Farewell Izzie....

Our cat died over the weekend which made me cry. She was a pretty wee thing, a cameo coloured moggy, dainty and sweet-natured. She lived permanently out-doors but knew which side her bread was buttered and knew who her family was, even the dog. Although still relatively young at about 6 and a half she got inexplicably sick and try as we might after a month was no longer the cat we remembered and there was no going back. I shall miss her. RIP Izzie.

Hi to the people who are reading my blog. Even though I sit here alone in my office, my tapping at the keyboard the only sound I hear, its comforting/reassuring/motivating/fun to know that I am part of a community of writers also sitting tapping out their stories, coming up against the same issues, pressing on despite the difficulties, wishing each other luck and best wishes. You are a fabulous bunch of folk and I couldn't wish for a better crowd to be a part of.

It is now officially September here in NZ and my picture book is out this month, it is NZ Book month for which I am doing a number of events at Auckland Public Libraries and the Auckland Art Gallery, my husband has a business trip out of town and there are cheerleading and dance competitions and other related events for my daughters. It will be a busy time and I certainly feel like I am at the top of an extremely slick slope wearing inappropriate shoes. I suspect I will be too busy to obsess over the things I usually obsess about but I hope I am not too busy to keep writing on the current project. I did a little bit of forward planning while exercising last night and wonder if i am going to come up a little short of my hoped for word count. The aim was around 50,000 but looking at where I am (18,000 words) and what I have left to write I don't think I will get there. Still, I am not going to stop now or change the synopsis so I will see what the result is when I get to the end.

Jumping through hoops with a glass half full...

So while I'm feeling confused and blue about the hoops I'm having to jump through to move forward with my writing, I'm slowly coming to realise that if I let it get me down and suck the energy out of me, I won't be moving forward with anything. The bottom line is, no matter what else is happening, I should keep writing. After all, it is obeying those pesky and intrusive words that won't let me give this career away. I have thought about giving up before and aside from the fact that i'm not much good at anything else, the stories just REFUSE to go away. Sure, I can moan and groan but that will not make someone say yes instead of no, or pick up my book in a bookshop. In fact moaning and groaning will probably have the reverse effect. It probably isn't good for my karma either. I think karma works better with a cheerful outlook, a glass half full kind of mentality and I have been forgetting this too much recently. One thing I will do in addition to keeping on with the writing is not accept everything as its given to me. Sometimes questions need to be asked and even if things cannot be changed I want a better understanding of how they work and how I fit into it all.

What do I want to be when I grow up?

My eldest, now fifteen, has just received the booklet outlining her subject options for next year. Next year is form five, also now more commonly known as year 11 and the first year of externally graded qualifications. We have both been looking at the booklet probably with different reactions. One of mine is sheer jealousy. She can pick things like photography, drama, japanese, graphics, computer studies and practical hospitality. But my favourite is 'writing for publication'. Jeepers! I would have killed to do a subject like that. If I'd had the chance to do that it might not have taken me another twenty years to admit I wanted to be a writer and get on with the job of trying to be one. In my fifth form year we could do art, two languages, music, sewing or cooking as options, history, geography or economics. They get to choose those as well as all the cool new things. So yeah, I'm a bad shade of green. However one thing doesn't change. My daughter is sitting there thinking 'what do I want to be when I grow up?' That question never disappears. What I thought I wanted to do when I was her age isn't what i have ended up doing now. I spent a lot of years in between studying science, and working in hospital administration to end up as a writer. But I'm more satisfied with my choices having made a few wrong turns along the way. And nothing is wasted. But I know from personal experience that not being sure now is not a bad thing. My advice to her now is to pick the subjects she feels most interested in no matter where they might lead. The more you enjoy something, the better your chances of doing well and finding a job down the track that plays to your skills and makes you happy. Nothing is wasted but also there is nothing to stop her, like me, studing different things in the future and changing where she is heading. Life is full of opportunities.

Off to a glittering event...what to wear?

Squeee! I am off to the NZ Book Month Launch next monday which I am most excited about. What does one wear? Do you think a tiara will be too much? Barbara Cartland never thought so. This is my first such do where I have actually been invited as an author and I feel very speshial and i feel it is important to dress accordingly. Of course as the first such outing it is the one where i get to set the tone for the rest of my writing career (as short as that may be - see yesterday's post) so i shall think long and hard about what I wear. What do famous creatives wear. All I can think of is Vivienne Westwood but i'm not sure if this is the image I am after. But then I also don't want to look like an extra off Coronation Street.

I bet Stacy Gregg never has this problem about what to wear. As a writer AND a fashion expert you would instantly know the correct thing to wear at a literary event. I'm trying to recall what the famous writers wore at the Melbourne conference I went to. I have to say the best dressed was Fifi Colston but I couldn't borrow anything of hers because she lives too far away and is petite and gorgeous and I would break any of her beautiful dresses. The only other writer who stood out was Neil Gaiman however while black jeans, jumper, leather jacket and Dr Martens are perfect on a rock star writer like him they would not be so much on me. Barbara never wore fairy wings did she? And I don't really write about fairies so that wouldn't be right either. But i also don't want to blend in or fade out. Well I have a week to work it out and if I come up with something good i shall post a photo.

When the voice becomes powerless...

Still thinking on voice. Perhaps voice for me is the 'personality' of the story, whether its via the main protagonist or the story at large. Or its 'heart'. Without heart or personality we would not be able to connect with the story. I am lucky that it seems to be an instinctive part of how I write. But this makes it difficult to advise someone else how to do it. In some ways I do not want to know the nuts and bolts of how I do what I do. I am a little nervous that if I understand too much about the process it will take away the magic and my writing will become flat and heartless. I guess that potentially rules out teaching writing as an adjunct to my writing career. Although at the moment I am asking 'what writing career?'. A few things I thought were done deals have become wobbly or the wheels have dropped off completely. Just when I thought I was in control of my situation, I find myself powerless again. This has been a bit distressing and I'm sitting here thinking, 'I'm not sure where to go from here.' My modus operandi isn't working and I feel the need to find a new approach. How much squeaking should this wheel be doing? I don't want to just give up on things but my head is getting a bit flat on one side from all the knocking against the brick wall. I'm off to see Mamma Mia this afternoon which I hope will be a bit of a boost. Then if i can get all my children back to school this coming week I might find some time to figure it all out. Wish me luck

Voice in the wilderness...

I was talking with a writer friend today about voice. She was experiencing difficulties with 'voice' in her novel and was wanting to discuss ways to deal with this. I have to confess my mind went blank. I don't make conscious decisions about voice. I couldn't even really say what voice is. Perhaps it's the 'style' or 'tone' of the writing. It should be a seamless part of the whole, almost a character itself, the character of the story. I don't think about it as a separate entity before I begin or as I go along. I consider my characters and the events that sweep them along and I suspect that the voice grows naturally out of the way I think about those things. Those considerations influence the tone of the setting, the dialogue, and how the characters respond. I write to show I care about the characters and the journey they are on and perhaps this comes through as voice and hopefully compels the reader to see what happens next. I suspect if I thought about it too much it would show. Is voice something we only notice if it isn't there? I don't know.

Even though they're not in the same room, I know they're there...

All three of my children are home sick today. I think only one is faking it. Even though I've banned them from using the computer so I can have free reign, it still changes the atmosphere around here and I find I don't work the same. My eldest has been off all week and I worry she has forgotten how to go to school. I will be re-training her in the subtle arts of school attendance as soon as she is well enough.

I am signed up to do author visits at a number of Auckland City public libraries for NZ book month in September. I am busy inside my head deciding how to approach these visits. Times like these I wish I had one or two more picture book titles out there as reading them all would fill up the time nicely. I certainly have written a couple I am very proud and fond of but they are unpublished and without pictures they don't have the same appeal to a bunch of littlies at your feet. These visits are not like author talks at schools where students might be expected to take an interest in the activity of actually writing stories. At the libraries the key theme will be a love of books. Still, I have a few weeks to come up with a game plan. Of course so much of this is still fairly new to me. Although I've done a few school visits, I have no teaching or library background but I have a few ideas about what I can do to get the children involved.

Today Kristin Nelson blogged about the benefits of Google Alerts and I have already signed myself up. I confess I do regularly google myself and have had some surprising and useful results, discovering new reviews, where my books are being touted online, and finding teaching resources associated with my work amongst other things. All good stuff. Sometimes it can be hard to see the new entries though and Google Alert will hopefully not only save me time and effort but improve my ability to keep tabs on what is happening to my work. Yay the internet.