In the meantime, read this...

I'm very proud of myself that I can keep a secret (or two or three...). I totally admit that I have the worst patience in the world but secrets I can do - so Fifi, no amount of begging or arm twisting will make me unseal my lips. Of course when I said 'tomorrow' I meant 'tomorrow' in publishing time which could mean weeks - hah!. I can say I am scheduled to be interviewed on the radio on July 11th, by Gordon Harcourt on RNZ according to this. But as for everything else, like you, I must wait to have things confirmed or otherwise. The interesting thing is that the one thing I have had some news on is the one thing not on my list of 10 possibles. So...

Here is an excerpt from a short story I wrote some time back, that I am very fond of, called The Gift. You can read the whole thing in the anthology, Short (Black Dog Books, 2008).

Everyone says I talk too much. My Mum says that as soon as I could make sounds when I was a baby, I would make noise all day long. When the sounds turned into words I was making sentences long before anyone else my age could. In class my teacher, Miss Watson, is forever saying, "Stop talking. Turn around and face the front of the class." Sometimes she says, "You will never learn anything if you don't listen."

My little sister Bubby says I even talk in my sleep. All night long she reckons. It's keeping her awake. My older brother Jimmy is always telling me to "Shut up."
"Mum," I call. "Jimmy told me to shut up." Mum used to come and tell him off but not anymore. Because I talk too much. I only do it because I have a lot to say. There's a lot going on in my mind and if I don't talk about it I feel like my head might explode.

Dad says if I'm not careful, I'll use up my allowance of words before I'm grown up. He says when I do I'll have to use somebody else's allowance and I'll probably start saying things like "Pass the cucumber sandwiches please, Cyril". Or maybe I just won't say anything at all. That would be the worst. My head would just keep filling up with thoughts and ideas and they'd have nowhere to go.

Then my Mum has a new baby. She calls her Renee and she is beautiful. Fat and shiny and full of smiles and giggles. She gets to be 18 months old and then two years and then two and a half and she doesn't talk at all. And then I know. I have used up my share of words just like Dad said and now I'm using up Renee's allowance too.