First Nations Australia Writers' Network

In early May I am attending the First Nations Australia Writers' Network round table workshop.  This is an initiative funded by the Australia Council and the purpose is to engage writers and publishers in conversation to improve communication in the area of Indigenous writing and publishing.  I am excited by this opportunity - Indigenous publishing is a tradition of which Omnibus is proud and one we have worked at for many years.  Soon we will publish  Leonie Norrington and Brenton McKenna's new work Bush Holiday, a wonderful collaboration of two creators whose knowledge and understanding of indigenous culture is both deep and wide.

Publishing Indigenous work is an area with many serious complications.  There are rather a lot of questions I am going to be asking when I get to the conference.

I am still sifting through the slush pile hoping against hope that I will find something wonderful.  Already we have come across some writers we are excited to be able to support and mentor.

Keep writing!

xxD

Adelaide Writers' Week

Adelaide Writers' Week is coming up fast.  The fabulous Laura Kroetsch has done another wonderful job of lining up new and exciting writers to share their world with us. 
I'll be chairing a panel with guests Nick Bland and Tohby Riddle on The Art of the Picture Book.  It starts at 3.45 pm on Sunday 3rd March and it will be a test of Qantas' scheduling and Melbourne's weather since I fly in to Adelaide about an hour prior to the start  of the session.  If I'm not there please will someone take over for me?

Nick and Tohby are such different creators of picture books - Tohby trained at the Sydney College of the Arts in a time when art was very conceptual - 'smearing butter on the walls and calling it art' according to Tohby.  Nick was self-taught but watched his father, a sculptor and artist who had to teach to keep his family alive and Nick felt his dad sacrificed his happiness this way.   

Nick is a huge fan of Tohby's work which he sees as in some ways wonderfully self-indulgent compared to his own books which are definitely aimed at a commercial market.  Tohby would disagree - I asked him if Unforgotten,  his latest picture book was a self-indulgent work and he was very clear that in his mind it was not.  The idea came from a very deep feeling and over a period of five years images and feelings would pop into his head; exciting, spine tingling ideas that he just couldn't grasp but that he had to find a way to give form to.  A lot of Tohby's work is like this - getsating for years, growing in depth and meaning.  A fidelity to the ideas is required and this is demanding in many ways.

Nick, who lives on the beach in the relaxed capital of Australia, Darwin, has a very different take on the work of making picture books.  His most recent picture book had a print run of 120 thousand and Nick will happily compromise to ensure his books sell.  Since he has now sold well over a million copies of his books this clearly works for him.  My own grandchildren absolutely love his books and they are  a joy to share so if there were compromises they worked brilliantly.

So two very different writer/illustrators and both with extraordinarily successful works that appeal to many people.  Making picture books is demanding and requires many people to bring the work to publication.  It is a great pleasure and a privilige to share this work with talented and passionate people.  Judging by the many hundreds of picture book submissions we receive every year it is clear there are a lot of people who would like to join this fraternity, but only a handful ever make it.

I'm looking forward to this discussion.

Jaipur Literary Festival

I have wanted to go to this particular literary event for three years now and at last this January I went.
It was well worth the trip.  If you are even vaguely curious about India or about Indian writing I would encourage you to attend.  Because it can be somewhat daunting to get all the information you need about attending the festival I have set out the steps that may help you get there from Australia.

Getting there from Australia
Once you make the decision to attend the Jaipur literary Festival you should immediately begin the process of arranging your visa.  The place to start this is online at http://indianvisaonline.gov.in/visa/  This will be your first taste of Indian bureaucracy but not your last.  It can be a lengthy process so be prepared with all documents required before you begin to fill in the forms.  Details such as your parent’s names seem oddly unnecessary until you arrive in India and see that the Pakistani threat is very serious indeed and so such detail is important to them.  Indian visas require a photograph that is not the usual passport size taken at post offices.  You will need to locate an actual photographer and have it done in a studio.

Next register for the festival.  This is mandatory – you will not be able to enter the site without having done so – however it is possible to register on arrival depending on availability.  I advise pre-registration however.  The lines can be long. http://jaipurliteraturefestival.org/registration

Get your inoculations
Recommended are Hepatitis, cholera, and malaria tablets.  If instead of using a specialist travel doctor you use your family doctor and shop around for the drugs it can save literally hundreds of dollars. 
Take mosquito repellent tho there were no mosquitoes while I was there. Take hand sanitiser – you will need it frequently.  Be sure to wash your hands just as frequently since the sanitiser seems to move the dirt about rather than actually remove it.  Take antibiotics if you think you might get Delhi belly.  This allows you to treat a bacterial infection.  Your doctor will have other suggestions.  I ate from food carts and did not get sick.  Drink only bottled or filtered water. 

Flights
I flew Singapore airlines.  The service was excellent.  Qantas have flights but these are more expensive.  Singapore Airlines was the cheapest I found. If you have to overnight in Singapore as I did it is advisable to book a room at the transit lounge at least three weeks in advance as rooms are not likely to be available on the day.  Here for a budget room you get a bed, table and television should you wish to watch it rather than sleep.  The shower and toilet facilities are shared, clean and good.  It costs around S$40 for six hours from midnight to six am and avoids you having to wander the corridors wondering why duty free goods cost twice as much as anywhere else.  book a room at http://www.gosimply.com/airport-lounges/singapore/singapore-airport/sin3atl

Arrival
You will transfer from the Delhi international airport to the domestic airport by walking from one to the other.  You will not be permitted to leave the airport – heavily armed militia will prevent you from attempting this.  The overwhelming presence of the military is both reassuring and terrifying by turns.  They carry AK47’s and hand guns.  They do not smile.  No one other than passengers with boarding passes and passports can enter an airport in India.  It is advisable when departing to allow at least three hours prior to boarding.  The bottle neck at Jaipur airport was long and unpleasant as people struggle to just enter the airport through the many security checks.  You will have your baggage which is to be loaded on the plane strapped automatically once it has been passed through the scanner.  This is a slow process as each bag is painstakingly checked.  TAKE CARE to attach the baggage label you are given at the airline counter to your hand luggage.  This is stamped and without it you cannot proceed through the subsequent security checks.  You will walk through the usual electronic ‘gate’ and then be patted down and have the wand passed over you and your hand luggage. There are three such security checks before you reach the boarding gate.  Even as you are about to board you are stopped on the gangplank and your boarding pass is stamped for a fourth time.  I watched an international author be sent all the way back to the first security point as we were about to board – he had lost a tag.

Accommodation
There are many possible places to stay depending on your taste and required level of comfort.  A number of authors and publishers from overseas were staying at the Country Comfort but I understood it wasn’t very special.  I stayed at a homestay called Ikaki Niwas.  http://www.ikaki.in/
This was so good I would unhesitatingly recommend it to anyone.  It has only been open for a couple of years and is run by a warm and friendly young married couple called JD and Devi. It won a Trip Advisor Traveller’s Choice award for 2013.   They arrange a driver to pick you up from the airport and drive you back.  This was complimentary. It is a short trip by Tuk Tuk (a charmingly wild and death defying vehicle, diesel powered and three wheeled) to the festival site and the journey costs approximately 100 rupee or about $2.  Tuk Tuk’s are easily obtained right outside on the main road. Check for current rates at Ikaki but our rate included all meals which are beautifully prepared and vegetarian.  Laundry can be sent out at night and is returned in the morning.  It costs very little to do a bag of washing.  This is a non-smoking venue.  JD was able to arrange vehicles for us to see the Taj Mahal, Amber Fort and an extraordinary Mughal palace – drivers were excellent and the cost was very little.  He will help with any query, speaks beautiful English and is the perfect host.  The cook reminded us a lot of Manuel but he isn’t slapped about the head by JD.

Buying block prints and eating salad
Jaipur is famous for its textiles and particularly the block printing.  To buy this go to Anokhi – it is fabulous, supports the artisans, sells real block printed clothing and there you can eat a brilliant, safe salad, have a great cup of tea and generally relax.  Their museum is also well worth a visit. I had no trouble getting there (you will see a warning about drivers on their site).  When leaving it’s a good idea to stuff the distinctive red shop bag into another bag or the new driver is likely to charge you double. http://www.anokhi.com/anokhi/visitingjaipur.html

Transport
Cabs are usually arranged by the hotel or homestay – I did not see any ‘for hire’ signs.  They are inexpensive but for a true Indian experience try either the Tuk Tuk or a rickshaw.  If you are overweight do not put the rickshaw rider through it however.  They struggle so hard over terrible roads determined to get their passengers to their destination and expending more energy than they can take in from the few calories they obtain each day.  They may, literally, be working themselves to death.  Tip them generously though they do not expect it.  You can afford it.
Always fix the price of your journey at the outset before you get into any vehicle.  You can haggle but it may not be worth it.  Driving in any form of transport is akin to finding yourself suddenly inside a video game where there are no traffic rules other than honking and slipping into impossible spaces as fast as you can.  They tend to ignore lanes altogether and prefer in fact to drive right down the centre line.  I was told this is to best avoid the occasional dog, cow, pig or person which may decide to launch itself from the side of the road.  It is at best a white knuckle adventure.  Shutting your eyes and crying ‘oh god’ just makes the driver laugh like mad.

Beggars
These proved to be far fewer than I expected but are almost always women with babies and the babies scratch on the car windows or tug at you as you pass.  This is truly heart breaking but the advice is not to give them money since it perpetuates the begging by children and often the money is taken by a man who is controlling many beggars.  You can give them food however which is easily obtained in most places from street vendors.

Is it really dirty?
Jaipur and Delhi were surprisingly clean.  There are slums of course and here the filth can be very overwhelming but even there rubbish is sifted by rag pickers and swept into piles which are collected.  I saw some examples of terrible filth in the old city – if you are particularly sensitive you can easily avoid these places.  Cows, pigs, goats, dogs (oh they are so very sad) donkeys camels and even elephants share the roads.  Dung is collected, mostly, dried and used for fires.  We were never accosted by any animal or person while walking in Jaipur.  It felt very safe indeed.

 The Festival itself
The first festival in 2005 had 14 visitors ‘most of whom were tourists who took the wrong turn’. This year the festival expected over two million footfalls on the weekend, which happened to coincide with the Indian national holiday, Independence Day.  Since they scan your pass every time you enter the site or leave and at each venue within the site they may be counting each as a footfall.  Nevertheless there was a steady and extraordinarily large stream of people all day long entering the site.  I would have no trouble believing in the figure of more than one hundred thousand people that were initially predicted.

The Indian Times covered the proceeding on the front page each day. The festival received a lot of publicity and is clearly highly regarded within India. There had been threats made against a Muslim author and there were snipers stationed on roofs around the festival – these were quite visible.  Military police are three or four deep at the entrance and scan the crowd.  They were also very visible and in large numbers on site.  You will have to pass through security which includes the scanner, the wand and the pat down before gaining entry. (This happens in every public building).
I was told that the Indian Government had told the organisers that no writer could make any derogatory comment about India – if this happened they would shut down the festival.  Some authors refused to attend at the last minute.  The Dali Lama was there and spoke on day one but for what I assume were security reasons was not listed on the programme – hence I missed him.

The bookshop was well stocked with every author’s work, both backlist and front list. It was doing a very good business indeed and even stocked a beautiful collection of Indian children’s picture books (I bought some).  Paperbacks cost around 400 rupee or less than ten dollars for exactly the same quality we would pay A$25 or more here.  I suggest you leave plenty of room to bring home books.

Young people will hand you a festival brochure as you enter showing the map of the site.  Go also to the information booth and buy a programme for 100 rupee.  This will then allow you to interpret what is otherwise a bare bones programme on the free handout.  The site is beautiful and literally swathed in gorgeous cloth which acts as sun screens and chair covers.  I have never seen such a beautiful literary festival. There is an avenue of orange pink and yellow paper lanterns and everywhere you look is colour and life.  Get to your chosen session as early as possible or you will stand with the hundreds of others who got there late.

There are food stalls around the site – our festivals could take a lesson from the various foods and craft stalls which so enlivened the proceedings. There were stalls for supporting the animals of India, to encourage registration by Indians (this is a huge government initiative to register every Indian national) stalls selling hand crafts made by disabled Indians and by artisans. It reminded me more of Womad than a literary festival site; it was vibrant and interesting and altogether appealing. Toilets are available but remember that in India toilet paper is rarely provided.  You are expected to use the hose.  If you take tissues you can have a western toilet experience however the system is not designed to handle the paper. 

The chairs of some of the sessions were particularly poor; the questions were not as probing as i hoped and they  wandered off topic frequently.  One began to talk about himself at some length while ignore the many questions from the audience. There were sessions which were both in Hindu and in English and were very enjoyable.  At all venues are enormous screens so that you can see the stage no matter where you stand.  There was also a huge twitter feed screen which was good fun. 

 India is like no country I have visited.  I want to return to see more.  The organisers of the Jaipur literary festival told me that they will be beginning a new festival in Bhutan.  i was instantly interested.  Looking back at the overall experience it seems better and better each day and each day I vow never ever to complain about my life again.

As Billal our sweet and funny driver said while wryly contemplating a particularly chaotic Indian moment on the road
‘Ahh.  My incredible India’

And it is.

Christmas memories

My earliest solid memory of Christmas was when I was six.  My sister, the mean one, (ok - I was the youngest; all my siblings were mean) took me in to the neighbours back shed and showed me where my parents were hiding our presents.
'See?  There is no Father Christmas you dummie.'
I cried.  I cried loudly.  It was little consolation that my sister was severely punished when I ran bawling back to mum and dobbed on her.  In my mind she was tied to a stake and burned to a crisp but I don't think that really happened.  I never saw any scars anyway, either mental or physical.  Basically my mean sister got away with destroying my childhood with one swift, well-aimed blow to my psyche and Christmas was never the same again.

Finding out that Santa wasn't real was a terrible jolt to my six year old mind.  It ranked alongside discovering there were no tiny people singing and playing weeny instruments inside the radio.  That Grandpop's blood sausage didn't taste like chocolate. (Yep - mean sister again.) That falling stars weren't actually whole falling stars but just the cosmos' way of burning off its rubbish.  That when my elderly neighbour shouted  'Look behind you, Zorro!' while watching the television, he couldn't actually hear her.  It also took rather too long to discover that paying my brother to polish his shoes was not a privilige and that it was actually unreasonable to have to pay him twice if the shine wasn't quite up to scratch. I grew up in a time when belief in things like these was entirely plausible - we had no Google to check our facts. All my facts came via my untrustworthy siblings and don't even get me started on the lifetime of falsehoods my brother told me.  He's still doing it, but just for the record, I know now that the reason you know it's me calling, bro, is not because you work for ASIO...

It's almost a relief to know there are still a few remnant populations tucked away in the suburbs whose parents are still inculcating lies like Santa and Falling Stars into their children's heads.  I do have some small concerns for those kids whose parents have purchased Elf On A Shelf and stuck that little tattletale in their children's bedrooms to report back to Santa on wether they've been naughty or nice.  I'm inclined to think those kids might need some expert help later on.  I want to give my grandchildren Christmas stocking and tell them Santa brought these but my daughter is more inclined to tell them these things are likely manufactured by underpaid Chinese labour and contributing to global warming.  I don't think she's actually told them this yet but the chances are high that she will. 

All I really have left to show for Christmas is my Cake.  Yes, Cake with a capital C.  The fruit is soaked for a full year in fabulous brandy.  Then in September gigantic duck eggs are sought and a dozen cracked open and beaten with kilos of brown sugar and rich yellow butter.  There are almost 3 kilo of various dried fruit in the bowl and I have to use my hands to mix it all.  After it's baked the Cake is covered in homemade marzipan and then with another layer of Christmas icing - also home made.  I love my Cake.  I unwrap it on Christmas day and wrap a ribbon round it then place it high on the Christmas Cake Plate in the centre of the table.  We eat it with hard sauce.

But not me, not this year.  This year I will just take great lungsful of the fruity aroma as others dig in because this Christmas I'm going to Avoid Those Calories. 

Christmas just isn't going to be the same.  But I hope Santa comes...

Have a wonderful holiday everyone.  Our office is closed from December 17th till January 7th.  That's plenty of time to write a blockbuster for us, right?

Sorting my bookshelf

This is a very beautiful, special Spring.  Maybe, as a friend commented this morning, it's because of all the rain we have had.  Maybe it's just a gift from the universe but it is magical to see the blossom on all the trees, the flowers everywhere in gardens and on the verges and to feel the softness in the air after winter.  It brings with it the urge to clean and sort and dump unwanted/uneeded stuff.  I have no idea why but spring cleaning is a real phenomenon in my house.  My own version of this has been to sort my bookshelves and as I have been doing this I have reflected on just how much work books really are in my life. 

Owning books requires one to house them somewhere - obviously - and this requires furniture and the takeup of space. Since I have a small house, not wishing to burden the universe with my heating and cooling bills, my space is limited.   The books take up rather a large proportion of it.  Not only that but they get dusty. I have to clean the shelves and the books themselves and not being a perfect housekeeper this can be a big chore when I do finally get to it.  Then once a year I need to cull.  Take some off the shelves and donate them to the Lion's bookshop  which is where a lot of them came from in the first place.  This process is very time consuming.  I am a reluctant culler of books, possibly because I have trouble identifying what I may never want to read again.  After all,I got the books in the first place because I wanted to own them, right?  It is easiest with what I would describe as fast fiction.  Books that are just time fillers; the sort you leave behind in the holiday house or hotel  because to take it further is a waste of your bag space.  Patricia Cornwell, Maeve Binchy, Robert Ludlum; books of that ilk get culled mercilessly.  But all the rest undergo a patient scrutiny that can make the job a very long one indeed and since I have a habit of using anything to hand as a bookmark I first have to flick the book open to see what might be hidden between the pages. 

Recently I was helping Emily Rodda, aka Jenny Rowe prepare for the Blue Mountains book sale she and a friend organise each year.  This involves wiping each book carefully with Mr Sheen (who'd have thought?) and following this with a flick of the pages.  The most fascinating things flick out sometimes. Death notices, photographs, newspaper review cuttings.  We looked at what people had culled from their collections - rather a lot of the aforementioned style of works made up the bulk - but there were also a great number of the coffee table style of book that appears to have gone out of fashion.  The sort that have been 'hand made' by Chinese workers applying top and tail bands, ribbons, sticking down the hard covers.  The kind that don't fit on any ordinary presses.  I was soon lost in thought about the place all those books had once occupied in the lives of their owners.  Some so well-worn they were barely holding together.  Others looking as thought they had never been opened.

All this reflection leads me to the 21st century's recent offering to book lovers - the e-book.  No shelving.  No dusting  Heartless culling at the flash of a finger because, probably, the hard drive is full, and anyone can write one which means - what?  Definitely it has led to bookstores closing down so fast the books haven't had time to leave their cartons.  Is literature is being debased by things like FSOG becoming a multi zillion best seller?  Should we worry that now anyone can write a book without the aid of an editor or publisher?  Does anyone care about standards in literature anymore or are we all keen to leave those rubbishy books behind in cyberspace, hidden forever from dust, needing no shelves, taking up no room in our homes or our hearts?

I return to my floor, my enormous pile of dusty books. I replace them, dusting as I go, one by one. 
Turns out I haven't got any unwanted books this year.
I eye the bookcase.  It's not so big really; a very good friend like this doesn't take up a lot of space my in life when I think about it.  And besides, my grandchildren have so much fun pulling the books off the shelves.   
I think I will try the kitchen cupboards next.  I'm sure I'll find at least two veggie peelers I dont want.

WordStorm

I am off to Darwin next week to speak at WordStorm, the Northern Territory's literature festival.  This is definitely a treat - not only for the opportunity to escape these cold Adelaide mornings as I walk to the bus covered in all the woolens I can find, but also because it's years (let's see, my youngest was eight when we last visited and he turns 21 this year) since I was last there.  Darwin is a long way from the rest of Australia but such a remarkable part of our country that I am very much looking forward to returning.  I only wish I had the opportunity to visit some of the more spectacular places while there, but sadly that is very unikely.  I hope to have the opportunity to meet and talk with plenty of N.T. writers and illustrators - in particular indigenous creators.  It has long been my wish to publish more indigenous writers and illustrators to complement Omnibus' wonderful backlist in this area.  So if you will be there, come up and say hello.  If you are an illustrator be sure to have a portfolio somewhere handy - include your sketch books; these are where I get most of my inspiration.  Our author Leonie Norrington lives in the Top End and I was excited to be able to visit her 'in situ' so to speak.  But Murphy's Law says Leonie will be in France when I am in Darwin.
Let's hope I get another opportunity to visit in the future.

 ABC radio have just started a monthly on-air bookclub.  They look like starting with our very own Monster Blood Tattoo.  I will post more when I have the details.

I have been thinking a lot about the list recently.  I am really keen to find new writers - people who are capable of realist fiction with powerful narrative and strong story lines. In the past couple of months the in-box has been crowded with picture books again.   I need three new Mates too - if you don't know what these are take a look at the link.

And this picture is not related to any of this post at all, but simply proves I'm doing more than reading on the weekend.

My first croquembouche.

A note from your Conductor.


I noticed this on the Wheeler Centre website.

Books That Make You Cringe

What are the books that you loved when you were younger, but now make you cringe with embarrassment? We've asked bookish folk like Kirsten Tranter, Michaela McGuire, the Wheeler Centre's Jenny Niven and Ronnie Scott that very question – and the answers have included R.L. Stine, Sweet Valley High, Judy Blume and Michael 'Jurassic Park' Crichton.

Is it just me or is it unfair to pin point books from your childhood that you are ashamed to admit you loved as a kid.  What about targeting books from your adult life that you once loved but that now make you cringe?  It smacks of the superior attitude so many people in adult publishing demonstrate when it comes to children's books.  So what if you loved Goosebumps when you were eleven and read every one in the series?   Or Sweet Valley High?  Ok, so those books might have been rather a long time ago but every generation has had a series like these that wasn't the most literary in the reading world but they got us reading and kept us reading.  And isn't that the whole point?

Emily Rodda aka Jenny Rowe has always said that reading is what counts - so called 'rubbish' books might be what we want today but we are unlikely to always want them and as we grow our tastes change and our reading choices grow and mature.  But we should not be ashamed  about our youthful reading choices.  Books we loved should not make us cringe with embarassment.  So shame on you, Wheeler Centre, for intimating that there were ever books we loved that we should now hide from view, take off our shelves or refuse to admit to in public.  They made us happy once.  They were a friend, a place to retreat to and a comfort. 

And in case you're interested, I LOVED Cherry Ames, Student Nurse and A Little Bush Maid.  What did you love?

A note from your Conductor xx

Mad March, Writers' Week and small-minded people

March in Adelaide is the time rather a lot of strangers roam the street, map in hand, looking for one of a number of events that happen in Adelaide.  Melbourne envies us our cosmopolitan insouciance as we natives wander white-hatted from outdoor event to outdoor event. They can only look on in wonder and disbelief as rain stays away, the sky is blue and a light breeze blows through the parks.  Writers' Week, Womadelaide, The Fringe, the Adelaide Festival, and oh yes, that race. The city is, for a few short days, practically shut down as roads are turned over to race tracks and cars with writing all over them shred their tyres through our leafy parkland streets.  Quite frankly I'd be very happy for Melbourne to steal the race from us like they stole the last one and good luck to them, Albert Park can have it. This year the screaming engines rather spoiled Ennio Morricone's concert and our beloved Premier had to call someone to suggest they turn off their ignitions. Now.  

Boori Pryor – first Australian Children's Laureate speaking at Adelaide Writers' Week

My favourite this year was Writers' Week. With a new director, Laura Kroetsch, at the helm  aided by Anna Hughes they managed to pull off the best event I think we have had in a long time. The truth is, and there are rather a lot of people in cardies who won't like this, Adelaide Writer's Week had become insular, stuffy and boring. There was nothing at all for children's writers, for example, so if you happened to be one or be interested in one it wasn't the place to be. There was nothing for families, the white marquees flapped noisily in any slight breeze and when not flapping did a rather remarkable imitation of plastic saunas.  People used to emerge from sessions and wring out their clothes. 

This year Laura disposed of the marquees which caused instant consternation among the white-hatted brigade. How dare she? Really! Those tents were an institution, didn't this foreigner know that?  (Oh yes, she isn't 'one of us' – indeed she had an actual accent which clearly put her at the back of the bus.)  She moved the food away from the areas where speakers were speaking and the book tent moved closer to the food with a very nice area between them for seating. The weather was perfect (sorry all those who were hoping for bog and wind to ruin it) the speakers were potent and the audiences excellent. There might not have been as many huge names there but our Writers' Week is famous for bringing in writers before they are famous. We may not have much money to fling at these overseas guests but those that come love the place. There was a brilliant family day, the marquees were replaced with light airy spaces covered by blue sails and the backdrops and entrance were woven sapling branches which added to the sense of lightness and creativity. And in a master stroke, the week was dedicated to children's writer, Margo Lanagan. Margo and I began writing at the same time – both published by Allen and Unwin. Margo went on to international fame ... sigh.

What a pity some of the very big publishers decided not to send their publicists when they had up to fourteen of their authors attending. There were no publisher parties this year either - are these publishers pinching in their belts and sticking the good wine under their desks perhaps? There is no doubt the industry is suffering right now and if it wasn't bloody-mindedness then I can only assume lack of funds was the problem.

Congratulations to Laura and her team.  Here's to many more innovative and exciting Writers' Weeks under her guidance. And here's to all those doubters and naysayers realising change isn't always a bad thing - sometimes it actually improves our world. Bring it on, Laura!

A note from your Conductor xx

Bait for the Reader

Sometimes you ought not research the person whose talk you are going to see.  In the internet age a great deal of everything anyone has ever said is already on youtube.  Googling the name of the speaker/presenter can take you, as it did me, direct to the very words he or she will be speaking.  That might not be a bad thing unless you'ver paid good money for tickets.  In my case the tickets were a welcome Christmas gift so I wasn't actually out of pocket.  Just a wee bit out of sorts because I had hoped to be surprised.  The speaker was Ira Glass.  The subject was the structure of story.  If you go to this link and watch all four parts you will have saved yourself the $45 for a ticket and learned something at the same time.
The art of the story
Ira Glass is  certainly interesting.  He can tell a story and he understands structure (he studied semiotics).  He made me think and I loved the way he used his iPad to run the whole show on stage.

But I wish I had remembered to buy tickets to David Sedaris.  I think he might have been more fun.

A note from your Conductor xx

Holding Out For Wonderful

Welcome to the New Year at Onyabus.  I've been remiss in posting - there is never enough time in the working day to sit and think but I am determined to Do Better.

Today has been a day of emails, interviews and, sigh, unsoliciteds.  The pile of unsolicited manuscripts is awfully high and awfully lacking in genius.  Would that it were otherwise.  Where are all the undiscovered diamonds of the children's lit world I wonder - those marvellous manuscripts from writers so talented they cannot help but get offers from all and sundry to publish their work?  I am probably the only children's publisher in the world who actually sifts through the unsolicited pile myself but I read on with a somewhat sinking feeling and less hope in my heart than when I began this morning.  There is always hope at the start of the reading pile.  There is always a need for chocolate or a stiff drink at the end.  I see we have been sent more stories about fairies...FYI we don't publish fairy books.  More stories about environmental disasters - no, not for us, thankyou.    Lots and lots of stories that the writers felt were picture books but are nothing more than lists of actions undertaken by a too-twee child.  Dog and cat stories - mostly heroic dogs and recalitrant cats.  No thanks. Four manuscripts were purportedly written by very small children whose grasp of language is uncannily adult but whose stories are woeful.  Sorry. Your teacher, aunt, mother or father ought to put the stories you write in a drawer and give them to you on your 21st - not post them to us. There is a smattering of stories about desperate teenagers whose lives are forever blighted by First World Problems like their hair, their boyfriend or their mother.  No thanks. We even have manuscripts about god, creationism and good calories. 

I am beginning to slump. 

Or even become slightly more deranged than usual..

How I look when deranged

Please someone send me a fabulous story - something utterly original.
In case I sound terribly ungrateful for the many manuscripts that fly in our door each day I am not.  I am just very, very picky. Markus Zusak's first published book, The Underdog came from the pile - such a wonderful story.  So original.  So beautifully written.  We snapped it up all those years ago and now look at him!  Then there was Michael Gerard Bauer, the perfect gentleman of publishing whose first book, The Running Man, came off the unsolicited pile too and went on to win so many awards they scarcely all fit on the cover.  Lyn Lee wote Pog - an unsolicited manuscript that won a swag of prizes.  We can spot a good one when we see it.  It just seems to me that there are a vast number of people out there who can't write but do anyway (and good on them, just don't send it to us) and an equal number of people who write what we call the OK Book; it's OK but it isn't wonderful. 

I'm holding out for wonderful.

A note from your Conductor xx

In the publisher's letterbox

A while back we invited submissions of envelope illustrations. You can see the original post here and the inspiration here. The best illustrated envelope wins not only five hardback picture books but also a serious look at the artist's portfolio. We thought it's about time to show some of the beautiful work we've received*. Thank you, so much, all you artists! And the competition is still open, so don't dawdle, doodle!

Bronwyn Esteban, Ferny Hills, Qld

Matthew Podgorski, Eden Hills, SA

'The Ghost Hunters', Nottingham, England

Marjory Gardner, Balwyn, Vic

Martin McKenna, UK

* At least one of these envelopes is from one of our wonderful friends and long-established illustrators who is not eligible for the competition. Sorry Martin, but we love your envelope!

What is your opinion about e-books and even more importantly, DRM?

I read a blog that was quite challenging and which I thought was interesting so for the sake of discussion and just because I think its time you creative types spoke up, I offer this link.


Let's see if anyone really cares ...


I am ideologically opposed to DRM. I think the world is going to become a very flexible place in this new on-line society and DRM is the stranglehold that will turn readers off. This isn't to say that our company or indeed any other Australian publisher feels the same way, of course. What do you think?


Some terrific reviews of our publishing in this month's Magpies magazine -- well done, Allayne Webster whose YA novel Stresshead was a hit.  And well done too, Eleanor Nilsson -- her title in the very popular Mates series, Aussie Dog, also got a big tick as did Randa Abdel-Fattah's Mate, Buzz Off!  We love reviewers when they do a good job.


Read, every day, something no one else is reading. Think, every day, something no one else is thinking. Do, every day, something no one else would be silly enough to do. It is bad for the mind to continually be part of unanimity. -- Christopher Morley, writer (1890-1957)

A note from your Conductor xx

What I wish was on my pile

Publishing is a very strange profession.  We make judgements each day about what is worth publishing and what is not and frequently the ones we reject turn up somewhere else where they are loved and supported and made into books.  So why is something rejected? Well, in our case we reject work that just isn't original enough, or literary enough, or funny enough, or serious enough, or clever enough.  Or possibly all of the above. Just as all readers do, we read with the hope that something magical will happen –- we won't want to stop reading. Lunch or coffee or that walk you meant to take today will just be forgotten in the absolute pleasure of a wonderful, captivating story with characters that capture you and settings so real you can walk there instead.

Where are those stories, by the way?  Please would all the writers who have one like that in their bottom drawer get it out now and send it to us? Just this week we have taken on three stories from the unsolicited pile. It does happen. Three writers who took a chance and sent their manuscript to us, fingers crossed, along with a self-addressed envelope just in case.

More than anything I wish we could publish some more writers with different ethnic backgrounds -- there must be some great children's writers out there with a different point of view, surely? 

On  a different note, I spent Easter with my family on the Mornington Peninsula -- very nice.  Heronswood Garden was just beautiful and I spent way too much time in the garden shop, as usual. Rolled about loudly on the lush green lawn (hmm, avoid cliches ...) with my grandson looking variously for his ears, nose, knees and belly button. What fun to play like a child. I thought about picture books as I read to him that weekend. He likes anything mechanical: trucks, fire engines, ambulances, but discovered when I tried to take him to the fireworks night that he doesn't like 'fire cracks'.  Now there's some very original and evocative language I like ...

A note from your Conductor xx

Young Street

It's odd how much you can dread change and then when it happens it all seems absolutely perfect. Our new office is so much like home now that I wonder how we ever lived with the old one. This one is quieter, closer to terrific shopping, loaded with charm and in all ways feels quite perfect for us.  That's a pic looking through my office to the meeting room.  Those persimmons are from Patricia's tree -- my absolute favourite fruit I think, after mangoes.


Kon, our wonderful new landlord, came in this week loaded up with Haigh's for Easter. He shops for us regularly at Haigh's and we love him for it. I went to dinner at a local Italian restaurant on the weekend and guess who was sitting behind me?  Kon! In his spiffy black shirt, and minus the silky basketball singlet, I almost didn't recognise him. It's his neighbourhood so perhaps he isn't stalking me ...


It turns out that he owns a church just down the road which is inhabited by many young people -- they've sort of taken it over for the last ten years and Kon is very easy going about that. He tells me the church is famous for its halloween parties. I wonder if we'll score an invite this year?  Our dear illustrator Dan is in the know so I'll check with him around October.


We had our housewarming a week or so ago, a very pleasant affair with no rowdy drunks or illustrators flinging themselves around the carpark on scooters as happened a while ago. And nothing spilled on the new carpet. We are very impressed with how sedate our creators are in the late afternoon. Poor Dan McGuinness was heard to cry, ' A young person!' when he saw Claire Richards turn up. He's not so young himself ... he should watch out.


I'm tremendously excited about a new author -- Emma Allen has written two beautiful picture books for us. Watch this space. Freya Blackwood is illustrating one of them. Emma has a lyrical quality to her work that is very special and we feel she will go far. I also read an unsolicited manuscript this week that sent shivers down my spine. It reminded me in a way of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nightime, but it was darker and more adult.  I would love to publish it, but the YA market is so hard and this is so different that I think I will have to twist arms.  Note to self -- build up arm muscles.


I feel that mental itch publishers feel when great talent is about to pop on to the list.  Looking forward to reading the great Australian novel on the slush pile very soon.  It's in the post, I'm sure of it!


A note from your Conductor xx

Our new landlord, Konglomerate

A new landlord is usually not your friend. Not necessarily your enemy either but generally there is just a faint relationship formed which is centred on how reliably you pay the rent.  Our new landlord, however, is a big, warm, funny Greek man called Kon.  We call him Konglomerate, after the character Con Glomryt in The Desperate Dwarf. His father was a property developer who sold everything in the seventies and went back to Greece where he discovered more relatives than he had remembered. He returned to Australia a few short years later, a lot poorer than he left, and had to start his property empire again when prices had more than quadrupled. Dad passed away and Kon now looks after the properties. What makes Kon so unusual is the extraordinary generosity he has shown us.  Pick whatever carpet you want, never mind about the price. You like those blinds? You can have them. I'll install a brand new air conditioning system and new vents while I'm at it. Yes, you can choose the new kitchen and the tiles. You'd like me to cut a hole in that wall and make a doorway?  Sure, I'll do that and please, let me buy you a ton of Haighs chocolates to take back to the girls.


I admit I was skeptical. I was suspicious. I worried that this was all too good to be true but every time I visit the new office to check on the progress of the work, he's done what he said he would. And he buys me coffee at the cafe across the road where we go in through the back door and the MIB that run the place seem always to have something to say to Kon.


Last week as I sat with Kon and two of his friends drinking my skinny cap while they downed their short blacks, they told me that now they had this close relationship with a children's publisher, and they know this is a lucrative business, they are going to write a children's book. I told them we had an excellent rejection slip. All three swung around and fixed me with their suddenly steely eyes.


'We don't take rejection well,' they said as one.


I'm pretty sure they were joking ...

Some thoughts from our Driver.

Your conductor needs a ticket to the Bahamas

There is not enough chocolate in the world to make moving an entire office feel easy. In ten days we will find all our possessions in some large trucks on their way to the even smaller cottage down the road. Time to replace two-drawer filing cabinets with four-drawer cabinets to make more space and, of course, that means taking all the files out.  While they're out I thought I might as well re-organise them. Are we the only publisher who keeps detailed files on each book?  And why is it that those files are so hideously out of order? And while I'm at this particular whinge, have you ever tried to file email correspondence in order when threads are pages long and copied from halfway through or a third of the way or even again and again from the start with five minute intervals separating them?


I have to pack my library, again.  Hard decision time so I could do with some advice. Is it best to shelve a picture book library by title, author or illustrator?


Should I take my tiered cake-plate collection to the new office or finally take them home?  (Who, I wonder, keeps their cake plate collection at work?) I've taken down the wooden thingos that my husband made and hung in my room.  It's amazing how much dust something hanging from the ceiling can gather over six or seven years.  I know the big armchair won't fit in my new room so does anyone want a great big blue armchair?  It's very comfy and lots of VIP bottoms have plonked down in it over the years.  Hardly any wear and tear either.  VIPs have awfully soft bottoms it seems; I think its all those cashmere clothes they wear.


Well, here's my stop. I'm off. 


P.S. Please don't send any manuscripts till we either a) get settled or b) return from the Bahamas.

The aforementioned Bahamas (pic courtesy of here)

Some thoughts from our Driver.

Dangerously low light

The stack of books on my desk in front of the window now obscures all sunlight from my room.  I am afraid of it.  I think at night the pages turn by themselves and there is a low moan I have heard more than once in the late afternoon.  That could be me as my head hits the desk, however.

Must drink more water.  Eat less sugar.  Walk every now and again further than between the fridge and the computer.

Right now I am thinking about covers constantly so the link I was sent this week is fresh in my mind. And then inside that link is a further link I like.

It’s somehow comforting to know I am part of an enormous grinding wheel that crushes everyone at some point.  I am but a mote of dust against its burr.  I feel no pain.




Photo by austinevan, flickr.com

Some thoughts from our Driver.