Cool links (Updated)

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

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

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

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

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

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

A Lack of Musings

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

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

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

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

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

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

Busy

I was asked yesterday what I’m looking forward to when I get back home. I answered, “cricket, warm weather, and seeing my family and friends”. But, obviously, not necessarily in that order. It occurred to me today that I’m also looking forward to not being so busy or surrounded by so many busy, busy, busy people.

New York’s just like that. You invite people to a party here and a bunch of them won’t even respond: they won’t say they’ll be there, they won’t say they can’t make it, and then they won’t show up. It’s not because they hate you. It’s just because they’re busy, overwhelmed, drowning. And when I’m here I wind up just as busy, just as behind with everything, unable to get all my work done, see all my friends, do all the cool things that I’ve heard rumours can be done in NYC.

It’s not that we’re not busy in Sydney. I’m a feelancer. My workload’s pretty much the same wherever I am. It’s not that I don’t have lots of busy friends there—hey Kate! It’s just that, I don’t know, busy is bigger in New York City. Wider. Denser. Hungrier.

Sydney’s slower, calmer, and much more relaxing. I can’t wait to get back there.

My World Fantasy Con Schedule (updated)

Only two panels, so there’ll be heaps of time to hang out in the bar. Woo hoo!

Thursday 2:00-3:00PM
Gender-Bending Fantasy (Capitol A)
Inhabitants of fantastic worlds typically disregard the laws of physics, and frequently re-cast societal norms to fit an un-earthly reality. This panel will discuss recent fantasy fiction that challenges assumptions of sex and gender.
Terry A. Garey, Ellen Klages, Justine Larbalestier(M), Diane Martin, Jill Roberts

Friday 12:00-1:00PM
Images of Women in Fantasy Literature (Capitol A)
The home of WisCon, Madison is the center for feminism in fantasy and science fiction. We will discuss the roles women have had in fantasy since Tolkien. Fantasy has become populated with women, finally, but are they realistic women who provide good role models? Can modern feminist ideals be successfully inserted into a medieval story? What are the best examples of a feminist character in fantasy?
Kate Elliott, Anne Harris, Graham Joyce, Justine Larbalestier, Jane Lindskold

Update: Turns out that Megan McCarron’s WFC schedule is way cooler than mine. I’m so jealous! (Except for the Clarion one. Never went to Clarion, me.)

I’m so miserable

I can’t do this. I can’t do freezing cold weather. I can’t. We just walked four blocks through icy wind and some sleet and it makes we want to curl up in a ball and cry and cry. I’m never ever ever staying this late in the Northern hemsphere. From now on at the very very most it’ll be June to September.

As Elvis is my witness I will never be cold again!

Yummy Yuba

Last night I tried fresh yuba for the very first time and it were sublime.


photo swiped from this site

I also ate the best edamame I’ve ever had (fresh and smoky), sake (unfiltered milky goodness), and chestnut icecream (words fail me).

The meal ended twelve hours ago, but I’m still in heaven just remembering all the flavours: eel stuffed with fresh tofu, skirt steak cooked in miso with enoki mushrooms, black sesame ice cream.

Food is good. Life is good.

Move along, people

There are no pictures of Daniel Vettori posted on this blog, with or without his shirt on. So all you folks googling “Daniel Vettori no shirt” or “Daniel Vettori sexy” can just move along to say here. And really, people, Daniel Vettori is not sexy. Michael Holding or Keith Miller now that’s sexy.

Mangosteen

Marrije asks what a mangosteen is. No words can convey the glory of the mangosteen. Instead I offer you this photograph:


which I swiped from dunnowhere ages ago stupidly forgetting to get the photographer’s name. Whoever took this: it’s © you.

Writers are the Best Whingers

Just read and giggled all over this post by Diana Peterfreund in which she wittily whinges about all the work she has to do (and skewers Star Wars). It struck a chord cause I was just about to whinge about the pageproofs of Daughters of Earth which just landed in my life with a very heavy thunk.

Aaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!

Diana (I’m taking liberties referring to her by first name, I don’t actually know her, but I read her fabbie blog, so I feel like I know her) starts by referring to a harder working writer who has family on top of it all, whereas Diana just has her sailor boy and a full-time job. I’m going to lower the bar still further: I have neither children nor pets nor a job (other than writing).

And yet I feel my case is worse than either of theirs because I am suffering (horribly) from post-paradise-adjustment syndrome (or ppas). Just days ago I was in Mexico living an admin-free existence: no shopping, no housecleaning, no dishwashing, no cooking, no laundry, no paying bills, no nothing—except writing. Luz Barron did all that for me, not to mention telling me excellent stories, mending my clothes (!), and taking me out to all the best fun bars in San Miguel. Luz made me food like this:


Mushroom-stuffed chillies on tomatoes & onions served with plantain & pomegranate & garlic rice.

Now I’m back in reality, but where is the counselling and social services team to help me through my ppas? No where! How am I supposed to cope without Luz? How am I supposed to live in the real world where I have to finish Magic! Magic! Magic! Oi! Oi! Oi, the third Magic or Madness book, go through the staggeringly long Daughters proofs, finish the great Australian mangosteen cricket Elvis fairy book, write the proposal for this jaw-droppingly brilliant idea I just had and do all that adminy stuff!? How is that possible?!

You know I used to have no sympathy for rich folk like Paris Hilton et al, what with their silver spoons wedged firmly down their throats. Rich bastards, I used to think, but now I know the truth: without their staff they’re helpless. Look what happens when someone like Paris takes dressing into her own hands. Not pretty, is it? Imagine her trying to get it together to make her own coffee. Or figure out how a washing machine works. Wow. Her life is really, really hard. Not quite as hard as mine given that she’s still in paradise and not in the land of ppas. But how much worse will it be for poor old Paris when her fall comes? How hideous will her ppas be?

Makes ya think, don’t it?

ball go fast

One of the freebie books I picked up in Atlantic City is The Believer Book of Writers Talking to Writers. In the intro it mentions that one of the interviews was conducted at a cricket match. So what did I do next? I leafed through every interview until I found that one, which turned out to be Adam Thirlwell talking to Tom Stoppard. But, here’s what a cricket tragic am I—once I got to the interview I skimmed impatiently through discussions of how Stoppard conceives and writes his plays, of Ionesco and Sappho and 9/11 and blah blah bloody blah, trying to find where they talk about the cricket being played in front of them.

I was beginning to think very poorly of Thirlwell and Stoppard. Very poorly indeed. How could you be at a match and discuss all sorts of arty farty blather, but not the actual cricket? How is that possible? For the love of Keith Miller!

Fortunately after pages of blather they finally get to the point, Stoppard applauds—“Oh that’s a just beautiful shot”—but then, horrifyingly fast, they reveal themselves as non-Cricket tragics. Thirlwell fails to discuss said cover drive and Stoppard says that:

Cricket seemed more or less pointless to me if you weren’t actually a wicket-keeper . . . It’s partly to do with the fact that every ball is frightening, if you’re keeping wicket, because there’s a good chance that you’ll have to deal with it if the batsman doesn’t. And, as you know, when it comes to catches being offered, probably three out of five go to the wicket-keeper, generally. So you feel that there’s a lot of responsibility on you, and one is constantly frightened of publicly shaming oneself—by dropping an easy catch or missing an easy stumping—which of course happened to me all the time, but nevertheless that’s what I liked doing.

While I, too, am fascinated by the wicketkeeper, I’m shocked that anyone could disparage all other fielders. I mean to say! What about the slips cordon? Silly mid on? Long leg? I’m not sure I feel quite the same way about Tom Stoppard now . . .

I heart Peter Roebuck

I’m not sure I’ve mentioned how much I adore cricket writer, Peter Roebuck. Mostly it’s cause his over-the-top metaphors and similies crack me up. He funny (and I can never tell whether it’s on purpose or not).

I’m frequently asked why I love the game of cricket so much. It’s a hard question to answer because there are so many answers. One of them has to do with the complex and fascinating history of the game and the countries it’s played in, which Mr Roebuck sums up in his latest piece for the Sydney Morning Herald in a satisfyingly overblown way:

In many respects, cricket is the most unruly of games. Consider its component parts. Ten teams play Test cricket. Two of them have been at loggerheads and sometimes war for 50 years. Two have suffered massacres ignored by the rest of the world, the victims being Ndebele and Tamil. One nation has been bankrupted by a wicked Stalinist, another is ruled by a military dictator. One country is emerging from centuries of racist rule, another lives on the breadline. The West Indies does not even exist. Endlessly frightened Australia is fighting an illegal war and passing disturbing legislation. England is torn between Europe and isolation. Until last week, New Zealand was a haven of sanity.

Enjoy!

Oh, and if anyone can tell me why New Zealand is no longer a “haven of sanity”—I’m all ears. Bonus points for anyone who can identify all of the countries mentioned.

Wow

So, last night we got to hang out with the smartest group of folks I’ve hung out with in an age (and I hang with much smartness, let me tell you). At the Teen section of Elizabeth Library, New Jersey, we read a little bit, we told anecdotes, got asked very smart and very funny questions, I got to talk Spanish, and afterwards we got to eat great pasta and drink good wine and enjoy more ace conversation.

I read from my great Australian cricket mangosteen Elvis fairy novel, which I feared would tank with the seventeen-year-olds, but they laughed harder than the Brooklyn audience. Yay! I finally wrote something that cracks people up. And some of them knew about cricket. One guy plays it with his Pakistani neighbours. How cool is that? And many loved basketball and knew about the WNBA, not just the NBA! Heaven.

Scott read from Pretties which kind of tanked, and then from Peeps, which went over huge guns. He read about toxoplasma and there was much speculation about who has the parasite and who doesn’t. (Don’t know what I’m talking about? Then you’ll have to read the book, won’t you?) So many of them had read at least one of Scott’s books. One had read all of them and was full of smart questions. I made Scott do his Donald Duck voice and it slayed them best of all (he can harmonise with himself—next time you see him, just ask—he loves to perform on command). There was a queue of people wanting to have their photo taken with Scott. How fab is that?

And at the end, the library gave everyone a copy of one of my books (they had a choice of Magic or Madness or Magic Lessons—yup, Penguin genorously gave them a whole stack of galleys) and one of Scott’s many books. Though some tried sneakily to take two of Scott’s books. The competition over copies of Peeps was intense. We signed for all of them and thus got to talk one on one to everyone. Great idea, no? It was fabulous fun and I want to do it again.

Have I ever mentioned how much I love libraries? And librarians? And people who love libraries and librarians? No? Well, I really, really, really do.

Atlantic City? No, thanks. (updated)

I don’t want to rubbish a whole city, especially when I was only there for a few hours, but Atlantic City is an erky perky bleah of a place. Friends warned me it was a shithole—I had no idea they were being kind. It’s ugly, full of the most hideous buildings ever built and populated by zombie gamblers, who are served by an army of twelve-year-old incompetent staff. Once you’re inside one of the casinos it’s almost impossible to get out again. All signs lead to more gambling areas. I’m convinced that hell will be nothing but Atlantic City casinos.

This is heresy for an Australian, but, I hate gambling. I love cards and I’ll bet on them, but not with money. Never for money. Betting with money turns people into glassy-eyed zombies, and call me old-fasthioned, but I prefer my zombies in Romero films, thank you very much.

So why were we in Atlantic City? To attend the New Atlantic Independent Booksellers book fair, which other than its location in a hellspawn casino, was a lot of fun. We met the fabulous Penguin reps, Holly and Todd, who looked after us excellently well and told great publishing stories; we hung out with fellow YA writers, Maureen Johnson and Melissa Kantor; we both signed a bunch of our books, Peeps and Magic or Madness, and we snaffled up many free books. The gems of my pile—other than Maureen’s and Melissa’s books—were:

Small Steps by Louis Sachar, which is the sequel to Holes! Woo hoo! I have the sequel to Holes and you don’t! Ha! Ha! Ha!

The Weather Makers by Tim Flannery. I adore Flannery. He’s frequently interviewed back home about science and enviromental issues and is the smartest, most interesting, and clearest explainers of such issues I’ve ever heard. He also writes really, really well. I can’t wait to read this one, not least because I know it’s going to help me understand what happened with hurricane Katrina.

Today, we go back to New Jersey:

7:00-8:30PM
Elizabeth Main Library
11 S. Broad St., Elizabeth
New Jersey

We’ll probably read and we’ll definitely chat and generally be our entertaining selves. We’ve only done one library event before but it was fabulous, so I’m really looking forward to this.

Oh, and if you’re from Atlantic City? My condolences.

Update: I am very stupid. I wrote a blog entry about casinos, but my spam filter is set to nuke any comments that contain the word “casino”. I apologise to anyone who had their comment nuked. You can post now. Though given the vast tide of casino spam I get your comment will go through to moderation, which I truly rooly honestly will check. Rooly soon.

Another late night post

On account of tomorrow we is off to Atlantic City for the book fair and then to Philadelphia to stay with the fabulous Liz Gilbert this is another hasty late night post. Not that it’s so very late, it just feels like it on account of Scott and me did our debut Brooklyn readings tonight at the Barbes Bar. Many of our friends came (yay them!) and there were actual total strangers (yay them, too!). Twas a blast. For the first time ever I actually enjoyed reading. How bout that? Scott read great in his Texan accent and Bennett Madison was most funny, too.

Highlight of the night: the youngest member of the audience coming up to me to tell me that she loved the bit I read from my as-yet-unfinished great Australian YA cricket fairy mangosteen novel. She told me what her fairy is and those of various members of her family. Then when I said I didn’t have a fairy, she said, “Yes, you do! You have the good-story fairy.” Isn’t that lovely? I was so touched I almost got teary. Sadly, I was too over-energised from reading to remember her name, but if you’re reading this: thank you! It meant a lot to me.

Back in the US of A (briefly)

After a month of no motorised transport there was a vast deal today. Cars, planes, taxis. We went from San Miguel to Mexico City to New York City. We are tired. Tomorrow there will be trains: to Brooklyn and back (see previous post). The day after that buses to Atlantic City. It’ll be broom broom broom all the time. I will pine for walks on cobble-stoned streets.

Since I promised Cherie that I’d blog every day once I left Mexico. I’m blogging at this late hour despite fatigue. How good am I? Say thank you, Cherie. Also tomorrow seems to be too chockers for blogging so I thought I’d sneak it in early.

Things that i achieved in San Miguel:

photos of hummingbirds
grew actual fingernails
50 thousand words of final Magic or Madness book
Scott and me arranged mercy killing of one tiny, tiny, very hungry, very lame kitten (I’d tell you more but I’d start crying)

Things that have happened in the world in my absence that aren’t horrible and tear-inducing:

Australia thrashed the World XI in one-day fixtures and look well placed in one-off six-day test, mostly on account of the glories of the spin twins Warne and MacGill

My sister had her time working on King Kong extended—Yay!!!

I’m sure there were other things but I’m too tired to think.

Sleep now.

Teen Read Week

Next week is Teen Read Week and me and Scott will be doing a bunch of readings and signings around the traps.

First up, the very day after we get back from Mexico, so expect us to be full of Mexican cheer (I plan to wear my Mexican cowboy hat and may do the entire reading in Spanish):

Sunday 16 October, 6:00PM
Justine Larbalestier
Bennett Madison
Scott Westerfeld
Barbès Reading Series
376 Ninth Street (at 6th Ave.)
Barbès Bar
Park Slope, Brooklyn
New York

I’ll be reading from Magic Lessons the sequel to Magic or Madness in a way that gives absolutely nothing away if you haven’t read the first book. I’ll also read a wee bit from a brand-new novel I’ve been working on. Scott will read from Peeps in his authentic Texan accent.

Monday 17 October
New Atlantic Independent Bookseller Association Trade Show
The Tropicana Resort & Casino
Brighton & The Boardwalk
Atlantic City
2:30-3:00: Scott signs 75 copies of Peeps in the author autographing area table #3.
They’ll also be giving away copies of Magic or Madness at the Penguin booth #204. Yay! Free books! I plan to snaffle up many (though not my own book, obviously).

Tuesday 18 October, 5:30-7:30PM
Scott reads at Books of Wonder
18 West 18th St
Manhattan
New York

Wednesday 19 October, 7:00–8:30 p.m.
Author Event:
Meet Scott Westerfeld and Justine Larbalestier
Elizabeth Main Library
11 S. Broad St., Elizabeth
New Jersey

So, it’s quite the busy week for us. Hope we get to see some of you.

Cactusland

We went out to San Miguel’s botanical gardens, a large and beautiful cactus preserve. There have been many changes since the last time we visited in February 2004. First up there are new dunnies. La Bond and Mr Rowe will appreciate the difference. Eighteen months ago there was just one: a tiny tin shed without dunny paper or the ability to flush convincingly. Now it is a thing of splendour. Behold:

Also it comes complete with lovely guardian dog.

Last time we visited it hadn’t rained in months. This time it was autumn after much rain.

Before:

Now:

And the cactus is in bloom:

Remind me why we’re leaving again?

hummingbird or hoax?

I finally did it. I finally got a photo of a hummingbird. Hell, I got two. What kind of a genius, am I? And it required no patience or planning at all. I just happened to be in the kitchen with the camera.


You see it? There in the centre right of the photo, just behind the pale purple flowers.

No? Well how about in this photo:

This time look just left of the pale purple flowers.

Okay then, here’s the first photo again, but this time cropped with the hummingbird dead centre:

And the second, also cropped and in the centre:

See it? Isn’t that cool? You don’t see it? Look closer, damn it! See the grey blur? See the wings? That’s the hummingbird. Bloody hell, those buggers move fast! More than a gazillion wing beats per minute, I reckon.

And you know what? I don’t care if you can’t see the hummingbird. I know it’s there. That’s all that matters. I have achieved the one thing I came to San Miguel to achieve: I have taken a photo of a hummingbird.

I loves them. I do.

P.S. Top of my current want list? A decent digi camera. You know, with a zoom and stuff.

Little Gift

This morning a hummingbird hovered outside the window directly in front of me for more than ten seconds. I got to see the tiny bits of green mixed in with its grey and brown. I got to see just how fast its wings vibrate. How much slower the tail feathers move. How long and thin its beak. How tiny it is: smaller than the palm of my hand.

Patrick O’Leary is right, you cannot think ill of a hummingbird. I withdraw my earlier comments.

Everything here in San Miguel continues good and well. We continue to eat way too many pastries, particularly the ones with pecans. We continue to write many, many words. I think Scott’s book is his best YA yet. And I remain happy with my own.

I shall be sad to leave.

Cake, Champagne, Pamplonada

Still having fun, still writing up a storm. I believe I’m now a third of the way into Magic or Madness III (and, yes, I have my fingers crossed that, finally, one of the trilogy will have the preferred title: Magic! Magic! Magic! Oi! Oi! Oi!). Being a third in works out well as we’re now a third of the way into our stay here. How bout that?

Was me birthday last week and Luz’s lovely sister baked me a cake:

It was dead good. Champagne was drunk. Poker was played. Excellent presents were received. Not to mention all the wonderful birthday calls. And I wrote a bunch of words. Yay, me.

Also, just to add to the birthday celebrations ’twas the week of Pamplonada, the Mexican running of the bulls. This meant even more rockets going off than usual as well as lots of wealthy (and a few not so wealthy) folk from all over Mexico descending on San Miguel for three or four days of drinking, fornicating, bull taunting, and, in some cases, broken bones and concussions. Imagine a slightly older schoolies week with bulls (for you Usian-types think spring break, Fort Lauderdale and bulls). The average age seemed to be early twenties.

Many of the newcomers were from Mexico City, invoking a mixture of awe and disgust in the locals as only wealthy, young, glossy folk from the big city can. I overheard one young local lass, saying to her friends,

“I do, too, have friends from Mexico [City]! Lots of them. You’ll see.”

“Who cares?” replied her friend. “They’re all [rough translation] unpleasant people.”

The uniform for the girls was tight jeans, high heel boots, shirt and cowboy hat. For the boys: jeans, boots, white shirt/T-shirt with red kerchief and cowboy hat. It’s amazing how such a simple look can speaks volumes as to class and wealth.

The Pamplonada, itself, was not at all what I was expecting. I’d been imagining a large amount of bulls let out at once and blokes in front running like buggery. In San Miguel they let one bull out at a time, the huge crowd parts, while all the bravest, cockiest and stupidest blokes do their best to provoke the bull into going them, waving tiny red kerchiefs, or big, full-on matador cape thingies, or pulling the bull’s tale. The bull, increasingly irritated by this behaviour, will then oblige by tossing one or more of them into the air, or kicking the fool standing behind him. One of the bulls was so annoyed by one particular bloke he threw him in the air, then tried to pick him up again several times, finally trampling him. Score many for the bull.

Eventually the bull will get bored or start to run off around the circuit. They then release the second bull and so on, until there are eight bulls being provoked, getting shitty and sending the occasional bloke into the nearby ambulances. Most of the bulls emerged fulling prepared to go anyone remotely near them. This usually turned out to be the blokes who’d let them out of their enclosure.

It was impossible not to barrack for the bulls. Fortunately, they seemed to aquit themselves well. Yay, bulls!

P.S. Thanks everyone for all the wonderful birthday messages! Touched me heart, it did. When I’m online for more than a few hours every three or four days I’ll reply.

Exercises in Futility

I decided it would be very cool to get a photograph of a hummingbird. And, indeed, it would be. But the gap between seeing the hummingbird, grabbing the camera, turning the crappy thing on, having it pointed in the right direction is so ridiculously long, that by then the hummingbird is five gardens over.

Apparently nature photography is tricky. Who knew?

Here’s one of my hummingbird shots. (I won’t bore you with all of them):


Notice the glaring absence of said humingbird.

I hereby give up. Stupid hummingbirds. I for one do not welcome our hummingbird overlords. I spit on their gravy.

This is writ ironical

In the olden days, some newspapers got so fed up with folks going off in high dudgeon about certain articles which proposed, say, that the rich eat the poor, that they took to ending such pieces with the following line, This is writ ironical. (Think of it as ye olde smiley face.)

Which is to say that a tin ear for irony while depressingly widespread nowadays, alas, is not a new development. Long before the intramanets, certain early readers of Jane Austen did not notice her tongue placed firmly in her cheek.

I know I don’t need to say this to the esteemed and learned readers of this blog, but for newer readers please to imagine those words—This is writ ironical—at the end of most posts.

I.e. Margo Lanagan is not Satan she’s just a very naughty Aussie girl.

That is all.

San Miguel: End of Day 6

Word count: 15,000

Average word count: 2,500 a day1

We arrived in the middle of the anniversary of the first Mexican revolution. Many days of holidays in a row. We arrived to cars being shut out from the Jardin and centre of town (bliss!), to fireworks and rockets going off every night (pretty!), to so many mariachis we could hear them all the way out to our place (besame mucho!), to people dancing in the streets in period costume (pretty!). To quiet mornings and days (except for the occasional rocket blasts) and melodiously noisy nights. ¡Viva Mexico!

Until Monday morning 7AM, holidays over and the the builders go back to work next door. Eighteen months ago when we first rented this house, they were laying the foundations. They’re still not finished. They work on and off from 7AM until around 5PM. Sometimes there are many of them, sometimes just one forlorn guy with a hammer. The best thing is they use no jackhammers, no pneumatic drills, no nothing powered by electricity. The bad thing is if they had they might be finished by now . . . I just stick headphones on and turn the music up a little louder (right now, listening to songs with the word “don’t”; in the title—I’m psyching the builders out).

So far I’ve heard the first four chapters of Scott’s new novel. It rocks. Out loud! And, yes, it is set in the Peeps universe. Cool, eh?

Have I mentioned that I love San Miguel? So green, so many flowers, butterflies, hummingbirds—hummingbirds! I think they’re my favourite birds in all the world. We don’t have them back home, but here I see several every day, just outside the window. So little, so powerful, so elegant. Ahhh . . . Don’t think I ever want to leave.


The view from where I sit to write. Look close and see the wicker couch I rest my feet on and the top of my laptop.


The other view from where I write. Flowers! Pretty!

  1. Look, I know word counts are spectacularly boring to everyone accept the person counting the words, but, mate, I’m bloody screaming along! Normally, when I’m starting a book I can barely scrape a thousand words a day together. I can’t believe how the words are pouring out of me! I mean, it’s the final book of me trilogy, I thought it was going to be horrible agony. I thought I had no idea what was going to happen. And here the book is practically writing itself! Maaate! Fingers crossed that I have not spoken too soon. Not superstitious, me. [↩]

Apologies

We’re only getting to the internet place once every three days (or so) and there’s not enough time for me to do all the internetty stuff I wanna. Have to do all the biz, admin, and research stuff first. Sigh. So, I’m behind with all my fun correspondence. If I haven’t writ it don’t mean the love is gone. Honest. I haven’t read anyone’s blog, or newspapers, or anything since we left NYC. I have no idea what’s happening in Sydney, NYC, or the rest of the world, or the blogsphere, or anywhere except our little bit of San Miguel. (Ask me about Luz’s life and I can tell you anything you wanna know! Short version: she’s doing great.) I’ll catch up some time in November. I hope.

San Miguel: End of Day 3

Thus far 10,000 words have been writ of the third Magic or Madness book.

Everything here is more beautiful than I remember on account of it being September the very best month of all.

The food is still excellent. Hibiscus quesadillas rule!

Brain unable to produce more words.

Thanks for all good wishes.

So Long, Farewell, Auf Wiedersehen, Goodnight . . .

In a few short hours, we’re off to Mexico. First Mexico City, where I’ve never been before, and hope to have a wee spot of amusement, and then San Miguel de Allende where we will be checking into writers’ boot camp and churning out zillions a word of day while being whipped and fed nothing but gruel and water. But at the end of the horror, there will be two new Larbalestier and Westerfeld novels. So it’ll be worth it . . .

If I can escape and get somewhere internety, I’ll blog. If not, you’ll know that I’ll be writing the good write!

Wish me luck.

OMG! Elizabeth Knox read my blog!

Okay, I admit it. I am a daggy, daggy fan. I discovered Elizabeth Knox last year courtesy of Delia Sherman and Ellen Kushner who gave me a copy of Vintner’s Luck, which made my head explode with pleasure. It had everything I want from a book: it was an historical featuring exquisite writing with lots of non-realist elements and it was wry-funny and smarter than Shane Warne on a cricket green. Just thinking about that book makes me happy. I haven’t been as excited about a new writer since I discovered Angela Carter and that was many, many, many years ago.

So imagine my over-the-top ecstatic joy when Elizabeth Knox wrote a comment on my blog! The one and the only. After recovering—OMG! Elizabeth Knox wrote a comment on my blog!—I began to write a response. Then I realised that her comment was buried under a post from the olden days. The whole world needs to know that Elizabeth Knox read my blog! Thus I have elevated it to this post. Elizabeth is responding to my saying that I loved her most recent book, Dreamhunter, but that it ends somewhat abruptly and there’s no indication anywhere on the book that it’s the first of two and what’s that about?

Hi Justine,

Thanks for the praise — it really puts lead in my pencil.

My Australian publishers thinking was this: dreamhunter would appeal to young adult and adult readers, fantasy and literary fiction readers, so a cover that gave no conclusive signals about genre would ensure it reached its widest audience. They explained all this to me. They decided, too, that Book One of Two or Book One of the Dreamhunter Duet (as it says on the UK edition) would give the game away. We talked about mentioning the One of Two thing on the back or in the blurb, then, well, my first copy turned up with nothing at all on it to indicate it was the first of two books. Needless to say I was a little alarmed.

But it isn’t the job of authors to make marketing decisions. I know that if I had to be responsible for those decisions I’d go bonkers

As for the cliff-hanger ending, it has nothing to do with marketing. Dreamhunter and Dreamquake are like one book cut in half. There’s a simple explanation for this. I set out to write the book intending it to be a work for young adults, in several parts. I got to the end of book one, Dreamhunter, and was still completely unsure whether or not I’d managed to produce a YA book, rather than something that was neither fish, fowl, nor good red meat. Part way through I had showed it to a fantasy editor at Randomhouse in the us, who assured me that, whatever it was, it wasn’t really fantasy. I gave it to my agent in London, who only knew that she liked it, not whether it was a YA book. I’m a reader of YA books. I know how they should read, and Dreamhunter worried me.

Anyway, Faber bought it, and an editor there gave me terrific advice about rewrites with the object of turning my dubious what-the-hell ms into a book for teen readers. It was only once I’d finished the rewrites that I had the confidence and experience to go on to finish the story (and to decide that it was two books, not three). The cliff-hanger ending wasn’t a problem for Julia, or to my editors in Australia. My US editor, Frances Foster at FSG, was uneasy about the precipitous tone but thought for a long time that a clear indication that the book was part one of two, and that two would be out only a year later, would take care of that. However, when she started line-editing (and read Katherine England’s review in the Australian magazine, Magpies) her worries came back and, since fsg are publishing a whole year after the UK and NZ/Australia, we had the option of transferring some of the beginning of Dreamquake to the end of FSG’s Dreamhunter—about five thousand words. The us edition does have a clearer sense of ending, and of the direction of the book. But I did need an editor to help me see the necessity for this.

No writer should ever underestimate the necessity of editors.

I heartily agree. My writing is so much better than it was before I was published and that’s solely because of the amazing editing I’ve had. Thank you Liesa Abrams and Eloise Flood!

What kind of advice did your Faber editor give you to make the tone more YA?

I agree that Dreamhunter doesn’t have the typical YA voice. (Don’t ask me to explain what I mean by that. I know it when I read it.) Like Margo Lanagan‘s Black Juice it could easily have been published as an adult novel. And like Margo’s book it works as literary and genre fiction. But that’s part of what I love about both books. It’s lovely to hear about editors being enthusiastic about those qualities.

You write in pencil?

I hope both books sell like hotcakes.

You Must Listen to This

“Rampage” is one of the best radio documentaries I’ve ever heard.

Over the last few years Australian war artist George Gittoes has been documenting the war in Iraq through the music of the conflict—the sounds being listened to and made by US troops in Iraq. Now he’s travelled home with the soldiers and found himself in a whole new war zone—America.

Miami specifically. In his previous documentary, Soundtrack to War (chunks of which were used in Michael Moore’s Fahrenheidt 9/11) one of the soldiers he followed, Elliot Lovett, said that Iraq was a doddle compared to where he lived in Miami. Gittoes followed him home and discovered that it was true.

Listen to it here.

How long does it take to write a novel?

I was asked that question (sort of) by “annonymous” when I mentioned that I have only four months to write the final Magic or Madness book. “A fan” also asked if writing a book in such a short time meant that it would suck.

Good questions.

Obviously novels can take any amount of time to write. I wrote the first draft of Magic or Madness in about eight weeks. The first draft of my as-yet-unpublished epic Cambodian novel took eleven years. Writing the third book in the morm trilogy in four months is not that fast, especially as the first two books were only 65 thousand words long. (Most adult novels are around 80-100 thousand words long.)

What’s due on 30 December is not the polished, perfect, every-word-glistening final draft of MorM 3. It’s the first draft. That first draft bit is important. Because there will be months of rewriting after I first hand it over to my editors, Liesa Abrams and Eloise Flood. For me that’s when the real writing begins.

I write novels (or, at least, I wrote the first two MorM books) like this:

Every day (or there abouts) I try to write at least a thousand words. At the beginning of the draft getting to a thousand words is a struggle by the time I’m about three quarters done and finally know where the book is going it (usually) becomes dead easy. I start each day by editing the previous day’s words and then moving forward. Every few days I read a chapter or two out loud to Scott and then begin the next day by incorporating the changes that come out of his criticisms.

Once I have a finished draft I read through the whole thing and rewrite it. When that’s done I’m so over the whole thing I can’t stand to look at it. That’s when I send it out to my faithful crew of first readers. Because I’m usually on a deadline I ask them to get back to me with their response asap, which around 70% of them do. Yay first readers! I then fume at the injustice of their stupid comments rewrite based on their comments and then send it off to my editors.

They then get back to me with notes, which if the first two books are anything to go by, boil down to this:

Make it less subtle. Less implying; more showing.

I ratchet everything up so that it’s horrendously over the top and send the manuscript back to them. They send back more notes:

Make it less subtle.

I fume. How could it possibly be less subtle than it already is!? I show Scott so that he can confirm the injustice of my editors’ comments. He agrees with them. I consider divorce. Then I do what I can to make everything horribly obvious. They respond with more demands for less subtlety. And repeat until my editors declare themselves satisfied.

At which point I realise they were right all along: the novel had been a bit undercooked. I decide that there are still too many anaemic threads. I go through the novel thickening each one. I continue this process obsessively all the way up to, and including, the proofreading stage.

The whole process takes about ten months.

So, to answer “a fan”. Yup, often that first draft is very sucky indeed. Fortunately I’ll have heaps of time to unsuck it.

Silences

It’s been quiet around here for several reasons. Mostly Hurricane Katrina and the aftermath. Despite reading John M. Ford’s excellent advice, I’ve been following all the news and like everyone else getting angry and upset. I really hope the disaster will lead to everything being done that needs to be done: rebuilding the wetlands, rebuilding New Orleans as a place for all her now former residents, and making sure that the response to any future hurricanes or anything else will never be so slow ever again.

Then all my tedious deadlines. The proofs of Magic Lessons and the paperback version of Magic or Madness need checking, and, of course, the third and final book in the trilogy needs writing, given that it’s due 30 December and I haven’t started yet. I was six months early with the first book. I really hope my editors remember that.

That’s why next Tuesday we’re off to San Miguel de Allende in Mexico for a month. Where we hope to get lots and lots of writing done in a house that is free of the distractions of the internet and television.

In the meantime I’ve gotten to see Cassie type the last words of her very first novel. Very impressive given that some of us were doing more gossiping than writing that day. Okay, that would’ve been me gossiping with myself. Scott and Holly were typing almost as furiously as Cassie. I wish they were both coming to Mexico too. Surely their diligence will rub off on me eventually . . .

Thinking about something else, anything else

Margo Lanagan reminds us all to be careful of the words we use. Just so! For me ’twas a timely reminder as I am perusing the proofreader’s pass of Magic Lessons and making more changes (mostly deleting “just”. Aaargh!)

Jim McDonald made me laugh with his lessons learned from British folk ballads. I’ve been a tad obsessed with ’em since I was a wee lass.

Gwenda points to this incredible exhibition of spirit photography currently on in NYC. Given our deadlines and imminent trip out of town, the odds of my seeing it are not good. Hell, we don’t seem to be able to get it together to see our friends here . . . Must not sign up for more than one book a year!

Eyewitness accounts

Boingboing has been linking to many heartwrenching accounts of the aftermath of Katrina. This one captures some of the intense anger many people are feeling. It’s also an account of local people in Texas doing whatever they can to help.

Texans are well-known for their generosity. It’s grand to know that they’re already demonstrating those qualities to the newcomers. (Scott’s family are all from Texas so I’ve experienced that warmth and kindness first hand.) Here’s hoping government at local, state and federal level will more than match the generosity of the people.

Scott’s uncle is a principal at a downtown high school in Houston. A few days ago Katrina had already given them 15 new students and he was already fielding calls from Louisiana teachers looking for jobs. It’s going to take a lot of money and resources to help Houston and the other cities accommodate all the folks from New Orleans and elsewhere. Here’s hoping they get everything they need.

Garlic and Sapphires

In the vein of fiddling while Rome burns I read Ruth Reichl’s decadent account of being the restaurant critic for The New York Times in one gulp last night. Could not put Garlic and Sapphires down, no matter how hungry I got, how desperate to run out of the house and find the incredible food, and wine she describes.

I defy you not to get very very hungry reading prose like this, even if you just ate:

I took a bite and immediately forgot his knee. I forgot everything but what was going on in my mouth, the fish doing a little tango with crunchy strips of artichoke. The softness of the fish was sandwiched between layers of crunch—the artichoke on the bottom, bread crumbs on top, the flavors appearing and vanishing in a maddening way. I thought I tasted chestnut, and then it was gone, absorbed into the deep musky flavor of the wine.

Want. Now!

Her food critic m.o. is kind of insane and involves wigs, elaborate costumes and whole new identities in order to avoid being identified and thus sucked up to outrageously, with over the top service and food because, don’t you know, she’s The New York Times restaurant critic and thus more important, even, than the king of Spain.

Anyway her book is well-writ and funny and sad and all about food and wine. What more could you ask for?

The Gulf

When the tsunami hit we were in Sydney. Psychically, Indonesia, Thailand, the whole of southeast asia, just doesn’t feel very far away from Australia. They are our neighbours. Yet the tsunami hit, thousands of people died and we ate our breakfast of mangoes, bananas and passionfruit, granola and yoghurt like always. Sure we cried, followed the coverage, donated money, but our life in Sydney was unaltered. We thought about other things, went out with our friends, laughed.

Now New Orleans is destroyed, hundreds are dead in Mississipi and Louisiana but life in New York isn’t any different. We’re in the same country, but we’re miles and miles away, here water is plentiful. We’ve cried at the coverage, donated money, but our life is just the same. Tonight we’ll watch the second playoff game between the New York Liberty and Indiana with friends. I still want the Liberty to win. I’ll scream at the tellie when there’s a bad call from the refs. I’ll yell happily when we score.

I don’t know what I was expecting. I don’t even know what I’m saying.

Tipping

The 5 September issue of the New Yorker has an informative piece by James Surowiecki on tipping. Apparently it didn’t become widespread in the US of A until after the Civil War and some states were so appalled by it they even banned the practice. Who knew?

There’s just one problem with the piece, he claims that Australia and Japan are countries where they don’t have tipping. Now, I don’t know about Japan, but it ain’t true about Australia. Tipping isn’t as widespread back home as it is here (thank God!), but tipping wait staff in restaurants is standard. Though unlike the USA, you don’t have to tip if the service sucks; and unlike New York City, 20 per cent is an epic tip, not de rigeur.

I hate tipping. I never know how much I’m supposed to give or to who. Taxidrivers? Yes. The lovely woman who delivers the mail? No. Huh? It’s so random! I hate the stress of going to the hairdresser and not knowing how much it’s really supposed to cost. I just wish people would charge me up front and leave out the guessing game. I hate the moment of handing over the tip. I feel like I’m trying to bribe someone. The whole thing is too bloody stressful. I wish people were simply paid decently and weren’t dependent on customers to make a living.

Thus endeth the rant.

Clarification (Updated)

A while back I wrote an essay, “Too Young to Publish”, which has been much linked to and discussed around the traps. Very gratifying that people have found it useful and thought provoking, cause, you know, that’s why I write these things. A few people, however, seem to have read me as saying that if you’re young you can’t be talented and shouldn’t be published.

Not no way never.

I’m glad Sonya Hartnett, S. E. Hinton and this really great fantasy writer whose name I’ve completely forgotten (update: Joyce Ballou Gregorian) who died very young (update: She was 21 when her first book pub’d and 44 when she died) after only two or three fab books (whose titles likewise are escaping me—update: The Broken Citadel 1975, Castledown 1977 and The Great Wheel 1987) published when they did. They were well and truly good enough.

The essay was addressed to the impatient, overly-convinced-of-her-own-genius, fifteen-year-old me. Even though I wouldn’t have listened and would have told the current me to bugger off. I was inspired to write it by teenage writers who wrote asking me about the age thing, and one of them kinda reminded me of me at that age (only less obnoxious).

Everything I said applies to a beginning writer of any age. No matter how old you are when you start writing, making being published your first priority and being driven into a deep, dark depression when you’re not is a waste of time. Improving your craft, learning to be a writer, a really good writer, is the thing. There are writers in their sixties who still don’t get this and writers in their teens who are all over it.

Translating Magic or Madness (updated)

Israeli editor, Didi Canoch, just read Magic or Madness, and while he enjoyed it, thinks it’s untranslatable into Hebrew. Colour me disappointed, but I found his reasons why, and the enusing discussion in the comments fascinating.

So far, the book has sold to Taiwan, France and Thailand. I confess I have been wondering how those translations were going to get around the linguistic play in the book between Australian and USian English. Especially as I don’t speak any of those languages and don’t know much about them. Didi reckons a French translation could make use of Quebecois French.

Which got me wondering: wouldn’t using Quebecois French or, say, Mexican Spanish—were Magic or Madness ever to be translated into Spanish (fingers crossed)—raise different questions? There’s a particular set of relations between France and Quebec; between Spain and Mexico. Weird, mixed up colonial/motherland questions. But Australia and the US of A don’t have that kind of relationship. Neither country colonised the other, I mean, not in the way that England colonised them both. Am I overthinking this?

Obviously, translation is always about approximation, so you go for the best solution available. I’m dead curious about how they’ll deal with these problems. Or whether they’ll even bother. I can see a possible translation that would simply leave out the differences in the way the characters speak. Though I do think the translation would lose something if they went that way. But then most people reading it wouldn’t know the difference, would they?

The whole thing reminds me of Rome which just started on HBO in which everyone talks with an English accent so that it’s easy to figure out what class they are: toffee English accents for the upper classes etc. Yet it’s a USian production. US English has a huge variety of accents, many of which are marked for class. I wonder why they didn’t have posh Romans talking like Boston Brahmins (think Katherine Hepburn) and the lower classes talking like working class New Jerseyites (think Tony Soprano). Too close to home, maybe?

Rome, by the way, is a hoot. I, Claudius updated and with a bigger budget. Much camp fun. I can’t wait for the second episode. Maybe they picked English accents because they’re so much camper than the accents of any other English speaking nation?

Update: for those not familiar with the book, Magic or Madness is told from three different points of view. The two Australian characters have their chapters in Australian spelling and grammar, and the one US character has her chapters in US spelling and grammar.

Some Questions for Those Who Have Read Magic or Madness (Updated)

I am about to start writing the third and final book of the Magic or Madness series. But before I open up that brand new document and put fingers to keyboard—gulp—I’m re-reading the first book as well as the sequel, Magic Lessons, (out next March) and taking notes about what questions need to be answered, what events must happen—all of that. Obviously, I have some ideas already (and, you know, a plot), but I’ll be reading for all the bits and pieces, themes, characters, character traits, ideas, memes etc., that I’ve forgotten about—Tom has a sister? Ooops!—and thinking about how (or whether) to weave them back in.

I was wondering if any of you have suggestions. What questions do you reckon absolutely must be answered in the final book? Are there any threads that if I leave them unresolved you will become ropeable and then hunt me down to wreak vengance? I’ve already had this conversation with my wonderful editors, Eloise and Liesa, and they had many definite ideas. Some of them startling. I’d love to hear yours too.

I’m not saying I’ll do what you ask, mind, but it will be excellent grist to the mill. Thanks!

Oh, and if you’ve already read Magic Lessons could you not mention any of the events from that book so as not to spoil those who’ve only read Magic or Madness? Feel free to email me with any ML inspired comments jl—@—justinelarbalestier.com (without the dashes, obviously).

Update: If you haven’t read Magic or Madness do not read the comments below. They are loaded with much spoilage.