Quick this and thating

28 November, 2005

Still no interwebby thing in our new home (I’m at my parents), but at least we can watch the cricket!

There’ve been some comments from actual editors on the gender balance question thing I posted about a while back. Confirming once again that there is no vast conspiracy—it’s all much more complicated than that.

I’m loving our new neighbourhood, Surry Hills, but am less than thrilled about the whole unpacking, organising, cleaning, not finding necessary things etc. Turns out that our flat while fab, lacks certain essentials. There’s hardly any storage, making unpacking really hard cause there’s no where to put anything. And a lack of hooks and railings for the hanging of towels in the bathroom is driving me nuts. Hanging the hand towel from one of the drawers is not the best solution. Also what is it with modern built-in wardrobes being narrower than most coathangers? I mean how did anyone think that was going to work out?! Aren’t wardrobes meant to protect clothes, not squish them?

I’m in love with Dwayne Bravo. What a miracle worker he is. And how much better has this third test been than the first two? So very good to be home in the land of cricket and wry understatment and really really good Thai food. Green mango salad . . .

Moving

22 November, 2005

Tomorrow we move to our brand new flat what we rented while still jetlagged, which may not be quite as fab as we remember. Scott tells me the bath isn’t torquoise, that it doesn’t come with jetpacks, nor is there an airship tethered to the roof. I could’ve sworn . . . Oh well, as long as the monkeys were real.

All our stuff will be hauled out of storage for the first time in an age. What larks will abound! ‘Cause everyone knows how fabulously fun moving is . . . almost as blissful as flathunting.

Internet access in the new flat isn’t lined up yet, so not sure when next I’ll blog, or answer emails, or google, or read anyone else’s blog. Sob.

Wish us luck!

Many Things

21 November, 2005

Hung out with Agnes and Lili of the Centre for Youth Literature and talked books. Tried to remember all the cool, hot YA books of this year and failed, so raved about A Rabbit’s Eyes yet again. Agnes raved about Adam Rapp and his books 33 snowfish and Under the Wolf, Under the Dog. I want to read them right now.

I found out that Magic or Madness is a Magpies pick of 2005 for older readers. That’s the second best book of the year list for MorM. How bout that?

Afternoon spent at the Penguin Australia offices where we were champagned and cheesed and got to meet more of everybody. Yay all of them! And had our very first meeting with the sales people, which was fabulous. We got to sit and talk about us and our books, which is pretty much all we talk about anyways. Much fun.

Last of all dinner with the mighty Tessa and wild-eyed Rjurik. Very very very silly. They are excellent.

Agnes Nieuwenhuizen

19 November, 2005

We’re in Melbourne, running around like crazies, and having fun. Spent all day yesterday at the fabulous School Libraries of Victoria conference, which was a blast. Shook me out of my jetlag. And Monday we get to hang out out with our Australian publishers at the Penguin offices, and also with the wonderful folks at the Centre for Youth Literature, Mike Shuttleworth, Lili Wilkinson and the fabulous Agnes Nieuwenhuizen. Agnes is profiled in today’s Age. She’s one of the most formidable, intelligent, engaged and engaging people I’ve met and today’s profile actually captures that.

Must dash!

Nothing Changes

16 November, 2005

Meghan McCarron has just written eloquently about sexism in publishing. Why do so many anthologies and short stories magazines have way more stories by men than by women? Why do men get more awards and reviewed more widely? The ensuing discussion is very cool, too.

I confess that I get very tired when I consider all of this. I spent years researching gender, sexuality, men, women and hermaphrodites in science fiction. Hell, I even wrote a book about it. Sometimes I wonder if anything has changed at all.

Fortunately, I’m now in a genre—Young Adult fiction—that’s overwhelmingly written by women. And its awards reflect that. The Prinz has only been awarded six times thus far and so far it’s 50% women. The US National Book Award has had a Young People’s Literature award since 1996 and women have won six times to the bloke’s three. The Australian Children’s Book Council Awards for Best Book of the Year (Older Readers) was first awarded in 1987: women eleven; blokes eight. (My counts may be out because I’m innumerate and jetlagged.)

Looks good to me.

This has been a great year

15 November, 2005

I just found out that both Scott and me made School Library Journal‘s best books of 2005 list. Scott for Peeps and me (obviously) for Magic or Madness. We is most happy. For me it’s more icing on an already well-iced cake.

I’d like to take a moment to (incoherently and jetlaggedly) say how amazed I am by how Morm has been doing. It’s my first novel. I’ve seen lots of first novels published, so I knew what to expect. The reviews have been amazing, the placement in bookshops, and the response from readers. After we hooked up with our foreign rights agent, Whitney Lee, I had hopes of selling into countries other than the US and Australia (where the book is set), but I wasn’t really expecting it to happen. But it’s now sold in Thailand, Taiwan, France and Germany. I keep having to pinch myself.

As long as I can remember I’ve wanted to be a writer, to make a living writing stories. And now I am.

The good side of jetlag

13 November, 2005

One of the best things about being jetlagged is getting to watch the sunrise. In my normal life I never see it. This morning though I watched my parent’s backyard go from pitch black to completely light. And because it’s spring their backyard is gorgeous. The jacaranda tree is covered in purple flowers. There are other plants in bloom with white and pink flowers. I just saw my first flock of rainbow lorikeets, chirruping back and forth at each other as they zoomed by. I should be up at this time more often.

The only noises I’m hearing are birds, the hum of the fridge from the kitchen, and various house creaking noises, but mostly birds. I’m so not in New York City anymore! It’s so wonderful to be home.

A Rabbit’s Eyes

9 November, 2005

Because I hate packing more than anything in the whole world, I’d like to tell you about the best book I read this year, A Rabbit’s Eyes by Kenjiro Haitani, published by the ubercool Vertical Books. And also because I’m anxious that I’m not packing when I really, really should be packing I’ll keep my comments brief.

A Rabbit’s Eyes is unbelieveably good and strange and very hard to describe. Told from the point of view of a brand-new, eager-to-be-good teacher, it’s all about this kid, Tetsuzo, who doesn’t speak and breeds flies (not houseflies though, they’re dirty). It’s wry and touching and I hate to say it—heartwarming, but in a totally non-vomitous way. It’s not like anything I’ve ever read before. In the best way, I never knew where the story was going. As soon as I finished I went back to the beginning and started over and it was even better on a second read. I love this book.

Go get it!

I go pack now.

I’m in Hebrew!

9 November, 2005

Well, not me so much as my essay “Too Young to Publish”. Awhile back Didi Chanoch asked if I minded if it were translated? I did not!

So now Itay Shlamkovitch has translated “Too Young to Publish” and Bli Panik has published it. If you read Hebrew check it out. (Is your Hebrew coming back, Da?) Hell, even if you don’t. It’s pretty.

This is the first of my writings that’s been translated. I’ve sold translations rights to Magic or Madness and Magic Lessons but the actual publishing of those translations hasn’t happened yet. Oh, the glory of online publication. So very fast!

Oh, and I think this is my name in Hebrew: ×’’סטין לרבליסטר

Cool, eh?

In Praise of the US Postal Service

8 November, 2005

I hear many USians complain about going to the post office and about the US postal system generally. I’m here to say you’re wrong. You lot have one of the best postal services in the world. It’s way cheaper, faster and better than the postal service of any other country I’ve been in.

I enjoy going to the post office on Fourth Avenue and Eleventh St. Most of the people who work there are lovely, have a sense of humour, and go out of their way to tell you the cheapest and/or fastest way to send things. And the woman who delivers our mail? A goddess. I’ve never ever seen her in a bad mood. She calls everybody “boopy” or “booboo” and is always smiling and cracking jokes. Whenever I run into her I know I’m going to have a really good day.

So stop your whingeing people. The rest of the world doesn’t have it so good as you lot. All hail the USPS!

Things not to do

7 November, 2005

Things not to do mere days before racking off back home:

1. Drop your laptop.

Actually, that’s the entire list.

Not a good day. Not at all. But laptop came out of it—while not quite as aesthetically pleasing as before—mostly functional.

Oh my! Oh no! (updated)

6 November, 2005

I swore to myself that I wouldn’t do it, that I would resist, that to give in and look at the trailer for the latest version of Pride and Prejudice would just make me ropeable at worst, sad at best. Keira Knightley as Elizabeth Bennett? Ack! Yeah, I know there are worse actors out there, who’d be even more ludicrously miscast, but it doesn’t make her any less of a crap choice.

I’m not a Knightley fan. I know it’s not her fault, but I’ve never forgiven her for becoming the famous one after Bend it Like Beckham, when it was the luminous Parminder Nagra who stole that movie, not Knightley. Now Nagra’s on ER and Knightley’s everywhere. Where’s the justice?

And let’s just say I didn’t have high hopes that the folks what made Love, Actually were going to do right by Miss Austen. But watch the trailer I did, only to discover that it’s more shockingly awful than the one for the 1940 Greer Garson Pride and Prejudice. At least that one (and the film) can be excused because of its camp value. This one, well. Is the film a satire of bad historical adaptations? I really hope so. Throughout Darcy looks incapable of keeping his shirt on, Elizabeth Bennett is shrill, and in two of the scenes it looks like the two are about to go the tongue! Bloody hell! Did the film makers even read the book?

And you know what? Elizabeth Bennett was not a woman ahead of her time. She was very much of it, shocked by sex before marriage, with no ambitions for herself other than becoming the wife of a good man. I could go on but it’s been said much better here.

Still, seeing the trailer was a very good thing—my loins are now well girded against seeing the actual movie. The thought of it goes well beyond shudder territory.

Update: Just to make it clear—I am no Jane Austen purist. My favourite adaptions of her work are Amy Hackerling’s Clueless (1995), Patricia Rozema’s Mansfield Park (1999), and Gurinder Chadha’s Bride and Prejudice (2004). Hah, all directed by women. I never noticed that before.

another question from googleland

5 November, 2005

Someone landed at my website after googling the following question:

“how do publishers decide print runs first second printing”

I don’t really know the answer to that question. Or, rather, questions, because the decision on the initial print run is a different (and more complicated question) than whether to reprint or not. If the book’s selling well and likely to sell out the first run, then you print again.

Or, mostly, I have heard horror stories like a recent unexpected bestseller whose first print run sold out flash quick and the editor had to plead with higher ups to do a second print run.

There are also houses that do such tiny initial runs that second printings are inevitable.

One editor told me that they go on instinct when recommending a print run. That if it feels like a 10,000 copy book that’s what they’ll ask for.

But, you know, I only got gossip. Are there any publishing people out there with actual information who want to respond?

Cool links (Updated)

4 November, 2005

1. Me and Scott just joined a most excellent group called AS IF! Authors supporting intellectual freedom. It’s a bunch of writers of young adult fiction, including folks like Holly Black and a host of other amazing writers, who’re fighting the good fight against book banning and other attempts to control the content of books for young adults. The blog lists all the members and our first action. Yay us!

2. Novelist Nicole Galland is following the path of the fourth crusade (which never reached the holy land) as research for her third novel and she’s blogging it in a most entertaining manner.

3. Claire Light just wrote a very fine piece on Rosa Parks and how her story has been distorted over and over again.

4. Magic or Madness got a B for morality! Joking aside, I really like this review, especially the third paragraph. That’s exactly what I hoped I was doing. It’s always a lovely feeling to be understood. I think the trilogy is very moral (and in that site’s scheme of things a B is a good grade), but no one else is going to be able to see that until they’ve read all three, which is one of the many problems with trilogies: you don’t know the whole story until you’ve read all the books. Things that may seem one way in the first book could well be totally transformed by the last book.

The review is on Refracted Light: A Christian perspective on fantasy. I was impressed by the site. The reviews are thoughtful and include warnings about content Christians might find offensive (Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials, for example, gets an F for morality, but an A- for writing). I think people should be warned about books they might be offended by (I can think of a tonne of books I wish I’d been warned about!), but like the other members of AS IF! I don’t believe books should be banned. Sites like this are a smart alternative to the book-banning strategy; rather than trying to suppress information they’re trying to provide it. Yay them!

Update: Coalescent posts about the site and there’s much discussion. Though, not enough people seem to be noticing that most of the reviews are pretty smart.

A Lack of Musings

3 November, 2005

A friend just asked if I’m ever going to write another musing again. She wonders if this blog has destroyed them for all time.

Tis true that I didn’t write a single one in September or October, but then I hardly wrote an email in that time either. But just as I will write emails again, so too will I muse again. I’ve even got a bunch of half-written ones: about podcasts, the artist who’s back to being known as prince again, about city hatred, being Australian, travelling, and about the nightmare of writing a mathematically gifted character (Reason in the Magic or Madness books when I am so not and how it gets harder with each book—not doing that again!).

It’s mostly not the blog what ate them. It’s trying to write two novels a year, plus Daughters of Earth, plus the various other ideas I’m turning into proposals and like that. I’m crap at multi-tasking. To be honest, I’m not even that good at single-tasking. Working on five different writing projects at once breaks my brain.

But blogging ain’t like that. It’s easy, relaxing, instant-gratification writing. I don’t slave over my posts the way I do over my musings, I don’t try to make them structured or particulary coherent. Thus they never take much time to write. And I love the response I get from the people what reads me posts. I was particuarly thrilled by the really cool discussion of translating in response to this post. (I’ve been meaning to ask David Moles for ages about his suggestion that the Australian and USian sections of Magic or Madness could be translated into Mexican and Argentinian Spanish, which way he was suggesting. Mexican=Australian; Argentinia=USian? On account of Mexicans are known for being laid back as are Australians—yeah, yeah, I’m an exception, okay?—and Argentinians like USians are known for, um, how do I put this delicately? their confidence.)

The conversations are the coolest part of blogging. I’m much less interested in blogs that don’t have a comments section.

And, er, um, to sum up: there’ll be more musings when I finish another one. In the future.