Reading Time

Spent the last couple of months or so re-reading the texts I have to re-read for my paid work - Emma, The Tempest, Cosi, Chekhov's short stories, Carver's short stories, a few poems by Jennifer Strauss, a few poems by Gwen Harwood, that sort of thing - very good company indeed.  However, keeping up-to-date with a reading list in my spare time means I don't have as much opportunity as I'd like to read the books I can't resist buying and which comprise my ever-growing personal book tower.  Anyway, with the re-reading list clear now, I can begin tackling them:

 Kurt Vonnegut's Mr Rosewater

 Haruki Murakami's Norwegian Wood

 Raymond Carver's Beginners

 Ardie Collins' Cult Fiction

 Magdalena Ball's Black Cow

 Alain De Botton's Religion for Atheists

 Alice Sebold's The Almost Moon

 Audrey Niffenegger's Her Fearful Symmetry

The Birds & Shadow Through Time

I love the sound of ravens in the morning.  Raucous, raucous, raucous.  They keep cropping up in my books too, which is why I've got a soundtrack of ravens cawing across my website.  Although, I admit, it can be enough to drive a person mad... especially if the computer screen hides the Sound Off/On button.  A friend of mine complained about them not so long ago, but then she doesn't like birds - finds them a bit scarey, so this film clip is especially for her.  It's one of my favourite Alfred Hitchcock movies.

I mentioned the re-release of Louise Cusack's Shadow Through Time trilogy in e-book (Momentum Books) a couple of weeks back.  Well, Louise has written about this in eVolution of a Trilogy over at The View From Here.  Well worth a read, whether you're an aspiring author looking for an insight or two, or just into fantasy romance.

Book slam, recent read and listening to...

Following on from my last post, here's the Yewbert Blotter website link.  Saturday was a 40 degree day in Port, so the edges of my leaves had wilted a tad by the time I faced the Book Slam audience, but the adrenaline of performance lifted them a bit and I, at least, got a kick from reading Chapter 19 (Part Two) of Grease Monkey.  Had to dash straight after, unfortunately, not because it was inflammatory and I got chased off, but because I had another commitment.  Anyway, all the best to Yewbert Blotter.

I mentioned some time back how much I liked Jim Crace's novel Being Dead, and so recently followed up on this by reading Quarantine (Whitbread Novel of the Year, shortlisted for the Booker Prize).  It's a retelling of the 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness story.  He's a fine storyteller is Jim Crace. Certainly makes me want to read another of his novels.

Also, listening to Clairy Browne and the Bangin' Rackettes a fair bit.  Wonderful Melbourne band with a great album, Baby Caught the Bus.  Here's the title song.

Book Slam, The Footpath Library, and Idiom

Along with a number of other writers, I'll be performing/reading/slamming at the inaugural Blarney Books & Art Book Slam this Saturday (from 7.30pm on 25th February, at Blarney Books & Art, Port Fairy).  It's a fund-raiser for Yewbert Blotter, a project that "has at its core a desire to give young people a fun and supportive place to create, to have confidence in themselves, and to learn more about themselves, their peers, and their artistic capabilities", which is A Very Good Thing as far as I'm concerned, and deserves all the support it can get.

The modest sum of $20.00 will assure entry to this event, along with refreshments, door prizes, music, writers reading and, very possibly, the not-so-rare opportunity to watch me make an idiot of myself. Bookings, however, are strongly advised, if not essential, so phone 55682174 or 0437754847.

And while I'm mentioning Very Good Things, I recently learned about The Benjamin Andrew Footpath Library, which "aims to make books more accessible to the homeless and disadvantaged members of our society, change our attitudes to these people and encourage literacy."  It's looking for book donations, although it has strict guidelines about what's acceptable or not, which, I discovered, precludes me from sending a few copies of The Grease Monkey's Tale and The Snowing and Greening of Thomas Passmore (drug themes), but makes a few copies of Ten Journeys a possibility.

In other newsy stuff, I've just received a copy of Idiom#47, edited by Tony Thompson and Jan May, in which a piece I wrote last year appears: Up yours, George Bernard Shaw!  Several months later, I still reckon it's an honest piece of writing and, though I don't often write non-fiction, I enjoyed putting it together.  Now to read some of the other articles.

A shout-out for Ardie Collins of Cult Fiction and the Cooper365 Project

I've recently been catching up with Ardie Collins, whose novel Cult Fiction was published in 2011, but who also spent the year writing a song a day for his self-inflicted Cooper365 project.  Not much point in writing any more here for the moment as I press-ganged Ardie into writing about it for The View From Here here.  So go visit.

New releases and re-releases

Few things happen quickly in the book world.  The gestation period of a novel, from conception to completion, is usually measured in years rather than months and, though e-publishing may change this, the process of getting a book into the marketplace isn't much quicker, if and when publishers get involved.  Similarly, an author might think there's no longer any interest in something they wrote, when it's been out of print for several years, only to find that's not the case.

Take Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist.  Written in 1987 and published by a small Brazilian publishing house, with a limited print run of 900 copies, Coelho later sold the rights to a larger publisher who turned it into a Brazilian best-seller.  Since then, it's grown into a world best-seller, translated into 67 languages and has sold many millions of copies.  Film rights for The Alchemist weren't purchased until 2004 - some 17 years after first publication - and, even then, filming came to nothing... until the rights were again sold on in 2008, although (4 years later) the film is yet to appear.

All this by way of saying that things are slow in the publishing industry and you just can't tell when a book is going to rise from the ashes and live again.  Which, in turn, is a roundabout  lead-in to giving a shout-out to Louise Cusack, whose fantasy trilogy Shadow Through Time is about to be re-released after being out of print for some time.  First published by Simon & Schuster 10 years ago, Pan Macmillan's ebook division, Momentum Books, will be releasing the digital version on 15th February.  She is understandably ecstatic, and you can read about the journey of the trilogy at Louise's website, where you can also pre-order the books.

While I'm shouting and congratulating about the place, congratulations to Jason Nahrung, who I've also mentioned here before. Jason's novella Salvage is being published by Twelfth Planet Press, and can be pre-ordered here, where you'll be able to read what it's about.  (And ain't it great, by the by, to see more and more publishers investing in novellas?)

Questions Writing and Photography Prizes

I was handed details of the Questions Writing and Photography Prizes for young Australians (under 23) yesterday, and thought them worth passing on.

Writing submissions can be fiction or non-fiction, between 1500 and 2000 words on any topic.  The prize is $2000 and publication.  Closing date is 1st July, 2012.

Similar prize and closing date for photography.

There's also a Future Justice Prize, recognising leadership and initiative of individuals or organisations.

Further details here: http://www.questions.com.au/prizes/index.php

Good luck.

Listening to: Playing for Change - Songs Around the World

After being introduced to this YouTube video of Playing for Change - Songs Around the World - I was given the CD, and have been playing it pretty heavily.  It's great music and a tremendous concept: musicians from around the world contribute to the recording of ten classic songs.  The video sums it up superbly.  This has to be one of the best recordings of Stand By Me.

Good living

It's been an idyllic summer so far - hot days and still nights, walks to the beach, regular swims, afternoon siestas, the cooking of fine meals, the drinking of much wine... you get the picture.  However, I suspect that too much good living gets in the way of writing at times, and the heat certainly puts my brain into a slower, mushier gear, so while I don't wish to trade any of this for being hungry in a cold attic (no thank you very much), I am feeling under-productive at the moment.  Two or three hours of editing and rewriting, a bit of reading and painting, but not a lot more than this.

Never mind, I tell myself, this delicious holiday feeling won't last forever, and then, human nature being what it is, I'll be yearning to recapture it all over again. So I'm damned if I won't make the most of it whilst it's here!

One of the books I've read - well, a booklet really - was lent me by a friend who's a fan of crime writer Michael Connelly.  In it, Michael Connelly describes how he developed two of his key characters: Mickey Haller and Harry Bosch. Although I haven't (yet) read any of Michael Connelly's novels, I found this a fascinating study, partly because it's often interesting to see how other authors work and partly because Mr Connelly very clearly recalls and articulates almost every stage of how these particular characters evolved.

I think this booklet was won as a prize.  I'm not quite sure what my friend had to do to win it, but it was a neat get all the same.

Recent reads: War with the Newts by Karel Capek

War with the Newts by Karel Čapek (translated by Ewald Osers) is unfortunately one of those books I would never have come across if it wasn't for a little serendipity: I was introduced to it by a friend who had recently travelled to the Czech Republic, and who, whilst there, had decided to read a Czech novel or two.  That I hadn't heard of it before may be the result of ignorance on my part, but, regardless of that small matter, this book deserves to be even more widely known. 

First published in 1936,  two years before Čapek's death at the age of 48, there's a classic timelessness about War with the Newts, even though the narrative voice comes across as a little dated at times - although this might also add to its charm.  Overall though, it possesses a number of exceptional qualities that remind me, at one and the same time, of Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels, George Orwell's Animal Farm and Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle.  That these three novels satirise the political follies of mankind may give an indication of what War with the Newts concerns itself with.

'Man discovers a species of giant, intelligent newts and learns to exploit them so successfully that the newts gain enough skills and arms to challenge man's place at the top of the animal kingdom. Along the way, Karel Čapek satirizes science, runaway capitalism, fascism, militarism, journalism, even Hollywood, yet he presents all the events on a comically human rather than spectacular scale.'   Catbird Press edition

His astute portrayal of various national stereotypes certainly has relevance 70 years on, and the political insights he provides make it easy to see why the Nazi Gestapo named him Czechoslavakia's "public enemy number two."

Reading this was time well spent.  Very glad I was introduced to it.