The other night I went to the Westgarth Cinema in Northcote, to see the opening night of Return To Nim's Island, loosely based on Wendy Orr's novel Nim At Sea. It was a charming film and the author was there signing. Wendy is a Twitter buddy and a fellow Ford Street writer. The place was filled with local children's and YA writers; I had a long conversation with Elizabeth Honey and briefly ran into Gabrielle Wang and another Twitter buddy, Mel Selemidis, both of whom had brought their own children. I ended up sitting with my friend and publisher Paul Collins and his children's writer partner Meredith Costain and joked that it was a bit like a party at his place: you couldn't throw a stone without hitting a children's writer!
Afterwards, I asked him if he had entered In The Beech Forest for this year's CBCA awards. He said he had, along with Ships In The Field which has done well. Mostly, he doesn't enter. Ford Street is a small press which he runs from home and it costs to enter, more than he can afford, and when he was entering he didn't even see on the CBCA short list books which had been on the short list for the Premier's Award.
But these two were special. I am keeping my fingers crossed that at least Den Scheer, the artist of In the Beech Forest, will be up for a Crichton Award, the one for new book illustrators. She deserves it.
Anyway, the list will be up at noon on Tuesday and I will pop it up here soon after that. I wonder how any I have on my shelves in the library? How many I have read? The thing is, I've read so much overseas stuff that some great local books may have slipped past me.
I invite my Aussie readers to speculate between now and Tuesday. Any thoughts on this?
Afterwards, I asked him if he had entered In The Beech Forest for this year's CBCA awards. He said he had, along with Ships In The Field which has done well. Mostly, he doesn't enter. Ford Street is a small press which he runs from home and it costs to enter, more than he can afford, and when he was entering he didn't even see on the CBCA short list books which had been on the short list for the Premier's Award.
But these two were special. I am keeping my fingers crossed that at least Den Scheer, the artist of In the Beech Forest, will be up for a Crichton Award, the one for new book illustrators. She deserves it.
Anyway, the list will be up at noon on Tuesday and I will pop it up here soon after that. I wonder how any I have on my shelves in the library? How many I have read? The thing is, I've read so much overseas stuff that some great local books may have slipped past me.
I invite my Aussie readers to speculate between now and Tuesday. Any thoughts on this?
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