Five for Friday

Neil Gaiman on entitlement issues; namely fans expecting George R. R. Martin to produce his next book immediately.

Some of the world's amazing places.

Charming artwork and obscure words.

Frank Warren, 'the most trusted strange in the world' is the keeper of post secret. Started out as a spontaneous project, people from all over the world tell him their secrets. He now posts them anonymously, of course, on his website Post Secret. The secrets we can never tell can be told to him. Read more on Mamma Mia.

Phoodie: my latest food blog discovery!

Image courtesy of Phoodie.com.au

Interview with Ciara Geraghty, author of Lifesaving for Beginners

Thanks to Sassi Sam I had the good fortune to meet with an interview Ciara Geraghty, author of Lifesaving for Beginners. I would like to thank Ciara for her time and for being such a charming person to interview. I have edited out the rambling parts of our conversation, though they were pretty interesting.

What inspired the story of Lifesaving for Beginners?

Lifesaving for Beginners was inspired by a conversation I had with a friend of mine in County Kerry. The last time I was there I was chatting to my friend and she was telling me the story of her two elderly spinster aunts who lived together and died within months of each other. My friends' Dad was their only remaining sibling and he was going through their personal effects after their deaths and he found a birth certificate. One of them had had a baby in her teens and given the baby up for adoption. The baby, a baby girl, was sent to an American couple. But the aunts never spoke of it and one ever knew. We don't even know if the other sister might have known or not.

That absolutely fascinated me, the idea something so huge could happen to somebody and they just bury it and then continue to live their lives as if nothing ever happened. So that inspired the story of Kat who as a teenager had a baby and then lived her life as if nothing happened.

Forced or pressured adoption is a very controversial issue. Are you particularly interested it as a social issue?

I remember in Ireland when I was 14, and there was this young girl, she was 15 at the time and she was pregnant. She lived in a small town in the midlands in Ireland. No one knew she was pregnant and when she was due to give birth she went to the grotto in the town, which is a statue of Our Lady in the grounds of the church, and that’s where she gave birth to her baby. She brought scissors to cut the umbilical cord but it was a freezing cold night and they both died.

That sort of snagged in my net, I never really forgot that, it was so horrendous. Even to talk about it now, it's a horrible thing to happen to a young girl. In Ireland in the 80s it was still such a shameful thing for a young girl to have a baby and have sex. Those two stories (the young girl and the aunt) resonated with me and I suppose that's what interested me about the whole adoption situation, that's how I came to it. I'm more about the stories than about the topics. Definitely I'm about the characters, they would be very important to me.

So you started with this true story of the Aunt who had secretly given birth, from there how does your story evolve? Does it start with a character?

It definitely starts with a character, yes. So I had my character Kat Kerrigan and I had the idea; and I was interested in the technical aspect of telling the same story through two difference perspectives. I love the idea of perspective, that two people can experience exactly the same thing but tell it very differently because of their perspective. I wanted to tell the same story but through two different people to see how that would work. So I thought Faith and Kat.

But I couldn't make Faith work.  She a 24 year old woman I don't know if it was the age gap or if I wasn't that interested but I tried for the longest time to tell it. I have a big file on my computer labelled 'Faith' with about 25,000 words but I couldn't get it to ring true, I just couldn't make it work.

Then I was reading another book, Emma Donoghue’s Room.  She tells a very horrific story of a woman in captivity who is basically abducted and kept in a cell below ground on this horrible man's property and she gives birth to a baby. (In the novel) the baby is now five and Donoghue tells this horrendous story of captivity and abuse though the eyes of a five year old. Because it’s told through his eyes, there is such beautiful innocence to it. He’s seeing these dark and horrendous things happening but because it is told through his eyes there is such a lightness and innocence about it.

So I thought why don't I tell Faith's story through the eyes of her younger brother Milo, and the minute I started doing that it worked, it came.

Milo, the second voice in Lifesaving for Beginners, is at once such a mature young man and then he has just the perfect voice for a 10-year-old. How difficult was he to write?

I think you need access to a 10 year old boy before you can write it truly. Emma Donoghue, when she wrote Room, her son was 5. I do think you need that experience, or have an incredible good imagination. Even just the tone of their voice, you have to be familiar with it to write it. At the time my son was nine and I just thought I have access to this voice and this innocence and the way kids talk. He's one of my favourite characters. He just really worked for me and I was delighted to be able to do that.

Of the two voices in Lifesaving for Beginners, was there one that one easier to write?

Milo was the easiest to write. Kat is a prickly character anyway, so writing her was tricky but I really enjoyed it because she's nothing like me. I mean we're both writers but she's in a whole different league. She's the JK Rowling of thrillers. I had great fun writing her and getting to be difficult and prickly but certainly Milo came much easier.

I did worry about the readers – are the readers going to be rooting for Kat? Are they going to be in her corner because she is so difficult? But readers are giving me good feedback, saying they were won over by her. She is such a lovely person but she buries it all.

Why is Kat so prickly?

I think what's wrong with her is that she's never dealt with what happened to her when she was 15 and she's basically been dealing with post-traumatic stress ever since then. The car accident basically forces her to deal with it, like a grenade landing in her life and blowing the whole thing out of the water.

I think she would have been a different person if that (giving birth as a teenager) hadn't happened to her. It had a huge impact of her but she never dealt with her and then with the accident all her chicken s came home to roost at once and then she had to confront them.

Kat’s brother Ed, who has Down Syndrome, was he a difficult character to write?

I wanted to write Ed because I wanted there to be a relationship for Kat where she shines. I wanted that one relationship in the book where her goodness and her humanity shone through, and her relationship with Ed was that relationship.

My children go to lifesaving classes every week and while they're there, there are people with Down Syndrome in the pool as well, having a swim. That's possibly where I got the idea from. And then I know a couple of people with Down’s and I did a lot of research as well.

Hopefully I got it ok, because you don't want to mess around with the portrayal of the condition. It's difficult because you don't want to be patronising. You want to deal with that sympathetically but not be patronising; there is a balance. He's a nice character in his own right. You like Ed, you don’t feel sorry for him. That's the side that Kat sees in him.

Five for Friday

Should I eat this shit? A website that tells you if you should eat something. 

To celebrate getting 1 million followers on Twitter, Lonely Planet have released their Best Travel 2013 guide free for download. 

Brisbane's latest mobile food enterprise, following in the very successful footsteps of the Bun Mobile: Wandering Elephant. 

Gucci releases new leather handbag line with a passport detailing the life of the cow it came from. The accessories version of 'meet the meat'?

The Australian Writers' Centre have opened their annual Australia's Best Blog competition, so if there are blogs out there that you really enjoy and value, nominate them for an award. This is a great opportunity to give recognition to people who put a lot of time and love into a project that brings enjoyment, help or entertainment to others as well as themselves.

 

Happy Friday

Five for Friday

First big announcement, one of my favourite people has made a return to blogging! Another Brisbane local girl, she and her own blog partner talk about 20-something life, bars, beauty, fashion and fun on Adventures In Colour.

Do we need a new punctuation mark?

It's not often that I genuinely lust after an H&M collection, though I do desperately wish we had the chain here in Australia, but this collection, I WANT!

I adore discovering new, accessible food blogs and here is Tales of a Truffle Pig. Sure, the writer is based out of Sydney but she posts about food and eating all over the country and even from Brisbane, I can enjoy her opinions on beer and recipes for zucchini and bacon slice!

Jennifer Lawrence is tied with Emma Stone and Meryl Streep as the person I want most to play me in a movie about my life. So this week I was thrilled to not only discover a new sarcastic gifs tumblr, but one that went nuts with Jennifer Lawrence gifs post-oscars. She's known for being rad in interviews, so there is an internet-library of potential material.

NaNoWriMo: an inglorious end

On midnight 30 November, NaNoWriMo 2012 ended. I wish I could report that I 'won' and wrote the full 50,000 word novella. But I didn't. To be honest, I barely wrote anything in the last week. I got wrapped up in other aspects of my life and dragging myself to the computer to type away had lost every ounce of appeal. Instead of feeling guilty about this, as I usually would, I felt rather calm. It didn't matter that I hadn't succeeded first time. To be honest, it would have been a minor miracle if I had. I had given it a damn good try and most importantly, by trying I had learnt a lot. 

I learnt that to write well I need to be in the mood. And if I think of a good sentence or phrase I should note it down immediately.

I learnt that writing takes a damn long time and you need to force yourself to stay at your desk and think and type.

I learnt what I already suspected – that writing something funny is one of the greatest challenges.

I learnt that I really would like to give this a go and so I am happy to report that I have been slowly typing away at my 'novel' since the month finished and one day I might even reach the mythical 50,000.

So, the end tally.

Number of words I wrote in NaNoWriMo 2012 according to the official counting-wizard: 25,092

I reckon that's pretty good for a first go. Yay me.

Five for Friday no. 46

Authors choose their favourite books for 2012.

A beautiful way to store books.

'Man Repellent' fashion blog. Wearing whatever she likes, whether chaps like it or not.

Do you have 300 words to say on the topic of Love? 

A British adventurer become the first person to travel to all the world's 'countries'.

NaNoWriMo week 2

Cups of coffee drunk as a direct result of NaNoWriMo: 7 
Glasses of wine alcoholic beverage drunk as a direct result of NaNoWriMo: 3

Ok, now I am officially behind. As I write this it’s late on the night of Thursday 15 November. I am exactly half way through the month but nowhere near the half way mark in my word count. The very helpful calculators on the NaNoWriMo website tell me that at my current rate I will finish on December 12 or else I can write 2,023 words a day to catch up and finish on November 30.

This is starting to get overwhelming.

I was at Maleny over the weekend and I thought that would be the perfect chance to catch up on my word count. Quiet, no distractions, no excuses to focus on other things, it was perfect. I did get a bit of writing done early in the morning but then eating and drinking got in the way and worst of all, I started reading a book I couldn’t put down. Self-discipline fail.

 Garden sculpture in Maleny. 

Because a photo of my computer wouldn't be very interesting.

NaNoWriMo: week one

Cups of coffee drunk as a direct result of NaNoWriMo: 1

Glasses of wine drunk as a direct result of NaNoWriMo: 4

Day 1.

I had a terrible sleep for no reason, so at 5am I was lying in bed, staring at my desk and thinking ‘What the Fuck was I thinking. Why do I think I can write a novel? It’s going to be awful and unreadable and even I won’t like it. WHY?!

So it was a really positive start to the month.

Overall, over the last 7 days I have written every day except one. You read about how hard it is, you know that the requisite daily 1,667 words is about 2 A4 pages. But until you have tried to write that much per day on a continued theme or story, you cannot imagine how difficult it really is. Between my job, a blog and personal writing, I can write pages and pages every day. All of which flows easily in comparison to a Novel.

I have been getting up early to write. I am reluctant to wake myself up but I think it is best to write when my brain is fresh. I even write before I have had my first morning coffee.

Having seen this quote by Hemingway many times;

I decided to try it one night. That did not work. After 4 glasses of wine I am in no mood to do anything except have a 5^th glass. I certainly could not have pulled out several hours of creative writing.

So far I am unhappy with what I have written. Any spontaneity has gone and I feel myself getting formulaic, as if my individual voice has drowned under the supposed sea of words. But I suppose that is the real gift in good writing – to have a voice, to communicate your thoughts and feelings succinctly, and ultimately, to transmit emotions over the page. I think humour must be one of the most difficult emotions to get across the page, but that is how I would like to write – humorously. Rather a big challenge I have set myself.

So. Word Count. 

Total goal / where I should be at one week / current total

50,000 / 11,669 / 8.585

I'm pretty far behind, if I'm honest. I just better sit down and have a productive writing weekend.

NaNoWriMo: The Challenge

Yesterday in a moment of madness I signed up for NaNoWriMo – National Novel Writing Month.

NaNoWriMo is in its 13^th year. It is an international project where would be-novel writers from all over the world sign up to write a novel, 50,000 words, in one month, starting on 1 November and finishing midnight on the 30^th.

 

I am not a writer.

I am not pretending to be a writer. I am not pretending that I am about to write the next literary sensation. I’m not even pretending that my words are even any good. However, I have for a long time wanted to sit down and write a book. A short book. Even if it never left the top drawer of my desk, I don’t care! It’s something I have wanted to do for years and I hope that by signing up to NaNoWriMo and committing to at least try, then I will get further than I have managed so far.

Participation in NaNoWriMo is free. It is a mostly online community of fellow writers – some professional, many amateur – who all share the same 50k word goal. Online you can read success stories and writing tips, make writing buddies to share your progress and ideas with; just generally be part of a writing community who support you towards this very tough goal.

Depending on where you live, there may be a municipal liaison officer in your area who may arrange get-togethers at book stores where you can meet fellow novelists and discuss your progress.

NaNoWriMo is run as a small not for profit organisation The Office of Letters and Light, servicing not only the hundreds of thousands of people who participate in the program every year but also establishing programs for  children, teenagers and adults to help them discovery their written potential. You can find out all about them on their website or through NaNoWriMo and you can donate to this worthy cause.

In the meantime, I need to get properly started on the outline for my novel, so that when November 1 rolls around, I am prepared to give it my best shot.

If anyone else signs up to NaNoWriMo for 2012, let me know, I'm love to exchange writing related stress stories. For anyone else, donations of wine to help the writing process will be much appreciated.

Or if you're doing NaNoWriMo yourself - be my writing buddy!

Five for Friday no. 34

The 2012 London Paralympics have begun!  Full coverage is on the ABC. See the program online. I watched some of the basketball this morning and it is incredible!

Starting next Wednesday is the annual Brisbane Writers Festival. Check out the full program.

The Campus Satorialist. The style and fashion of over 40 different universities world wide. I suspect none of our Qld unis are going to appear very much. 

Image courtesy of The Campus Satorialist. 

An amazing trick for separating eggs.

Rich Kids of Instagram. Voyeuristic and annoying. Much like reality TV. 

 Image courtesy of Rich Kids of Instagram.

The beginning and the end of Harry Potter

I found this on a tumblr and just had to share it, even though I don't have a tumblr account and have no intention of getting one.

The first and last lines of each Harry Potter novel.

Five for Friday no.20

Household tips from great writers. Use Jane Austen's recipe for eggs with tarragon or Proust's tiramisu.

Dresses made out of beautiful city maps.

 A list of top 10 Shakespeare characters. You'll be surprised who is listed. 

A typographic dating game.

Cakes inspired by Spring Runway looks. I would eat the hell out of Louis Vuitton.

Diary of a travel-a-holic

We've had quite the run of long weekends recently, sadly now come to an end...sniff sniff. Anyway, one of the many benefits of this run of extra relax time is that I have been able to finally finish off my Vietnam holiday diaries. This is a personal project I was definitely going to finish by the end of 2011, then definitely by Easter. So 2 weeks after Easter isn't that bad.

I'm a bit of a diarist. I try to keep one – a proper, written, what I did and how I felt diary – every day but it is a lot more work than you might think. On holidays though, I'm much better at it. There is that gap in time pretty much every day when you've got back to your apartment / room after a long day out and you're having a rest before heading out again for food or drink of whatever it is you're getting up to, that is just perfect for writing about the day. So much happens on the typical holiday day and I find that you forget almost all of it within a few months. If you have a diary though, written on the day to record all those conversations and sights and meals and anecdotes, you have a physical memory repository you can pull off the shelf at any time and remind yourself of an amazing day.

 

This is actually a habit I picked up from my Dad who keeps an amazing record of every holiday he takes, and one of my favourite things to do used to be to pick a family diary off the shelves and read al about what we did when I was 5 in Spain or the Christmas in Germany when I was 12. It helps me to recall even the vaguest of memories.

So, I finally finished my Vietnam diary. Held up by the fact that 2 days into our three week trip my little iPaq died and I had to take notes or hand-write the whole thing, then translate to computer doc etc. I printed all my photos, I bought a couple of scrap books and voila! Here is the final result:

The two finished diaries. Not for public consumption.

I would be fibbing if I didn't say I wasn't a little proud of myself. It costs a lot of time and a bit of money to make even just these two (big) books. But then in 20 years time they will still be sitting on my bookshelves, where ever I happen to be, and I can pull them down and flick through them and remember our walk through the valley near Sa Pa and the amazing street food in Ha Noi as if it was yesterday. That makes it worth every moment and every cent.

12 diaries and a lot of memories.

Does anyone else keep a diary? Even just for holidays?

R.I.P Qld Premier's Literary Awards

I am adding my voice to the many in uproar today over Campbell Newman's decision to take an axe to the Queensland Premiere's Literary Awards.

This was not an election promise, just a first step in Newman's budget-preservation strategy, that also includes announcements of potential redundancies at certain government departments (heard on 612ABC Brisbane radio this morning).

Not that axing the awards is going to save a whole lot of moolah - a total of $250,000 in the year. In governmental terms, that's pocket-change. The sort of money they might spend on paperclips and staples per annum.

Even Federal Minister for the Arts Simon Crean came out on twitter, stating:

@SimonCrean_MP: Disappointed the @TheQldPremier has cut the Literary Awards, especially in the National Year of Reading. Short sighted! Reconsider Premier.

Despite the uproar that I have been aware of today, most of the State won't care, which is why the Premier can get away with it. Who cares now? The arts community, who probably didn't vote LNP anyway. He knows that and knows that this is an easy storm to weather. But it shouldn't be. Brisbane does not exactly have the most glowing reputation as a cultural destination and this is leap backwards. We voted in a Premier who doesn't care about writing, books or the promotion of literacy. Go Campbell.

Did I mention it is also the National Year of Reading?

I do not need to write a full blog post about this, because so many talented Brisbane writers have put fingers to keyboards today and turned their minds to the reasons and the stupidity.

Stuart Glover - founder of the Brisbane Writers Festival

Andrew Stafford, author of Pig City

Nick Earls, author of Zigzag Street

Josh Donellen – up and coming writer and Rave magazine’s music reviewer. 'Inaugural Premier's Obituary Award'

The Queensland Writers Centre’s official response on their facebook page (like them while you’re visiting).

Sign the official petition to reverse the decision.

Official website of the (former) Queensland Premiers Literary Awards.

The Courier Mail's wrap-up and their 'overwhelming' reader response as former arts MP Matt Foley calls the decision "a squalid, ugly start to the business of government".