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A is for April
1. It occurred to me that so much of writing is waiting: waiting for ideas to come, or the next scene; waiting to see whether publishers like your latest offering; whether readers like it. Writing is, in this sense, the antithesis of modern life, modern communication,...

Fab in Fourteen
Happy New Year, dear reader! (You know who you are.) This year is about Writing. Which shouldn’t come as a surprise, coming from a writer, but the last couple of years have been, well, distracting, not to put too fine a point on it. So even though many aspects of my...

The thing with thirteen
1. It is the end of a year of turmoil and upheaval. There has been loss and illness and grief, and pressure-cooker stresses. It has been a year of endings of various kinds. It has been a year of revisiting the past, of trying to find how I got from there to here. This...

When You Remember Me
1. Sometimes words are not sufficient, even for a writer. Last month, I lost a woman who meant more to me than she could know, although I tried and failed to explain it to her on many occasions. She was my substitute mother, an unjudging ear, my pole star in times of...

Wired for sound
On Tuesday I was interviewed on national radio for the first time. I’m not quite sure how it happened: I got a call from the producer of Books and Arts Daily and next thing it’s early in the morning and I’m waiting nervously to go into the ABC studios to talk about YA...

Darn, it’s December again
1. Months have passed with no blogging, but lots of day-job, writing gigs and general rushing about. It was with some surprise that I noted the arrival of December: it’s been an awfully long time since I’ve had such a dramatic, intense year. I’ve learned how to shoot...

Eight in October
1. October was the eighth month in the Roman calendar, which seems about right, as it does not seem possible that we’re heading toward the round-up of 2012. Mind you, so much has changed this year, for better and for worse, that it seems more like the work of eight...

Arise, August!
1. So many people launched fabulous books in July. I went to the launch of Meg McKinlay and Kyle Odgers’ new book Ten Tiny Things, which I’d been tantalised by in Rottnest, and James Foley’s In the Lion, which I’d been tantalised by in Singapore. I adored them...

No More Beer and Skittles
Oh, I know, it’s been ever such a long time. But I’ve been busy. Dianne Wolfer, Naomi Kojima, Yoko Yoshizawa, Leonard S. Marcus, me, James Foley and Norman Jorgensen at Ku De Ta, Singapore * At the end of May I was lucky enough to visit Singapore to present...

Losing It unleashed
Having a book launch involves as much organisation, angst and ‘why-am-I-doing-this-again?’ fretting as your average wedding. Okay, so maybe I’m exaggerating, but really, a launch is not for the faint of heart. Once upon a time publishers used to organise launches: in...