Even in a little thing

Sun, 19 Jul 2009 14:13:57 GMT

The draft program for Continuum has just been webbed and I'm on a panel called "The past is a different country" with Chelsea Quinn Yarbro and Lucy Sussex. It just doesn't get cooler than that.

Now, in celebration, do I grab my Lowenthal from my shelves or my Chelsea Quinn Yarbro? DO I want a book entitled "The past is a different country" or to read someone who uses history in fiction? Choices, choices.

Sat, 18 Jul 2009 14:14:51 GMT

I had a round dozen students today, ranging in age from 8 (and three-quarters) to 14. They voted - en masse - to skip a break (sunshine and stalls and biscuits) in favour of talking about books. They worked for four hours. They were literate and funny and hard-working. We talked books a lot and all of them had read a vast number, thoughtfully and intelligently. And they're the direct result of the Harry Potter phenomenon.

Baggage

Fri, 17 Jul 2009 10:18:26 GMT

This is the announcement I've been hinting at for a while. All the stories are in and are suffering the final throes of editing. No writers have yet killed me. Tessa and Kirsten came closest, I think.

The anthology will be out next year and is called Baggage. It's all about the stuff we carry with us, inside us, especially that which we brought with us to Australia. It's such an Australian anthology (with just a touch of New Zealand). It's rather wonderful. I keep reading the stories and thinking "Am I really editing this? Wow."

I'll let you know more when we get closer to release date. Right now, I thought you'd like to know who the line-up. In alphabetical order, the writers are:

Deborah Biancotti
KJ Bishop
Simon Brown
Monica Carroll
Jennifer Fallon
Laura Goodin
Y Green
Tessa Kum
Maxine McArthur
Lucy Sussex
Kaaron Warren
Janeen Webb

Fri, 17 Jul 2009 03:32:23 GMT

There's a meme doing the rounds that has first lines from whatever one is working on. It made me curious to see how much I'm working on at once (fiction only) and what the first lines look like. I'm going to include work that I'm actively editing as well as unfinished work. Three of the first lines have been accepted for publication, along with the novels/short stories that go with them. I shall send a food history postcard (with recipe) to anyone who can spot which ones these are. Publishers of said works are excluded, for obvious reasons:

Fay's Saturday afternoon was made up of two car chases, one romantic idyll, a bag of flour, two litres of milk, sliced cheese on toast on an exotic island in the middle of the Caribbean, a loaf of bread, a lettuce, six tomatoes, a distant dream of flying into a silent night, and a tired argument with the girl who checked out the groceries.

What has this fine week in store?

Lots of other people have years where ghosts appear.

Livia had once taken an off-world lover.

"My life has two anchors," thought Priscilla.

Kristy wanted the ground to swallow her up, but there was no place to hide in a Louisianan diner.

"What do I do with a pirate?" demanded Caley, as she and Lignat walked down the endless corridor to the new meeting room.

Thu, 16 Jul 2009 08:42:04 GMT

Every time I read the draft Progress Report for Conflux, something makes me realise that Confluz has subtle differences to most other Cons. Lots of SF conventions have banquets. We're the only one that has a banquet cooked by a well-known chef with a history of kangaroo wrangling.

The progress report will be out soon. Roo wrangling is featured.

Wed, 15 Jul 2009 14:16:00 GMT

It doesn't matter how many stories I edit, I always have four stories to go. Sometimes it's six, but just when I think I've got it below four, another story appears in my in-box. This last month, only one of those stories has been mine.

Not everything obeys this strange little law. I don't have four reviews to go. Only three.

I don't have four books to read, either. I have three piles. Or rather, I had three piles. The pile in my bedroom toppled and is creating modern art on my floor. I picked up the top book and ruined the work of art, but it was worth it to find good reading.

I just realised. I tend to read four books at a time. Lots of good things come in fours.

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 17:17:05 GMT

I'm not a well person and the unwellness means I can't sleep. The doctor doesn't open for four hours and I'm wondering how much work I can get done in that time. Tomorrow I get Life through Cellophane back for selected edits and I'm hoping that the final edits for The Art of Effective Dreaming will appear shortly, so clearing the decks is not such a bad thing to do. Getting well would be an equally good thing to do, but it appears my body doesn't want to do that by itself.

One thing I promised (not work, but still, I promised) was the fourth of Angry Robot's new books. It's Chris Roberson's Book of Secrets.

We're besotted with books that contain secrets, whether they be of the Albertus Magnus variety or the Deathnote kind. It makes it rather dangerous to use 'Book of Secrets' as the title of a novel, because we carry so many expectations with us of what we shall find in that novel. I'll get back to that thought. Not tonight, though. It's tough on a book to have a title that carries so many burdens, and so I didn't worry about whether the book matched my expectations of it from the title.

Roberson's writing flows out sentence after sentence, practiced and mellifluous. Very easy to read, but also very even in tone. Almost lulling. I need to be occasionally shaken to wake up so I pay attention to the story.

It's an easy read. A very good book for a lazy day. The fact that I want to shake up Roberson's prose means it's not my style. The themes and storyline aren't quite my style, either. I can see that it would suit a bunch of other readers: a touch of noir, a touch of bad boy dealing with a rough world will work for quite a number of people.It's a superhero comic of a book, with a vast amount of explanation and backstory.

It's a careful book, a structured book, with just the right amount of surprise in just the right places. And as I typed this from the notes I took when I read it last month, I realised that I didn't make many notes of the contents. I had to open the file up and remind myself. This just goes to show that even a very good book - with just the right amount of surprise in just the right places – won't work for all readers. With all the other books I've taken notes of things that delighted me or horrified me. My notes are mostly to do with Roberson's craft.

I want to apologise to it, for not falling in love with it. Reading it was like a first date where we each see how very worthy the other is, but ring up our friends when we get home and say "There was no spark between us. None at all."

I do recommend it, especially for the beach during summer, but not to those whose book tastes are precisely the same as mine.

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 03:38:35 GMT

I promised more comments on new Angry Robot books this week. Just two comments on two books. This is the first (and aren't I impressively good at stating the obvious?).

Nekropolis was not what I expected. I've got to stop expecting things, I think. I thought it would be dark fantasy or evil horror, but it's something quite different. It's an addictive kind of different: I started reading and couldn't stop. Not fine writing, but fun writing. Tongue-in-cheek and zombie-centred, Nekropolis is a noir story set in a place where humans are rare and probably on the menu.

Nekropolis is an overwhelmingly odd place. A zombie detective plays Virgil and leads us through it, his own life being a very intimate part of what we see. There are bunches of danger and swathes of trouble. There is whimsy; there is quest; there is heart; there is severe weirdness.

The misbegotten lovechild of Chandler and Baudelaire? No, that doesn't describe it. Chandler fits, but Baudelaire is not right. The drugs that Baudelaire took might fit, though. Maybe what it reminds me of is the Wizard of Oz written by Chandler and Anne Rice on Baudelairean drugs.

Tim Waggoner has invented a city that owes a debt to a great deal of literature, both high and low, and influences are easy to see but hard to summarise. For me, anyhow. I keep thinking "That reminds me of this," and "Oh, I like how he used that bit of vampire lore!" The book is a warped tribute to many stories and writers.

I don't have a fine, funny line to finish on. I want to contemplate the sub-genre that Nekropolis is part of. There is an increasing number of noir-ish dark fantasy around. Even Charmaine Harris' work fits. So, wile you think of a nice parting quip to end this post, I'll think about genre and sub-genre and why vampires are more often depicted as love interest than, say, fieldmice.

Mon, 13 Jul 2009 06:32:06 GMT

It's so important to watch Harry Potter films. Of all this and next week's courses, the school for wizards one is the only one that has enough enrolments to go ahead so far. People don't want to learn about heroes and writers are very confident about their capacity to have and hold an audience. Kids, however, want their own wizardly schools.

I'm really not sure the confidence in public speaking is well-founded, so I'm hoping that the speaking course will get a few people by the weekend. It makes such a difference for an audience if the writer actually knows a bit about what they're doing. It's so disconcerting when a writer has no idea about using their centre of gravity and sways back and forth for ten minutes, or if they focus on a pen rather than on their listeners, or if they can't tell how far their voice is projecting. That's why I'm teaching this particular course. There are many and many new and emerging writers in Canberra right now, and all of them have the capacity to fascinate a crowd, but have no technique.

It's a sad by-product of recession that people don't have money for studying their heroes. I'll spend those evenings writing novel.

And now, if you'll excuse me, I have more school novels to read.

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 04:41:40 GMT

July is advancing apace and I haven't put out a How To Avoid Gillian bulletin recently. This is not a good thing. People are in danger of running into me by mistake.

Next Saturday morning I teach writers how to use microphones, speak confidently in public and other handy things. In the afternoon I'm teaching the youth of Canberra how to write their own school for wizards. Between the two, I shall be enjoying the Gorman House markets. Details of all this (except for the Gorman House markets) is on the ACT Writers' website. There's more youth writing inspired by the Harry Potter universe from 22 August, too. This could be a Harry Potter year, if the youth of Canberra like him as much as they did last film and the film before.

From 20 August you should avoid the ANU once a week, in the evenings, for I'll be there to teach people (teachers, writers, general public) how to bring the Middle Ages to life in their projects and classes. Actually, I'm there earlier than that, to teach a course about some of our heroes and their origins (called Finding Heroes) and on 25 July doing a one-day course on writing articles for the web. Yes, I'm going into uni on a Saturday.

That's all my teaching in the immediate future. If all the courses go ahead, I'll be busy and have enough to live on, which is good on so many counts.

The canny will have noticed a blank though, in the second week of August. This is the moment when all Melbourne people should avoid Continuum. I shall not be a big presence, or important, but I shall be there, rejoicing in friends and speculative fiction and good conversation and Melbourne food. How many books I buy will be in direct relation to how many students I have in the preceding weeks.

And today? I spent the morning with Kate and am spending the rest of the day working madly. Go anywhere you like except my living room: you're safe from me.

Sat, 11 Jul 2009 12:47:15 GMT

Everything happens at once in my life, always. I should assume this. Some of the 'everything at once' is cool (the novels progress towards publication, as does the next anthology), some is less cool ('health' is the operative word here) and some distinctly worrying (my family insists on doing exciting stuff). The most interesting news is, as ever, not my own, and you have to wait for my news. This is why I write fiction, I suspect. It all behaves so much better than real life.

Fri, 10 Jul 2009 07:18:47 GMT

Why is sleep so important? Because when I sleep, I sort out the big things, the stuff that's too hard to deal with when awake.

Last night I dreamed a dream about my family. I hugged my great-aunt. The last of a big family - she's grudgingly alive and I saw her at Les's funeral. It hurt her when I held her hand. In the dream I gave her a hearty hug. In my dreams she's not as fragile as a piece of Queen Anne's lace.

When I woke up, my head was filled with music and I suddenly realised that neither father had appeared at that family function. "They're both dead," my half awake self said to my dreaming self. "That's why they weren't there." And that's the moment I finally accepted that Les is gone. Sometimes it takes days, sometimes weeks. This time it's taken months for me to reach a deep acceptance.

I'm still angry: parents aren't supposed to die. I should be able to ring him and ask about my front door and about the lighting in my lounge and to gossip with him about the grandchildren. Instead I give cheek to his grandchildren on Facebook and just let the draught at the door remain unblocked. Right now the grandchildren and I are deciding if Mum is cool or ubercool.

I know he's gone. Just now I put some scented geranium in the pot-pourri bowl at the door and it will mingle with lavender and his warmth and wonderfulness will greet friends at my front door. Les was well-known for his amazing pelargoniums and geraniums and this comes from the biggest and best of them all, the one he planted at the driveway. It has a mixed flower scent, like an old-fashioned pot pourri. He was an old-fashioned father and I miss him.

It's good I can let him go, though. Parents shouldn't have to remain that long, unreleased.

Fri, 10 Jul 2009 05:47:19 GMT

My life is still full of the "I must remind people about this" stuff. I keep forgetting things, so I'm going to remind anyone who may be in Canberra for Conflux that they can help decide the workshop I'm giving, just this once. There are only 2 more days for suggestions, though, so you may want to speak up soon.

The good thing about bad health is when you get to the "it doesn't hurt as much" stage the brain kinda kicks into gear. I had worked out that gentle movement was what my skin needed to not be as bad and I have gone through many seasons of Star Trek as a result. After my night with only a half hour sleep, my brain resturned a little and I read Kate Wilhelm's Storyteller (and I now know what's wrong with my novel-in-progress and why it doesn't have the tension the plotline says it should, which makes that whole horrid night worthwhile), and I'm in the middle of some Carol Emschwiller and Kim Westwood's The Daughters of Moab. By shifting between them I can fit my mood and legs and brain all at once. It's my second pair of books this week, Monday to Friday was a book sandwich buttered with Star Trek and with a Kate Wilhelm filling.

I'm still in catch-up mode with other work, but it's beginning to happen.

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 02:49:58 GMT

I'm getting a big kick out of readers enjoying the guests visting my food history blog. It appears that many food history buffs are just as interested in the food lives of writers as I am.

I also got a big kick out of actually sleeping last night. My skin is still a mess and life is still painful, but last night my bed actually behaved like a bed rather than as an irritant and I got a full night's proper sleep. A few more nights like that and the annoyingly irritated soul you're getting used to will fade into the nowhere she came from.

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 14:23:44 GMT

kitzen_kat gave me another five ideas to play with.

speculative fiction

To me, all fiction is speculative. This makes it hard to answer someone who demands to know what speculative fiction is. Bad novels are ones without solid worldbuilding, whether the novel is mimetic, romance, fantasy, mystery... and if you're worldbuilding, you're creating realities and if you're creating realities then the fiction is speculative.

Having carefully spelled that out, I also feel that there is 'genre' speculative fiction writing where tales are told using specific tropes and patterns and plot arcs. This genre is one of my major forms of fun and my world is richer from it.

Now for the bottom line. When I say that I write spec fic, I may be referring to one definition or to the other. It all depends on what I'm writing.

cooking

I'm no clearer with cooking. I can cook. I could cook (as I love to tell people) 3 course meals for 8 by the time I was twelve. I use historical recipes, international cuisines, unusual ingredients. I'm not a gourmet cook. I suspect I'm not even a food snob. What I am is someone who loves understanding how people see the world and interpret it and one of the best places to understand this is in peoples' relations with food.

empathy

A real gift. A lot of people think they have it and are wrong. Every single person I've met who really has a sense of others is someone I value very much. Very special and rare, these folks.

laughter

I couldn't live without laughter. I'm not someone who laughs aloud easily or often, but I often have a quiet chuckle underneath a sober surface.

intelligence

Intelligence is a complicated beastie. Too much of one variety or another can lead to great loneliness. Every ounce of understanding one can bring to the world, however, is wonderful. Thank goodness some forms of understanding don't require genius. I wish that all forms of genius carried understanding, empathy and compassion.

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 13:04:58 GMT

I'll be doing a workshop at Conflux this year. Instead of the usual "This would be a good workshop to do," we're asking for input. If there's a workshop you'd really like me to teach then you can either follow these instructions, or you can simply answer this blog entry. If the topic you want me to teach appeals to Karen (the Convenor) then I might just end up teaching your dream subject.

The decision will be made on Monday at the latest, so get your suggestions in quickly!

Tue, 07 Jul 2009 13:18:52 GMT

Laura gave me five words. I love this meme - it leads into strange places.

Geology

My family had rocks instead of brains when I was a child and the need to underpin landscapes has stuck with me. I can't write unless I know where the coal seams are and if there is sandstone or limestone round. I prefer writing with limestone, to be honest. Limestone reacts to lemons nicely and that's a solid reason for writing it into a novel or two.

The same applies to history. I understand the effect of the caves under Arras and the chalk that lies under most of England. Rocks are important.

I've never formally studied geology, though and I'm really pig-ignorant about it. I just know how to love chert and identify good opal. And I know where to find graptolites in the wild.

Marginalia

Anyone who has handled illuminated manuscripts develops a love of marginalia and I am no exception. I'm so predictable! In my next life (I have lots of plans for my next life) I intend to have at least a modicum of drawing ability, so I can create my own marginalia.

Yiddishkeit

I learned Yiddishkeit later in life than most people expect. It's what they think of as Jewish, so I've taken some pains to educate myself in the basics. They're only the basics, though, and they don't come from my childhood. I managed to shock my nephews once, because they were saying things that should not be said, but in Yiddish, and I told them off. They know that the family is solidly Anglo-Aussie-Jewish in culture and had entirely forgotten that I had studied German a little. Mum says I shouldn't even have needed that. She used to be a high school teacher and identified bad language by the tone of voice. Her students were convinced she spoke about fifty languages, I think.

I can cook most food associated with Yiddishkeit, because it's good food and I pestered people till they taught me.

I didn't learn enough Yiddishkeit to act the way people supposed I ought to until I was in my late 20s. Stiff upper lip is what I was taught, proper behaviour, very English. When I finally got to England I felt right at home. Making scones is far more from my soul than making strudel.

Myth

Myth is something I find arguable. I guess I don't believe in the universalness of tales. Tale types tend to be cultural and a lot of the classifications that have been made (pace Propp-suporters!) have cultural limitations. I love them though. Myths re-told or expanded or invented can make some of the best stories. The mythic doesn't always equal grandiose - it is a precise balance between the numinous and our private lives. One of my favourite modern recounters of myths is Terry Pratchett.

Resonance

Everything has resonance. Where the resonance is missing, we can hear the hollowness and are distubed. Horror stories often consist of taking away some of the resonance we naturally seek.

I'm rather glad Laura chose that word, because it's what I look for in stories and what I try to write into my novels. Layers that reinforce make the resonances work. They create harmonics that make us satisfied with what we're reading. My favourite writing has immense sequences of resonances but is clear as a bell. The harmonics of the bell or the clarity of the sound of a tapped crystal - where the complex sound translates as simple and fills me with joy.

Mon, 06 Jul 2009 10:47:18 GMT

Something you didn't know about me. It's all Jason Fischer's fault. I'm quite cheerful, really. Relatively. Mostly. Maybe.

Lauren Beukes, Moxyland

Mon, 06 Jul 2009 03:22:05 GMT

I meant to blog about Moxyland last week, when it came out. I'm doing this a lot recently, saying I'll do something, doing all the hard yakka then stuff getting in the way and the final bit is unfinished. I call this the oops-I-forgot-to-email syndrome.

When I read Moxyland ( Lauren Beukes, one of the four first books for Angry Robot) I kept on wanting to pile adjective on adjective and make a tumbling, hurried list. Maybe it's just as well that last week was not so good, because I can read serious reviews of it and, guess what – more than one of them piles adjective on adjective. The review that gets quoted all over the place is by Charles Stross*, so I'll refer you to his if you want that tumbled feel that captures the soul of the novel as I first read it.

I didn't want to like Moxyland for the first fifty pages. This isn't because it was bad. It's a good novel, especially if you like a fast pace, lots of hi-tech and a social conscience. I didn't want to like it because my brain said "Not more Doctorow." The society resonates better than Doctorow's societies for me and the characters have more depth. If I were putting a shelf together of a certain type of future dystopia, then it would start with Gibson, some Stross (since not all his work is of this kind), Doctorow and Beukes. Add Simon Brown's Winter and there's a nice week's reading: not cheerful, but definitely quality.

What I like most about Beukes is that the society she uses as her base is not the US, not the UK, not Canada. My world grew in a number of ways. I had to question a lot of the assumptions I carry to books of this sort.

I like the start Angry Robot has made to their imprint. Both of the first two books are keepers. Next week I'll talk about the second two books. I have to finish more on my oops-I-forgot-to-email list before then.

*I still want to re-read Biggles when I think of him. It's because he's the only person I know who talks using words like 'spiffing' with any degree of comfort.

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 23:36:40 GMT

Another announcement. This one's for anyone in the US or Canada (just to even things out a bit). A copy of Masques and a poster signed by almost half the authors is being given away here. An Aussie work you can actually get hold of - miracles do happen.

Feel free to link to the giveaway!

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 02:18:54 GMT

Sometimes I need a special announcement blog, for all the announcements that pass by my desk. Right now, they're all related to Conflux.

There will be another short story competition, with Undead Backbrain publication. It's all to do with Ninjaz and Cat Sparx. Watch the Conflux website, or watch this space.

Speaking of Ninjaz, we're having a masquerade as well as a banquet as well as a SF vs romance gauntlet. The Gauntlet is on Friday night (yay for CSFG!), the banquet on Saturday (yay for my testing team and our 'roo-wrangling chef!) and the masquerade on Sunday (yay for Cat Sparx and Ninjas with Attitude). Plus there are our guests of honour: Emily Rodda, Jim Minz, Marc McBride and, on Saturday, a whole gang of Canberra writers. And a booklaunch. Lots of booklaunches, in fact, but one of particular importance (to me, anyhow). There's more, but that's all my brain can take in at once.

All that has made me hungry. Lunchtime, I think.

Maybe I'll do an unannouncement post later, because really, this blog doesn't exist for announcements - the announcements happen because I lead a complex life.

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:51:22 GMT

When I grow up, I shall be fascinating. I am firmly convinced of this.

In the interim, I shall read Joan Aiken and be fascinating by proxy.

I couldn't start reading my lovely new Armitage book (Small Beer Press is one of my dream publishers) until I had caught up on a certain amount of my missed work from the last few days. Fortunately, we've just had another weather change and I can't sleep until the aches are past. This gives me Aiken time.

If I were grown up I would probably have to be entirely sensible. Maybe I'll delay becoming fascinating just a bit longer.

Short Story Competition

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 08:40:30 GMT

I'm still full of announcements. let me give you another one, just so's I don't burst from them all.

Conflux Short Story Competition

This year’s short story competition is on the Conflux 6 theme of “Secrets”.

The story must be on the theme of the convention. Stories are a maximum of 2000 words. There must be a speculative element. Otherwise, the sky is the limit. Stories that fail in any of these elements will be judged ineligible.

Entries will only be accepted April 1 to July 31, 2009. (The deadline has been extended due to several requests). Stories may be emailed to storycomp@conflux.org.au.

You must be a Conflux 6 member to enter, entry after membership is free. The winner will be chosen by a panel of three authors.

The winning story will be edited by Conflux GoH Jim Minz for publication in the Convention Magazine. So here is your opportunity to work with an experienced editor!

Two runners-up will also appear in the Convention magazine. All winners will receive a surprise package of books and a certificate.

Please spread the word - less than a month to go!

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 12:20:52 GMT

I am so quick-thinking today! Also so full of iron. If I just tell you this one last important fact then I shall leave my computer alone until the weather has finished annoying me.

Anyhow, what I wanted to say is that all sorts of updates have been made to the Conflux site. I know, I should have said that in the last post. If I had, though, you would have missed out on hearing all about the Conflux Minicon. It's a very miniature minicon this year, so check it out early and mark the bits off on your diary where you want to attend. It's free. It's on a computer near you. Which I won't be, in five minutes. Enjoy the rest of Thursday. Avoid weather-induced headaches.

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 12:13:44 GMT

Conflux banquet has its very own online form. And I have my very own migraine. People who want to book for the banquet are so much luckier than I am today.

For Aussies who ski, this migraine doesn't indicate a storm at my door, but a blizzard on high. It will be a good weekend for snow. Migraines do not lie.