I have a theory

Every single USian woman I have ever known finds English accents unbelievably sexy. No matter that there are gazillions of different English accents, they think they’re all sexy: Yorkshire, Chav, Geordie, Sloane Ranger, cockney—they don’t care. If an English person speaks they are ipso facto sexy. There is not a USian woman on the planet who does not hold this view.

As an Australian it is difficult for me to express my extreme horror so I will not bother. My true compatriots understand. Enough said.

But how is it possible for every woman of one nation to hold such an insane belief?

I have a theory.

The British tourist authorities have been secretly brainwashing USian women. And I suspect they’ve done it by implanting a tiny chip that emits brainwashing English-accents-are-sexy rays in every copy of Pride and Prejudice and every Hugh Grant movie.

I believe the folks responsible for attempting to convince the rest of the world of the existence of “Cool Britannia” (as if!) are capable of anything.1

So USian women quit reading, watching or thinking about Pride and Prejudice and Hugh Grant. Let your ears hear unhindered. The way Tony Blair talks? Not sexy. David Beckham? Not even close. The Prince of Wales? Aarrghh!!!

In the meantime we unbrainwashed folk have to learn compassion for those so afflicted. Especially for those whose brain damage has led them into unfortunate relationships. They know not what they do.

  1. Or it could be bunnies. You know, cause they’re not cute like everybody supposes. [↩]

Slaughter of the Minnow-cents + Sachin

Every world cup it seems there’s a debate about whether allowing in the so-called minnows of the game is a good idea or not. Because every world cup there are 200-plus run victories as Bermuda or Scotland or whoever are bowled out for less than a hundred by Australia or India or whoever.

It’s happened again this year. Herschelle Gibbs even smashed a world record 36 off an over against the Netherlands. For those whose maths is as poor as mine that’s a six off every single ball. No one had ever it done it internationally before, not in ODIs and not in test cricket.

The argument against the inclusion of minnows is that they help create crazy world records like that cause they’re just not up to snuff. “What’s the point of such an uneven competition?” they ask. And blah blah blah.

To which my response is, “Please!” One of the best ways to improve at anything is to learn from people who are better and more experienced than you are. Letting the minnows play with the top cricketing nations means that they will get oodles of practice against the best players in the world. As they improve they’ll create more interest in cricket back home and more potential cricket players and thus the game will grow and prosper throughout the world.

And they do get better.

As evidence I present Exhibits A & B: Bangladesh and Ireland.

The minnows sometimes upset the giants. Bangladesh just beat India in the first round. In the past few years they’ve racked up victories against a number of top teams including Australia. They are no longer as minnowy as they once were. I don’t think they’re a shot at the world cup (though how cool would that be?) but they’re certainly going to give a number of teams a testing time. Yay, Bangladesh!

First Ireland tied with Zimbabwe in their opening match and then in their second they beat Pakistan! Bowling them out for a pathetic 132 in the 45th over and following that up with a gritty batting display against some awesome bowling (and even better appealing—give Mr Sami an Oscar! He’s up there with Our Shane). And I’m so relieved the bad light and rain did not reduce things to a Duckworth-Lewis decision. Bravo to Ireland. They have several players I reckon England1 would love to have on their side.

Back in the olden days Sri Lanka and New Zealand were minnows; now they are not. They got that way by being included in world-class competition. I really don’t understand how anyone could argue against minnow inclusion. Me, I’m hoping a US of A team will qualify for the next world cup.

And via Christopher Rowe some other cricketing news: Sachin Tendulkar is going to have his own comic book:

The superhero character will be known as “Sachin The Master Blaster” for comic books, animation and games.

Excuse me? Sachin is one of the finest, but there is only one Master Blaster and his name is Viv Richards.

The article also claims that Sachin is the second greatest batsman of all time. Nuh uh. Not on his own he isn’t. I don’t care what Wisden says. There are a lot of other very fine batsmen in the running for that spot. Other than Sir Viv, there’s Brian Lara, Garfield Sobers, Sunil Gavaskar, and Ricky Ponting. But don’t ask me to pick a best out of that lot. I can’t. They’re all amazing. And besides comparisons are odious.

  1. Bummer about that loss to New Zealand, eh? [↩]

What should I write next?

Remember way back when I asked you to help me to decide what to write next? You all told me the fairy book, which I dutifully wrote, but now I’m feeling all indecisive again. Can you help me out?

Here are the options:

  • The great Australian feminist monkey knife-fighting cricket Elvis mangosteen fairy novel . This one is written.
  • The compulsive liar book narrated by a—you guessed it—compulsive liar. Downside: will involve lots of outlining. I hates outlining. Plus it’s going to be so hard! Upside: whenever I mention this one folks get very excited.
  • The beginnings of cricket historical romance. Downside: lots of research and all my cricket history books are in storage in Sydney. Upside: yumminess. I am besotted with my protag and her love interest.
  • The baby killing ghost novel set in Sydney in the late 19th century in which the ghost does not kill babies nor do babies kill ghosts. Downside: research materials all in storage in Sydney. Upside: ghost story!
  • The plastic surgery running away from Hollywood novel. Downside: protag is a USian. I am not USian thus writing it will be really hard. All the sentences in my head are Australian. Upside: Very cool structure that makes me grin just thinking about it.
  • Werewolf snowboarding epic. Downside: I’ve never snowboarded making it tricky describing it plus I’d need to do a lot of research on wolves. Upside: Werewolves snowboarding!
  • Northern Territory multi-family multi-racial lots of killing epic. Downside: yeah, yeah, research materials elsewhere. Plus I’d need to spend at least a few weeks up there again, doing lots of non-book research. Fun but not possible for quite awhile. Upside: I love love love writing epics.
  • Kid who grows up in a Vintage Clothes Shop which her mum runs who can pick the best buys at fifty paces (much more interesting than this description makes it sound—honest!) Downside: I know nothing about the vintage clothes industry works. More bloody research! Upside: clothes, yummy delicous magic clothes.
  • Protag’s father goes missing presumed dead on account of he and protag’s mum very into each other. Mum is forced to take in a lodger to help pay the mortgage. She advertises for a female uni student but takes in a strange youngish man who has no visible means of support and yet pays the rent on time. He’s gorge and speaks a zillion languages but the seventeen-year old girl protag doesn’t trust him. Her twin brothers (eight) almost immediately fall under his sway. I could go on, but it’s just not very pitchable. Alas. Downside: Not very ptichable. Tis one of those books that’s clear in my head but takes months to explain. Sigh. Upside: tis very clear in my head.
  • Try to write a short story. I’ve had a brain wave for completely transforming a story of mine that’s never worked into one that will. It involves making the ending not suck (why did I not think of that before?!) and setting it a couple hundred years ahead of where it’s set now. It involves no research. Downside: I suck at short stories. Upside: Not starting from scratch and may lead to an actual good story. That would be cool!

My agent is most excited about the Liar book on account of its ease of pitchability but she also agrees with the famous children’s book editor, Ursula Nordstrom, who wrote

I never want to forget that if Lewis Carroll had asked me whether or not he should bother writing about a little girl named Alice who fell asleep and dreamed that she had a lot of adventures down a rabbit hole, it would not have sounded awfully tempting to any editor.

The book described before writing it rarely exactly matches the finished book and sometimes doesn’t even come close. And if it did what would be the fun in writing? There’d be no surprises!

I could sit down and start writing any one of these. Yes, heaps need research, but writing first and researching sketchily as you go is fun. I do have the intramanets afterall. And it’s not that long till we’re back in Sydney where I can fill in some of my [did they have spin bowling back then? When did they first call them “googlies”] notes.

But I do not have a burning desire to write any of them at the moment. I do not have a burning desire to write at all. My one burning desire is to continue reading lots of lovely manga . . . But I did say I’d write two novels this year. Sigh.

What’s it to be?

Leggings

If you were to ask I would tell you that I am not a fan of leggings. I think they look pretty revolting under skirts, capris, long jumpers (that’s sweaters to you Usians) or whatever you choose to pair them with. They’re ugly and enhance nothing.

Of course, I’d change my tune in a heartbeat if by leggings you meant these incredible Balenciaga robot-leg creations. Leggings like these I can embrace. Or, you know, wear. Is that totally Metropolis or what?

Unfortunately, the fabulous Lauren McLaughlin who told me about these beauties says they cost about the same as a house, or at least, a very expensive car. Le sigh. Have to wait for the cheaper knock offs I guess. And how comfortable would they be? Though for something that cool I think a bit of comfort could be sacrificed, don’t you?

Quit it already

What is it with you people?

I tell you what an abomination in the sight of the Lord unicorns are and how much I love love love zombies and what do you do? You send me an endless stream of unicorn-related stuff. Gah!

Quit it already! No more!

Now zombie related links I’m all for. Fire away. Share your zombie love with me.

But the next person to so much as type or say the u-word anywhere near me? Well, that’s a paddlin’.

I hope I have made myself clear.

A real life Reason Cansino

Reason Cansino, the protag of my Magic or Madness trilogy, is somewhat of a mathematical prodigy, but she pales in comparison to Terence Tao:

By age two, he had learned to read. At 9, he attended college math classes. At 20, he finished his Ph.D.

Now 31, he has grown from prodigy to one of the world’s top mathematicians.

. . .

“I always liked numbers,” he said.

A 2-year-old Terry Tao used toy blocks to show older children how to count. He was aquick with language and used the blocks to spell words like “dog” and “cat.”

. . .

At age 5, he was enrolled in a public school, and his parents, adminstrators and teachers set up an individualized program for him. He proceeded through each subject at his own pace, quickly accelerating through several grades in maths and science while remaining closer to his age group in other subjects. In English classes, for instance, he became flustered when he had to write essays.

“I never really got the hang of that,” he said. “These very vague, undefined questions. i always liked situations where there were very clear rules of what to do.”

Assigned to write a story about what was going on at home, Terry went from room to room and made detailed lists of the contents.

I love that last image of the boy writing lists, rather than a story. Though, of course, depending on how he ordered them, they could well wind up being one. Harper’s Index is jampacked with stories. Many of them deeply disturbing.

I can’t imagine Reason making lists in quite that way (though in the early chapters of Magic or Madness she is pretty methodical as she notes the contents of the rooms of her grandmother’s house) but I can totally see her using blocks to teach other kids to count. And if she were to survive the last book of the trilogy1 I see her going on to be a mathematician. Maybe she’d be working on primes just like Mr Tao. They do sing to her.

The Times article on Tao is a lovely portrait of someone who hasn’t been wrecked by being a prodigy. Nice to have a counter to all those stories of prodigies who crash and burn.

  1. Do not ask for I will not tell you. [↩]

Magic’s Child Screensavers + manga

Now available for your delectation: gorgeous Magic’s Child screensavers complete with animated butterflies. I just tested it and it made me squeal with happiness. It comes in mac and pc flavours. Happy sigh. Thank you, Courtney Wood, for all your hard work!

What better way to celebrate the final book in the Magic or Madness trilogy’s arrival (just eleven more days) then to have pretty butterflies flutter across your computer screen?

And now I will return to my manga binge. I gave myself a much deserved (truly!) holiday: I went out and gathered up armloads of delicious manga and now I’m reading it. Why, oh why, did I only get the first four volumes of Monster?! What was I thinking? Everyone told me it was awesome! I need more. I must have more.

Heh hem. Don’t mind me. I’m off to read more of Her Majesty’s Dog. Mmmmm, manga!

Amazon meanness (updated)

Further to Maureen’s wittiness on the topic, I thought I’d add some (sadly) serious thoughts.

First, I’ve heard from pretty much everyone that reviews by punters on Amazon have zero effect on book sales. Let me repeat that for the amazon-review obsessed writers: Amazon reviews have zero effect on book sales. We writers are tieing ourselves in knots over nothing. Do not worry your pretty little head about your amazon reviews—it will not hurt your sales or your career—just your feelings.1

Update: I was referring to nasty Amazon reviews having no effect. Should have made that clearer. Also I have since heard from folks who have worked at or with Amazon that Amazon’s own research shows that punters’ reviews on Amazon has no stastistically significant impact on sales. They may sway you, but that puts you in the minority (according to that research). The vast majority of people going to buy books on Amazon already know what they want. They do not browse. (On the other hand punters’ reviews seem to have an impact on the sale of appliances etc.)

It’s also important for writers to remember that book sales on Amazon are not a very signifcant chunk of the overall book market. I’ve heard estimates that range from 3% to 7% as to what that share is. You can sell badly on Amazon and still be selling very nicely indeed elsewhere. /end update

The reviews on Amazon that make me crankiest are the toxic attacks on writers which almost always say little about the book they’re purportedly reviewing:

I went to tihs riter’s websight and they are bigheads and narcarsitac adn this book sux and they smell bad and there girlfrend is a ho.2

I have taken to pressing the “report this” button cause “reviews” like that really are inappropriate. Review the book, not the person. We all know some writers are jerks, but that’s got nothing to do with the books they write. Some of my favourite books were written by people I’d rather not ever have a beer with. Or, you know, be on the same continent as. Doesn’t stop them being fabulous writers.

What is it with Amazon reviews that brings this viciousness out in certain people? Would they say stuff like that to the writer’s face? What is it about the internet that makes some people feel free to be mean in a way they never would if the person were standing in front of them?

As it happens this syndrome has a name: “online disinhibition effect” and a bunch of research is being done on it.

So next time you’re starting to add something cranky to a comment thread or on amazon or wherever perhaps you should ask yourself if you would say what you’re about to share with the greater online universe to the person’s face. If you wouldn’t then don’t post it.

I wish someone had given me that advice a long time ago. Sadly I’ve been online since 1993 and, um, I have sent many an email and comment that I really really wish I hadn’t. The worse thing, of course, is that stuff will come back to haunt you. I guess that’s why so much online viciousness is posted anonymously. Wish I’d thought of that!

So, anyone want to share (anonymously if you prefer) some of your online misdemeanours? Anything you regret? Am I the only one who’s succumbed to “online disinhibition effect”?

  1. No laughing matter, of course. I believe I’ve mentioned the horrible condition that most writers suffer from: thin-skinitis. [↩]
  2. In case you were wondering: No, I’ve had no such nasty reviews written about me. I mean I’ve had reviews from folks who didn’t like my books but no attacks on me personally. [↩]

Why?

Why do I keep writing novels that involve numbers? I am spending today going through the Great Australian Cricket Mangosteen Fairy Monkey Knife Fight Elvis YA novel and counting things, many different things, because sadly it is a vital part of my plot.

Why?

Why do I keep doing this to myself? I am borderline inumerate (and deeply ashamed of it). Hmmm . . . Maybe that’s why? My shame keeps prodding me towards numeracy. Stupid shame. Stupid numbers.

Let this be a warning to anyone still in school and inclined to slack off in maths class. It will bite you in the bum later. Study hard! Pay attention! This stuff is important.

In other news Maureen is handing out the best advice ever on dealing with a crappy Amazon review. It’s official: Maureen is my favourite comic writer of all time.

One of my favourite Amazon activities is to go to my fave books and order the reviews from lowest stars to highest. I then go through hitting the “no” button. “No, your stupid review is not remotely useful! No! I say, No!” It’s remarkably cathartic.

Speaking of comic, scary brilliance. You should all go see The Host. It’s so fabulous that even the New York Times noticed. Best monster movie ever.

Also Diana seems to agree that the relaxation poses in yoga are excellent for solving plot holes and other problems with your novel. Meditation? What’s that?

Okay, I have procrastinated enough. I must return to counting. (Stupid novel!)

Magic’s Child & Other stuff

The first offline review of Magic’s Child has appeared in Kirkus Reviews. They seem to like it. The entire review is riddled with spoilers so here are the highlights:

In this sizzling conclusion to a mordant fantasy trilogy, magic is more curse than blessing for 15-year-old Reason. . . . Alternating chapters by Reason, Jay-Tee and their friend Tom recount this crackling blend of fantastic adventure and soap-opera angst with vivid splashes of Aussie and American slang. . . . [A]dolescent readers will be left pondering their own hard choices. Not a stand-alone story, but the entire trilogy is a worthwhile purchase.

Not bad, eh? A number of pullquotes. Thank you, Kirkus!

In other news scifi.com’s Scifiwire is interviewing various award shorlistees, like, um, me for the Norton Award. I hear there’ll be interviews soon with Maureen Johnson and Scott Westerfeld. I assume they’ll also talk to Susan Beth Pfeffer and Megan Whalen Turner. Hope so!

In other news Rebecca designed this T-shirt in honour of Scott and mine’s visit to Houston. Isn’t it awesome?

Is that not the coolest Magic or Madness/Midnighters combination you ever saw? There are even butterflies! I love it!

Story read out loud in front of the peoples

The reading last night was lovely. I’m now convinced that around five minutes is the perfect length for a reading. I have a shockingly short attention span, but for five minutes long even I can stay focussed.

Of course now I have a whole stack of books I have to pick up to find out what happens next. Everyone was so funny and sweet and excellent. I do so love being read to. Much better than doing the reading . . .

Three years ago I talked about my very first readings and how not fun they were. I’ve read many many many times since then. I no longer experience blind terror, at this stage the terror has eyes and can spot all the people in the room yawning and looking bored, and instead of convulsing my whole body (particularly my vocal chords) the terror just messes with my hands. I also hardly ever throw up or feel like I’m going to now. A vast improvement, no?

I still don’t really enjoy reading.

The hardest part is the minutes just before I read: the waiting-to-read part. I find myself in this strange hyper uncomfortable space not entirely capable of hearing what is going on around me, except my own name, cause when I hear it that means it’s time. I pick up my papers, read the words, sometimes the wrong ones, sometimes skipping a few, aware that my hands could get so out of control that the pages go flying, or I’ll spill water everywhere, or my stomach could revolt. For the last year or so none of those things have happened. I’ve gotten to the end without making too great a fool of myself. Progress!

My reward is the after-reading feeling. A lovely adrenaline rush that stay for ages and makes me feel like I’m floating and invincible and witty and charming. I can get by on that buzz for hours.

I’d still MUCH rather be read to.

How about you lot? Anyone got any horror stories of readings gone wrong to share?

Day jobs

Rebecca asks:

Got any suggestions for day jobs? What were yours?

Good question.

My jobs were: babysitter, sales assistant, receptionist, cleaner, waitress (very briefly), admin worker, IT support, academic.

Being an academic was my main day job and the one I held when I finished my first novel and countless short stories. I found that the research I did often fed into my fiction, but at the same time I found it very difficult to switch between scholarly and non-scholarly writing.

But I’ve heard many say that being an academic is perfect for a writer because you can get a lot of writing done during the long summer vacations. I’m not convinced. All the academics I know work their arses off over summer, teaching summer school, revising courses, and doing loads of other admin, not to mention writing all the scholarly articles and books they need to secure tenure and promotion.

I met this guy once who claimed that being a builder was perfect for a writer because there was nothing you took home from your job. At the end of the day when you were finiished you were finished and could throw yourself into writing your novel.

I open the question to all you writers:

What are (were) your day jobs to support your writing habit? What jobs do you think are the best for a writer to have? Rebecca needs your guidance.

Getting paid, or, don’t quit your day job

I promised some friends that I wouldn’t blog about the business of writing for a while and I haven’t in ages so, um, you two? Avert your eyes.

Recently some dear friends of mine sold books for the very first time. A small round of applause for their hard work and good fortune! Yay, them!

And as you do (and as I did) they’ve started planning how to spend their advance money (such that it is). They were suffering from the missaprehension that they would be seeing the money sometime soon. I disabused them.

Now I would like to disabuse you.

Before I begin two things:

    1. I’m only talking about publishing payment practices in the US of A and I’m only talking about mine and my friends’ experiences of them. I have never worked in publishing. I’d be grateful and interested to hear about varying experiences both here and in the rest of the world. And I’d love to hear from those who pay as well as those who receive.

    2. I suspect some of you are hazy on what exactly an advance is. (I was.) An advance is a sum of money that is paid (or advanced) to a writer by a publisher against the future earnings of a book. So when a writer is made an offer of money for their book that offer is an advance.

    I sold my first book (not a novel) to Wesleyan University Press for US$1,000. I got to keep that money no matter what happened, but I didn’t get any more dosh from Wesleyan until the royalties (a percentage of each book sold, can vary from 5% to 12% depending on format) on the book exceeded the $1,000 needed to pay Wesleyan back.

Here’s what happens when you sell a book:

A choir of angels sing and fairy dust descends from the air

Once you have accepted an offer on your book the nitty gritty of the contract must be negotiated. This is tricky to do and involves things like “escalation clauses” and “sub-rights” and is why it’s a stupendously excellent idea to have an agent do it for you. Believe me they earn their 15%.

How long that process takes depends on whether your agent already has a specific pre-negotiated contract with the publishing house or not. When I negotiated my contract with Penguin USA for the Magic or Madness books it didn’t take very long because I had no idea what I was doing and said yes to pretty much everything. Ah, the perils of negotiating a contract agent-less.

Once that’s done the contract has to be drawn up. How long that takes depends on the publishing house. Once it’s done your agent checks it. Believe it or not, sometimes there are things in the contract that shouldn’t be there, items that have specifically been negotiated out. This is another reason it’s such a great idea to have an agent.

One of the items specified in the contract is not just how much you will be paid, but how you will be paid. Typically (but definitely not always) your advance is split into thirds. The first third you get upon signing the contract, the second upon delivery and acceptance of your manuscript, and the third upon publication.

If you have a three-book deal of say $15,000 a book1 your total advance is $45,000. Thus you get $15,000 up front as the third on signing because you are signing for all three books. Then you get another $5,000 when the first book is delivered and accepted because that is a third of the $15,000 advance for that book. Then another $5,000 on the publication of the first book. And so on for the second and third book. Your $45,000 winds up being spread over at least three years, but sometimes more than four or five. This depends on how long before your first book is published.

Back to the contract:

Once your agent approves it, you sign it, and the contract is returned to the publishing house where the department that handles payments issues a cheque. I have seen the gap between signing the contract and receiving the cheque be anywhere between two weeks and a year. Any of you had a quicker turnaround? Slower?

The gap between accepting the offer and the contract being offered can also be many weeks. So it’s not only possible but usual for it to take at least six weeks between the intial offer and your cheque showing up. And, frankly, six weeks is fast.

And remember that’s just the first third. The other two thirds will come to you in third of a third parcels over the next few years. It means that your writing earnings could well look like this (minus your agent’s 15% which I haven’t taken out on account of my mathematical ability is not up to it):

2007: $20,000 (payment on signing, delivery & acceptance of 1st book)
2008: $10,000 (publication of 1st, delivery & acceptance of 2nd)
2009: $10,000 (publication of 2nd, delivery & acceptance of 3rd)
2010: $5,000 (publication of 3nd)

It will especially look like this if, like me, you didn’t know enough to make sure that your three-book deal wasn’t joint accounted. I sold my trilogy in 2003 and although the first two books have already earned out their advances I have not seen any royalties. Nor will I until the third book earns out as well. That’s what joint accounted means: The accounting for all three books is tied together.

It’s also increasingly unusual for a book to come out that quickly. I have several friends who sold books last year that aren’t scheduled for publication until 2009 (or in one case 2010). In which case their spread could look like this:

2006: $20,000 (payment on signing, delivery & acceptance of 1st book)
2007: $5,000 (delivery & acceptance of 2nd)
2008: $5,000 (delivery & acceptance of 3rd)
2009: $5,000 (publication of 1st)
2010: $5,000 (publication of 2nd)
2011: $5,000 (publication of 3rd)

Obviously living on $5,000 a year is tricky. Most full-time writers I know are getting bigger advances than that, or writing more than one book a year, or doing other kinds of writing, or all of the above. Scalzi did a recent breakdown of his fiction writing earnings over the past few years.

The more salient point: Most writers I know have a day job.

Each one of those payments comes less quickly than you think it will. I naively thought that my payment on delivery & acceptance of my first book would come automatically as soon as my editor had accepted the manuscript. It did not come until I asked for it. Or rather several weeks after asking.

This is not unique to publishing. It is, in fact, the lot of the freelancer: No matter who you work for, no matter what the industry, the gap between doing the work and getting paid is a LOT longer than we freelancers would like.

Hope this has been helpful.

Do please fill the comments thread with criticisms, questions and accounts of how it works in other places. I’m all ears. (Or, you know, eyes. Whatever!)

  1. That’s an above average advance for most genres I know about. I chose it because it’s easier to do the maths with an advance of $15,000. [↩]

Bad Writing Day

Here are some of the things that guarantee a bad writing day:

  • laptop making loud and disturbingly ominous noises
  • no fingernails left to bite
  • person writing nearby typing too loudly
  • person writing nearby sighing too loudly
  • too many interesting blogs to read
  • not enough interesting blogs to read
  • the availability of the internet
  • the non-availability of the internet
  • the moon not being in the seventh house
  • the moon being in the seventh house
  • the long google search to figure out what the moon being in the seventh house actually means
  • the siren call of other more interesting novels that want to be written
  • the siren call of other more interesting novels that want to be read
  • not to mention the graphic novels and manga and pile of New Yorkers
  • it being the wrong time of the month
  • it being the wrong time of the year
  • it being the wrong hemisphere
  • a recently developed allergy to typing and pencils and pens and any known means of conveying words in head onto paper
  • helper monkeys being lazy
  • non-availability of replacement helper monkeys
  • novel failing to rewrite itself

Care to add some? I know I’m not alone.

And now I begin this writing day. May the internet not tempt me, the moon be where it’s supposed to be, and the helper monkeys well behaved!

Readings and 500th post

Next week there are three readings in Manhattan that you all need to get to:

Tuesday, 6 March, 7PM (Doors open 6:30 PM)
Andrea Kail and Lauren McLaughlin
will be reading as part of The New York Review of Science Fiction Readings
Admission is free but if you want to support the series a $5 donation would be lovely
South Street Seaport Museum’s Melville Gallery
213 Water Street (near Beekman)

I don’t know Andrea Kail’s work but she shares a background in film and TV with Lauren and sounds most interesting indeed. Lauren’s work I do know. She’s awesome and her book Cycler is hilarious. It’s about a girl who turns into a boy once a month. It comes out from Random House in 2008 so this is your chance to say you knew all about Lauren way back when. Cycler‘s going to be a hit.

Wednesday, 7 March, 6-8PM
Me and these other fabulous YA authors will be reading our little hearts out:
Eireann Corrigan (Ordinary Ghosts)
Erin Downing (Prom Crashers)
Leslie Margolis (Price of Admission)
Justine Larbalestier (Magic’s Child)
Maryrose Wood (Why I Let My Hair Grow Out)
Daniel Ehrenhaft and Adrienne Maria Vrettos (reading from the 21 Proms anthology)
Tompkins Square branch
New York Public Library
331 E. 10th Street (cnr of Ave B)

That is a mighty fabulous lineup. How could you not venure out into the cold to see us? Also I may be handing out Magic or Madness trilogy bookmarks. If I remember to bring them that is. Are you sure you can go through life without such a bookmark? I didn’t think so.

Thursday, 8 March, 7-8:30PM
A reading and discussion with Yvette Christiansë author of Unconfessed.
A book signing reception will follow.
Labyrinth Books
536 West 112th Street
between Broadway and Amsterdam

I’ve spoken about Yvette’s work before. So I will be brief: She’s a genius. You do not want to miss this!

So that’s what I’ll be doing this week. I hope I get to see some of you lot at one of these events. I’ll be the one complaining about the cold.

Also this is my 500th post on this blog. Not bad, eh? If only writing novels were as easy as blogging . . . Here’s to another 500 posts!

PS My friend says many thanks for all the audio book suggestions. Do keep them coming.

Audio Books

A friend is in desperate need of recommendations for really good audio books. Fiction, non-fiction, doesn’t matter just as long as they’re really good. I don’t listen to ’em myself so I was of no use.

Can you help her out?

Swearing

Scrotumgate and the never-ending debate about what words are appropriate for what age groups made me realise something very important: You USians talk funny!

See, in Australia where I grew up the words that some people think you should never say and others use all the time are called “swear words” and the act of using them is “swearing”. Here in the United States of America they are “curse” or even odder “cuss” words and when you say them you are “cursing” or “cussing”.

Both of which sound unbelievably quaint as well as kind of cute to my ears. It’s as if I’ve been chatting with folks who appear to be from the twenty-first century and then—Bam!—all of a sudden a time machine has landed in their mouths, taken control of their tongues, and they can now only say words from the 1700s. “That blasted sea dog cussed at1 me!”

Okaaay, I think, backing away slowly.

And I use words like “hence” which makes many USians think that the time machine’s grabbed my tongue. These fun linguistic differences are why I keep coming back here. Such larks! (Oh, okay, and the fact that my fella is a Seppo. Details, details!)

Here are my favourite USianisms (some are regional; some have spread far beyond her borders):

    Discombobulate (Best. Word. Ever.)

    Copacetic (A fancy word for “okay”. Who knew? So euphonious. Pleasure in my ears!)

    All the myriad different words for a bad sandwich such as “hoagie”, “hero”, “grinder” etc etc

    Sketchy (Meaning “dodgy”—obviously “dodgy” is better than “sketchy” but it still ain’t too foul)

    On line (As in “Are you standing on line?” I’ve only ever heard this one in NYC)

    Burglarize (Hah! I giggle every time I hear it. Scott has the same reaction to “removalist” back home)

Can’t think of any more right now. What are your favourite American words? Am I alone in finding “cuss” antiquated?

  1. Cussed on me? Near me? See? I don’t even know what the right preposition is! [↩]

Perfect quote

Joan Didion1 is wise:

There was nothing I did not discuss with John.

Because we were both writers and both worked at home our days were filled with the sound of each other’s voices.

I did not always think he was right nor did he always think I was right but we were each the person the other trusted. There was no separation between our investments or interests in any given situation. Many people assumed that we must be, since sometimes one and sometimes the other would get the better review, the bigger advance, in some way “competitive”, that our private life must be a minefield of professional envies and resentments. This was so far from the case that the general insistence on it came to suggest certain lacunae in the popular understanding of marriage.

The only amendment I’d make is that it’s not just popular understandings of marriage but of any close relationships. Siblings and close friends are also popularly supposed to be in competition with one another.

I remember when me and two good friends were up for the same scholarship. One of them won. No one would believe that we were happy for her. They did not understand that we could be disappointed for ourselves and happy for her at the same time. Clearly they feared their heads would explode if they admitted that those two feelings could exist side by side.

To avert said head explosion they questioned us further, adding more “reallys?” and “are you sures?” to their questions. We kept saying that we weren’t jealous, that we were overjoyed for our friend. They changed tactics and accused us of protesting too much. We sighed and backed away.

What can you say when you are asked if you’re jealous of your parent/sibling/lover/spouse/best friend? It’s like being asked if you still beat your spouse.2 In fact, just writing this will convince some people that I’m being defensive. (Or that I’m still beating my spouse.)

This view of the world mystifies me. Mostly because in my experience people who see themselves as being in competition with you, who are cranky when you succeed, and rejoice when you fail are not your friends. They will not do good by you. Flee from them! Let me repeat because I think it’s really important:

People who are cranky when you succeed and rejoice when you fail are not your friends.

When someone asks me if I’m jealous or resentful of someone I care about it feels like they’re asking me to say that I’m not friends with that person. Which is why I find it such a weird question. I still haven’t figured out what to say to the people whose response to my boasting about the achievements of a loved one is to console me. Huh? It’s like we’re not living on the same planet.

Why do so many think spouses or siblings or best friends in the same profession are automatically in competition? Is it because movies such as A Star is Born have trained us to think that way? Are we confusing fictional narratives and plot devices with real life?

Because, me, I really don’t get it. Can any of you clue me in?

  1. The quote comes from her moving memoir of the aftermath of her husband’s death, The Year of Magical Thinking. [↩]
  2. For the record: I have never beaten Scott. Not unless he’s asked nicely. 🙂 However, I have on occasion told him he is a poo-head but only when he was totally being a poo-head. [↩]

Two excellent things

1. I am now officially an award-winning author. Sort of.

Daughters of Earth just won the Susan Koppelman Award for Best Anthology, Multi-Authored, or Edited book in Feminist Studies in Popular Culture which is given by the Popular Culture Association. How cool is that? No book of mine has ever won an award before.

As I didn’t write Daughters—other than the introduction anyways—I’m not sure this qualifies me as an award-winning author. I guess what I am is the editor of an award-winning book. I sure did put a lot of work into it and so did all the contributors. We’re very proud and thrilled that someone else likes it well enough to give it a prize. Woo hoo!

Thank you so much Brian Attebery, Joan Donawerth, L Timmel Duchamp, Andrea Hairston, Joan Haran, Cathy Hawkins, Veronica Hollinger, Josh Lukin, Mary E. Papke, Wendy Pearson, and Lisa Yaszek for writing such fabulous essays. What a fabulous bunch1 of scholars!

2. A bunch of us Young Adult writer types will be doing a reading next Wednesday:

Eireann Corrigan (Ordinary Ghosts)
Erin Downing (Prom Crashers)
Justine Larbalestier (Magic’s Child)
Leslie Margolis (Price of Admission)
Maryrose Wood (Why I Let My Hair Grow Out)
Daniel Ehrenhaft and Adrienne Maria Vrettos (reading from the 21 Proms anthology)
Wednesday, 7 March, 6-8PM
Tompkins Square branch
New York Public Library
331 E. 10th Street (cnr of Ave B)

Hope you New York types will be able to join us. Tis quite the lineup.

  1. What should the collective noun for a group of scholars be? A folio of scholars? A vellum? Footnote? A tenure? (Though that’s harsh on those without and the independent scholars.) A reference? [↩]

Ode to Kirihito

I’ve been dipping my toe in the worlds of manga and graphic novels over the past year or so. Allow me to express some neophyte enthusiasm: WOW!!! Seriously, I’ve loved the majority of what I’ve read and the stuff I haven’t like that much in the early volumes (I’m looking at you, Saiyuki) has become fabulous later on.

I’m pretty sure the 90% rule1 still applies, I just happen to have very excellent guides (thank you, Micole, Rachel, and Doselle). And Anne Ishii of Vertical Books who led me to Osamu Tezuka‘s Ode to Kirihito, which I loved so much I feel compelled to rave about it here.

Ode to Kirihito is like nothing I’ve ever read before. So much so that I don’t even know how to describe it. It’s a medical thriller, it’s a philosophic musing about what it is to be human, it’s completely unputdownable. That’s saying something because it is a very big book. There are depraved sideshow performers, corrupt doctors, scary small town locals, depraved and corrupt crime lords, nuns, as well as racist mine overseers.

From page to page I had no idea what was going to happen next, but when it did, it made sense. It all worked. More than worked, it sang.

And that’s just the story. The art is something else again.2 Although Ode was first published in the early 1970s if I hadn’t known that I couldn’t have guessed it. The art looks contemporary. More than that it looks cutting edge contemporary. It’s so beautiful that I would stop to just stare at many of the pages. And, trust me, I’m not someone who will stop to smell the roses when I’m as caught up in a story as I was with Ode to Kirihito. It was just so gorgeous I could not soak it up.

You all have to read this book. It is gobsmackingly awesome. And weird. Very very very weird.

I am now going to read the first volume of Tezuka’s Buddha. I must now read everything he has ever written. He is a genius and I am smitten.

  1. Otherwise known as Sturgeon’s Law: “Ninety per cent of everything is crap”. [↩]
  2. Not that they’re separable. I know that. I’m just new to this, remember. [↩]

Norton shortlist

The Norton shortlist is now final:

    Devilish—Maureen Johnson (Penguin Razorbill)
    Magic or Madness—Justine Larbalestier (Penguin Razorbill)
    Life As We Knew It—Susan Beth Pfeffer (Harcourt)
    Midnighters 2: Touching Darkness—Scott Westerfeld (Harper Eos)
    Peeps—Scott Westerfeld (Penguin Razorbill)
    The King of Attolia—Megan Whalen Turner (Greenwillow Books HarperCollins)

All the books on the list are wonderful1 (except mine obviously). I’m so honoured to be in such incredible company. Wow.

Yet despite the glories of Maureen’s catholic school girls demon fighters and Scott’s reimainged vampires and magic twenty-fifth hour, if I were to vote right now2 I would vote for King of Attolia.

I’ve mentioned before how much Megan Whalen Turner’s trilogy means to me. It’s stunning. Beautifully written and it pushes all my buttons (in a good way). It would be awesome if she won the Norton because it would be not just for this book, but for the whole trilogy. She’s one of my favourite living writers and deserves every honour going.

Hey, I just noticed there’s three Razorbill books on that list! How bout that? Eloise Flood created one hell of a list.

  1. The only one I haven’t yet read is the Pfeffer which I’ve heard from people I trust is amazing. I can’t wait to get my mitts on it. [↩]
  2. And if I were a member of SFWA. [↩]

What I did over the weekend

The short version of the past three days:

  • The Humble Teen Lit Festival was unbelievably wonderful and run by the awesomest group of librarians and teachers ever. Thanks for taking such great care of me, Dawn!
  • The Humble students and the other folks who showed up were smart and receptive and asked lots of questions I hadn’t been asked before. Fabulous!
  • My old man is insanely popular. I mean I knew he was popular, but I didn’t realise he was that popular. I thought I was going to burst I was so proud of him. You shoulda seen his signing queue! Around the block! Mental!
  • Scott’s family are lovely. Catching up with Uncle Ronnie the principal (and wow do his students love him) and Jackie and Ken would have made the trip totally worthwhile without the added bonus of Teen Lit Festival.
  • All writers obsess about their character’s shrugging or smiling or raising eyebrows too much.
  • Apparently there are two airports in Houston. Ooops.
  • Getting from one to the other is a seventy dollar cab ride.
  • Way too many of you lot are deeply deluded about vampires. It saddens me.
  • None of you knows about Scott Pilgrim?! This causes me great pain. Go out and read the three volumes immediately! That’s an order.
  • Although I feared three days without my computer it turned out to be way more of a blessing than a curse. I may now take a couple of days off from its evil thrall once a week. Or monthly. Or possibly every six months . . .
  • It was still lovely to come home to all your mail and comments here. Bless!

And now I go pass out. While being other places is wondrousness, getting to and from them is increasingly horrible. It took us fourteen hours to get from Houston to NYC. That’s how long it takes to get from LA to Sydney . . . That ain’t right.

Stop asking already

So apparently knowing my position on zombies and unicorns is not enough for you people. You need to know my stance on all the other important issues. Here you go then:

Werewolves versus vampires

Gotta be werewolves. There’s the whole monthly cycle thing. What could be worse1 than menstruating? Turning into a wolf! The whole metaphor for adolescence: “Ew! My body is changing in hairy and grotesque ways!” Plus wolves! What is not unbelievably awesome and fascinating and wondrous about wolves? Nothing!

Best examples: “Boobs” by Suzy McKee Charnas which is possibly the best short story ever written2 and Ginger Snaps, a most excellent Canadian movie.3

Vampires do not do it for me. The thought of getting intimate with someone who’s not only walking dead, but has (usually) been dead for centuries. Ewww! Call me old fashioned but that does not spell romance to me; it spells necrophilia. (I know that seems to contradict my stance on zombies, but no one’s talking zombie boyfriends.)

Superman versus Batman

Batman. Please! Where is the interest in someone who can do everything and can only be defeated with a really lame plot coupon? Kryptonite can kiss my left eyeball. Plus Batman is campy goodness. I am less fond of his darker incarnations. Plus Eartha Kitt! Julie Newmar!

Best examples: the TV show! Kapow! Zap! Biff! Zonk!

Saiyuki versus Scott Pilgrim

No! Don’t make me choose! I can’t. My brain will explode. The world will break into tiny pieces. I loves them both. I do! A jeep that’s a dragon versus dance fights with evil ex-boyfriends? They’re both so wonderfully cracktastically heavenly. If you haven’t gotten into either you really really really should.

I can give you no more answers. I’m too busy clutching my copies of Saiyuki and Scott Pilgrim to my chest and sobbing over their perfection. (Plus gotta go pack for Houston.)

But feel free to ask more curly quessies and supply your own answers. Though not if they’re the wrong answers, obviously. That’s right, unicorn lovers, I mean you.

  1. Some would say better. There are times when I would rather be a wolf than menstruating . . . [↩]
  2. Except for all the other great short stories. [↩]
  3. I quite like the sequel, but on no account see the third one. In fact, let us just pretend there is no third movie. [↩]

Humble Houston,* here we come

This Saturday me and Scott and some other illustrious young adult literature types will be talking about our books and life (and the superiority of zombies over unicorns) and anything else you care to ask us about at a teen literary festival in Humble, Texas:

Saturday, 24 February, 2007
Humble ISD Libraries’
Teen Lit Festival 07
Guests are: Chris Crutcher, Gail Giles,
Justine Larbalestier, Benjamin Alíre Sáenz,
Scott Westerfeld and Chris Yambar
Atascocita High School Campus
Humble, Texas

The event is open to the public so if you’re anywhere in the vicinity do come and say hi. Even if you’re not into mine or Scott’s books, it’ll be totally worth it just to hear Chris Crutcher‘s keynote address. He’s an incredible, awe-inspiring speaker. I heard him last year and he made me cry. (In a good way.)

Instructions for getting there can be found here.

I’m really looking forward to it for several reasons such as Scott’s uncle is a headmaster principal there and this means we get to hang out with him and his lovely family, also I may get to meet Chris Crutcher (I hope I don’t make a fool of myself!), I’ve never been to Houston, I’m looking forward to meeting certain fans I hear are coming all the way from Austin, and because it’s warm down there. Proper, over-20C warmth. I’m so happy just thinking about it!

*And I don’t mean the street just south of me here in NYC.))

Different strokes*

If I wasn’t already convinced that there are many different ways to write novels this quote from Cynthia Leitich Smith would clinch it for me:

it is a regular part of my process to write a full novel draft, print it to read once, and then I throw1 it away and delete the file. Really. It’s my way of just getting to know the characters and their world. If I were to build on those first, fumbling efforts, my stories would have pretty shaky foundations. I’m not saying this is for everyone. Some folks can fully envision their work right out of the chute. But me, I figure whatever survives when I open the new document deserves a fair shot. Whatever doesn’t . . . doesn’t.

Oh. My. Elvis.

And, yet, I can kind of see where she’s coming from. My first drafts are pretty shaky foundations. I just prefer the security of having them to having nothing at all. As I demonstrated in this post, my first drafts are often vastly different to my finished books. They can change points of view, or whether they’re told in first person or third or whatever. Characters’ motivations, names, ages—everything can change. I throw huge chunks away. Not a lot of the first draft survives into the final.

But throwing a whole novel out?

What if I just wound up writing another shaky first draft? Do I throw that one out too? And start over again? Couldn’t that go on forever?

On the other hand, my first drafts are a lot better than they used to be. So maybe if I adopted this strategy, they’d improve even faster?

It also occurs to me that it might be a really good strategy for making my short stories work. I’ve got kajillions of broken short stories. What if I started over from scratch on the promising ones? I’m a much better writer than I was last time I attempted to write one.

Hmmm . . .

Yet throwing an entire novel away? Deleting the file?! My brain it hurts! My eyes they bleed! Gah!

Also what about the historians? What about tax deductible donation of your papers to a library collection? I hear some of them even pay for such things. How do you donate them if you throw them away?! Think of posterity!

Deep breaths, Justine, deep breaths. There are many different ways to write a novel. Also not everyone is into donating their work to libraries. Quit thinking like an historian.

*Am I the only one who finds that expression “different strokes for different folks” vaguely obscene?

  1. I’m sure she meant into the recycling. [↩]

Fan art and librarians

Writer and artist, Chris Howard, was so inspired by reading Magic or Madness he painted a portrait of Reason:

It amazes me that my books have inspired some folks to commit art. Makes me all teary!

I’m also made teary1 by the awesomeness of the vast majority of librarians. The recent kerfuffle over a dog’s scrotum has led many to think that librarians in the US of A are all for banning books over a single word. This is emphatically not the case. The American Library Association has a whole division that goes to battle to protect intellectual freedom in the US of A. They’re the ones who bring us banned books week. They fight the good fight! They are all godesses. (Even the boy librarians.)

Teariness also comes over me as I contemplate all the kids’ books that have the word “scrotum” in them. (Mostly because if I had one I would cry if these things were done to said body part. I mean, OW!) Via Read Alert.

  1. Best segue ever, eh? [↩]

I expose myself

Given that it’s now late February and Magic Lessons is available in a corrected and cheaper paperback edition in the US of A, and Magic’s Child is a mere month away from pubbing,1 I thought I would celebrate by posting the very first draft of the first two and a bit chapters of Magic or Madness:

Chapter One

Reason missed her mother. She lay on her new bed in her new home missing her mum, Sarafina, so much it hurt. It was her first day in her grandmother’s house. She should get up, explore, do things, but all she could think about was how much she missed her mother.

Compare and contrast with what wound up in the final version of Magic or Madness many, many, many, many rewrites later:

Chapter One: Reason Cansino

My name is Reason Cansino. I was named Reason because my mother, Sarafina, thought it was prettier than Logic or Rationality or Intellect and had better nicknames, too. Not that Sarafina has ever called me anything but Reason. My mother believes in all those things: logic, reason, and the rest, and in mathematics, which fortunately wasn’t on the list of possible names. I’m grateful to have a head full of numbers, but I wouldn’t want to answer to the name of Algebra, Trigonometry, or Calculus.

I have mentioned before that my first drafts are really bad. Now you have proof!

“Reason missed her mum.” Has there ever been a less dynamic first sentence? Or first paragraph? “I miss my mum and instead of doing anything I’m going to whinge.” I’d keep reading that. Not!

I hope this encourages you in your own writing endeavours. The first draft ain’t nothing but the very roughest of beginnings. It exists only to be enbiggened and embettered.

Hmmm, maybe I shouldn’t have posted the first draft after all?

Justine backs away slowly from the computer.

These are not the droids you’re looking for!

  1. Two months if you are in Australia or New Zealand. Many more months if you’re looking to score a copy in a language other than English. [↩]

Zombies, unicorns, scrotum (updated)

What have I started? Arguments about the relative merits of zombies and unicorns rage across the intramanets. And on each thread someone suggests the zombie-unicorn hybrid. Great minds think alike? Or fools seldom differ?

I was greatly distressed that lovely friends of mine like Holly Black, Cecil Castellucci, Meg McCarron and Literaticat have fallen pray to the false glittery charms of unicorns despite the fact that being virgin fascists unicorns would have nothing to do with them. I guess it falls into the whole desiring-what-you-can’t-have camp. Perhaps to resolve our issues Holly and I should collaborate on a Zombies vesus Unicorns novel? I will write the zombies and she can have the unicorns. Though I’m not sure how well that will work given that she won’t read about zombies and I won’t read about unicorns.

Some school librarians are saying that they won’t have Susan Patron’s Newbery Award-winning novel, THE HIGHER POWER OF LUCKY, in their library because it contains the word “scrotum” (in reference to a dog). Apparently “scrotum” is an offensive word. I had no idea. I thought it was an anatomical term for a part of the male body. I’ve never heard anyone use it as a swear word and I come from a swearing people.

The New York Times also covers the story but seems to think that authors sneak words like “scrotum” into their novels solely to offend.1 Um, what now? Rosemary Graham responds eloquently to the extremely unbalanced Times coverage. The best reporting on the whole story can be found at Publishers Weekly which points out the role Jordan Sonnenblick and Asif! had in drawing attention to it.

I write novels to tell the best stories I can for teenagers. I try very hard to write characters who are believeable and I choose the language they use accordingly. I do not set out to offend anyone. I’m sorry when that happens, but I’m not going to write less believable stories in order not to offend people. That leads to the worst possible kind of censorship: When you start second-guessing yourself. Can I use the word “pom”? No, that will offend English people. Can I use the word “pink”? No, that will offend pink-haters (and possibly also pink-lovers). How about “jasmine”? No, Margo Lanagan will come gunning for me. When does it end?

Librarians and school librarians in particular have an incredibly hard job. I admire them tremendously. I just wish we were living in a world where people’s response to being offended was to talk about why, to explain the history and context of the word, and how that has made it offensive to them, rather than trying to wipe the books that contain the word off the face of the earth. I mean I am not advocating banning books about unicorns. I just won’t blurb them.

As soon as it is warm enough to go outside I’m off to buy a copy of The Higher Power of Lucky from my local children’s bookshop.

Update: Scott adds his two cents’ worth.

  1. For the record, if concerned adults can find the naughty words we wicked authors sneak into our books then we clearly haven’t been sneaky enough. [↩]

More on blurbs, plus zombies

I am so proud that my serious, soul-baring post about the trials and tribulations of blurbs wound up turning into a debate about whether unicorns or zombies are better. Sometimes I just love my genre people.

This response to Scalzi and me on blurbing also made me smile. I am, indeed, very proud of this sentence:

“How do you tell someone you shot their dog cause you really hate unicorns?”

The writer of that post suggests that it would be amusing to just blurb everything and if you don’t like a book give it an ambiguous blurb of the “I cannot praise this book too highly” variety. Clearly they meant it in jest, but it reminded me that there are writers out there who do exactly that.

Writers of this ilk let you know that they don’t like your book via their blurb:

Justine Larbalestier’s Zombie Dancing is the worst kind of commericial romantic filth. My eyes they bleed! I would rather eat my own entrails than be in the same room with this “book”. Run away as fast as you can!
—Discerning Genius Writer, author of genius books that sell very well thank you very much

It’s only happened to me once (very early on in my career) but, wow, did it hurt. Basically in four sentences this famous (in Australia) writer said they thought my writing sucked and I had no future.

Ouch.

Frankly, I think writing ambiguous, indifferent, or bad blurbs in the real world is passive aggressive nastiness. If you don’t like a book, don’t blurb it. Writers are delicate fragile creatures. Don’t be pouring acid on them!

To sum up, zombies are a zillion, bazllion, katrillion times better than smelly old unicorns, and blurbs are a tricky business.

Blurbs

John Scalzi has a post up explaining his blurb policy. He even kindly explains what blurbs are.

I think his policy is so spot on that I’ve adopted it (slightly amended) as my own:

1. Yes, I am happy to look at books and if I love them I will blurb them.

I adore reading my peers’ work and getting to read them ahead of publication is particularly exciting. It makes me feel like I’m really part of the Young Adult publishing world with my little ole finger right on the pulse. Not to mention that being asked for a blurb is an honour.1 It says that someone somewhere thinks my say so might be good enough to sell a book. That’s flattering as hell. I mean, Wow.

So far I’ve been lucky: None of the books I’ve been asked to blurb have been bad. And yet I’ve blurbed only one novel. I’ve not blurbed books I thought were pretty darn good because I didn’t think they’d be a good fit with my audience. Or because they touch on certain taboos or bugbears of mine. (You know, like unicorns or negative portrayals of Australians.)

I have now read and not blurbed several books by people I know and like and who’ve written other books I would have blurbed in a heartbeat. It sucks, but not as much as having my name on the back of a book that I feel uncomfortable about. I can’t have my readership thinking I endorse unicorns.

I have to really love a book or think it’s doing something important or new to have my name on the back extolling its virtues. I don’t have the largest readership in the world, but I want my readers to know that if I’m talking up someone else’s book I’m really into it. That way if they read it, hate it, and call me on it, I can in good conscience say, “I blurbed it because I loved it. I’m sorry you don’t agree.”

2. Requests for blurbs should come from the book’s editor or publisher, not from the writer.

That’s the ideal, but sometimes your editor is too busy, or your press too small to do it, and it falls on your shoulders. I understand. I’ve been there.

Scalzi gives lots of excellent reasons why it’s better for the blurb request to come from the publishing house than from the writer. I’ll add another one: it’s really embarrassing for a writer to have to ask another writer to publically praise them.

I’ve had to ask writers to sing the glories of me. Even if I know they like my work, and are likely to be willing, it makes me feel like I’m going to throw up. I really really really hate having to ask. I’d much rather have someone else do that. I’d much rather not know if a writer chooses not to blurb me. I’d much rather not even know who was asked.

And I’d really much rather have writers not know I’ve been asked to blurb their books so it never comes up that I haven’t done so. Having to explain to a friend why you won’t blurb their book is one of the world’s least fun things to do. Me, I don’t even like hurting the feelings of authors I’ve never met! Scalzi’s right, it’s just like shooting their dog. And how do you tell someone you shot their dog cause you really hate unicorns?

I have several writer friends who have a no-blurb policy. I’m starting to think that’s a really good idea. The reason I can’t adopt it is that so many people have blurbed me. It would feel churlish not to blurb other people. I know from fan mail that people have picked up my books because of blurbs from Holly Black, Samuel R. Delany, Cory Doctorow and Karen Joy Fowler. While I don’t have anywhere near their audience, if a blurb from me will help someone new whose work I love, than of course I will blurb them.

The other scary thing about blurbs—and let’s face it they’re a whole lot of terror for a writer—is that they’re really really hard to write. Seriously it’s easier to write a whole new novel than it is to write a good blurb:

“You should read this book. It is really good. I liked it. Heaps.”
—Justine Larbalestier, author of books that must really suck if that’s her idea of a good blurb.

Gah!

  1. Though who gets asked is a mystery to me, seeing as how I get asked to do it so much more often than Scott “New York Times Bestselling Author” Westerfeld does. What’s up with that?
    [↩]

Transitions

A while back, I was reading a biography of Kingsley Amis (what an entertainingly grumpy man he was) in which he mentions that the hardest part of writing is “getting your characters out of the pub and into the cab”.

Oh, yes, indeed. Even though I don’t write the kind of books where characters go from pubs to cabs—or vice versa—they do very inconveniently need to transition from one scene to another. Or from one side of the room to the other. The gall of them! Stupid characters.

Sex scenes are a cinch. Action ditto. Writing the tragic break up? Piece of cake. The death scene? Doddle.

But transitions? Total bugger.

Sometimes I am so stumped by my attempt to get a character to walk from one side of the street to the other—Just walk! Not even walk and chew gum! Nothing fancy!—that I give up and blow them up instead. So much easier. Or, you know, simply cut to the next bit. Thank you, film world, for inventing the jump cut.

And yet if you keep up that approach you run out of characters. Also endless jump cuts get really old really quickly.

So I spend hours writing and rewriting simple transitions: “Leandra Hotshot spied Gertrude Schadenfreude on the other side of the room. She had a red rose between her teeth and champagne flute in her hand. Leandra got out of her chair and nimbly darted towards her friend.”

Gah!

“Leandra Hotshot meandered toward her red rose munching friend Gertrude Schadenfreude. Sometimes the other side of the room seemed so very far away.”

More gah!

“Leandra Hotshot spontaneously combusted, leaving both sides of the room coated in human ashes. Gertrude dusted the light grey flakes from her shoulders, wondering where all the snow had come from. She had never been very bright.”

Ah, much better! Except for the elimination of my central character. But I never liked her anyway.

Stupid transitions.

What do you lot find hardest about writing? For me it’s transitions and deadlines. That and the fact that non-paid writing (like blogging) is so much more fun than paid writing.

What? I’m supposed to be rewriting the great Australian Elvis fairy cricket monkey mangosteen knife fight novel right now? Me? I thought Maureen was taking care of that. No? Really? Huh. Well, that blows. Do you think Scalzi could do it then? Or Cory? They both write fast . . .

Important matters

1. I have been accused in certain circles (okay, in certain emails) of deliberately not mentioning the English win in the recent ODIs against Australia in New Zealand. So here you go, you whingeing poms:

    Yay, England for finally stringing together three wins in a row! Way to peak at the right time. Yes, you are now contenders for the World Cup next month. Go forth and be happy!

    It’s still only One-day cricket, but.

2. I’ve also been meaning to remonstrate with one Maureen Johnson who has let down her fellow pro writers by revealing one of the most closely guarded secrets of our trade. First it was Matthew Cheney, and now Maureen. When is this going to stop, people? Are you going to start selling your secret decoder rings to the punters? I hope you remember the sacred oathes you swore. Don’t forget that there will be repercussions!

3. I’ve also been asked why I think it’s okay to hurt Maureen Dowd’s feelings when I’m so precious about novelists’ feelings. To which I can only respond: Well, der. I am a novelist. Of course I’m more worried about our feelings. Besides it’s well known that columnists are made of much sterner stuff than thin-skinned novelists. They are mocked all the time and are well used to it. But every time a novelist is mocked a little piece of the world’s communal imagination disappears in a tiny puff of smoke. It’s on your own heads if you mock us.

The one exception is John Scalzi who has managed to maintain the thick hide of a columnist despite becoming a novelist. You can mock him as much as you want. He loves it!

4. Over in the magical land of livejournal, there’s some really fascinating discussions going on about urban fantasy and the demonisation of “normal”. I have much to say on this subject and am struggling to get them together in a way that makes sense to anyone but me. But they involve lots of thoughts about Pan’s Labyrinth and fairy tales.

5. I have discovered a good thing about the cold. When you fall over in the street, you’re so padded with gloves and coats and scarves and etc etc, that it doesn’t hurt!

6. Feel free to share some matters you consider important.

Reviews

The ethics of accepting free things for review is being debated amongst comic reviewers. Can you give an unbiased opinion about a book or comic or DVD or whatever if it’s a freebie? Etc etc blah blah blah.

Please! Of course, you can.

I have to admit I find this debate a bit yawn-worthy. Reviewers and critics have been getting stuff for free and then completely slamming the stuff they don’t like since the dawn of the printed word. If someone out there is giving only good reviews to the free stuff then they’re not worthy of the name “reviewer” or “critic”. They’re poorly paid advertising. Readers can tell the difference.

Colleen Mondor agrees the debate is pretty silly. She also makes a really excellent point over at Comics Worth Reading:

I am sure it is frustrating for creators to know their books (or comics) are being sent out there and then not hear anything from reviewers, but it is just one more step in the long frustrating game of publication. Honestly, I think writers should be glad that there are so many more venues for their books to be reviewed now then in the past —at least with the web you can get your work reviewed by literally hundreds of places, rather than relying on a very few the way it was twenty years ago. At least you have a decent shot to get some publicity.

This is so very true. In the last six months or so I’ve been finding accidentally stumbling across roughly a review a week of one of my books somewhere on the intramanets. Some are just a line or two, others are much longer. That’s a lot of talk about my books that would not have existed ten years ago. Or even five. Not all are positive, not all sites have a tonne of traffic. So they’re not generating oodles of sales. Doesn’t matter. It’s absolutely delicious to be able to read what my audience thinks. To have tangible proof that I have an audience. No matter how small.

I remember way back in 1993, at my very first science fiction convention, meeting a published writer who had already published five or six books. She told me one of the things she liked best about cons was getting to meet people who’d read her books. “Otherwise, I’d just be writing in a vacuum. Most of my books haven’t been reviewed anywhere.”

My eyes bugged out. It had never occurred to me that you could be a published author and not be reviewed. (It had never occurred to me that you could be a published writer and not be living on champagne, mangosteens, and caviar with rainbows of happiness cascading all around you.) Now, of course, I know better.

I’ve just finished a trilogy. The first book was widely reviewed in the offline press, the second book—not so much. I’ll be interested to see what happens with the third. I’ve heard that the longer a series goes on, the less you get reviewed. (You know, unless you’re J. K. Rowling.)

But I do know that even if I get no “official” reviews at all. There’ll still be online ones. There have already been a few. I came across the lastest one today. It’s from one of the regular commenters here, Rebecca, and it’s her very first book review. I think it’s excellent, but I’m incredibly biased. She says

Magic’s Child does everything I could have hoped for and more. If you aren’t already reading it, or on the waiting list to borrow my copy of Magic or Madness (hehe, I have a waiting list), then you should go out and get the books RIGHT NOW. Plus, Magic Lessons just came out in paperback. And so I must conclude that Magic’s Child is awesome and was an excellent, surprising, and exciting end to the trilogy (which, incidentally, I pulled an all-nighter to read. Yes–it’s that good 😀 ). Read it. Everyone. Now. 🙂

So, yeah, what Colleen said. This writer is very glad indeed that the intramawebbies has produced so many more venues for reviewing and talking about the things we love. Yay intramanets!

Monkey love

Scott just sent me this because we both love cricket and monkeys.1 It is the personification of our love. It makes me so happy!

Though I gotta say that’s a pretty suspicious looking bowling action. And why is the umpire lying on the ground? Because the monkey is totally using body line? Check it: the monkey’s aiming at their heads! Or perhaps because the monkey has used six different balls? That’s gotta be worse than ball tampering, right? Bad cheating monkey!

  1. He found it here, but I’d love to know the original source. [↩]

Maureen Dowd Makes Me Cranky

I am cranky. Two main things are contributing to this state.

1. As some of you may have noticed my site has been down on and off today. Grrr. Also for the last two days my email has been mostly down. Double Grr.

2. Maureen Dowd.

To try and uncranky myself I sat down to read today’s New York Times. I carefully skipped the newsy parts cause they often cause crankiness to multiply. Unfortunately, the first thing I read was Maureen Dowd’s breathtakingly stupid column about chicklit.

Bloody hell! What a morass of ignorance and misinformation. On the one hand, she’s trying to say that all chick lit sucks. On the other, she talks about books like Sylvia Plath’s The Belljar and Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet being rebranded in pink. Presumably, she does not think those texts are worthless.

As it happens many books are billed as chicklit that are not, and some that are, well, they’re very bloody good (Love Walked In for instance).

Dowd starts by talking about chicklit’s invasion of the serious adult literature shelves (Heels over Hemingway! Run for the hills!). But the only text she quotes is a young adult title, Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging. Of course it sounds young! Its protag is a teenager! It was written for the twelve years old and up market. It’s also bloody funny. But Dowd is too pure of mind to have noticed. Sloppy journalism much?

And then there’s this:

Giving the books an even more interchangeable feeling is the bacholerette party of log-rolling blurbs by chick-lit authors. Jennifer Good in Bed Weiner blurbs Sarah Mlynowski’s Me vs Me and Karen McCullah Lutz’s The Bachelorette Party. Lauren Weisberger blurbs Emily Something Borrowed Giffin.

Stop the bleeding presses. Someone in the same genre is blurbing someone else in the same genre? Oh. My. God. It must be stopped.

But wait! Here is the back of a Peter Carey book. He is blurbed by Salman Rushdie. They both write mainstream literature that gets reviewed and lauded by the NYT. They know each other! Another freaking conspiracy.

Hmm, I wonder why the publishing industry would do something so bizarre as have people in the same genre blurb each other? Could it be because folks who’ve read Jennifer Weiner are the folks likely to enjoy Sarah Mlynowski? And those who love Salman Rushdie may well get into Peter Carey? No, that can’t be it.

Here are my questions:

Why the endless deriding of this genre? Why aren’t there people getting het up about the pernicious influence of techno thrillers? Some of those are shockingly written, but I’ve never seen a columnist lose any sleep over how well those books sell, or the fact that they’re mostly written and read by men. In all genres there are many badly written books. Including mainstream literature. What makes chicklit so evil?

Also how come it counts as journalism to walk around a bookshop mouthing off ignorantly about a genre you know nothing about, grabbing three dozen of them to take home, flip through, and then mock in your newspaper column?

Why did it not occur to Dowd to interview some of the writers, editors, publishers and consumers of the genre? Or to ask them what their faves are and why? Too much hard work for you, Ms Dowd?

Why does Dowd not explain exactly what’s wrong with the existence of chicklit? I mean, seriously, what is the point of her column? Why is she so threatened by the colour pink?

Okay, that didn’t help. I’m still cranky.

I’ll be stomping off out of your way now.

A slight oversight

It has been brought to my attention that the US paperback of Magic Lessons—the middle-but-still-loved book of the trilogy—is now available and has been for a week.

So, um, if you’re a paperback kind of a person—there you go! The first two volumes are now in the cheaper and more portable version.

And if you see or have seen copies out in the wild please to let me know. Because, as I’ve mentioned it’s been too cold for me to leave the flat. I mean it’s still in the minuses. I need positives before I’ll venture out there. (Today a piece of ice fell onto our window sill. That is a thousand kinds of wrong.)

I should also mention that the paperback edition is the authorised-with-way-less-typoes version. You know, if that kind of thing matters to you.

It does to me.

I’m obsessed with getting rid of all possible typoes and other whoopsies from my books. Unfortunately, in order to do that I have to go over them a lot. And, well, if you write a book you’ve been over it close to a billion times before it gets into print. Once it’s in print the very last thing in the world you want to do is read it again. So typo elimination is an onerous task.

Which is to say, should you ever find any typoes in any of my books please let me know so I can get them corrected for the next edition.

I know I’m not the only one driven insane by typoes. Nor am I the only writer who is unfond of re-reading my writing. Step up and confess, people. You write but you don’t like to read it, do you? And typoes? They’re a sharp pain in your side, aren’t they?

How to reconcile the two?

Excuse the digression. My point was: Magic Lessons out now in paperback. Please to add to your collection. Or suggest your library do so. I need new shoes!

Oh happy day!

I just found out that Penguin Australia has moved forward the publication of Magic’s Child. Instead of September, it’s going to be out in April. That’s right, only two months away instead of seven. Brilliant, eh?

It’s especially great since I go home in early May. This will be the first time I’ve been in Australia when one of my books just came out. Yay!

And they’ll be keeping the US cover:

How gorgeous is that? Very. It’s even more beautimous in three dimensions. I know this because Razorbill (my US publisher) just couriered across a copy of it. I’ve held Magic’s Child in my hands and caressed it. The colours are even richer, and the title has sweet, sweeet embossing. Woo hoo!

So there you have it. The US edition in hardcover will be out in March and the Australian in paperback in April. Followed by all three books in Thailand in October. Then all three come out in Germany in 2008 with two month gaps between each one.1 World domination is nearly mine!

  1. As soon as I have release dates on the other editions I’ll let you know. [↩]

Calling all Melbournites

A friend from the frozen north, Chris McLaren, is choofing off to Melbourne soon and will have a whole day to spare for sightseeing. What should he see? And will he be able to see anything given the bushfires?

I recommended the Croft Institute because it has test tubes in it and they make me happy.

He would welcome any advice, recommendations and warnings about the fair city of Melbourne from actual Melbournites.

An interview and some questions

Adrienne Martini interviewed me for Bookslut about Daughters of Earth and Battle of the Sexes. Go have a squiz. Co-incidentally Martini was just interviewed by Scalzi and it made me want to read her book.

The questions:

If Stephen Colbert shook your hand today would you ever wash it again? Just wondering.1

Is Diana Wynne Jones’s latest book, The Pinhoe Egg, her best in years?2 Oh, you know it is. That book made me so happy!

  1. Not that I have any plans of washing while it’s still winter. What if the hot water cuts out while I’m all soaped up? I’ll wash again in June when I leave the flat again. [↩]
  2. Not that the last few books were bad in any way, shape or form—I don’t believe that she could write a bad book—they were just less genius-y than my faves of hers. [↩]

Best movie of all time

For ages people have been telling me that I have to see Lagaan. Well, now I have. And everyone’s right. It is the best movie of all time. No contest.

It has everything that should be in a movie: cricket, the British are the baddies, more cricket, dancing, singing, a love triangle, and more cricket. Lagaan is perfect. (Well, it could have been longer with a wee bit more cricket and a few more songs, but other than that—perfect.)

At least seventy minutes of the movie is a cricket match. How did that make any sense to American viewers? Cause most of the folks who’ve recommended it have been yanquis who know nothing about the noble game. How did you keep track of the balls and overs? How did you even realise

S
P
O
I
L
E
R

that Bhuvan wasn’t out at the end cause the evil bastard captain had stepped over the boundary when he took the catch?

Also what was it like not getting all the cool little cricket history references?

I mean the actor cast as the big baddie captain even looks like Douglas Jardine (or at least he looks like Hugo Weaving playing Douglas Jardine in Bodyline—same thing). And he certainly behaves like Douglas Jardine. Right down to stretching the ethical limits of the game to breaking point. And then there was the fabulous homage to Baloo Palwankar with the untouchable spinner. Fabulous stuff.

Sigh. And now I believe I will watch it again.

Shiny, shiny, new!

There’s a lot of unwisdom about publishing (and pretty much everything else) out there on the mighty intramanets. Fortunately wise folks like Holly Black are battling the unwisdom with wisdom:

I’ve noticed there is a trend to believe that a writer should get their first book out by any means necessary—that even paying to be published is establishing a “track record” that will impress future publishers. Scam publishers claim it all the time, but the claim has been made so many times that it’s trickled down into being part of aspiring novelist folklore.

Don’t believe it. A track record tells the publisher what to expect from that author, which is why a poor track record is worse than none at all. Publishers are—like all entertainment—looking for the next big thing. Unpublished first novels are potential bestsellers just as much as they are potential anything else. That’s why “debut novel” sounds exciting and “sophmore novel” sounds, well, less exciting. Publishers aren’t looking for a track record. They are looking for a great book that they can sell like crazy.

Publishing is a greedy, greedy machine that is always looking for shiny, shiny new authors! I know that’s hard to believe when you’re struggling to be published, but agents want to find new clients, editors want to find new authors, and publishers are desperate for the next Harry Potter, or Da Vinci Code, or whatever. And they don’t necessarily want it to be exactly like those books, they just want it to sell like those books.

Published writers sometimes complain about up-and-coming writers getting all the attention. “I’ve published six books now! But do I get the advances of that shiny new author? No, I do not! Where’s the justice?”

Those complaints are just as silly as the unpublished writers who are convinced the big New York houses are uninterested in new talent. You might have puny advances now, but you don’t know what’s ahead. Lots of authors who’ve had a bunch of not particularly successful books go on to have hits. Dan Brown is a good example. So is my old man. Scott’s first New York Times bestseller was his thirteenth book (under his own name). And Robin Hobb is a fabulous example of how to resuscitate a failing career.1 Sales taking a nose dive? Then publish under a different name.

Obviously, not every published author is going to have the career of a Brown or a Hobb or a Westerfeld. The thing is though that you never know who’s going to have that break out book. It could happen to you. And if it doesn’t happen with the first book, it could with the thirteenth. Or when you change your name, or switch genres.

You can find examples of every kind of publishing success story if you look hard enough. First time young novelist makes it big. First time old novelist who ditto. Overnight success story. Writer who has been plugging away forever is finally published with a huge advance, a big Hollywood deal, as well as graphic novel adaptation, and a Broadway musical. Many are the paths to publishing success.2 It’s good to keep that in mind while you struggle.

Twenty years passed between my first submission to a pro adult market and my first sale. I aimed to be published by the time I was 18, then by the time I was 20, then by the time I was 25, then 30. All those ages zoomed by without publication. My first pro sale came when I was 35. By then I had long since stopped aiming to be an S. E. Hinton or Thomas Chatterton and switched to modelling myself on writers who didn’t sell until later in life, like Elizabeth Jolly and James Tiptree, Jr.

That’s the beauty of publishing, unlike dance or any sport, there is a role model for you no matter how old or young you are, no matter what circumstances you’re writing in. And you don’t even have to give up hope on your deathbed cause there are plenty of posthumous publishing successes as well.

See? In the world of publishing there can even be a bright side to death.

  1. Failing in terms of sales, not artistically—I’m a fan of the Lindholm books. [↩]
  2. And, yes, many are the paths to publishing failure. But let’s not go there, eh? This is me in Pollyanna the glad girl mode. [↩]

Cold

I have been whingeing more than somewhat about the cold since we landed in NYC. As I type this it’s -9 (15.7F) outside and the winds are howling. Both of which strikes me as just plain wrong.

But rather than focuss on the utter misery and horror of it, I’m trying to think of some positives. Like, um, er, ah, um, . . . Okay, I got nothing. I can think of nothing good about weather this cold.

Can any of you help me? Do any of you like the cold? See something positive about it? Do please share. Because I haven’t left the flat since Friday and I’m kind of not planning to until we get to June and warmth.

Give me a reason to go outside. A good reason.

Hollywood sucks: a rant

On the plane from Sydney to NYC, I watched a lot of films and most of them were awful. Especially The Departed. Once again, I sat there, jaw dropping, thinking this is what racks up gazillions of award nominations? What are they seeing that I am not? Am I the only one who cares that no one’s motivations make any sense? That there are plot holes so deep and wide you could ride all the world’s horses through them?

Warning: Spoilers follow.

Not that you will care within about ten minutes of the film starting. Frankly I was hoping they would all die. It was the only way in which the film gratified my wishes.

Like why would you, on finally (at long bloody last) figuring out who the bad guy is, go arrest him yourself? Why would you not take the ample evidence you had straight to the authorities? Or at least go arrest him with lots of back up? Why do female psychiatrists in Hollywood movies have absolutely no ethics and sleep with their patients within seconds of meeting them? And why are they not in the slightest bit conflicted by this?

(Side questions: Why did all the white lead males under forty look and talk exactly like one another? I could not tell them apart!)

There were no real people in The Departed. Not one. Maybe that’s what the title really refers to: the departure of charcterisation and coherent plot. None of them had families. None of them had remotely believable pasts. They only existed—and that barely—for the duration of the movie. It wasn’t a movie. It was a shell of a simulacrum of an impression of the photocopy of an idea of a movie.

There’s a reason films and television like this spawn no fanfic. There’s no there there for fans to run and play with. Everything is cardboard. Shiny cardboard with way-too-white teeth.

I also saw Miami Vice which was just as ludicrous. Colin Farrell wins my award for worst American accent ever. But at least it was cheerfully and colourfully stupid and way more stuff blew up.

If I hadn’t seen Pan’s Labyrinth and The Queen recently I’d be concluding that all movies suck. (You know, just like all those folks who conclude that all YA sucks after reading one Gossip Girl book.) But wait a second. They’re not Hollywood films, are they?

Why does Hollywood keep spending gazillions of dollars making so-called A grade movies that make no sense at all, are badly written, cliche ridden, and boring, and why does it keep giving such train wrecks a gold statue with no penis? I’m looking at you, Crash.

I can’t remember the last time I genuinely enjoyed a Hollywood A grade prestige flick. Quite frankly I’ve reached the point where I will never spend money on such movies again. Bugger ’em. I’ll stick to the much-better B grade and independent and non-USian films from now on. Some of them will suck too, but not in the same glossy, vampiric, scary simulacra way that the Hollywood monstrosities do. A pox on the lot of them and their shiny interchangeable stars.

Gah!

Love of writing

Doris Egan has a lovely essay about writing from the heart that explains that it does not mean writing drippy and sentimental (unless, you know, that’s your heart’s desire), but allowing yourself to write what you want to write without second guessing yourself.

I have heard people object to the idea that you should write what you love on the grounds that some people have no talent and no taste and what they love is too hideous for words.

Leaving aside how subjective the idea of talent and taste are, why can’t people without either write if they want to? Who are they harming? (Other than the eyes and brains of those who read the slush pile, but they knew the dangers when they took on the job.)

Lots of people write who have no intention of ever being published or becoming a pro writer. Why shouldn’t they? I like to dance, but I’m not ever going to make a living at it.

Sure there are lots of people who try to become pro writers and don’t succeed. There are lots of actors, singers, musicians and dancers who are unable to support themselves doing it. So they find other ways to make a living, but keep on doing what it is that they love.

I know I talk here a lot about writing as a profession. That’s because I’m a pro writer and the realities of that concern me greatly. But if I stop being able to make a living at it, I will not stop writing. This isn’t just how I earn my money, it’s a huge part of who I am. Most of my writing life has been spent unpublished and without an audience. It never stopped me.

I love writing. If you love it, no matter how talentless others might consider you, then write.

RW8: Killing the dogs

Ariel

would like to hear more about your early childhood experiences in the Australian bush.

Katerate seconded this request.

My parents are anthropologists. And so a chunk of my childhood was spent on aboriginal settlements in the Northern Territory of Australia.

It’s the part of my childhood I remember most vividly and it gave Reason some of her background. The opening of Magic Lessons is a direct rip of my own memories:

Sarafina held up the cards with one hand, waving flies away and patting one of the dogs with the other. They were good dogs and knew enough not to try stealing any of the women’s meat. At least not while the women were looking. Besides, they were allowed to snatch up the discarded guts.

There were dogs everywhere. Running in packs. We kids would play with them and sometimes it felt like they were keeping an eye on us. You know, like lots of Lassies saving lots of Jimmys from falling down wells. Except without actual wells.

Someone decided there were too many dogs. I don’t know who. Someone from the government, maybe. Like the health department or something. Anyway they decided the dogs had to be culled. They rounded most of the dogs up and shot them.

I didn’t see any of it. I hid in the caravan. But I heard the shots and the yelps. I’m sure I must’ve been upset, but I don’t remember that. This is not a traumatic memory.

What I remember is my sister going out and looking at the dead dogs. Not in a morbid way. She must’ve been like three or something. She was just curious. I remember feeling really ashamed that I was too scared to look at them. My three-year-old sister was braver than me.

The dogs were buried and soon the survivors were running around like nothing had happened. And so, I guess, were we.

Not everything bad that happens in your childhood is a trauma, sometimes it’s just part of the soup you’re floating in.

Woo hoo!

Both Magic Lessons and Daughters of Earth have made the the Locus Recommended Reading list. Scott also makes an appearance with not one, not two, but three of his books making the cut: The Last Days, Specials and Blue Noon.

Then there’s my compatriots Margo Lanagan (making four appearances) and Gath Nix. Others on the list that I’ve read and loved are the two stories from Christopher Rowe, as well as Julie Phillips’ Tiptree biography, Ellen Kushner’s Privilege of the Sword and Naomi Novik’s Temeraire. Woo hoo! If you haven’t read these you really need to.

I’m sure there are other wonderful books and stories on there, but I confess I haven’t read hardly any of them. I am bad.

In other news UK author Kevin Wignall of Contemporary Nomad likes Magic or Madness and Magic Lessons. Check it out! Though Oz English is not a dialect of Pom English. No way!

This has been a very head-swelling year thus far. May it keep on keeping on!

RW7: Inspiration

Little Willow asks:

What inspires you to write?

This is one of those questions that make me go all monosyllabic1 and grunty and I-dunno, I-dunno, I-dunno. Cause most of the time I have no idea where story ideas come from. None.

But sometimes I know exactly where. Like the Magic or Madness trilogy which began something like this:

I was reading a fantasy novel that suddenly took a turn for the deeply lame. So lame that I wound up throwing it across the room. Here’s what caused the book hurlage:

“I am in trouble!” quoth the hero. “Fortunately I have a magic pill of trouble-destroying properties! I will swallow it! All will be well.”2

This reader couldn’t swallow it. I was so cranky I started writing a book of my own. One where the magic wasn’t there to fix every problem the hero (or author) encounters; a book where, indeed, magic is the problem. That book became Magic or Madness.

It probably reflects poorly upon me that I am more inspired by books I hate than books I love. Sigh.

But I’m not alone, am I? Someone tell me I’m not alone . . .

  1. Don’t you love how the word for speaking in one syllable words has many syllables? [↩]
  2. No, I will not name the book. You people know the drill. [↩]

That word does not mean what you think it means

This one breaks my brain.

From the Sydney Morning Herald the Australian cricket team responds to accusations of being arrogant, rude, sledging bastards:

“The way I look at cricket, you do everything possible to win. Some people like the verbal side of the game, some don’t, but you just get one with what your job. I take what Vincent is saying as a backhanded compliment.”

Hayden, Clark’s Australian teammate, was equally indignant.

“If he considers that to be the case, I’m not unhappy about it, to be honest,” Hayden said. “It’s a great clash between New Zealand and Australia and long may it continue. It doesn’t matter what sport—we could be playing kick a cockroach from here to the wall and we’d want to be competitive.”

You know last time I looked “indignant” meant “cranky”, “pissed off”, “ropeable”. It did not mean “bemused”.

Talk about sloppy journalism of the let’s-try-to-manufacture-controversy-even-if-the-quotes-don’t-fit variety. That or the journo truly doesn’t know what “indignant” means. Well, whoever wrote that, I am indignant at your use of the word indignant.

Though maybe they were just being a smartarse? Cause Hayden is just as indignant as Clarke, i.e. not at all.

RW6: Sydney and New York

Orangedragonfly wants to know

When you are in sydney, what do you miss most about new york?

and (of course) when you are in new york, what do you miss most about sydney?

My answer is much the same for both questions: above everything else I miss my family and my friends. My parents live in Sydney so when I’m there I don’t miss them, but I do miss my sister who lives in Los Angeles. So I miss her and my parents when I’m in New York.

I mentioned in an earlier post that no matter where I am I’m always missing someone. That’s pretty much a definition of what it is to be human. Even the most stay-at-home types have friends and family who have moved away. And people we love die. We’re always missing them as well.

I’ve yet to get truly homesick for New York City, the way I do for Sydney. When I’m not in the big apple it’s pretty much out of sight, out of mind (except my friends, natch!). But sometimes my homesickness for Sydney is a physical ache. I long for the smell of it. Truly, Sydney is one of the best smelling cities I’ve ever known. I miss the light and the big skies. I miss the easiness of it. It’s where I’ve spent the majority of my life. I know how Sydney works; I’m not sure I’ll ever really know NYC so intimately.

Which is not to say that NYC isn’t wonderful. It is in many many ways. Almost four years back I wrote a Sydney/New York City comparison. Most of it is still holds true. There are many, many things that NYC does a lot better than Sydney. But Sydney is my heart, NYC isn’t.

Magic’s Child anxiety

Tansy Rayner Roberts has reviewed Magic’s Child for As If: Australian Speculative Fiction in Focus. Be warned: it’s deeply spoilerific.

Roberts enjoyed Magic’s Child as much as Mr Doctorow of boingboing did:

Magic’s Child, like the other two books in Larbalestier’s Magic or Madness trilogy, is one of those clever novels that, because it is so easy and enjoyable to read, might fool you into thinking it is slight when it is actually rich with dark ideas and chewy themes. The series is also great entry level speculative fiction, heartily recommended as a way to introduce non-fantasy readers into the genre.

My books are gateway drugs! Woo hoo!

I’m as chuffed by this review as I was by Roberts’ review of Magic Lessons and for similar reasons. Once again she’s pointed out a few things about the book and the trilogy that I hadn’t noticed. Cool, eh? But I can’t discuss ’em on account of most people haven’t read it yet. Remind me in a few weeks!

Because it was such a difficult book to write, it’s not only a relief to be getting positive responses, but a bit of a shock. I have no perspective on Magic’s Child. None at all. I’m not sure I’ll be able to read it again.1 The writing and rewriting of it (especially the ending—how many endings were there? Do not ask!) was fraught and ugly and brain destroying.

That folks are enjoying it is huge compensation for those dismal days. It’s even more pleasing that no one (so far) has accused me of doing a Pullman ripping them off with a crappy unsatisfying ending.

Because that’s the other big fear: Does the ending work? The biggest complaints about series and trilogies is that the ending ends more whimpery than bang-y, or goes off somewhere new and unprepared for, that it does not resolve all that was set up in the earlier books. I’ve been that ripped-off reader; I did not like the idea of perpetrating the rip off.

Of course it’s all early days. Magic’s Child isn’t out till March. Plenty of time for readers to hate it!

We writers are hopeless. Sensitive and crazy overprotective about our books. Melina Marchetta expresses it perfectly. When a new book comes out:

  1. You want to be very cool and say that you love your novel and are very proud of it, and if your readers don’t feel the same way, that’s fine. First big lie. You want everyone to love it.

  2. You tell everyone that a bad review doesn’t affect you because you know other people (your mum) loved the story. Second big lie. I received a really bad Jellicoe review and I spoke about the fact that I wasn’t going to speak about it for days and days (but it was a very very mean spirited review).

  3. You tell a friend that it’s okay that they’ve never read any of your novels. Third big lie. When they’ve read that mumbo jumbo Ulysees and forced you to read Camus, then the least they can do is get the DVD out and pretend they’ve read one of your novels.

And as I said I’m particularly nervous about the reception of Magic’s Child. If me the author don’t know how I feels about it, then how can others love the poor wee thing? (Yes, I am aware of the many logical fallacies here. Not least that how I feel about the book is entirely immaterial to how anyone else feels about it. I did say we writers are hopeless, didn’t I?)

Well, these people seem to like it. Phew!

  1. Except the epilogue. I’m dead fond of the epilogue. The glossary and acknowledgments aren’t bad neither. Though I’m ashamed I forgot to thank all my English teachers from primary and high school. What was I thinking? [↩]