Hey pssst

I have news.

I have a literary agent who likes my novel and thinks she can sell it to a publisher.

I don't think I have EVER been this excited but I am really, really calm. Inside I am doing that arm-waving-dance that Kermit the frog does.

Champagne tonightski.

Ulysses cracked

This is how anyone is ever going to be able to read this fucking book. Audiobook. But be warned, I estimate there are about thirty hours of it.

Having said that, it's is amazing and brilliant and an unbelievable achievement.

I drove to Adelaide on Friday and back today. I'm half way through. I think maybe MAYBE I'll be able to read the paper version after this. Or read it while listening again.

Extraordinary stuff and now I want to know more about his background. I wonder whether his marriage was happy, how much of a sensualist he was. How he worked, how he worked on this.

Hope everyone had a good weekend. I did.

Past the Shallows

I bought this yesterday at Readings. Really, me and Readings is a dangerous combination. I was in there with P and the longer I'm in there, the more likely I am to pick up something else. Once something is picked up, it's rarely put back.

Come on, I said to her. She was sitting down the back, looking at something vampiric.

Just a minute, she said.

I wandered back to new releases. To the tables. And picked up another two.

Walked out with Past the Shallows, Jasper Jones, The Light Between Oceans by M L Stedman (about a lighthouse; one day I'd like to write about a lighthouse) and the new Jonathan Franzen collection of essays Farther Away. I, unlike many others it seems, love Franzen's writing.

Everyone has raved about Jasper Jones and we have to discuss the first chapter tomorrow night at my writing/reading group. Past the Shallows I read and finished this morning, it's a quick read but it's moving. Disappointed (or unsurprised) to note the usual suspects in terms of the following cliched appearances (some of which appear in my first novel, too, so I'm not blameless): a significant photograph, a car crash, a dead mother (seriously, everyone has dead or disappeared or distant mothers). Also a violent father. It also very quickly reminded me of Winton (the sea)/Hemingway (again, sea motifs) and Mockingbird (Boo Radley echo) but while I felt this was obvious, perhaps it was just moi? As it was, the brothers and their relationship was beautifully rendered. It was moving and I enjoyed it. I shed a tear which always counts for lots of points. She writes beautifully. It was spare but not too spare. It was filled-in but not too filled-in. There was no stultifying interior 'feelings' stuff (something I'm guilty of in my writing sometimes.) It deserved the recent Dobbie award.

With the recent 'Australian' books I put All That I Am above Foal's Bread only because it is an 'important, global, large' book but I adored Foal's Bread more, and Past the Shallows I liked a lot.

For Jo: JM Coetzee is...

... a novelist and he wrote, amongst other things, Disgrace and Elizabeth Costello. I loved Disgrace and it was made into a film as well, with John Malkovich. Coetzee is originally from South Africa but now lives in Australia, in Adelaide I think. Anyway, he's one of the eminent writers around the traps.

Also, in other news, the Tour de France finishes tonight so I can go back to my early nights. It's killing me Jerry.

And just finished my umpteenth draft of my thing. Added another layer in to make it more 'topical' and after a read from some readers in my group, will send it around the traps. Again. But different traps this time, unless one or two of the previous traps are willing to have another look-see.

Fingerrrrs crossed.

All That I Am

A few months ago, when I first tried to read this book, I struggled with the early pages. Best opening line ever? was followed by lots of description of physical mannerisms and I found the unlikeliness of a person standing on a snowy balcony, dripping with bath-water, for long minutes, unbelievable.  BUT I did go back and re-read and got momentum and the second time these mountains seemed more mole-hill and none of it stopped me reading, though I continued to notice. I got through the whole thing effortlessly and ended up really enjoying it. It has stayed with me, particularly some of the female characters. They are still with me, which is proof that this book works. So I guess this is a kind of tail-between-the-legs post to say that as soon as I read it I knew it would win the Miles Franklin and I think it deserved to win the award. It's a really large book and in parts is so beautifully written, she puts words together really really finely. So I take back what I said.

Suck job? Maybe, but really who cares. The book starts with a fabulous sentence, and if you can ignore the tucking of hair behind ears and repeated references to insignificant body characteristics, it's a great novel.

I was probably just bitter because she's so damn good-looking.

I recently read Foal's Bread, another on the short-list, and I loved this one as well. Where others have said they didn't really like the main female character for me, she was a sympathetic character, not least because of her flaws. This is great writing too.

So been a while

I have nothing much to report, well I do actually. Manuscript for book # 1 is with two publishers, on their request thanks to a feisty pitch via email by a writerly colleague of mine.

Imagine a bidding war between Text and Random House. Oh, I wish.

Everybody please cross fingers and any other bendy flexible bits of bodies. Thank you, I shall keep you posted.

Almost finished first draft of book # 2.

*

In other news, business is going well. We have 11 schools 'on the books' and debuted a few weeks ago. It's all going swimmingly though we'd like a few more bookings so we are doing mail out number 3 on the school holidays.

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Today I went to Readings to kill time. This is what I bought:

Five Bells by Gail Jones.

Animal People by Charlotte Wood.

The Idea of Home by Geraldine Brooks (as part of the Boyer Lectures). I was disappointed with People of the Book and thus wasn't interested in Caleb's Crossing but liked The Year of Wonders and adored Nine Parts of Desire (non-fiction) so I expect this small volume will be engaging.

Quarterly Essay featuring Anna Krien's 'Us and Them' piece on animal welfare/animals/us and them

AND

Orhan Pamuk's The Museum of Innocence.

If just for the front cover, love it.

Which to read first, oh I love these types of conundrums!

I just can't help myself

Whenever I go into a bookshop, I come out with at least one book. Whenever I go into a second-hand bookshop, I come out with double, because I figure they are cheap.

Went away on the weekend to a small country town and I think I spent as much on books as I did two nights of accommodation (it was cheap accommodation.)

I picked up:

Hemingway, A biography by Jeffrey Meyers. it's hard cover and it cost $20.00. It's a biggun.

The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath. I don't read poetry really and I am going to start trying a bit more. Throw the old poetry a fricken bone, so to speak. This copy is hardcover, in good nick and cost $12.00. It also has a groovy pic on the cover, a photo of her typing on a typewriter. At least I guess it's her.

The Consolations of Philosophy by Alain de Botton. Two things about this. Does he not have the best name in the world? Also, this book is cleverly divided into sections which offer consolations for (in order): unpopularity; not having enough money; frustration; inadequacy; a broken heart and difficulties. And if that weren't delicious enough, then he has paired each section with a famous philosopher: Socrates for unpopularity, Epicurus for the money one, Seneca for frustration and of course Schopenhauer for a broken heart - "the darkest of thinkers and yet, paradoxically, the most cheering." I have another of his books, not yet read. I think it's Status Anxiety. This new book also is hardcover and cost $5.00

The Monkey's Mask, Dorothy Porter. It's a nice cover, female head tilted back so you can see the line of her throat. Cost $10.00

Ernest Hemingway, A Life Story by Carlos Baker. I can't get enough of Old Hem. Paperback, good condition, $6.00

A Million Little Pieces by James Frey. I wouldn't want to give the liar full price but this is paperback, good condition and was $10.00

Marcel Proust: A Biography by Richard H. Barker. Hardcover and has a painting of a face with a veree Franch moo-stache on the front. $5.00

Hazel Hawke's daughter's memoir of her mother with Alzheimers. Don't judge me. At least I didn't get the Diana and Charles one. $5.00

Hello! Is there anybody out there?

I return shame-faced to my much-neglected little plot. I have tried to post a couple of times but became frustrated by blogger not uploading pics or videos or whatever, and so have sworn and closed down the screen.

But also, I confess, I have been unfaithful to blogger and any remaining readers (all two of you?) by becoming embroiled in a couple of facebook pages, on a particular social issue. For the first time I have seen trolling, and been abused, and threatened by faceless peeps who are really very nasty. It's all winding down though, and I have just spent some minutes going through some of my old booky posts and thinking to myself 'oh it's really just so much more urbane and pleasant over here.'

So I henceforth vow to crank up the old engine and get going once more over here.

To kick-start, I have been reading as usual:

Under the Knife, Andrea Goldsmith. Am enjoying it heaps.

The Low Road, Chris Womersley (half way through this one, it's ok, don't love it like I loved Bereft, short-listed for the Miles Franklin. Hope it wins.)

The Book of Rachael, Leslie Cannold. (Half way through, it's interesting but not my usual read.)

Vampire Academy series - 6 books, as part of keeping up with Princess's reading world

How Fiction Works, James Wood

To read: 1915, Roger McxDonald (who wrote one of the other shortlisted M Franklin books, When Colts Ran. I also have that, haven't read it yet.)

Faulks on Fiction

Utopian Man, Lisa Lang

The Paris Wife, Paula McLain.

For research: Gallipoli, Les Carlyon.

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My writing is going well. Have just made more revisions to MS #1. it's with an agent at the moment, who has had it for ages, but she is doing me and the person who recommended me to her a favour so I have to be patient but it's hard.

MS #2 I am writing sporadically but mainly researching/reading, thinking a lot. It's kind of formed in my mind (a new and strange experience) but I'm not rushing to get it out. Slowly slowly. It will take a long time to finish this one I think.

*

The family is all fine. We had a fairly awesome Good Friday yesterday and I'm thinking it needs to become a regular thing that we - have brunch all together at the table, take the dog to the park, play a boardgame all together, eat take away food (Indian last night, but could be Chinese next year) and then watch Life of Brian. Again.

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Let me know your news.

Movies and books

Books and movies.

Some of you will remember that I often like to educate Princess in the ways of movies that I have loved or that I have though significant at the time even though a re-look sometimes makes me shake my head and think 'what the fuck was I thinking?'

A prime example of this is The Highlander (1984). When I first saw it, I thought it was fabulous. Now we need to consider the context - Harry Potter free and before good digital special effects, it was pre-Terminator 2 (1991) but post Terminator 1 (1984).

When I watched it again with Princess and Clokes (who had never seen it!) it was so scarring to the eyes of my daughter (by way of terrible special effects, bad fight scenes and all-round badness) that we had to turn it off half way through. I was embarrassed. How could I have gotten it so wrong?

That was earlier in the school holidays. Now, whenever I trot out another '80s movie Princess's first question is 'are the special effects.' My dignity is only assuaged by the fact she doesn't physically make the hand-quote movements.

Eighties movies that have impressed her thus far are:

St Elmo's Fire (largely because of Rob Lowe's face) and About Last Night (his torso.)

She quite liked Pretty in Pink despite the absence of any parts of Rob Lowe's anatomy, and watching it now I had a new-found appreciation for the character of the Duckman. I think back then he was too out there for me. I always liked the boring characters, the Andrew McCarthys, if you will.

We also had a Tom Cruise retrospect. Risky Business (she liked, she said he was hot. I was surprised, I never thought him attractive even back then. I'd forgotten how sexy the sex scenes are, oh well, she's fourteen now.) Top Gun, The Firm and we are trying to get Jerry Maguire. It's obviously a popular movie because it's never in the shop.

Other things we have watched:

Some 30 Rock.
Vampire Diaries - 1st season. Once the first season was nearing an end I'd become a bit meh about it but she loves it.
Notting Hill - she liked it
Sleepless in Seattle - not so keen on it, she said it was 'alright' but because we'd watched When Harry Met Sally first (which she loved for the humour) I think Sleepless was a bit soppy and sad.
My Best Friend's Wedding - she confirmed my memory that the best scenes were the Cameron Diaz karaoke as well as Rupert thingo's scenes. Julia Roberts's character was appalling and we both hated her. There's Something About Mary - she liked it. Who wouldn't?

Now to John Cusack. I have always loved Cusack and like others for me the love began with one movie - The Sure Thing. There was also Say Anything. I can't remember which one I saw first but they are both good, with TST better overall. What a wonderful movie. Wonderful.

We watched Stand By Me and she loved it. LOVED IT. Which is good because it is so awesome.

We watched Almost Famous which I enjoyed more this time than when I saw it previously.

And for some contemporary viewing, we watched Superbad and Thirteen. I was prepared for Superbad to be, well, super bad, but I loved it. What a glimpse into the male brain. But what fantastic characters they were, and the party scenes with sex and alcohol, there are some really fine messages there. It wasn't like American Pie at all (which is just fucking stupid.) Thirteen was about two 13-year-old girls. Confronting and frightening and not at all funny. Holly Hunter was good, the kids were good who played the girls, they were 13 and 14 when they filmed.

SO if it sounds like all I've been doing is lying around watching movies you'd be pretty right. I went back to work a couple of weeks ago but just 2 short days a week. We went to the pool once, we have't been away, I've been painting shelves today, not much writing going on really, I haven't got the space. Reading: at the moment I'm reading Russell Brand's Booky Wooky 2. It was on special at Borders and I just grabbed it. Unlike the rest of the world I haven't really known much about him. I knew of him but didn't realise what the fuss was about. Clokes and I saw Get Him to the Greek recently and talk about charisma. The Man Has Charisma. Is it the androgyny? The height? The chains and belts and leather? I don't know but you know what. The man can write. He is clearly quite brilliant and he could be a writer if he wanted to. I reckon.

I bought Peter Carey's My Life as a Fake and Theft: A Love Story. Also Camus's The Plague and The Fall. Also I'm mid-way through Rosalie Ham's Summer at Mount Hope (like it more than her first The Dressmaker) and have also gotten myself a copy of Winton's Dirt Music. Read it years ago but it was a borrowed copy. Time to re-read I think.

So that's about it.

Oh we are also still working through Lost. We are in the final season, about 8 eps to go? Princess has lost interest (heh) and I know it's gotten silly BUT I JUST WANT TO SEE HOW IT ENDS.

Ciao ciao.

Murdering your darlings

The above is a paraphrased quote from Stephen King's On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft. This is a book which he wrote and tells the reader, very conversationally, a bit about how he got started with his writing, and how to write better.

It is quite simply one of the best books I have ever read on this subject. You know what? It IS the best.

I first read it several years ago, and just finished re-reading it now.

He says some of the best advice he got from someone else was that you have to be prepared to murder your darlings. Your darlings are your words, maybe words that you are especially proud of, but if they don't progress the story, or are redundant or padding, you need to get rid of them.

It's interesting, and he's right.

*

I am sitting at my new work space in the new house. Once again I have my old kitchen table that is motherfuck big, huge enough for me to have lots of piles of crap on it and still plenty of space to work. It faces a stretch of bay windows - four of them, count them, 1, 2, 3, 4 - and I can see an enormous house across the street and rose bushes and greenery along our front fence. The light is wonderful.

To my left are two bookcases filled with books.

Here's one:

Then to each side of the bookcase are stacks of other books that won't fit.

On the left, yes, evidence of my Stephen King collection. For a couple of decades, these books (along with my Jackie Collins, Agatha Christies, Sidney Sheldons, Robert Ludlums and Dick Francises etc) have been hidden away in boxes in whatever garage I've had my "extra shit" in.

I am now out and proud. I read these books voraciously when I was younger. Couldn't get enough of them, but balanced them out with deeper, more literary readings. I don't read a lot of genre but these good folks represent the genre I did read: horror (only good horror, ie Stephen King, but also dabbled in a bit of Anne Rice and a writer called Dennis Wheatley. I'd be interested to hear if anyone has heard/read him. The first book I read of his was called The Satanist and my bro and I loved it.

My dad put me onto Ludlum and Dick Francis. Excellent story writers, I enjoyed them so much.

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The other day I popped into the BookGrocer in High St, Northcote. We pass this place weekly/fortnightly, but always with the car full of child and on the way to dinner in the north. I had my opportunity to stop and bought the following:

So much excitement and joy. Have to finish what I'm reading now before I delve.

Books I am in the middle of:

The Lovely Bones

The Hand that Signed the Paper*

Anna Karenina

John Irving's new one, something about Twisted River. He's on Radio National tomorrow by the way, with Ramona Koval at 10am and repeated at 8pm. One of the my favourite authors, and if I had to name one who I have adored the most, 'twould be him.

I'll show you my other bookcase next time.

* I have read this and am re-reading after just having finished The Demidenko Files - which is a fascinating and comprehensive collection of all news articles and some radio time on the Demidenko/Milesa Franklin/anti-semitism scandal.