I have two books coming out this year - Pink in August, and Angel Fish in September.
I've been working on Angel Fish for a couple of years now. It's about the Children's Crusade, which happened (maybe) in 1212, where a shepherd boy called Stephen decided that the only thing that would liberate Jerusalem from the Infidel was the purity and innocence of Children. He raised an army of 10 000 children, marched over the Swiss Alps (where a bunch of them died, due to a lack of important cold-weather gear like, um, shoes), and got to Genoa, where he said the ocean would part before him and they would walk across the ocean floor to the Holy Land.
This was problematic for two reasons: a) Greece was in the way; and b) it didn't work.
But two nice men called William the Iron and Hugh the Pig turned up and said that they were rich merchants who TOTALLY believed in the children's cause, and that would charter a bunch of ships to take the kids to the Holy Land. And Stephen said "well, of course that's exactly what I meant when I said the ocean would part." And off they went.
Except William and Hugh weren't merchants at all. They were PIRATES, and sold all the kids into slavery.
It's a feel-good kind of novel. I'll be posting the cover and an excerpt in weeks to come.
In Extras, the last book in Scott Westerfeld’s Uglies series, Aya tells us that when Tally Youngblood made the mind-rain fall, it cured all the pretties and changed the world forever. But Tally and her friends did more than change their world; they changed ours too.
Mind-Rain continues what Tally started, with startling, funny and insightful essays on the world, characters and ideas of the Uglies series, plus the short story that inspired Westerfeld to write the books in the first place.
Think you know everything about Tally’s world? After Mind-Rain, you'll never look at the Uglies series the same way again.
Apologies for the hiatus - in the last month I've delivered the Reading Matters conference, sent a book to press (!), am three weeks away from sending ANOTHER book to press (!!), and been struck down with a nasty (but swine-free) cold.
I will placate you with two things. First, a quote from Bernard Beckett at Reading Matters, when asked what his advice for aspiring writers would be:
Be alive to the absurdity of the world.
(Bernard also might have said something about how he would love to read a cross between Huck Finn and Twilight, and the words "drown the bitch" may have been mentioned, but perhaps I misheard.)
Second! Here is the final cover of Pink, complete with blurb and quotes from John Green and Simmone Howell! (click to make view fullsize)
Later this month, more news on the NEXT book, some other stuff I've been doing and a post about My Favourite Artist.
The fabulous Steph at Hey, Teenager of the Year! has just become the first ever reviewer of Pink. I like the bit where she says "The distinct theme of this novel is 'it's okay if you're not sure' - not an issue that's common in YA literature at the moment, but which is masterfully handled in Pink."
Those of you who aren't super-cool teenage bloggers and didn't get ARCs have to wait until August to read it.
Also, how cool is the new Girlfriend Fiction ad? I want that T shirt.
I keep going to schools and things and people don't recognise me because my author photo is old and I now have different hair. So I got Dad to take some photos to try and get a new one.
Firstly - what's territorial copyright? What are parallel import restrictions and why do we have them?
Basically, there's a law in Australia where, if a book is published in Australia within 30 days of it being published overseas, an Australian bookseller cannot import and sell the international edition. Now there's a proposal to remove that restriction. The people in favour of getting rid of it say that it will make books cheaper - we all know that books are cheaper in America, we can see so on Amazon.
But why are books cheaper over there? Two main reasons. The first is that the US is a much bigger pond than Australia. There's more people to buy books, therefore publishers can print more, at a lower cost. The second is that, because of the big pond, most books in the US come out first in hardcover (which is expensive), and then later in a very cheap mass-market edition, printed on very low-quality paper with inferior binding.
In Australia, we generally don't print in hardcover, because there aren't enough people to buy the books to make it financially viable. But that means our first edition paperbacks are pretty high-quality - usually a B or C format, and on good quality paper and embellished covers.
So why not remove this territorial copyright? What purpose does it serve? A few, actually. Firstly, both the US and the UK have full territorial copyright - they don't even have the 30-day rule. They fully protect their publishing industry and authors against imports from other countries. The only country, in fact, to remove its territorial copyright is New Zealand, a country with almost no local publishing to start with. And there is no evidence that it has resulted in cheaper books.
But here's the main reason. If it is cheaper to buy an overseas edition of an Australian book, chances are the consumer will do it. Which means that the Australian publisher doesn't get the money, and the author gets a much lower royalty. With less money flowing through Australian publishers, they become unable to support the smaller books, the niche books. The books that might not sell a squillion copies but are still worthy of publication. Australian authors will turn to the US and UK markets for publication, instead of publishing locally first. In order to appeal to overseas markets, the Australian-ness of their stories will be stripped away.
Dymocks CEO Don Grover has this to say: "I don't think the Australian consumer cares (about buying Australian products), they care about price". He obviously has a lot of respect for his customers.
And let's talk about booksellers for a moment. Customers are already shopping in an international market - you can order any book you like from the US or the UK as an individual, online or through your local bookshop. Australian booksellers are already having to compete with Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk - so why shouldn't they be allowed to import cheaper books?
Because if we did lift the restrictions, how long do you think it would be before an Amazon.com.au sprang up? With a US-owned Amazon warehouse in Australia, how many Australian booksellers would be able to compete with the scale of Amazon, without the overseas shipping costs? Not Dymocks, that's for sure.
Ex-Premier Bob Carr is a member of the Coalition for Cheaper Books (along with such august establishments as Coles, KMart, Big W and Dymocks). He says that our current comparatively high book prices are resulting in kids who don't read*. He says that the average book price is $35, which is driving consumers away from buying books for their children. This is a very irritating non-sequitur. Because sure, if you average out all the books in the bookshop, including coffee-table books and cookbooks, the average price is $35. But go into the children's and young adult section of a bookshop, and you will be unlikely to find many books that cost over $20.
My next book Pink, is set in Melbourne. It mentions Flinders Street and trams and the GPO shopping centre and many other places. When it gets published in the US, it won't be set in Melbourne anymore. The footpaths will be sidewalks. The Mums will be Moms. Maths class will be math class, and Ava's high school will no longer be named The Billy Hughes School for Academic Excellence, after an ex-Prime Minister. And that's fine, for my US readers. I understand why those changes need to be made. But for Australians to have to read the de-Australianed version because it's cheaper? It's just wrong.
(this post is a modified version of my submission to the ACCC)
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*Will somebody think of the children! Let them have cheap books! Mandatory internet filters will make them big and strong and put a rose in every cheek... Or is that Vegemite?
Inanna was the Sumerian goddess of sex, love, fertility and warfare. Her sister was Ereshkigal, queen of the Underworld, and Inanna wished to visit her.
Before she left, she told her uncle Enki, god of craft, water, intelligence and creation where she was going, in case she got into trouble. Then she dressed for her visit in a turban, wig, a lapis lazuli necklace, beads, a royal dress, a golden ring and a lapis lazuli measuring rod.
The gatekeeper of the first gate of the Underworld informed Inanna that she could only pass if she handed over the measuring rod.
'Why?' asked Inanna.
The first gatekeeper shrugged. 'It is just the way of the Underworld.'
Inanna handed over the rod and passed through the gate.
At the second gate, the gatekeeper asked her for her golden ring.
'Why?' asked Inanna.
The second gatekeeper shrugged. 'It is just the way of the Underworld.'
Inanna handed over the ring and passed through the gate.
At the third gate she surrendered her beads. At the fourth, her necklace. The fifth gatekeeper took her turban and the sixth her wig. At the seventh gate she removed her dress, and arrived before her sister naked, all of her power stripped from her along with her jewels.
Ereshkigal was not the the most loving of sisters. She was jealous that Inanna could come and go as she pleased, when she, Ereshkigal, could never leave the Undeworld. So she declared that Inanna was to be turned into a corpse and hung on a meathook.
For three days and nights, Inanna's rotting corpse hung from the meathook. And then her uncle Enki started to worry about her.
He took the dirt from under his fingernails and made two tiny creatures who were neither male nor female. He whispered to them to appease Ereshkigal, find Inanna, and sprinkle her corpse with the food and water of life.
The fingernail-creatures were so tiny that they passed through all seven gates of the Underworld unnoticed. When they found Ereshkigal, she was moaning and crying like a woman giving birth.
'The terrible pain!' she cried.
'Oh!' said the fingernail-creatures relied. 'Poor you! You must feel terrible.'
'I do!' said Ereshkigal. 'It hurts so.'
'Tsk tsk,' said the fingernail-creatures. 'You're being so brave. You are wonderful.'
Ereshkigal was so grateful for the sympathy of the fingernail-creatures that she asked them what they wanted. They replied that they wanted the corpse of Inanna.
They sprinkled the rotting meat with the food and water of life, and revived Inanna, but Ereshkigal declared that she couldn't leave the Underworld unless someone took her place. She then sent demons up to the surface to find someone to replace Inanna.
First they came across Nincurba, Inanna's priest, who was mourning for Inanna. Inanna refused to let him take her place, as he had been there for her. Next the demons found Cara, Inanna's beautician, also in mourning. But Inanna refused him too, as Cara had always been there for her. Then the demons came across Dumuzi, Inanna's husband. He was dressed in nice clothing and enjoying himself even though his wife was missing presumed dead. Inanna frowned and let the demons take him.
And so Inanna returned to her home with the memory of hanging on the meathook fresh in her mind, the memory of how it felt to be stripped of her clothes and power. And a renewed appreciation for the people who she loved, who loved her back.
I had my astrological chart done yesterday. It's not really the sort of thing I'd normally do - it was a birthday present from some friends. But it turned out to be very interesting.
I don't believe in astrology. I don't think that what time of day I was born affected my personality. But I think that there are common experiences of being a human, and therefore humanity has common stories. These stories - myths, fairy tales, fables - are useful in interpreting our own lives and stories, and understanding what it means to be human. So astrology is a bit like that - it's a fictional construct, but a useful tool to help us understand ourselves a little better.
So here's what I learnt about myself yesterday. I'm an Aries Sun, Aries Ascendant, Aries Mars and Aries Venus. This is a lot of Aries. I am headstrong, fiery, bossy, curious, creative. I'm independent but not alone. I have a Taurus Moon, which makes me take all my Aries energy and ground it, turning it into something practical and valuable - like writing books.
Anyway. One of the most interesting things that the astrologer said was my relationship to the feminine. She said that other bits of my chart indicated that part of my "quest" was to champion the feminine, and bring it to the fore not as an opposition to the masculine, but as an equal, a compliment. Which resonated quite a lot given the ranting I've been doing lately about women's stories and female protagonists.
The astrologer also told me the Sumerian myth of Inanna and Ereshkigal, which I shall repeat here later this week, as it's one of my new favourite stories.
Last week the Children's Book Council Book of the Year Shortlist was announced. There were sixteen books on the Older Readers Notable list, with six books on the actual Shortlist. Of the sixteen Notables, four books have female protagonists. On the Shortlist, there's just one.
Firstly, congratulations to all the authors on the lists. Please don't think for a moment that what follows is a criticism of your work. You're all awesome and totally deserve to be there.
But where are all the girls? Where is Simmone Howell's Everything Beautiful? Or Joanne Horniman's My Candlelight Novel? Or Michelle Cooper's A Brief History of Montmaray? Or Julia Lawrinson's The Push?
If you take a look back over the years at the books that have won and been shortlisted in the past, you'll notice that there aren't many girls at all (Melina Marchetta's Looking for Alibrandi and Saving Francesca are among the handful of girl-protagonist books awarded the gong in over 60 years).
And it's happening everywhere! Today the Miles Franklin shortlist was announced. How many women writers on the shortlist? NONE. Ironic, huh? For a literary award that was named in honour of a woman who had to pretend to be a man in order to get published. A HUNDRED YEARS AGO.
What's going on? Why, as a society, do we privilege stories about boys and men? Why are their stories more Literary? Is it because people figure that girls will read books about boys, but boys won't read books about girls? Is it because girl-stories are often focussed on an emotion-based arc, rather than an action-based one?
I'm currently in the very early stages of thinking about The Next Book. And I wanted to try writing a book for girls, but with a male protagonist. But now I'm not so sure. More girl books, I say! More spunky girls being awesome! Awards be damned!
I realised the other day that, with three of the four novels I've written, a character's name gets changed during the editing stage. In fact, it's the same character, in every book. It's the "appropriate mate" character, or the character that the protagonist thinks she wants (whether or not she ends up getting him differs from story to story). And each change has been for a different reason.
In Scatterheart, the character of James was originally Jack, and he was the ship's carpenter. But it turned out it's really hard to make a humble tradesperson unlikeable, so he became new-money-aristocracy instead (much easier to dislike). Jack felt like too honest a name, and James was the logical alternative.
In The Not Quite Perfect Boyfriend, Ben was originally Steven. He was Steven because when I was thirteen and made up an imaginary British boyfriend, that's what his name was. But then I started writing Angel Fish,my book about the Children's Crusade, and one of the main characters in that is Stephan. And he really existed (well, maybe), so I couldn't change his name. Except a name-change for Steven was very complicated, because I had this whole word-play thing going on with his initials spelling out SOW and SLOW. And at first I thought I'd just replace Steven with another S name. But there was already a Sam and a Spence in PINK, and what with Stephan in Angel Fish as well it all seemed a bit much. So Steven became Ben, after the first boy I ever had a proper crush on, and I changed the initials thing to BOW and BLOW.
The name-change in PINK was much more straightforward. It turns out there is already a Spence in Penni Russon's next book, which comes out before mine. So I tried to think of another preppy-jock-name, and came up with Nathan, Ryan, Dylan, Logan, and finally Ethan. I don't know why I find -an names preppy/jocky. I just do. But Ethan he is.
PS. You want some wacky name fun? Let me introduce you to Barkevious Mingo, Calamity McEntire and Taco Vandervelde, over at Name of the Year.
Here’s the latest entry in the “grownups are all bastards” file.
Residents of a Nottinghamshire housing estate have installed pink lights which show up teenagers’ spots in a bid to stop them gathering in the area.
And:
Yobs are being shamed out of anti-social behaviour by bright pink lights which show up their acne. The lights are so strong they highlight skin blemishes and have been successful in moving on youths from troublespots who view pink as being “uncool.” … Manager Dave Hey said: “With the fluorescent pink light we are trying to embarass young people out of the area. “The pink is not seen as particularly macho among young men and apparently it highlights acne and blemishes in the skin.
It starts with philosophy, and then moves through feminism, politics, graveyards, literature, monsters real and imagined, syphilis and ends up with, of all things, the humble computer. And it’s ALL TRUE.
So there was this guy, right? William Godwin. He was a political philosopher and novelist in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. He wrote a book called Things as They Are or The Adventures of Caleb Williams, which is said to be the first mystery novel.
William married a lady called Mary. Mary Wollstonecraft, to be precise. You may have heard of her. She is one of the pioneers of modern feminism, and wrote A Vindication of the Rights of Woman in 1792, where she argues that women aren’t inferior to men at all, they are just not as well educated. And wouldn’t it be nice, if everyone were treated as rational people and our social order was founded on reason.
Mary Wollstonecraft
Mary had a few children (some illegitimately), but we’re going to focus on her namesake, Mary Godwin. Mary Wollstonecraft died when baby Mary was only ten days old, so little Mary was brought up by her father and given a somewhat eccentric education. The story goes that William Godwin taught her to read by tracing her little pudgy fingers over the letters on her mother’s tombstone. He said, of Mary:
“She is singularly bold, somewhat imperious, and active of mind. Her desire of knowledge is great, and her perseverance in everything she undertakes almost invincible.”
Mary Shelley
Mary, it seemed, was destined for great things. And here’s where it gets interesting.
Percy Bysshe Shelley was estranged from his aristocratic family and his pregnant wife, because of his interest in radicalism. He was drawn to William Godwin’s political theory, and offered to pay off Godwin’s debts. Then he met Mary, who was seventeen at the time (Shelley was 22). They began secretly seeing each other. When William Godwin found out, he was mightily annoyed (especially since the debt-paying-off never eventuated), and Mary and Percy ran away together to live in sin.
A few years and a miscarriage later, Mary and Percy found themselves in Geneva with their friend Lord Byron, who was having an affair with Mary’s stepsister, Claire.
They rented the Villa Diodati by Lake Geneva, and basically just hung out writing, boating and talking late into the night. Also there was John William Polidori, a romantic novelist.
One particularly wet and rainy afternoon, Byron suggested they all write a supernatural story to entertain each other. Polidori wrote a short story that is basically the reason why teenage girls go weak at the knees at the mention of Edward Cullen – the story, Vampyre, is acknowledged to be the beginning of the vampire genre.
Mary also started what she thought would be a short story, but ended up being Frankenstein.
We’re going to follow this story on a slightly different path now, for the final chapter. Lord Byron had two daughters. The second was with Claire Clairmont, Mary Shelley’s stepsister. This illegitimate daughter, Allegra, died aged 5.
The other daughter was Ada, also known as The Hon. Augusta Ada Byron, or, later, Ada, Countess of Lovelace, or, now, Ada Lovelace.
Ada Lovelace
Ada Lovelace is perhaps best known as being the first computer programmer. Well, sort of. She worked with Charles Babbage on a sort of theoretical predecessor to the modern computer. She also recongised that computers were capable of much more than just calculating numbers, which was something that no one (including Babbage) had ever considered.
Ada’s mother was very worried that her daughter might succumb to the madness of her father (you know, the syphilis, incest, sexual promiscuity that Byron is famed for), so she had Ada privately tutored in science and mathematics for a young age (the best way to stave off madness, as I’m sure you all know, is quadratic equations).
She was good mates with Charles Dickens, and also with Babbage, who said this about her:
Forget this world and all its troubles and if
possible its multitudinous Charlatans — every thing
in short but the Enchantress of Numbers.
So here we are, at the end of our story. Or the beginning. Today is Ada Lovelace Day, and I have pledged to blog about women in science. Although I ended up blogging about women in political science and science fiction, as well as the ordinary kind of science.
I think perhaps one day I will write a novel about this strange dynasty of women. But in the meantime, if you want to hang out in Ada's world a little more, I can recommend Bruce Sterling's The Difference Engine.
Remember when David Levithan came to Melbourne and made this speech, talking about killing the vampires for young (queer) teens?
Here is a machinima version of the original Die, Vampire, Die! song from [title of show]. Highly recommended for anyone who ever feels the pain of creativity.
On Sunday, 50 young people, six authors and other assorted interested/ing individuals gathered at the State Library, to hear two additional authors talk about stuff, and eat cake.
And it made me really happy, because it kind of felt like coming home. I’ve been working at the Centre for Youth Literature for nearly six years now*, but I’ve been involved for a lot longer.
The first CYL event I went to, a Bookgig at St Martin’s Youth Arts Theatre. It was 1993. I was 12. The author was Isobelle Carmody, the book was The Gathering. I went to a whole lot of Bookgigs as a kid, and loved them all. Talking about books with other young people and Real Live Authors seemed to be pretty much the best way to spend a Sunday afternoon, and I’m pleased to say that it still is.
Here’s a photo of that first Bookgig. See if you can find Tiny Lili**.
*ZOMG.
**Clue: Jeans too short. White socks. Otherwise, I haven't really changed.
It's my first overseas edition, my first translation AND my first hardcover. AND my first book with SPARKLES. It is as SPARKLY as the SPARKLIEST of vampires.
The best thing about being in another language, is running the blurb through Google Translator. Thus:
Als Hannah Cheshire den Heiratsantrag ihres Hauslehrers Thomas Behr ablehnt, ahnt sie nicht, dass sie damit ihr Schicksal fur immer beseiglt. Von einem Moment auf den anderen verwandelt sich ihr wohlbehutetes Leben in einen Albtraum. Und ihr wird klar, dass ihre Vergangenheit auf einer einzigen groben Luge beruhte...
...becomes:
As Hannah Cheshire the marriage of their teacher's house rejects Thomas Behr, an idea they did not put them so that their fate for ever beseiglt. From one moment to the other wohlbehutetes transforms her life into a nightmare. And it is clear that their past on a single broad based Luge ...
Which pretty much sums up the book.
Scatterheart is published in Germany by Coppenrath.
It's a scary time, here in Victoria. I keep thinking about all the regional schools I've visited over the last few years. Many of them aren't there anymore. I hope the kids are all okay.
It's hard to know what to do. I think everyone wants to help, but unless you're a firefighter, there's not much we can do right now. The Australian Red Cross are saying they've got enough blood for now, but that money can always help. You can donate to the Australian Red Cross Bushfire Appeal here.
