist when it was snapped up for 23.4 million dollars (15.1 million euros). Yep, saw that one too. Sorry, but it looked like it had escaped from the florists down the road on Valentine's Day. I am obviously a diehard Rodin fan, and Koons doesn't enthrall or excite me one tiny bit. The photo above is of his plastic red lobster, one of the less obstructive pieces (it was easier to dodge around).

The gardens are beautiful, and I really wished some of the fountains were working. This is Apollo, with horses, emerging out of the water. Imagine this at sunset with the water spouts going (this pool and the Grand Canal below it are aligned with the setting sun).

The Joys of Research

Now if you were writing a fantasy novel, how could you not be thrilled by room after room of arms and armour from 13th - 16th century? It's not my main genre (think pirates and muskets and pistols and swords), and this period is 700 or so years after the one I am researching while here, but it all feeds in somehow. And I kept thinking about my friend T, and taking photos so I could give them to her and say, "See? Look at all this iron and steel and stuff!" All of this, by the way, was in the Musee de L'Armee at the Hotel des Invalides (military museum going back to the 13th century). Some of my favourite things were the knight's armour with the little hooks and holders on the side (a bit like big cup hooks) that you rested your lance on, and the suits of armour made child-size. Got a kid who's a bit overly-energetic? Throw some armour on him and send him off to war!

I was also fascinated by the pistols and muskets from the 1600s. They did some serious experimenting with ratchets and wheels and hammers and levers, in order to create firearms that were more reliable and accurate. Of course, when you were relying on gunpowder and a spark, reliability was never guaranteed. I also found the crossbows to be incredibly lethal-looking - you'd have a hard time recovering from one of those arrows. OK, I will move on from my medieval weapons moment!

I can't remember when I became a Rodin "fan". Fan seems a paltry word. It was either late in high school or early in my years as a trainee librarian, let loose amongst a library full of books. Both The Thinker (above) and The Kiss (of course, I was a teenager) expressed everything to me, through bronze and marble. Today I visited the Musee Rodin, and could hardly believe I was seeing the original sculptures, as well as their early studies. It's a very strange feeling, to have almost idolised a collection of works of art for such a long time, and then finally get to see them for real. The passion and eloquence in his sculptures, and their effect on me, has not at all been diminished by seeing them today. And in this age of cynicism and "what's next" tourism, that is a wonderful thing.

The Wandering Writer

I spent the first few days in Paris, rushing around, trying to fit in as much as I could. It was great, and I saw many things that I know will feed into my writing, and my stories. But it has gradually been filtering into my mind how much that rushing had become a habit in my "normal" life. Work consumed many of my hours, and sucked out a fair amount of creative energy too, and I'd got into the habit of rushing through life, trying to get all my work done in order to find time and space for writing. And then feeling pressured to make every writing minute count. Two hours to write? Better make sure I get at least 1000 words out of it.

So if you're wondering why there is a picture of a church up above, that's part of the slowing down. I was wandering on Saturday afternoon, knowing I had to collect my bags and find my next abode (an apartment this week) and not willing to cram in another museum. Instead, I walked around Les Halles and found this church. Well, "found" is probably the wrong word. It's a pretty big church!! St Eustache. You could be forgiven for thinking it was Notre Dame. Inside, the arched ceilings are several hundred feet above, and the organ at the other end is immense.

No wonder those who worshipped in cathedrals or churches like this maintained their awe. How could you not? The building itself is a wonder. And the sense of peace and quiet had me sitting and being quiet too for quite some time. That's a good thing for a writer.
One of the things I have discovered I really like about Paris is the squares and gardens. I can be walking anywhere, and turn a corner to find a garden like this, open to anyone to come in and sit for a while. Maybe it's because I've spent too long with gum trees and drought-tolerant gardens (which equates to very few flowers and pretty boring plants, let's face it). But every time I have found one of these spaces, I've had to stop and sit awhile.

In A Writer's Paris by Eric Maisel, he talks about writing in Paris, about finding places to sit and contemplate and write. I had such an amazing hot chocolate this morning that I just had to write about it! But it's not so much the experiences that are inspiring my writing. It is simply the time and the headspace. I have almost stopped myself clock-watching (not yet but I'm trying), but I am definitely becoming far more aware of how much I needed to slow down mentally, and just be in my own space at last.

Blogging from Paris

I was asked today, "Why do you want to go there?" Meaning Paris. As opposed to London, maybe, or Hawaii. I guess it goes back to high school. I learned French for four years (and am trying to put it into practice here) and always wanted to visit. I had a teacher in my fourth year who did lots of French things with us - we had a Bastille Day dinner, for instance. Then, when I was travelling in my early 20s, I ended up whizzing through France in a day. I could've been anywhere! (And it put me off travelling with other people for many, many years.)
So maybe France has always been "the thing I have to do".

Anyway, I'm here now, and am still having to tell myself every day, "I am in Paris, I am in Paris". Because I can't quite believe it. All the same, I have come home at the end of every day with very sore feet, and am usually asleep by 9pm. Restoring energy for the next day. Of course, one of the things on my Visit List was the Catacombs (hence the photo above of skulls and bones). What I didn't realise was that they are also part of the vast underground quarries from the 1800s, and you have to walk many hundreds of metres underground, through narrow tunnels with low roofs, to get to the actual Catacombs. Not an experience for the claustrophobic.

Suffice to say, when I emerged above ground again, I was two Metro stations away from where I started! I've also been to the Picasso museum (somehow ended up going around it backwards - chronologically that is - which gave me a whole new perspective on how his styles and subjects developed). The Museum of the Middle Ages was fantastic, and gave me lots of material for my new book, as well as ideas and images.

Today was Louvre Day. I started at the bottom end of the Tuileries garden and called in to the L'Orangerie, mainly because there were Monets there. Little did I know that there was actually an amazing exhibition of eight huge panels, in two oval rooms. The largest painting was around 20 metres long, the smallest about 8. The rest of the paintings on the floor below were a mix of Cezanne, Gaugin, Renoir and a few others. An excellent collection.

Then the Louvre. It took me half an hour to finally orient myself so I could work out where the things were that I wanted to see. This photo above is the Mona Lisa. Yes, that's her in the background somewhere. I thought it was more fascinating to watch the crowd pushing to get close and take "their own photo", even if it was with a mobile phone. The mythology around this painting is fascinating, and Dan Brown had added to it a thousand-fold. It's a painting. One among many, many paintings, just in the Louvre, let alone the rest of the world.

The Louvre itself was almost more interesting to me than the artworks. Many of the rooms have been restored to their original decor (or whatever you want to call it), which was stunning in many cases. I couldn't help thinking about today's architecture - the corners, clean lines, spare design, the total minimalism we think is style. And comparing it to, for example, Napoleon's quarters, where every surface is covered in paintings, gilt, carving, fabric wallpaper, more paintings, more gilt and ornamentation. And then there are the chandeliers!! I am writing in my journal, writing poems, soaking it all in - adding to what I feel has been a rather depleted imagination recently. We'll see what comes out at the other end.

Writing and Travelling

At my house right now, there are three To-Do lists in operation. That's because I'm about to fly off overseas for nearly four weeks, and the preparation is a nightmare (but only, I might add, because I am obsessive and have organised the whole trip myself, instead of leaving it in the hands of a travel agent - such are the self-induced nightmares of the person who wants to do their own thing). So today I have been cancelling newspapers (husband says he won't bother reading them), paying bills (husband won't notice they are overdue) and buying extra cat food (husband may send cats out to earn their own living, like the chooks).

But I know that once I actually climb onto the aeroplane, after having several hissy fits over things I think I have forgotten to organise, I will relax and all will be in the past. There is something about being out of tangible reach (urgent emails don't really count) that suddenly releases you from the real world. Once you have left, the most urgent thing is what movie to watch, or what book to read. Such a life of luxury, where the luxury is free time!

But I am travelling as a writer - not a travel writer, researching hotels and restaurants and finding bargains for others. I am a writer on the journey of discovery, of finding new places and seeing with new eyes, and writing about what stirs me, what makes me feel different. Some months ago, I read Eric Maisel's A Writer's Paris, and it was wonderful. Today I picked it up, flicked through some pages and thought, No, I can't bear to read one more thing about Paris. Now I want to be there for myself.

I have plans for very definite things I want to write, and also specific places and times I want to research for a book I am working on. But mostly I want to soak up the experience of a different world, and reflect it through both words and photographs. A book may come out of it, or two. But it is the immersion and dreaming that counts in a writer's life - the time when the urge to write takes over from everything else - deadlines, expectations, publishability. It's about flights of language and imagery, capturing the elusive, and carrying pen and notebook everywhere so as not to let that moment of fire escape without it first singeing the page.
Stay tuned. Who knows what will appear here in the coming weeks!

Comedy and Crime

The only session I attended at the Writers' Festival this year (apart from schools sessions with children's and YA writers) was listed as a spotlight on Mark Billingham. I've enjoyed his crime novels, featuring Tom Thorne as the main character, although I was a bit disappointed in the latest, In the Dark. It's a stand-alone, and uses several viewpoint characters. About halfway through, it starts to zero in on two main characters, but for a while it seemed a bit aimless and all over the place. Still, I imagine any series character needs a rest now and then.

The session actually turned out to be on comedy and crime (was this the MC's idea, perhaps?) and also featured Michael Robotham, and Billingham's UK editor who looked a bit nonplussed at being on the stage. Billingham has been a standup comedian for a few years, and was obviously used to performing. Part of his talk consisted of reading out emails he has received from various odd people over the years (odd being an understatement), and was very funny. However, MR didn't let the topic faze him at all, and proceeded to tell stories about his days as a journalist.

Both of them did a great job of talking about comedy vs crime, horror vs humour, and why a funny line in the midst of tragedy works so well. And there was nothing academic about it at all. It was an entertaining hour of storytelling. There certainly is a knack to pleasing the crowd, I think - mostly they are readers, and if they've read your books, they're not going to be interested in a re-hash of the plots, or a publicity plug (which I have seen many writers do over the years, to audience disappointment). If you have given many such talks, like Emily Rodda has, it must be hard to find new topics. You end up hoping the audience is new and won't have heard your anecdotes before.

Melbourne Writers' Festival 08

Last year I went a bit berserk. I went to twelve sessions. A wide range from poetry to crime to short fiction - all sorts. This year? I searched through the program, found maybe five things I was interested in and booked ... one. The program seemed laden with worthy sessions on issues and politics and topics I felt I should be keen on, but couldn't really be bothered. It all felt a bit academic and D&M. On any day there were two things of interest, they were at opposite ends of the day. Even I can't waste five hours drinking coffee and wandering through the bookshop, trying to keep my credit card in my pocket. So instead I had a look at the schools program for the festival, a challenge in itself since it's all on the website and is like trying to grapple with a many-headed monster.

I booked four school sessions, and attended three today (luckily you don't have to be a student or a teacher - anyone can go). There was I, and some teachers and a few hundred school kids from Grade 6 through to ... bigger teens, maybe Year 10 or so. Session 1: I've never read anything by Joseph Delaney (and neither had 99% of the audience, funnily enough) but I'd heard of his series which begins with The Spook's Apprentice. As soon as JD sussed out that hardly any of us had read his books, he quickly gave us a tidy summary of the characters and plot that sounded pretty good, and then talked a lot about background, characters, dialogue, research, all in a lovely Lancashire accent (he mentioned lads a lot, which made me laugh).

He was a teacher for many years before selling his first novel and eventually turning to writing full-time, and it showed. He talked fast, but had lots of interesting anecdotes and examples, and kept everyone focused. He had multiple rejections for adult novels before turning to fantasy for kids, and has found his niche, if you can call having books published in 20 countries a niche.

The second session was Melina Marchetta and Rachel Cohn, talking about characters, but for me, this session never really gelled. I'm not sure why. Maybe it was because they talked about characters in that vague way that writers sometimes do (the characters talked to me and told me what to write) and the audience seemed a bit sceptical about it all. The joint reading was very, very fast, hard to follow at times, and the woman up the top giving the wind-up signal didn't help. A teacher standing next to me in the coffee queue had been to another session where a writer dropped the F word, which apparently didn't go down very well.

The third session was Emily Rodda, and many of the kids in the audience were Grade 6 or Year 7, and were clearly big fans. Emily got applause just for walking onto the stage! She talked about ideas, and the questions she often gets asked. She said many kids ask her where she gets her ideas from, but only one has ever asked how she makes her stories so believable. She said it's because she herself totally believes in the worlds and the characters she creates, and it just naturally comes through in the storytelling. Question time showed dozens of hands raised, with only a few able to be answered - a very popular session.

Afterwards, I thought more about that concept of believing in the world you have created, and I think she is absolutely right. The two novels I have really struggled with have both been ones that I have felt I never entered into entirely, heart and soul. Yet with others, like the Tracey Binns stories, I can see that school, those kids and teachers, as if they are real, and it feels so easy to dive into that world and write from within it. There are stories and novels I have written where I have felt that same experience, and even though some have been rejected and may never get published, I doubt I will ever give up on them. They have been "real" writing experiences, and I have to hope that one day I'll find an editor who will engage with that story world in the same way.

Lu Rees Archives in Canberra

One of the interesting places in Canberra for children's writers (and students and readers too) is the Lu Rees Archives, which are in the University of Canberra Library building. Among other things, the Archives holds drafts of manuscripts and illustrations, as well as books of historical interest.
These are all books by Ethel Turner, who wrote, among other books, Seven Little Australians. It's now considered an Australian children's classic.
And this is Margaret Wild, who donated many of her papers to the Archives last week. Here, she is standing in front of a display of her picture book, Fox, illustrated by Ron Brooks. It's one of my favourite books, and has won many awards.

Canberra at Minus 4 Degrees

Frosty football field!
Three days in Canberra whizzed by. I did ten sessions, covering six different schools (at one school I did three writing workshops in one day) and had a great time. Everything is amazingly well-organised, with volunteers to ferry the writers and illustrators around (unless you are foolish enough to venture out on your own - Canberra is pretty spread out, and it's easy to misjudge travel times). The kids were all great, and I had a range from Grade 2 up to Grade 6.

On Tuesday evening we all went to the Lu Rees Archives for a donation event. Margaret Wild handed over a lot of her papers - drafts, manuscripts, etc - and also someone who had bought an illustration from Lucy Goosey by Ann James then donated it to the Archives. We were given a tour of the Archives, which are in the University of Canberra Library, and it struck me how much they are managing to cram into what seems like a very small space. It'd be great if the uni could find another 2oo square metres or so for them!

After an exciting Friday last week (the CBCA Awards where I didn't have to make a speech, thank goodness - I was focusing on not tripping over when I went up for my Honour certificate), I spent the weekend with my family who had flown in for the occasion. Then off to Canberra. Trying to be healthy and remove some of the sludge in my system, I went for early morning walks each day (hi, Craig!). The first morning there was a frost, the second morning there was an even bigger frost. Unfortunately, my photos don't do the icy ground justice. My fingers may have been freezing but I did enjoy the VERY crisp air.

The Awards are Announced!

On Friday the CBCA Awards for 2008 were announced, and I'm now allowed to tell everyone that my book (above) won an Honour Book award in the Younger Readers category.
Yaayyy!
Full awards list here.
Only the winners had to make a speech, but Aaron Blabey brought the house down when he showed us his first draft of Pearl Barley and Charlie Parsley - written on a long strip of toilet paper because that was the only paper he could find when the full idea hit him (first notes were on the back of his boarding pass for his plane trip)!

Fear of Success

A few years ago, I had a great day in San Antonio with two writer friends, talking books and writing, and how do you cram writing into a jam-packed day - all that stuff that writers share and complain about, when they're not eating cakes to celebrate each other's successes (well, it was San Antonio so we ate burritos instead). One of the things we looked at was an exercise in a writing book about what do you anticipate and fear most about achieving your writing dreams. In other words, when you have plenty of books published and are (maybe) making a living from your writing, what will you be happy about and what do you think the down sides are going to be.

It was very interesting, not least because each of us had entirely different ideas on the subject. The exercise, by the way, is in Word Work by Bruce Holland Rogers. He calls it Pig Will and Pig Won't, and as you can guess, I have just found all my notes from that day, which got me thinking. We talked about what it might be like to be J.K. Rowling, who now can't go to the supermarket in peace. But she is the exception. However, as a successful writer, there are other things to fear. Like being signed up for a two or three book contract and not being able to deliver. Or writing a second novel after a very successful first, and it gets terrible reviews and your publisher hates you.

I often hear people say, "Oh, when you get published, all your problems are over." No, you just get a different set of problems! But one thing that no one talks about much is the fear of getting published. As long as you are writing only for you, you can do whatever you like. You can walk around all day in your PJs or trackie pants, you can ignore your personal grooming, you can let your fear of public speaking rule the roost and never have to confront it. You can choose to write, or not to write. Nobody is waiting for your book. Nobody cares except you.

But once you send it out, and it gets accepted, the rules change. You need to be presentable, you need to grit your teeth and work with an editor, you need to do publicity stuff - and these days, you can't kid yourself you can get away with being a recluse or a grunge eccentric. It's in your contract that you do publicity and they expect you to do it well. So there's a lot of pay-off in just writing and rewriting your book, year after year, believing that one day it will be ready. One day you'll be ready. Just not yet.