The seas are pretty rough out there...

I thought the year was going fast but even I wasn't prepared for a UK based pocket pal posting about Christmas items already showing up in the shops over there. I wish marketing would stop trying to rush us through the seasons, festive and otherwise; my head is spinning from the unnatural speed of things.

Last time I posted I was talking about the New Zealand Children's and Young Adults Book Awards shortlistings. Well the Awards night has come and gone, as if a fever dream. I came away empty handed but it was an epic evening and children's books were the winner on the night. Ka rawe!! You can check out the winners here.

And here are some pics from the night:

Illustrator, Vasanti Unka, the Dark and I, with our finalist book Lucy and the Dark

Translator Pānia Papa, myself and illustrator Isobel Joy Te Aho-White with our finalist book He Tārū Kahika

I was delighted to receive copies of an early chapter book I wrote for the Ministry of Education. I worked on it while I was away in Shanghai last year and since then it has been edited, checked, illustrated and road tested and I have to say it is a rather lovely wee thing and I am very proud of my part in it.

I have also been working to complete a few non-creative writery tasks so the decks are clear for the last quarter of the year and I am currently on target. In October we will be off to visit our eldest, meeting up with her in San Francisco, and doing a little bit of touring nearby. I have a couple of projects which I would love to get finished on my return. I hate to see them lying half done in the bottom draw.  No matter what their fate might be they deserve to be whole.

And in somewhat encouraging news for the future, I have just signed a contract for a new picture book - coming out 2026 all things being equal. I am delighted and relieved. There's lots of fun language in this one and the potential for some epic illustrations. An illustrator is on board and when details are ready to go I will let you know what's what. Sometimes in the past there have been enormous oceans to cross between books, so it is always a relief to keep my writing career sailing on a little further. The seas are pretty rough out there right now and it is very tempting to climb inside an abandoned shell and clam up. And then something will happen and I poke myself out of my shell and wave my arms and legs around and I find myself a little further along. Who knows where I might end up - at least the journey is never dull.

Focusing on the making rather than on the end product ...

I had some really good news recently. I have been around the traps too long to think it a done deal at this point, but if things do go according to plan I will have not two, but three picture books coming out in the second half of this year. Huzzah!!! This has happened to me once before, in 2021 and, I have to say, it was something of a strange experience, especially in the covid era. In all honesty it went very differently to how I imagined it would. I am interested and excited to see how it goes this time. And I will tell you more when there is more to tell :-)

I have come to realise how easy it is to get suckered in to the drive/obsession to keep being published. Getting a yes is a heady hit of the feel goods and you'd have to be an automaton to not want to repeat that boost of endorphins. Then follows the desperate efforts to write the next publishable thing. Is this it? Is this it? Maybe this one will be? Or that! But this can be an unhelpful road to go down. Don't get me wrong. I definitely want to keep being published. But I find it hard to create good work when I am focusing on what a publisher might think. I can't know what they're going to think. They don't know either. Not until they think it. Making good art - whether that's a picture book, or a novel, or a poem for adults, or for children - is the goal. And good art might not only please me, it might please the publisher as well. Of course focusing on the making rather than on the end product is easier said than done and I am working on some strategies to keep the focus where it should be. I think, in part, it's about slowing down and letting things breathe a bit more.

In other news, my book with Vasanti Unka, My Elephant is Blue (Penguin, 2021), is coming out in the US on April 11th and has been accruing some State-side reviews which has been rather encouraging. There is this lovely one in Kirkus, and this one in Foreword Reviews and perhaps the loveliest one I've ever seen here at Books Worth Reading . I'm also being interviewed for an American podcast, Reading With Your Kids, which should be posted up some time around the release date. Gulp. 

I'll also be running my all day Writing Picture Books for Children workshop on Sunday April 2nd. If you, or anyone you know, is keen to get the good oil on how to get started you can find registration details here. And if you can't make it in April I will be repeating the course in August.

Right then, I'm off to work on some poems. If I make some good ones, when the opportunities arise I will have things to submit.

Entering the Storylines Awards? ...

Hello fair writer peeps, what's new? What's new for me is a grown up poem I wrote will be appearing in a grown up poetry anthology next year - this is a first for me and I am very, very excited and also slightly bewildered. Also I have written an educational resource for My Elephant is Blue which is now available in the menu at the top of this blog's landing page.  

I don't know if you've noticed but the Storylines writing awards close at the end of this month - October 31st - and hopefully some of you will be sending in entries, so you'll be polishing, revising, editing, tidying and putting the finishing flourishes on your manuscripts right now. I've been both an entrant (Joy Cowley and Tom Fitzgibbon) and a judge (Joy Cowley) and I can honestly say, hand on heart, these are wonderful competitions - worth entering, albeit nerve wracking and difficult to shortlist in, but they force you to finish a story, to polish it till it gleams, and to take a risk which is all part of how this business works. And every entry is read by the publishers involved. 

My tips, if you are planning to enter ...

1) When you have revised, checked spelling and got rid of all those darlings that aren't pulling their weight and making a solid contribution to your story as a whole, put your story away for a couple of days. Ideally the longer the better but clearly its getting down to the wire now so if you can look away from it for 48 hours it will help. It is amazing how mistakes or rough bits manage to hide themselves from our prying eyes when we have been checking, re-checking, and re-re-checking the same story for weeks on end. A wee break will bring them back to the surface and you will be a little more objective for one final read through.

2) Think - have I got the rhythm right? Many a fabulous story is ruined by an abrupt rhythm which spoils the reading experience. Does it flow smoothly or do you stumble and hiccup on some words or punctuation? If something makes you pause, even if you think it fits, see if you can rearrange it or smooth it out somehow. I find my gut is usually smarter than me at this point.

3) While your story is having a wee lie down in a darkened room, go and check the submission details and rules of engagement. Make a checklist and then do everything they have asked you to do. This is not the time to be a rule breaker. 

4) Note the required word counts on the entry forms. Are you in the right range? You really need to be. If you aren't, your story might not be ready. 

5) Number your pages. And I think it can be handy to put the title of your story in the header at the top of the page. If manuscripts get dropped or muddled by accident this should help every page find its rightful home again.

6) Covid means delays in mail deliveries - post early to ensure your manuscripts get there in time.

7) Have a strategy to get you through the long wait. Winners are announced at the Storylines Margaret Mahy Day which is usually end of March beginning of April. Join a band, knit a car, run away to the circus ... and work on a new story ... and if picture books are your thing then that new manuscript you are working on can be entered on the open submissions day that Scholastic hold on Valentine's Day.    

8) I never got anywhere when I entered the Tom Fitzgibbon. I entered the Joy Cowley maybe 4 or 5 times and got shortlisted twice I think - the stories that were shortlisted needed heaps more work. Don't despair if you don't win or shortlist - it is not the final word or the end of anything. It was a useful step for me to take no matter the outcome. I think entering helped familiarise my name with some folk. It certainly made me keep writing. 

Okay that's enough for now ... you really should be getting those stories ready ... talk soon ... and GOOD LUCK!!!

A picture book milestone ...

I heard back in March that Penguin wanted to publish my picture book story 'My Elephant is Blue'. The paperwork was to be sorted, and then ... we went into lockdown. But happy days, a little belatedly, we have reached the contract stage, which makes it very exciting and real and announceable. Yay!!!

The plan is for it to come out next year - I'll keep you posted as more information comes to hand. I cannot wait to hear who the illustrator will be - a pachyderm aficionado I hope. It'll be my tenth picture book which somehow feels like a bit of a milestone. I feel very lucky to still be here, doing this thing I love. After several years in the wilderness my current situation is surreal. The clocks are melting ...

Invitations and opportunities are coming in again for school visits and workshops too, and hopefully, if we remain in level one, I'll be conducting my Writing Children's Picture Books workshop at Selwyn College in Auckland on Saturday, 22nd August (and repeated on Sunday, September 20th). You can check out deets here. I've got a bit slack about my writing in recent weeks, and it's time to crack the WIP whip, so I'm off to work on a new story ... talk soon.

Managing the news hungry writer...

One day two weeks ago was a red letter day. I got two emails that surprised and delighted me. One was responding positively to a bold suggestion I'd made sometime in the second half of last year. The other was to let me know a short story I'd submitted was accepted for publication. I floated, giddy, for 24 hours and believed in myself for at least 4 or 5 days. Now I'm back to my usual normal grumpy, jittery, self-doubting, frequent email-refreshing self.

As a writer, receiving any news is addictive. Good news makes you happy. Great news makes you high as a kite. And the rest of the time we are in withdrawal. Where the analogy goes awry is that we have no control over the supply of our favourite drug. So we need some management techniques to help us survive the cold turkey times. Because we never know how long they'll last or if they'll ever be over again.

For all the people who say 'but writing should be your addiction', or 'distract yourself from waiting for responses to your submissions/proposals/putting your neck on the line by getting started on your next book' - they are lying to themselves. Or they're not and I'm just so happy for them in their lovely homes in Stepford.

So here are my ideas for getting through...

1) Run away to a far away country where you can ignore the fact that there is no new news (an expensive option and only good for short bursts)

2) Have children so you can sneak a high from their good news. This is a major (and costly) investment but can really pay off in the long run

3) Refrigerate or freeze your favourite emails/letters so you can enjoy them again later. Please note however you cannot refreeze a thawed email, and previously frozen news will deteriorate faster

4) Keep news fresher for longer by watering daily. Some folk recommend a dried arrangement and these will last a lot longer but the colours do fade and they can become very brittle.

5) Fake news is NOT recommended. Especially as it makes the real news harder to identify

6) Don't try and 'be' the news. The media/social media are by their very nature rather judgy and generally harsh critics. Even filters won't protect you


The truth is all news wears out eventually anyway. Careful handling will make it last longer but it will become history at some point no matter what you do. Of course this is a blessing for the less than stellar variety. There will always be periods without news. You will get times where your email inbox goes deathly quiet and the world seems to be spinning on without you. Staying in the game is still the best way to keep new news coming in, but know that the days of waiting and wishing to hear are just a normal part of this job we have found ourselves in. And it pays to remember too that all writers have to deal with the lulls and the cold turkey trough. Hanging out with each other during an absence of news may just be the best way to get through. Be kind to yourself. And nice to each other

Adulthood - why go there?

Yesterday the publisher unexpectedly sent through roughs for the picture book I have coming out with them next year. I am rather in love with how beautiful they are (and these are just the roughs!). And I now cannot wait for this book to be out. I would like to know how people I have never met get inside my head and take the ideas there and breath a layer of visual magic on them.  This is how we like our surprises to go :)

I am also doing some prep work on a new project. This is because I have other more important things to be doing. You know how it goes. There is interest in the new project though so it too will become important. But I should finish up my other jobs first.

If you are regular readers you will know I am a regular bleater on the subject of the adult literary/children's literature divide. It is a sore subject with me and one which I doubt will ever resolve to my satisfaction. But I like to see folk fighting the good fight, putting up sensible arguments and this is very well done here by Philip Nel.  I thought this was good - 3) Almost no children’s literature is written, illustrated, edited, marketed, sold, or taught by children. Adults — and adults’ idea of “children” — create children’s books. It’s profoundly hypocritical for an adult to suggest children’s literature as unworthy of adult attention. Indeed, adults who make such claims are either hypocrites, fools, or both. Or just rude?

And it astounds me how adults forget their own childhood so readily. Not just the interest in the world around them they felt as children, all the facts and details and mechanics of it all to be soaked up, and their striving to wrestle themselves into maturity, but the desire they felt for acknowledgement, understanding and legitimacy in the eyes of the adults who surrounded them. Children are complex, inquiring, and full of potential and the adults who understand this work to provide literature which stimulates and extends this potential. Literature that acknowledges them, asks the big questions, challenges them and treats them as the intelligent, amazing folk that they are. I wish folk would stop trivializing material written for children and the people who produce it - its disrespectful. Bleat over and out.

I have not forgotten about Jack the Viking: Magnetic North...

It is very exciting when someone responds this way to something I have written. Thank you Brill, over at  Random Acts of Reviewing ( a brilliant name for a book review blog IMHO) for your very nice review of my book The Half Life of Ryan Davis.

I have finished (for the meantime) one project (yay!!) and I'm now at work on the next - the rewrite of Jack the Viking: Magnetic North. Hopefully this won't take me more than a couple of months (fingers crossed). I need to get cracking on my research project for my university paper although I have my topic sorted which in some respects is probably the hardest part of the whole endeavour (yay!!) and what's more my topic revolves around one of my most favourite recent reads (double yay with lashings of whipped things). I also have a new role as a NZ Authors mentor (yay some more!!). I'm really looking forward to working together with my assigned mentee on her writing project. I was a mentee on the scheme back in 2005/6 and it was a huge boost for my writing and for me personally. I am very happy to have the opportunity to pay it forward.

My eldest is nearing the end of her time away in the US and she is wrapping things up in style. This weekend just past she went to Prom with a good friend Ayla at Ayla's school (so she still has Prom at her own school to come). Here they are - Elora and Ayla - looking absolutely gorgeous.

and lucky Elora also got to go to Key West over Spring Break (we went there for a day during our family East-Coast-of-the-US odyssey back in 2007). Here she is with (almost all of) her host family The Glissons. Thank you Glisson family for taking great care of my daughter.

Why art and culture?...

Here is part of a children's story of mine that I am rather fond of

The Man Who Grew Flowers

A long time ago, after we were cave men, but quite a bit before we were like we are today, men and women would go out and look for good things to eat. They tested out the fruit that hung from trees and if they were really smart, first they watched to see if animals ate it.
Sometimes they weren’t that smart.

They checked out the roots of some plants and the fruit that drooped from vines and bushes of others. If the fruit had been there all summer long sometimes they had a party afterwards.

They figured out what was good and what wasn’t. And then the very clever ones worked out how to grow more. The seeds they spat out on the ground sometimes sprouted and the old roots grew new roots and made a new bush which fattened the new roots up until they were good to eat.

The people who grew things had something to eat when there were no animals to hunt. And they could serve up a pretty nice, well-balanced meal if someone did bring home the bacon. Soon it was the in-thing to do.

Except for one man. He liked the cherries but thought the blossoms were amazing. He enjoyed the passionfruit but marveled at the passion flower. And even though he knew some fruit was no good to eat he couldn’t help admiring their flowers. He collected their seeds and planted them. How happy he felt when the flowers popped out when the weather warmed.

But his friends frowned.
“You cannot eat that,” they protested. “That is a waste of effort.”
“If I am hungry there are fruits and vegetables growing wild that I can gather and animals that I can hunt. But I like the flowers. They make me happy, so it is not a waste.”
“What will you do when the ground freezes and the herds go south?”
“I will be hungry, but the memory of the flowers will keep me going until they return.”...

And congratulations to Jill Marshall, author, publisher (www.pearjambooks.com ) and superwoman, Arts and Culture category winner in the 2011 Next Magazine Woman of the Year Awards!

Drinks Monitor...

Someone who knows me very well bought me the coolest badge as a belated birthday present (she also got me book vouchers - I am a little bit in heaven right now). I will be wearing this at every opportunity. I am hoping to work my way up to the badge that says 'Head Girl' :)

I have a month left to finish the WIP. It is a short month. That seems unfair. It has been a tight time frame and I have discovered the pitfalls of having a deadline hanging over you. They are not as appealing as they look from the other side. It is a good experience however and I don't regret it. It hasn't killed me and I am probably stronger.

Last week I received an e-mail with some of the final artwork for my next picture book The House That Went To Sea, due out mid year. I love the pictures. I think the artist's style suits the tone of the story beautifully. I am so looking forward to holding the finished product in my hands. As soon as the cover is sorted I will post up a picture. I also received my copy of Pick 'n' Mix: Volume 2 last week (see above) with a story of mine in it (The Monster Under My Bed). There are lots of other great stories inside by people like Kyle Mewburn, Lorraine Orman and David Hill. Just like its mate, Volume 1, it looks fab. It is available now.

And here for your perusal, because we all need a good laugh, is a juicy link courtesy of Janet Reid. Bless her for ferreting out these gems. I laughed MHO.

Pick this...

Note: For those of you who didn't know, growing like Topsy is a reference from Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin.

I got my final university assignment back in the post today. I was very happy. My SO called me a girlie swot. One of the benefits of having a paper completely internally assessed is that I get to see what the tutor thought of my efforts. I like that his comments on my essays and tasks push my understanding even further. I learnt something extra from his feedback. I wouldn't have had that in an exam.

Some of you will already know I now have a picture book coming out next year. I love this story. I mentioned it a while back in this blog with a brief excerpt - The House That Went to Sea. I am so very happy it will be a book. It has happened very quickly (I sent the manuscript off less then a month ago). I am excited to see what the illustrator comes up with. I now have to put head down and bum up to get finishing my World War Two chapter book. The trail went a little cold while I waited for the publisher to decide whether they would definitely take this story, then it got a little more distant while I worked furiously to finish my university assignments. My task now is to quickly bring myself back up to speed with where I was at and where I'm going next, and fall into a pattern, a rhythm of regular writing to complete it. I still feel in touch with the 'voice' and my direction, so it should be reasonably straight forward. I am not sure what I will go on to after that is finished by April next year. Maybe, I hope, a proper holiday ( I will be writing over christmas - even when we go away - to meet my deadline).

I think I might wander up to my local indie bookshop (the fabulous TimeOut) and see if they have the new Scholastic Short Story Anthology with some of my stories in, Pick 'n Mix: Volume One. I haven't seen it yet and I am curious. I have recently been pondering the idea of doing an e-book of my children's short stories. I have an 8,000 word story that has received praise but no publication offers yet, that I think would go in a collection quite nicely, along with the fifteen or so published and unpublished short stories I've accumulated over the years. I will be exploring the mechanics and process of publishing an e-book and will let you know what I discover and how I get on.

I'm dreaming of tee-shirt weather...

I went visiting on Tuesday up to Murray's Bay School on the North Shore. With my trusty sidekick, new author Elena De Roo (her gorgeous picture book The Rain Train, illustrated by Brian Lovelock was launched on August 7th) by my side for some school visit observations, I talked to all the middle and senior classes and gave a workshop to a group of budding writers in the afternoon. The children were attentive and enthusiastic and I love how they continue to embrace books. Books rock. Where there are books, there is hope.

Today I'm starting a series of writing workshops with some older budding writers at the local intermediate school and tomorrow morning I'm off to chat with some fabostory enthusiasts at Maungawhau School. Whew. Its a busy week. On Sunday its the Auckland Storylines Family Day and I will be there (Aotea Centre, on level 3 I think?) on the Kiwiwritekidz table if you want to come and say hi, ask questions or pick up any fabostory writing tips.

I've recently had some good news (sorry this is embargoed till the i's are dotted and the t's are crossed) and some bad news - a 'no' on something that I thought was looking pretty good. I am allowing myself some grieving time and then I'm going to put this result in my past where it belongs and move forward with new submissions, and new writing, because really, what else can you do when you're a writer. I hate the no's. I hate that sinking feeling as you read the rejection and the sinking plummets from a greater height when its been a long wait. In rational moments I will remind myself that a longer consideration means the writing/story was in the ball park. And I will send this story out to another publisher to start the whole process all over again.

I am ready for some uninterrupted sunshine and some warmth. The first of September isn't far away. Bring on Spring I say...

We live in risk-averse times...

Went to a christmas work do last night with my SO which included a screening of The Time Traveller's Wife. I enjoyed the movie and I cried. I think it successfully captured the essence of the book and managed to convey enough of the complex story although there is no doubt in my mind that the book is the superior beast. Yes we know in the movie that Henry and Clare love each other but the book gives us every reason why. And even though the movie is a summary that cannot fully capture the depth and breadth of the book, it is still a moving and satisfying love story. Rachel Mc Adams and Eric Bana were great.

Love Fifi's velvet Jesus. Go check it out here. Its especially cool that he has a hint of a smile - I like to think he might have smiled sometimes (after all he wasn't an author trying to get published).

Was interested to see on Beattie's Blog this morning that Viking is rejacketing Edward de Bono's backlist and Jeffrey Archer is being paid 18 million pounds for an as-yet unwritten 5 book series. While I might be persuaded by the argument that celebrity books and big name commercial writers might help publishers also publish less commercial propositions, this is a huge amount of money to tie up. How many books by new or mid list authors could be published with 18 million pounds? And who knew that a publisher even had that kind of money? Especially in the current economic climate?? And while I can only dream of having any of my books stay in print long enough to be rejacketed, rejacketing just seems another sign of these risk averse times. My sighs can probably be heard in Invercargill. I promise to try and be more cheerful soon.

A full time writer?...

It is a strange week. My daughters sports team is in crisis and its stressful for her as she comes up to her NCEA exams. My SO's work is a leetle crazy right now too. Yet I have had three good bits of news this week - one related to my writing, one for my university study, and one completely out of the blue. I'm trying not to jump up and down too much but I am definitely doing a little dance on the inside.

I came across this smart yet funny bit of writerly advice (where writer/editor Kit Whitfield cleverly compares query letters to dating) the other day via Sally Zigmond's blog The Elephant in the Writing Room. Its not quite so applicable for the New Zealand writing/publishing scene but still very much worth a read.

You know how gas expands to fill a jar? I am definitely an expert time waster. When people ask if I write full time I tend to laugh. I have time available at the moment to spend on my writing but I still manage to distract myself with other things LIKE HOUSEWORK or Sudoku or picking lint out of my navel. There are writers who sit at their computer every day and make themselves write so many words (like a thousand or ten thousand or something). I'm not sure I'm capable of this, or that I want to be capable of this. It works for them but I'm not sure it would work for me. I like the way my stories develop slowly over time. Short stories and picture books are my quick writing fix but novels need a longer gestation. There's a lot of thinking that goes on behind the scenes, and a whole heap of tinkering, both inside my mind and on the page. Sometimes I wish they'd just hurry and grow up and leave home but then they wouldn't be my stories. My stories have to be hand made by me, using the process that I use. So you tell me, do I write full time?

Hi Honey....I'm home

Hi Honey, I'm home....sorry I was away so long...been busy with non-writing related things but now I'm back...

On sunday its November. Most of me is ready for September now. It usually happens around this time of year - the months are flying past faster than I can keep up with. I might be ready for christmas by next February. On Halloween my middle child turns fourteen.

I am writing an article at the moment on 2010 (even though I am obviously not ready for it yet). At this time of year we tend to spend a lot of time looking back and making 'best-of' lists and things like that. Its a good idea to look back at what was achieved over the year but also now is a good time to think about what might be achieved in the future. Okay, as writers, this is a bit tricky because so much of what we might achieve is out of our control. The only things we can control are the words. But now I'm thinking about the stories I have on-the-go that need finishing and polishing and how long realistically it might take me to do this. I'm wondering about how far afield I want to submit my manuscripts next year and how I go about this. Who might be the best fit for my work and how should I present myself - should I do things differently or stick with the same MO. Next year I think I would like to try some face-to-face meetings with local publishers but I would also like to send some things overseas and in order to put my best foot forward I need a starry query letter. Janet Reid, literary agent and blogger in NYC recently posted a summary on writing a good query letter. Go check it out here - its good advice. I'm also debating whether to do more study next year and wondering whether I can afford to go to the SCBWI conference in Australia (which I think is on in October). I guess attending the conference will depend on what manuscripts I will have to offer at that point, what has happened with my work between now and then, and what use I can make out of such a visit. It might be good to do an Australian based pitch slam if they have one.

Catching up on writery news on Beattie's blog today I saw that Mallinson are being taken in under the Penguin umbrella. The children's publishing industry in NZ needs to buy even slimmer fitting trousers now. Like the ones in that doctored photo of the model with the impossibly tiny waist.

In other news, Noddy, like Winnie the Pooh, is attempting a comeback. Sigh. If booksellers are saving their christmas budgets for Dan Brown in the adult section, will they be setting their childrens allotment aside for Winnie and Noddy? And superstar merino Shrek will be mixing and mingling with Queenstown shoppers this weekend to launch his new book. He's a bit of a dag but he has a good angle and as his needs are simple his royalties go to charity. If he sells more books than I did at my last launch I may cry.

Come and meet me...

The scheduled publication dates of several projects that my work is appearing in have been delayed. I know these things happen. I feel like a pirate. Garr.

I have not written any words of fiction this week. Rats.

I got my second assignment back and I got a good mark - yay.

The Were-Nana has made another list - will tell you more soon. Yowza.

If you would like to come and say hi and meet me in the flesh or have me sign a book I am appearing at the Storylines Family Day in Auckland on Sunday August 30th. This is a free event on at the Aotea centre (the Edge). I'm in the Limelight room at 10.30 - 11 talking bout my books, at Wheelers Bookshop stand at 11 - 11.30 with Kyle Mewburn, and reading at Borders Bookshop at 12 - 12.30. I'm at Lower NZI at 1.30 - 2 (St Cuthberts are doing a performance of The Were-Nana) and at the Children's Bookshop stand from 2 - 2.30. I wrap up with some more reading on level 4 at Scholastic Books out loud from 2.30 - 3. Storylines family Days are excellent fun and a chance to meet authors and illustrators of childrens books. I'm hoping to squeeze in a visit myself to the Artists in Action event and especially hoping I will have the opportunity to meet Dylan Horrocks. There are lots of excellent people talking about their work, reading from their books and exhibiting their talents. You can check out the Storylines website here for more details about family days in your area. I hope to see you on the 30th.

Do unto others...

There's been a lot said over the last few days on some of my favourite blogs about author Alice Hoffman's public brain explosion over a slightly less then loving review of her most recent book (you can read about it here). Name calling is frowned upon on any occasion but I think giving out personal contact details for the reviewer and asking fans to get 'in touch' was the height of stupidity. I haven't agreed with everything ever said about my books but I find a darkened room without any means of communication with the outside world to do my seething in. I don't like everything I read, so why should I expect anyone else to be different. However Ms Hoffman's melt down gave me the opportunity to read this and in addition to it being sound advice, I almost laughed my head right off. Thanks to Jane Smith at How Publishing Really Works for posting the link.

I also hopped on over to writer Mary McCallum's blog this morning via Beattie's Blog and found her piece on character excellent. You should read it too, whether you find writing good characters easier than making cornflakes and milk for breakfast, or not.

And for anyone waiting to hear my news, don't worry, when I hear it you'll be almost the first to know. This is the first lesson of publishing. Everything in publishing takes 50 million times longer than it does in the normal world. And no Maureen, I'm not going to be on Dancing with the Stars, despite my dancing skills. The day a NZ writer for children is considered celebrity enough to appear on this show I will eat my shorts.

And here are a few snippets of info about me

I'm 5 foot three inches tall, I am the youngest of four, I can only speak english, and both my parents are Polish. I love to travel and my last name is pronounced Shi-manic.