Selena Wang Interviews Charlie Higson

Charlie Higson, the author of the Young James Bond and The Enemy series was kind enough to agree to an interview with The Great Raven. I'd also like to welcome special guest blogger Selena Wang, a former student and current member of my lunchtime book club. Selena is a huge fan of Mr Higson's books for young adults.

The Young James Bond books are fast-moving and delightful, set in the 1930s, when the future spy is still at school at Eton. Somehow he always ends up having an adventure worthy of his future self.

The Enemy series - two books so far - is set after a horrible disease strikes people over fourteen, leaving the children to fend for themselves and cope with flesh-eating zombies who may once have been parents and other loved ones. It's one of the scariest things I have ever read - but it is also about friendship, courage and trust.


Selena: Where did you get inspiration for the Young James Bond series?

Well, obviously the James Bond books were inspired by James Bond himself! I grew up in the 1960s when James Bond was the biggest thing on the planet and I was hooked. First by the films, from when I was about six years old, and later on by the books. So, I guess Ian Fleming, who created James Bond and wrote the original books, was also a huge inspiration to me. I had no idea when I was younger that I would ever be asked to write my own James Bond books, but when I was approached the first thing I did was to go back and reread all the books to really get me in the mood for writing my own young Bond adventures.

As I say, writing the Young Bond books wasn’t my idea. I was approached completely out of the blue by someone from Ian Fleming Publications, the company that looks after James Bond. They had an idea to do a series of books about Bond before he became a secret agent. All I had to do was think up the ideas for the stories.

People always ask writers where they get their ideas from. Personally I find the Internet is very useful. There’s an online site called Ideas ‘R’ Us. You simply fill in a questionnaire with things like ‘what type of characters would you like in the story?’, ‘where would you like to set it?’, what genre - thriller, horror, fantasy, comedy - etc. Do you want it to be about secret agents/vampires/zombies/pirates/aliens/school kids/talking animals etc. How long do you want it to be? Do you want it based on real life events? Do you want to use parts of your own life or make it all up…? And so on, and so forth, and it sends you back ideas for books. Actually that’s a lie, of course there’s no such site, although perhaps there should be. But if you think of the online site as your brain it works in exactly the same way - you go through the whole process - of sending all those questions to your brain - and it all starts swilling around in there and with any luck your brain thinks up ideas for stories. As a writer you're always storing these ideas away, everything that happens to you, everything you read about, see on the TV, hear about, dream about, it all goes in there in case it might be of some use. Sometimes ideas for stories, and these are always the best ideas, come to you very quickly, almost fully formed. This happened when I was offered the job of writing the Young Bond books. Even as I was talking to the person who was explaining the idea to me I had an idea of how the whole first book would work and so I agreed to do the series straightaway. Also, writing is the same as any other skill - the more you do it the easier it becomes. The very act of writing one book will give you an idea for three or four other books. Often when you're hard at work you’ll hit on something and think “that’s a great idea but I can’t fit it in this book.” And you put it aside in that great big computer you call your brain and keep it for later.

Sue: LOL! There was one American SF writer who, on being asked where he got his ideas, said that he sent five dollars to a PO Box in the US city of Schenectady where a little old lady made ideas available. It sounds like your real source of ideas is much better!



Selena: Are there any aspects of your personality in either series?

It’s impossible to write a novel without putting quite a lot of your own personality into it. I think many writers would agree that nearly all the characters in their books are based on aspects of their own personality. In the end it is all that any of us really know. Ourselves. Our books also reflect our personalities in that we write about things that interest or excite us. The places I send James Bond, the adventures he gets into, are all things that I am interested in. The new series, the Enemy, is very much based where I live in London. The kids in it are based on the friends of my own boys. But some of the characters, even the girls, have aspects of my own personality. If I was to be honest, I would say that my own character is probably something of a mix of Arran, Ollie and Ed.

Selena: Are any characters in the Young Bond and The Enemy series based on real people?

I take aspects of people from real life, but have never based a character entirely on one person.

Sue and Selena: At the end of By Royal Command, James Bond goes to a new school in Scotland. Are you planning on writing any more about him there?

Not in the near future. I did have some stories about him worked out for his new life and his new school, but I am too busy working on my new series now, and I don't think that Ian Fleming Publications will hang on and wait for me for ever. Maybe they will get someone else in to write his new adventures.


Selena: Are you planning a new series? If so, can you tell us about it?

I wrote a long fantasy novel when I was a teenager and have been rereading it recently, with quite a lot of work it just might be publishable…


Selena: Each book so far in The Enemy series is about a different group, although some characters from The Enemy are in The Dead. Are you planning to combine them in the next book?

Yes, The Fear (book 3) carries on the process of joining up the two main groups of characters.

Selena: Will there be any more Young Bond graphic novels?

Not in the near future, they take a long time to make and don’t sell as many copies as normal novels, so Puffin have no plans for any more.

Sue: Pity! Our students simply love graphic novels and those are doing well in my library. :-(

When in 2011 will the next book in The Enemy series come out? (SB: We live in Australia, Mr Higson, so do you have an Australian release date?)

Assuming that Penguin Australia publish at the same time, it will be out in September.

Selena: How much research did you have to do for Young Bond, because it was set a long time ago?

I had to do lots. Luckily the 1930s were a fascinating time with a lot going on so I found it all quite interesting. I also had to research a lot about Eton school, to make those parts realistic. Doing research gives you good ideas for storylines.

I went to Sardinia to research bits of Blood Fever. Then I went to the Austrian Alps and learnt to ski to help with my research for By Royal Command. Unfortunately I didn’t have time to travel to Mexico to research Hurricane Gold, which I would have loved to do, but I was too busy writing the book! The thing with kids’ books is that the readers need the next book right now! And you all grow up so quickly, so I had to write the books quite fast to keep you satisfied, which meant less time for travel. Lots of my books are set in London because I live in London. I like writing about the city, so I don’t have to travel far to do my research but it is good fun poking around some interesting and obscure areas.

Selena: I really enjoyed all the riddles and puzzles in Double or Die. Did you think of them all yourself or did someone help you?

I did most of them myself, though I did have some help from a couple of guys who make up cryptic crosswords for newspapers. Maybe in the end the clues were too hard, I don’t think any kids solved any of them!

Selena: The Enemy series is based in London, I want to ask if all the streets and place you mention in the series are real? (Such as: the museum, the schools……) - and did you go there for research?

It’s all real. If you wanted you could come over and retrace all the kids’ footsteps. The only ‘made up’ part was Rowhurst school, which is based on my old school, Sevenoaks.

Selena: I’ve also been reading the Alex Rider series. What do you think are some differences between James Bond and Alex Rider?

I think Anthony Horowitz is a brilliant author. I think his books are very exciting with a cliffhanger in every chapter. I probably wouldn’t have started writing kids’ books if it wasn’t for Anthony. Before his Alex Rider series they weren’t really a lot of action adventure stories for boys out there and publishers didn’t think boys liked to read, but of course they do like to read if they’re given the right books, and Anthony’s books - full of action and gadgets and heroism - work really well (for girls as well!), which is why Ian Fleming Publications thought it might be good to try some young James Bond books. So I will always be a huge fan of Anthony.

The main difference is that Anthony’s books are set in the modern world, and are based on the James Bond we see in the new films, and my books are set in the past and are more based on the James Bond we find in the original Ian Fleming books.

Selena: It’s unusual, for the time, that James Bond has friends who are Indian and Chinese. Why did you give him these friends?

Actually I’m not sure it was completely unusual for the time. The mix at Eton was not wide in terms of class, but other countries have upper classes as well! Eton has always had a lot of foreign pupils studying there. There has been a tradition of rich foreigners, and foreign aristocracy, sending their children to the school, as it was considered to be the best in the world. There have been some quite exotic boys at the school, like the future King of Siam. I wanted to show that Bond was able to make friends with all types of people and also that he was an unusual boy, almost something of an outsider, and so had a group of multi-cultural friends. He does also befriend some posh English boys, of course. I wanted to show that perhaps James Bond was more at home mixing with the more unconventional boys at the school

Questions by Sue, Selena’s teacher

I see you’ve been writing for adults till now, but you seem to have settled nicely into writing for children and young adults. Was the change hard?

I wrote several unpublished books in my younger days in a variety of different styles - I was a fan of fantasy, then sci-fi, then Gothic fiction and post-modernist writers like William Burroughs… while I was at university I wrote a couple of very long and complex arty student type of novels. I was then turned on to crime writing by a friend, particularly hard-boiled American crime fiction. I fell in love with that direct stripped down style of writing. There aren’t pages and pages of flowery descriptions, there’s a lot of dialogue, the writers grab you on the first page and don’t let you go. I decided to try writing some crime books in this style found that I enjoyed it. The first one I wrote, King of the Ants, was published. This coincided with my burgeoning career writing comedy for television. But, after four novels, the TV work took over. It took up all my time and, let’s face it, paid a lot better than writing books. Cut to 10 years later I now have three boys of my own and want to write something for them. I was looking around for ideas when I was approached by my old editor from when I’d been writing the adult books, she was now working for Ian Fleming Publications and thought that I might be right for the new Young Bond series. She knew I had three boys, she knew I was a big James Bond fan, and most importantly she felt that my writing style would work very well for children. I obviously couldn’t use so much bad language and had to remove any sexual content but otherwise I didn’t really change my approach when writing for children. The interesting thing, though, is that you cannot take for granted what they will know about the world. The 1930s were a fascinating time politically and I wanted to get a lot of this into my books but I would be writing away and suddenly realize that the average ten year old doesn’t know the difference between a Communist and Fascist, so my job was to explain often quite complex ideas to children in a way that they wouldn’t feel as if they were being given some kind of history lesson. I found this a challenge but, of course, by having my central character, James Bond, a boy himself it meant that other people could explain things to him. I’ve always liked books that tell you stuff, Fleming was very good at telling us stuff, and I think if you get it right kids quite like being told stuff. I was slightly worried when I started SilverFin that they might not like my style so I read it out to my own boys as a bedtime story as I finished each chapter - which is why the books are so violent. To keep up their interest I soon realized I would have to kill someone on nearly every page.

In another Q and A you said you were inspired by I Am Legend for The Enemy, but the premise of that book (which I’ve read) is that everyone turns into a vampire except the hero. Is your zombie disease based on a real one?
This is what it says on Wikipedia about the book…

I Am Legend is a 1954 horror fiction novel by American writer Richard Matheson. It was influential in the development of the zombie genre and in popularizing the concept of a worldwide apocalypse due to disease. The novel was a success and was adapted to film as The Last Man on Earth in 1964, as The Omega Man in 1971, and as I Am Legend in 2007, along with an unofficial direct to video production capitalizing on that film, I Am Omega. It was also the inspiration behind the 1968 film Night of the Living Dead.

I Am Legend inspired many and varied horror films and books. The idea of one lone figure in a changed world trying to fight against unhuman foes is very potent. It’s interesting how they treat the monsters in each the different film versions of the book. In the Charlton Heston version, the vampires are given many of the characteristics of the Manson family. And in the Will Smith version they are sort of alien zombie figures. Richard Matheson was very good at trying to bring a level of reality to his fantasy scenarios, he always worked in some kind of scientific and medical background to the supernatural goings-on and rooted his stories in everyday reality. I’ve tried to do the same in my books. The disease in The Enemy is not based on a real disease, no, but I’m in the process now talking to various doctors and scientists trying to find out how it might actually work. I wanted my monsters to have elements of the classic cannibal zombie as well as the vampire. The ultraviolet rays of the sun increase the effects of the disease and so, like vampires, the grown-ups don’t like going out in daylight. The zombie and the vampire are very similar anyway, they’re both undead, they both feast off the living.

In each Young Bond novel there’s a brave and beautiful girl, i.e. a sort of “Bond Girl”. Is this deliberate or did you just want to include female characters? Either way, do you think the girls fit into their time, the 1930s?
The girls are very much Bond girls. You can’t have a James Bond story without a strong female element. Fleming has been criticised for the depiction of his female characters and of male-female relationships and female desires. But he did at least put some memorable and entertaining girls into his books. He was attracted to strong healthy no-nonsense outdoorsy types and most of his Bond girls fit this mould. I wanted my girls to be similar. Wilder Lawless in the first book very much stands up to James Bond and saves his skin on one important occasion. I wanted to get across to boys read that girls could be fun and have a sense of adventure too. I probably had the most fun writing the character of Precious Stone in Hurricane Gold. She starts out a spoiled pampered rich brat and ends up a lean mean fighting machine navigating the terrors of the rat-run alongside James.

The 1930s were a very interesting time, there was a big growth in female equality and a big growth in vigorous outdoor pursuits like cycling, hiking, skiing, whatever. Women started wearing trousers in more ways than one. I think girls and boys did mix pretty well and particularly in England there grew up a strong breed of tough female adventurers who came to the fore in the 20s and 30s and of course fully came into their own in the Second World War, which gave a great boost to female equality.

Thanks very much for your wonderful interview, Mr Higson! We're looking forward to your next book ... and the one after that... :-)

My First Book Trailer - ouch!

It started when I was with the Random House folk at Supanova. They told me about a book trailer competition they're running for teenagers. It wasn't yet up - and when it is up, they will be giving some firm conditions, which are necessary because they'll be putting it up on-line. It has to be copyright-free material. Obviously, I suspect, there will be limitations even on such things as filming your young brother or sister, because of regulations about that (I saw the ladies taking a photo of a costumed con attendee for the RH blog, but not her small daughter). The copyright-free web site they gave me turned out to be copyright-free but not money-free. You have to pay for use of images from the site. While trying to work out if I could maybe put in a school subscription for the purpose, and because the information is STILL not up on the web site (something on YouTube, but not all the information), I surfed for genuinely free sites, but the few I found were limited in what they had.

I realised that I could use some public domain images and music, although the students might not find that of much interest, but I did have to have a sample - and I thought that perhaps we could have a book trailer competition for Children's Book Week, with a lunchtime festival. The trailers wouldn't go on-line, but we could show them at lunchtime and maybe burn a DVD for the library, to show next year's students. That way, we could use what we want and have fun.

As I haven't yet worked out the mysteries of iMovie, apart from dumping existing films on it, and I go back to work tomorrow, I have spent most of my post-Swancon time today putting together a basic PowerPoint book trailer for Wolfborn. It's very crude, but I've learned some things by experimenting and will learn more as soon as I can get someone to sit with me and explain.

Meanwhile, my class can have a huge laugh at my expense and go do something much better, once they work out which book they'd like to use. It's a nice way of making them think about a book they like - and one girl in my class was asking if she could do an animated piece for her assignment last time (too late, alas, or I'd know just how good she is).

I actually found a picture of a wolf howling under TWO moons (there are three in my world, but maybe the third isn't up yet), a Breton castle, some Arthur Rackham fairies (public domain), a dark forest, a bas-relief of Cernunnos, a wolfhound and a - hopefully - public domain portrait of Attila the Hun to go with the "Ruthless villains!" slide.

I'd like to come up with something a bit speedier than the score I used in the end, but I managed to get the right timing for the second half of "The Ring Goes South" from the FOTR score and it kind of worked. There was a nice dramatic flourish during the "Wild Hunt" slide.

Awful as it is, I'm kind of proud at having given it a go. It's an achievement, doing something I haven't tried before (well, PowerPoints, yes, but not with a story, music and theme).

Because of copyright I can't put it up on-line, but if anyone wants to have a look and a giggle, ask me privately and I'll see if i can share the file with you.

Vale Sarah Jane!

I couldn't sleep this morning, so I got up and went on-line to check out the Swancon program - I'm heading off tomorrow very early and have to finish preparing. I turned on the radio and just now I have heard the sad news. At only sixty-three, Elisabeth Sladen, Sarah Jane Smith to those of us who love Dr Who, has died of cancer.

I liked Sarah Jane from the moment she turned up, pretending to be someone else, to get a good news story. She didn't take nonsense from the Doctor, which is saying something for Tom Baker's version, and when she was ready, she left, even if she didn't get the dramatic exit she'd hoped for. I was so pleased when the character returned and the Doctor had time to explain himself and reconcile with her. And that scene where she and Rose are sharing jokes about him and laughing their heads off!

Elisabeth Sladen was a wonderful companion, one of my favourites, and it was clear she enjoyed what she was doing.

RIP, Elisabeth!

Today I am Going To...

Okay, this entry belongs more in Livejournal than in my literary blog, but Livejournal keeps giving me trouble opening, so here goes.

It's only three days till I head for my adventure in Perth, where I hope to promote my book and have fun.

So today I am going to:

finish the house cleaning after breakfast.

have a go at making some Kosher le Pesach chocolate truffles because my oven is still bung and I can't do my usual contribution of orange and walnut cake or macaroons (I have been doing macaroons the last few years because nobody has any room left for a proper dessert after the seder meal.)

go into town, where I will buy a printer cartridge so I can finish printing out the covers for the CDs I;m taking to the convention. George Ivanoff, who has a much better reading voice than I do, has kindly read a sample from each of our books into Garage Band and I've burned some on to CD. I'm not much good at design, but I really can't ask George to do that as well (needless to say, as a professional web page designer he's better at that too!).

meet a teacher-librarian colleague from another school, Lyndi Chapman, in Lygon Street (better take some Wolfborn and Crime Time bookmarks along for her). It will be nice to have a chat with her; she has a nice new school after her old one treated her badly.

go to my mother's place for the first night of Passover. Only Mum, my sister and brother-in-law tonight, so we'll keep it simple. Tomorrow is the big family night and I've promised my nephew Max a Crime Time mug, as he asked. Have to get it done tomorrow afternoon.

do some planning for the paranormal romance panel at Swancon. Nicole Murphy suggests we keep it light because they've put it on at 10.30 pm!

Big day! Better have brekky and get on with it.

BURN BRIGHT By Marianne De Pierres. Random House Australia, 2011

Review first published on January Magazine

I have a history with this author. When we first met, at a writers’ workshop at Aussiecon 3, she had submitted 4000 words of adult cyberpunk and I had submitted the same amount of YA fantasy. In the end, my YA novel got 60,000 words in and froze and Marianne became a well-known and highly respected author of, first cyberpunk, then space-based SF for adults.

Now she has entered my territory with her first YA novel, Burn Bright and it is very, very good.

The heroine of Burn Bright, Retra, is a Seal. That doesn’t mean she loves swimming but that she lives in a sealed enclave, one whose lifestyle would make the Puritans look like hippies.

When Retra’s brother, Joel, runs away to Ixion, island of teenage pleasure, where young people party all night (there is no day there), Retra’s family is punished. Unable to stand it any more, Retra flees to Ixion herself, to find her brother.

She finds out a lot of other things too. And one question everybody on Ixion asks sooner or later is: what happens when you get too old?

I enjoyed this, not only because of the storyline but because the heroine grows. She has always been strong, deep down, preparing herself for the pain she will feel from her obedience strip when she escapes, but the girl who arrives at Ixion is meek and easily shocked. As the novel goes on, Retra – who eventually takes the Ixion name “Naif” – is able to show her strength and courage to look after her new friends. Ironically, her Seal discipline is a help.

This is the first of a series, so be prepared for it to end at a dramatic moment.

Recommended.

SALTWATER VAMPIRES By Kirsty Eagar. Camberwell, Victoria: Penguin, 2010

In 1629, a Dutch ship, Batavia, on its maiden voyage, was wrecked off the coast of Western Australia. The captain and some of his crew left in a boat looking for water, then for help. While he was gone, a number of the remaining crew mutinied and committed a mass murder of many passengers. When the captain finally returned, the mutineers were arrested and, mostly, executed, although two of them were left behind, stranded on the coast of Western Australia. We don’t know what happened to them, although there are unlikely stories about “blue-eyed Aborigines”, suggesting they settled down and had descendants.

That much is history – and I researched it for my last book, Crime Time: Australians behaving badly, which made this novel of even more interest to me. The story of Batavia has been used a number of times in fiction, but this is the first time I’ve found it in a vampire story – and what a delicious idea it is! What if, suggests the author, the four main mutineers, led by Jeronimus Cornelisz, had done all that killing for a very specific purpose – to have a source of food for the feeding frenzy that would follow their planned, deliberate turn to the vampire state? What if, in fact, they’re still around in the twenty-first century and have plans yet again? Where better to do it than a small coastal town which hosts an annual music festival?

Jamie is a surfer teen. He’s been feeling bad about abandoning his mate Dale one night, to swim for help when Dale’s father’s boat was on fire. Dale is alive but not well and not talking to him. One night Jamie goes surfing to avoid the daytime crowds, when Dale arrives on his own surfboard – and bites him.

Dale has turned, Jamie is turning and there’s only one way to recover their mortality. Can they do this and save the town before New Year’s Eve when everything is going to go pear-shaped?

Read it and find out!

I liked the suggestion that you can’t just become a vampire – or turn someone to vampire state – without the permission of Piravem, a sort of vampire guild in Amsterdam. Anyone turned by accident is tracked down and killed. Can’t have mortals starting to believe they exist! Those who want to become immortal have to do an apprenticeship, then be approved by the guild. Some people, of course, just won’t do it by the book, so the guild has not been happy with Cornelisz and his friends over the centuries.

The characters are likable and there’s enough normal teen angst to make it more than just another vampire story - “My mate isn’t talking to me, I like his girlfriend, there’s a terrific new girl in town…”

Best of all, there’s no dark, brooding and honourable vampire for the girls to fall in love with! They’re scum, pure and simple.

This is a truly Aussie vampire story, not only in the setting but in the history that goes with it. Highly recommended.

Woot! CBCA Notable

I'd like to say Wolfborn was on the shortlist, but as you'll know from my last post, it isn't. It is, however, a Notable. Haven't had one of those since my women scientists book. Some years ago I was told that to get on the Notables list, six judges had to think the book should go on the short list. Effectively, it's an Honourabe Mention.

I can live with that.

The CBCA shortlist for 2011

Here it is - just found it on the CBCA web site a short time ago. I've read some of the books on the older readers list and one on the younger readers list. My personal favourite of the former is Doug McLeod's book, but I suspect it's too over-the-top to win in this particular award. This, of course, is a personal opinion and I will be delighted to be proven wrong - no abuse, please, if you disagree! We're civilized here.

If you've read any of these books, please do put in a comment about it. I mean to do something at my school about reading and voting, if I get the chance to work on it and I can get the other teachers involved. If I can work out how to do book trailers myself I might even run a book trailer competition and see if we can enter the Random House one.

I might even run a competition on this site, with a prize for anyone who correctly chooses the winner, giving reasons why they think it will or should win. Watch this space.


Older Readers:

Crowley, Cath:Graffiti Moon. Pan Macmillan Australia
Hartnett, Sonya: The Midnight Zoo. Viking Books, Penguin Group (Australia)
Horniman, Joanne: About a Girl. Allen & Unwin
MacLeod, Doug: The Life of a Teenage Body- Snatcher. Penguin Books, Penguin Group (Australia)
Marchetta, Melina: The Piper’s Son. Penguin Books, Penguin Group (Australia)
Wood, Fiona: Six Impossible Things. Pan Macmillan Australia

Book of the Year: Younger Readers. Intended for independent younger readers.

Bauer, Michael Gerard: Just a Dog. Omnibus Books, Scholastic Australia
Bongers, Christine: Henry Hoey Hobson. Woolshed Press, Random House Australia
Branford, Anna Ill. Sarah Davis: Violet Mackerel’s Brilliant Plot. Walker Books Australia
Carmody, Isobelle: The Red Wind. Viking Books, Penguin Group (Australia)
McKinlay, Meg Ill. Leila Rudge: Duck for a Day. Walker Books Australia
Murphy, Sally Ill. Rhian Nest James: Toppling. Walker Books Australia

Book of the Year: Early Childhood. Intended for children in the pre-reading to early reading stages.

Champion, Tom Niland & Niland, Kilmeny Ill. Deborah Niland: The Tall Man and the Twelve Babies. Allen & Unwin
Dubosarsky, Ursula Ill. Mitch Vane. The Deep End. Puffin Books, Penguin Group (Australia)
Lester, Alison: Noni the Pony. Allen & Unwin
Niland, Deborah: It’s Bedtime, William!. Viking Books, Penguin Group (Australia)
Norrington, Leonie Ill. Dee Huxley: Look See, Look at Me!. Allen & Unwin
Ormerod, Jan Ill. Freya Blackwood: Maudie and Bear. Little Hare Books

Picture Book of the Year. Intended for an audience ranging from birth to 18 years. (Some books may be for mature readers)

Baker, Jeannie: Mirror. Walker Books
Bancroft, Bronwyn: Why I Love Australia. Little Hare Books
Greenberg, Nikki: Hamlet. Allen & Unwin
Kane, Kim Ill. Lucia Masciullo: Family Forest. Hardie Grant Egmont
McKimmie, Chris: Two Peas in a Pod. Allen & Unwin
Riddle, Tohby: My Uncle’s Donkey. Viking Books, Penguin Group (Australia)

Eve Pownall Award for Information Books Intended for an audience ranging from birth to 18 years. (Some books may be for mature readers)
Brasch, Nicolas: Theme Parks, Playgrounds and Toys. Macmillan Education Australia
Brooks, Ron: Drawn from the Heart: A Memoir. Allen & Unwin
Davidson, Leon: Zero Hour: The Anzacs on the Western Front. The Text Publishing Company
Dubosarsky, Ursula Illustrated by Tohby Riddle: The Return of the Word Spy. Viking, Penguin Group (Australia)
Lloyd, Alison Illustrated by Terry Denton :Wicked Warriors & Evil Emperors: The True Story of the Fight for Ancient China
Puffin Books, Penguin Group (Australia)

One Arm Point Remote Community School: Our World: Bardi Jaawi: Life at Ardiyooloon. Magabala Books

A Super(Nova) Weekend

Who would have thought I could get so much out of a whole weekend in the dealers' room? I usually like to go to panels, but I had a dealers' room pass and let's face it, I was at Supanova to promote my book. I could have paid for a regular ticket, but Wolfborn was my priority.

At the table, I finally put a face to the name of Sarana Behan, a publicist, and met some of her colleagues at Random House. Michael Pryor was also there for a while on the Saturday, nice to see him. Michael is going overseas, so won't be at either Swancon or Continuum. I snarled a little in sheer envy when he said he was going for research - why can't I travel for research? - and he joked about writing guides to the resorts of the South Pacific, which needed research as well...

Promotion went very well. We only sold three copies of my book on the Saturday, but lots of people wanted signed bookmarks and posters, so hopefully they will buy books later. A lovely lady who has since found this web site and introduced herself as "Sheep Rustler", made my day by saying she and her daughter had both read and loved the book. There was a librarian from Aquinas College who took a poster signed to the kids and some bookmarks to hand out to them. If they don't have the book already, they'll get it now, because why put up a signed poster if the kids can't borrow it? :-) Sarana kept saying, "You can go now if you like", not wanting me to give up my weekend, but every time I was about to get up, I had another person or group wanting me to sign something. A girl could get a really swelled head from something like this, although the real ego booster is when they BUY the thing! ;-)

Yesterday Sarana had moved my seat to the other side of the table, facing the Dymock's stall and that was much better. Every time someone stopped at the stall to sign up for the newsletter or take some flyers and bookmarks, Sarana would say, "Do you like werewolves? There's this one, and the author is over there if you want her to sign for you..." and send them over to me. And whenever I persuaded them to buy, they'd say, "Can I actually get this book?" and I'd point to the pile at the Dymock's stall, where it could be found easily, saying, "Right over there." That worked well and by lunchtime we'd sold seven. (We sold a lot more during the rest of the day). Admittedly two were to a couple of young ladies I had met at the tram stop in town on the way to the con. Three friends were travelling to Supanova. Two were dressed as Ford Prefect and Arthur Dent and were delighted when I recognised them. Their third friend wasn't in costume, but I think intended to be, later. (She bought a copy of my book) In fact, they had all been changing as the day went on Saturday and had brought another change of costume.

This is something I think is wonderful about these pop culture expos, something we no longer have at most regular fannish conventions (except, as far as I know, Nullas Anxietas, the Discworld con, where every other person is in costume). The place is overflowing with people in hall costume. I think I'll take something to Swancon, even if it's only a caftan, cloak and veil, to look vaguely mediaeval.

In the course of the con, I met Nat from Of Science And Swords bookshop, who said he recognised me as a customer and I said with a smile, "Yes, and you still don't have any copies of my book!" Before the con was over, we'd discussed me coming in for a signing. His boss did say, "Look, I'm sorry we don't have your book, but local distributors all want you to buy a minimum $500 worth of books" and of course, they're a small business - a VERY small business, located in an expensive city arcade. I get that, totally - and I feel better about it now I know why.

But the ladies at RH said they should call the company anyway and they'd get some suggestions for a cheaper distributor. So hopefully, that will work out. Fingers crossed! As long as I was there I asked them if they could check out "Sword At Sunset" which may have to come from the US, because our students are starting to read Rosemary Sutcliff and I don't have the sequel to the Eagle Of The Ninth Chronicles. Fortunately, they're all into buying from the US, so if it's available they should be able to get it for me.

By the end of yesterday I'd been invited to be a guest speaker at the Melbourne SF Club mini-con next month. Nice! Promote promote promote! Mind you, some of the members have already bought copies at Nova Mob the other night, which was great.

I had a chat with Marianne De Pierres, author of the very good YA novel Burn Bright, who kindly offered to come talk to my book club about a week after the holidays. There won't be time for anyone much to read the book before then, so far only one has read it because we've only just got it, but I will buy some more so they can read it afterwards. I don't have her adult SF in my library,but this one is an excellent start for them and there's a sequel to come.

That's something nice to tell my dearest book clubbers at our meeting first day back!

Terrific weekend! Makes me feel somewhat better about the fact that the Melbourne Writers' Festival doesn't want me this year for their Youth Day.

ASIM Issue #50

Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine has just released its 50th issue. Okay, I'm biased, being a member of the co-op and I did choose one of the stories for this issue, but I promise it's well worth getting. Because the stories were chosen by most of us, there's a wide variety of story types, from the deeply serious to the downright silly; my own selection, "The Wine Endures" by Anthony Panegyres, a Perth writer, is gently humorous with a touching ending. The issue looks terrific, too, with a "redux" cover by Les Peterson, who did the cover of the very first issue, plus several more. The internals are done by some of the top artists on our list.

We will be selling it at Swancon, but if you're not coming along, you can always order a copy. If you want PDF, you only have three months to get it, which is our agreement with our writers, who can't be expected to surrender their rights permanently.

Speaking of PDF, if you're not one of our regular reviewers and would be interested in reviewing this issue in PDF form, let me know.

Supanova and Me

I don't normally go to Supanova. There are only so many "pop culture expos" you can go to in a year. I've been attending Armageddon with my friend and workmate Jasna and her son Chris, because it's generally cheap and has guest speakers I want to hear. Peter David was there a couple of years ago, the author of those lovely novels about King Arthur coming back and running for Mayor of New York, then becoming President of the US and having a whole lot of fantastical adventures while he's about it. He also did some Trek novels, but that's not why he was invited either - he's gone into graphic novels! There are actors as well and last year we went to hear Sylvester McCoy and Sophie Aldred, though the poor sods had to compete with a very noisy event going on in another corner of the hall. They managed well, I should say. They must have had to put up with a lot of weird stuff in the course of attending conventions.

This year, though, I'm also going to Supanova, because my publishers at Random House asked if I'd like to come along and promote Wolfborn. There will also be the delightful Michael Pryor, who wrote those gorgeous steampunk novels I've reviewed on these pages and Marianne De Pierres, who is actually on the con's guest list, but will presumably pop over to the table at the dealer's room as well. I'll be there from Saturday afternoon, after coming from my mother's place, and spend all day Sunday as well, except I'm going to the one-man Lord Of The Rings at the Comedy Festival late Sunday afternoon, so will have to leave by about three.

Anyone want to come and get their copy of Wolfborn signed? Better still, buy one, for a family member or friend if you have your own? :-) Plenty to see and do, even once you've been to the Random House table.

There are going to be some fabulous writers and actors there - more writers, in fact, than at Armageddon - though I'm not sure if I'll get to see any of them except Marianne, because the Random House bunch will probably just get me a dealers' room pass. That's fine. I have Swancon only a week later and there will be plenty to see and do there - and, yes, my book to promote and Fantastic Planet will be bringing copies, so I don't have to lug them myself.

And then off to the one-man Lord of The Rings!

The Whole Megillah

Today is Purim, the Jewish festival when we celebrate Queen Esther saving her people from the evil Haman. We read the Megillah, the Book of Esther, which, interestingly, is unique in the Bible in that it doesn't mention the name of God. The story has been covered in Norah Lofts's book, Esther, which is good fun. Her Esther is a nerd who makes a living, when she has to take her nose out of the books, by catering wealthy feasts. She spends her year in the king's palace, while waiting for her turn at a visit to His Majesty, in the palace library reading, so when she has supper with the king she has something more interesting to discuss than "How do I look?"

On my first trip to Israel, I dropped into a bookshop and found a gorgeous book I still have. It's an illustrated Megillah with Hebrew on one side of each page and English on the other. The book is illustrated like an illuminated manuscript, with illoed plates. I treasure it and read it every year.

A beautiful book, like every other thing of beauty, is a joy forever.

I couldn't get my system to show all the images that came up on Google Images, but here's a sample of his style. Apparently, he illoed quite a few Biblical stories - and other stuff. Go check it out on Google Images yourself!

Shaun Tan does it again!

Rejoice! Having won a Best Artist Hugo only last year, our very own Aussie Shaun Tan has now won an Oscar for the short film based on his book The Lost Thing. Not only that, but they're talking about doing a feature-length version of the wonderful The Arrival.

It's terrific to think that a guy who does books for children can do so well in the world and his name can be known to more than just the kids and the librarians and teachers, like me.

I remember when I first saw The Arrival - I can't say I read it, because it had no text, but it told a story it took me some time to absorb, about a man who arrives in a new country, fleeing the old one, to make a place for himself before sending for the family. It said so much about the refugee experience - and the migrant experience in general - without a word, and I then saw a play version, again without words.

Maybe it will get him another well-deserved Oscar when it's filmed?

I'm going to drink a toast to Mr Tan tonight.

Blood Maidens By Barbara Hambly. Severn House Publishers, 2010

It's 1911. Oxford university lecturer and former spy James Asher and his doctor wife Lydia are asked by their vampire friend Don Simon Ysidro to accompany him to Russia. He's worried. He's had a letter from a woman he once knew in England, now settled in Russia's vampire community. Something terrible may be about to happen in Russia that will affect the world.

Well, that's what he wants them to believe, anyway. In fact, it may be more personal than that - and yet, he might be right. Once again, in this third novel in the series that began with a book called Immortal Blood on my side of the world and Those Who Hunt The Night in the US, James and Lydia are caught up in adventure and danger.

The question in this one is - can vampires love? The answer seems to be yes, and not only for Ysidro, who once begged this woman not to turn, but to tell you more here would be a spoiler.

I like the way Barbara Hambly presents her vampires. Unlike many other writers in this time of the mega-selling paranormal romance, she doesn't sentimentalise them. The reader is never allowed to forget how Ysidro and his fellow vampires survive. Even Ysidro admits that you have to be pretty selfish to agree to become a vampire. At the same time, he has enough positive qualities for James and Lydia to try not to think too hard about this.

A nice touch here is the way the Russian aristocracy behave like vampires towards the lower classes. No one actually says it, but you can't help thinking so as you read. And reading it, you know exactly what's going to happen to those aristocrats in only a few years...

Barbara Hambly's books just keep getting better and better.

Recommended!

From Slushpile to Art

I answer inquiries for Andromeda Spaceways - both general ones and art inquiries. I also arrange with artists for them to illustrate stories and do our covers. I really enjoy this. I get all sorts of inquiries, from oh-so-professional freelancers who inform me that they can spare some time in November to do a cover for our publication to those who have no idea what we do publish because, like some of the writing students, they haven't checked out our web site let alone read our magazine. Mostly, of course, we get fabulous artists whose work I look at and think, "Oh, my god, has she checked out our rates? Does she realise how little we can pay her for a LOT of work?" And mostly, they assure me that yes, they've checked and the small payment is fine. Those are the ones who love spec fic and think this would be a nice thing to do as long as they don't have a commission from someone who can actually help them pay their bills. Occasionally they haven't checked and have to withdraw their submission.

Then there are those who have looked at the web site and still don't seem to get that we publish science fiction and send me a sample that would be fine for an advertising campaign but has no connection with what we publish. I ask them politely if they have something more appropriate and rarely hear from them again.

I don't blame them for trying. You have to check out any market you can when you're trying to make a living. But a quick look at our web site ought to convince most graphic designers who do advertising that this really isn't the market for them and save them a disappointing reply from me.

I will say that one young woman who lived in Melbourne and wasn't actually a science fiction fan, just an artist looking for a market, did take the trouble to go to Collected Works Bookshop, ASIM's Melbourne over-the-counter outlet and buy up the back issues to study her market. She never got back to me, but she at least had a go.

How do I know, apart from samples (they don't always send one with their inquiry) that they haven't checked? Well, there are the ones who send you what's clearly a standard inquiry, e.g. "As a book publisher, you must...", "I've been impressed by your catalogue of books..."

Thank heaven this is a minority! And thank heaven for the first-class artists who do work with us!

First Writers' Club for the Year

Today we had our first meeting of the campus writers' club. There were some new Year 7 students who had joined us. The usual suspects from last year, after I'd shown them the web site of Express Media and told them that Voiceworks pays young people $100 an item, settled happily down to work on their latest masterpieces. some on Inkpop, some just in Word. The new Year 7 students were keen to start work, then one of them said, "Miss, we don't have our logins yet." The computer teacher does these, but was busy elsewhere, so I had to log in to my account for them, recommending they emailed their stories to themselves. With great enthusiasm, they got started on their own epics. Robert had done a couple of pages from scratch before the bell rang, the others a bit less.

Thando handed me several pages of close print to read. Dylan and Selena were working on editing his piece for Inkpop.

I ran around like a headless chook and lost a vital password to the Conspiracy365 web site (Gabrielle Lord's YA site) while checking out books, taking people's stories and passing on a DVD to a staff member. It was in my email, though, so I checked out the site's email address and after lunch sent off my request.

I think I got in about five minutes to eat my lunch...

Phryne Fisher goes TV

I just heard, tonight, at a meeting of Sisters In Crime - the wonderful Phryne Fisher novels of Kerry Greenwood are finally making it to TV, as a 13 part series. I Googled, but not much is known yet - the funding has just been approved and the series will be shown on the ABC. The books have just been crying out to be filmed. Historical crime is doing very well on TV, and 1920s Melbourne would be fabulous. I'll look forward to reading more about it as the information comes through.

Whale's Tale review copies

I've had a request from Liz Bright at Peggy Bright Books, asking me to offer, on her behalf, review copies of The Whale's Tale by Edwina Harvey (reviewed on this site and January Magazine some time ago) to bloggers who might be interested. She knows this site does a lot of speculative fiction reviews and is read by those interested in the area.

So how about it? Anyone want a free book to review? All I can tell you, apart from my own review, is that the students at my school have been enjoying it very much. They were lucky enough to meet the author at Book Club when she was in Melbourne last year for Aussiecon and had a great time discussing it with her.

If you're interested, contact Liz at the following email address: editor@peggybrightbooks.com.

Various promos for my book

I've been very lucky in the promotions field. If anyone wants to hear the interview I did with Robert Jan on Zero G, there's a direct download up - www.rrr.org.au and scroll down to Zero G. It came out well, I think, though I'm cringing at the sound of my voice, as we all do, I guess. You never sound the way you do in your head.

Recently a lady called Rachel, who had reviewed Wolfborn on her blog, Fictional Fantasy, asked me for an interview, and it's just gone up. She asked me for a picture of my writing space and I just don't have one - I write all over the place - so I sent along a pic I took for a previous article in which I'd commented on the perception that writers do all their work in cafes, like J.K.Rowling, who actually did. It was a joke picture of me in my local cafe, with glass in one hand and a Harry Potter book in the other. I actually did work on one book in that cafe, but it was less the writing than the research - the place has free wifi and I'd run out of dialup time.

Anyway, the interview is up and it looks great.

My editor from January Magazine, Linda Richards, has kindly given the book a plug on her web site. She has a policy of not reviewing books by her reviewers, but still gave it a plug, which was nice, I thought.

Back to work next week and I will soon see what those students who borrowed the book for the holidays or got their own thought of it!

Look What I Found! A new Barbara Hambly book!

Yesterday I was in the library when I stumbled across a brand new book in the series that started with a book that's called either Immortal Blood or Those Who Hunt The Night, depending where you live, and continued with Travelling With The Dead.

I read both the books about James Asher, university lecturer and spy in the Edwardian era, and his intelligent wife, Lydia, who found the various vampire residences through checking paperwork. They're exciting and entertaining, occasionally funny and deeply touching. Barbara Hambly's vampires can be likable, but she never gets sentimental about them, reminding her readers constantly that the charming, witty Don Simon Ysidro, who came to England with Phillip of Spain when he married Queen Mary, is a killer thousands of times over and, like every other vampire, is a selfish bastard, because you have to be, to survive as a vampire - even Ysidro admits this.

Imagine my delight when I found this brand new book in the series, admittedly with a rather dreadful cover and title of Blood Maidens. If it had been anyone but this writer, I probably wouldn't have bothered even to open it, but once open, the book is as wonderful as the others. I'm halfway through it and trying unsuccessfully to slow down and relish it. Alas, I will be finished very soon and have to wait for whatever is her next offering.

I am a fan of Barbara Hambly. I began with Dragonsbane, in which an earnest young man goes looking for the only knight who ever managed to kill a dragon and finds out that he is a man who'd rather be reading than fighting and that he did it with poisoned harpoons because it had to be done, and that was the only way. I had to read more.

I love the way all her stories are just a little bit different from others of their genre. You care about her characters. A woman who is a history scholar saves the universe using her research skills. A wizard hero has been locked up for years because his mentor was an evil dark lord (The Silent Tower)That was, of course, Antryg Windrose, my favourite of her characters. He was so very like the Tom Baker Doctor, except he wore cheap jewellery instead of long scarves. He even had his own "Council of Timelords" who hated him!

The Magicians of Night was also just a bit different. The hero, a magician from a world where the mageborn are persecuted, is lured into another universe by a cry for help from people he thinks are also being persecuted - only to find himself in Nazi Germany, summoned by Hitler's magicians! It was the sequel to The Rainbow Abyss, but i think a better book.

When this writer turned to historical mystery, I followed, being a lover of crime fiction, and was pleased I had. Benjamin January, her African-American doctor/musician/investigator, lives in New Orleans during the era of slavery. Ex-slaves have only so many options. However he feels about it, Ben's family live there and he has to work around it. The city is a character in its own right; you can hear, see, smell it.

Excuse me. I have to get back to my book, before I read the latest YA vampire novel.

WHAT I’VE BEEN READING – NON-FICTION

I enjoy reading non-fiction. Sooner or later you have to look up stuff for what you’re going to write, but in between books it’s good just to read anything that comes your way and looks interesting. Sooner or later you can use it – and if you don’t use it directly, you at least feel you know what you’re talking about.

I read New Scientist quite regularly – I’m still making my way through the Christmas/New Year issue, which always has something amusing in it, such as what cheese does to you overnight. I’m just reading the article about robot actors. I got a real taste for layman’s science when I was working on my second book, Potions To Pulsars: Women Doing Science and really had to understand what my heroines had achieved. I used children’s books that could explain it in simple terms and dictionaries of physics, biology, etc. That was around the time I started to read New Scientist and found an article about Hedy Lamarr who, apart from being a beautiful woman and actress, was an inventor. She created a communications thing to help in the war effort, based on the way a pianola works, and while it wasn’t used till after the war, it did end up forming the basis of the mobile phone. She got a much-belated award for services to science.

You never know what you’ll find that helps in the writing and meanwhile you have a lot of fun.

I pick up most of my books in second-hand bookshops, Collected Works Bookshop in Melbourne and remainders book stores – you know, the kind which open up a few weeks before Christmas to sell off stuff and close by about February? It’s amazing what you find there. Among other things I’ve found a history of coffee, a history of chocolate, of sweets and a history of tourism. Tourism was fascinating, from Romans trotting around the empire to mediaeval pilgrims and Thomas Cook’s arrangements for people to go to temperance meetings. There was a wonderful story in the book about the White Ship, a ship which was supposed to carry the heir to the throne of England and his mates back to England after partying in France. This was the son of Henry I. The night before the voyage, lots of booze was sent to the ship from the party. The sailors got drunk, the ship smashed on the rocks and the passengers were drowned. They were, in fact, a lot of the young aristocrats of England. As a result of this incident, the new heir was Henry’s daughter Matilda, the mother of the future Henry II. This led to a civil war between her and her cousin Stephen. Eventually, he got to be king for life and her son became the next king, bringing us the Plantagenet dynasty, and what followed on from that. So our European history is the way it is because a bunch of sailors got drunk one night early in the 12th century. I found that delicious and thought, one of these days I’m going to play around with the alternative universe history that comes from this. Not yet, but eventually….

I’m reading a book called Drinking For England, a history of boozing and lechery in England. Oh, that Prince Regent! I recently finished a history of the Roman games, which taught me that in ancient Rome, executions in the arena happened at lunchtime. That stuck in my mind more than anything else in the book, though I am certainly impressed by the rest of it. Think about all those stories of Christian martyrs being thrown to the lions – and then get it into your head that it was just not all that important to the Romans, just another lunchtime event while you waited for the gladiators, who were what you'd really come to see. While the martyrs were singing hymns and facing their deaths, in the stands above people were rummaging in their picnic baskets for the last of the olives and debating whether they should take the chance of losing their seats by going to the lavatory or finding the Roman equivalent of the hot dog stand. The richer patrons, of course, had a season ticket and went off to a much better lunch somewhere else.

In other words, that scene in Monty Python’s Life of Brian in which the rebels are sitting at the games, buying hot nibbles from Brian and sneering at the Judean People’s Front was not that far off the mark. Of course, the Pythons were a pretty scholarly bunch. They met at university and at least one of them, Terry Jones, is still writing very enjoyable books of history (get hold of his book on the murder of Chaucer if you can. He sure convinced me Chaucer was murdered!).

I have just started to read a book about clothes in Anglo-Saxon England – fascinating! And perhaps useful for my next book...

Andromeda Spaceways 50th anniversary issue

You all know, by now, that I've been involved with Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine for some years. I read slush, I answer inquiries, both general and art-related and I occasionally select and edit a story. We're making a big thing of our 50th issue, which is the next - and I have chosen a story for it! There's some good stuff in there, so even if you haven't been subscribing, you might like to check out this one.

Edwina Harvey says it better than I could, so here are her words:

With Andromeda Spaceways Inflight magazine issue 49 printed and distributed, we're working our way towards our half century.

ASIM issue 50 promises to be a bumper issue, with a solar-system of editors selecting their favourite stories to bring to you, a wrap around cover by our founding cover artist, Les Petersen, and featuring a "Where are they now" special looking at what people who have belonged to the ASIM co-op at various times have acheived iover the years (and if you were a member of the ASIM co-op, and this is news to you, send me an e-mail real damn quick so we can include you in our spread)

IIf you are a former ASIMite you probably know Edwina's email address, but if you don't and want to contact her, ask me.

To celebrate our milestone, we're looking at running a few special deals, so keep watching this space. {I'll add anything new as I find out.)

And of course, if you're a writer with a book being published soon, or an editor of another magazine, or even a craftsperson, and you wouldn't mind advertising in ASIM 50, please contact me because our prices are negotiable, and we will consider contra deals.

You all know we're slowing down a little after issue 50, don't you? We'll be cutting back to 4 issues a year but gracefully giving over to middle-age spread by upping our page count per issue, so our subscribers don't miss a single word for their subscriptions.

Just so you know, the reason for cutting back numbers of issues per year is not because we couldn't be bothered or are about to close but because it's got to the point where these are only so many deadlines a year we can meet and do it right. And we all have Real Life and writing of our own. But the issues will be longer, so subscribers will still get the same amount of new fiction.

More publicity!

The interview went well, I think. The information is up on the RRR web site under "Zero G" and the podcast will be up as soon as Rob Jan, the host, can put it up. That should be in the next few days, so if anyone is interested, go check it out on www.rrr.org.au

Meanwhile, there's a Q and A up on Good Reading Magazine http://goodreadingmagazine.com.au/meettheauthor.cfm - fantastic publicity!

Also, Random House, my publisher, asked me for five entries for their blog - two are up already! Nice!

This is my two hundredth post on this blog, so it deserves a bit of fuss. I originally started it because there were some books that weren't possible to review for january Magazine, but deserved reviewing, and I wanted a place on-line that was mine. I do have Livejournal blog which I don't do a lot with, because I put most of my energy into this one, and I have another Blogger one whichI set up as an experiment and still use for everyday stuff, such as what I'm doing with my students. I doubt it gets anywhere near the number of hits this one does, but people do occasionally tell me they've been reading it and finding it interesting. I sometimes copy and paste between blogs because most of my Livejournal "friends" don't read this one and vice versa (some do - hi, Morva!)






Because this is a book blog, I'll just mention what I'm reading right now. Scott Westerfeld's Behemoth is proving just as good as Leviathan, to which it's a sequel - more of this when I finish and review it - and finishing up Melissa Marr's Fragile Eternity, which I've borrowed from my school library, third in the Wicked Lovely series of novels about Faeries. I like that this writer has done her research on the subject. The first book had quotes from a whole range of classic texts about Faerie folklore, some which I've read myself. Faeries are not nice or sweet and I like the way she has made the Summer King, looking for a queen, not the ideal boyfriend. This one, I think, is getting a little more into Faerie politics than I would have expected, but we'll see how it's used in the next book. Meanwhile, the students at my school are reading them and enjoying. You can't ask more than that.

Interview on RRR

For anybody who has time to turn to 3RRR, I will be doing an interview about Wolfborn on Rob Jan's science fiction program, Zero G, Monday at about 1.00 p.m. Rob's program has been running for quite a few years and he manages to get interviews with some big-name writers, actors and other big names. If you miss the program, there may be a podcast at some stage, as well as streaming on the day.

If you do listen and manage to record, please let me know. I'm still trying to get the hang of podcasts on my new computer and broadband connection.

I hope it goes well! I haven't done a radio interview in quite some time and my first interview I stuffed up beautifully. Well, I think I did, anyway. It was going fine and the interviewer, who had told me off-air that she hadn't actually had the chance to read the book because the publisher hadn't sent her a copy on time, was doing very well bluffing her way through the cover blurb when she mentioned "the woman scientist who had disguised herself as a man" and unthinkingly, I asked, "Which one did you mean?" (There were two in my book). We did manage to bullshit our way through the rest, but still... This interviewer has read the novel, though. Wish me luck!

New Follower, New Link

I've added a link on the side to a web site called Marcus Marcus And The Hurting Heart. The author, Rab Fulton, who has just joined this site, is an Irish storyteller and poet, currently doing a writer in residence post, who is writing a speculative fiction novel on-line, as a blog. I don't know if I'd ever have the courage to do that!

Go check out his ghostly murder mystery set in the future, which he's writing a chapter at a time. I certainly intend to read it.

Welcome to The Great Raven, Rab!

H.I.V.E; Zero Hour. By Mark Walden. London, Bloomsbury, 2010

In the first novel of this series, H.I.V.E: Higher Institute of Villainous Education, we met Otto Malpense, a computer genius who also had the uncanny power of connecting with computers, who found himself in H.I.V.E, a sort of Hogwarts for training super-villains, after showing his skills by making the Prime Minister drop his trousers on national television. There, he meets other young criminal geniuses who become his friends. The original novel was very funny indeed, throwing in cheeky references to spy movies, such as the white cat with a jewelled collar that sits in the villain’s lap; at H.I.V.E, the white cat is one of the teachers, who had been trapped in her cat’s body by accident, and the jewelled collar is her communication device. The “Neville Longbottom” character created a giant plant that almost ate the school.

As the novels continued, the humour mostly disappeared, to be replaced by straight action adventure with a speculative fiction twist. The main villain of the series was an AI called Overlord, which had gotten out of control and wanted to take over the world. We did eventually find out why Otto had those abilities and in the last book, H.I.V.E: Rogue, Otto was taken by the enemy and taken over for most of the story.

In this latest offering, the baddies – and you have to remember that everyone in this series is technically a baddie – take over the school and scatter the council of GLOVE, the organisation governing the “good” baddies who just want to make lots of money, not rule the world. They take hostages at a secret American military base and start issuing orders to the president. Now Otto, his friends Laura, Lucy, Shelby and Wing and the school’s headmaster, Max Nero, are on the run, fortunately in a fabulous piece of technology called Megalodon, trying to stop Overlord, who has demanded Otto as part of the price of releasing those hostages. If Overlord wins this time, everyone in the world will be taken over. But Max Nero has one ace left up his sleeve – something known as Zero Hour, planned years ago…

I suppose I can see why the over-the-top humour was dropped after the first novel, apart from the occasional amusing scene. The point had been made and after that, it wouldn’t work any more. The story wasn’t finished. So the direction changed and the last few books, this one included, are more like the many action-adventures being written for teenagers in recent years. This series is likely to appeal to teens who have been reading Anthony Horowitz’s Alex Rider novels and Charlie Higson’s Young James Bond books. There is an appendix at the end, which invites readers to find out for which stream of H.I.V.E they would be suitable, then whether they have what it takes to be a super-villain anyway. I got into the Political/Financial Stream, but wasn’t quite villainous for the big time.

The series has gotten to the point where books can't be read stand-alone, so read the others first. It's worth the effort.

A Toast To The Professor!

Yesterday, January 3rd, I was sitting on the beach, re-reading Lord of The Rings and loving it as always. I remember the first time I read it. I was tired after a year's work and just wanted to go somewhere that I didn't have to go out for coffee with friends or family and lie on the beach and read. I went to Sorrento, where I stayed at the YHA. The hostel owner was trying to impress a lady who was there to work on a tourist information book by telling me all the things I could do in Sorrento and all I wanted was to get to my dorm, dump everything and take my book to the beach. After listening for a while, I interrupted as politely as I could and said thanks, but I just wanted to go lie on the beach.

I am very lucky the tide didn't come and sweep me away that day. The book sure did! Since then, I have re-read it every now and then - often on the beach - whenever I feel the need for comfort and rest. I love the fact that it suggests ordinary people can be heroes - and gives ordinary problems to the epic hero types. There aren't many women in it, but when they do appear, they're strong. Even Lobelia Sackville-Baggins turns out well in the end. (I'm a member of a Tolkien list under the name of "Lobelia"). I find myself re-reading a chapter and saying, "Oh, great, this is the fabulous chapter where Aragorn..."

And I FORGOT TOLKIEN'S BIRTHDAY! Damn!

So today I'll find a nice pub somewhere and go in to toast "the Professor" and if you haven't done so yet, please do!

Me and my new T-shirt!

Isn't it great what you can do nowadays? I decided it might be nice to promote my new book, so I went to the local camera shop and using a simple JPEG file, I got a T-shirt in an hour, promoting my book for about the same price as promoting someone else's product (and I never have understood why people pay to wear a shirt advertising a brand of shoes or jeans! You'd think the company would hand out the shirts for free). I also got a shirt with my last book, Crime Time, on it, but haven't yet worn it. As soon as I can, I'll get someone to take a photo of me in that one.

Meanwhile, I got my nephew Mark to take some photos of me in my lovely new shirt and am considering getting some mugs made up for friends who have already bought the book, so what do you give them?

I know this has been possible for years, but hey, this is my first time!

Here I am in it!

UNEARTHLY By Cynthia Hand. Sydney: HarperCollins, 2011

Clara is part-angel. She has known this since she turned fourteen a couple of years ago. Like others of her kind, she expects to learn her “purpose” on earth, a task she must perform. According to visions she has been having, this seems to be saving a boy from a forest fire somewhere in the US state of Wyoming. Clara, her half-angel mother and her younger brother move to the small town where the boy, Christian, lives.

Clara knows she must get close enough to Christian to be on the spot whenever the disaster happens. She’s also learning to use her hidden wings, in case she needs to carry him.

But there are problems. Christian, a sweet boy liked by everyone, has a girlfriend whom he loves. Can Clara help him without interfering with his love life? Does she even want to? And what about her own love life, in the shape of the gorgeous Tucker, her friend’s brother? What happens when she’s carried out her angelic mission?

And how does she survive the Black Wimgs, a group of fallen angels who have plans of their own?

After some years of one vampire tale after another, it seems that angels are taking over the popular teen paranormal romance. In fact, when I told one of my students that I was reading this book for reviewing, she asked, "And is she red-haired?"

"Er, no, she has had to dye it red," I replied.

"Blonde, then."

She was right about that. So it seems that already there are conventions in this form of fiction. On the other hand, another character, who is also a part-angel, is dark.

This is the first angel romance I’ve read, myself, and it’s good readable stuff which the girls should enjoy, even if the main angel character is the girl rather than the boy. What would it be like to try to work out how to use wings? To have to hold back in athletics, dance and such because you’re so good at them that even if no one asks questions you feel you’re being unfair to the competition? And being good at everything doesn't necessarily mean you're good at getting every boy you might want.

I liked the author's description of Wyoming, which made me think it's a place I'd enjoy visiting; she lives not far from there herself, so knows about it. I'd never ski, but found it fascinating to read about in this book; there's a lot more to it than just Girl-Angel and the boys in her life. I suspect the author is a keen skier herself.

The girls will like it for certain; several were eyeing my copy of this book before the holidays began and I had to promise it would go into the library when reviewed before I could get it out of their clutches.

They will be even more pleased to find out that it;s the first of a series.

What I enjoy about Christmas Day

Christmas isn't my holiday. I don't have any need to spend it having lunch and exchanging gifts with family members. I think we had a barbecue once, but not to celebrate Christmas, just because it was nice.

But I do enjoy Christmas Day. My usual routine on Christmas Day is: a. get up earlyish and bake bread. b. pack a picnic lunch, using my homemade bread for the sandwiches, with something gourmet as the filling - perhaps a good-quality cheese or two. The rest of the meal is a hard-boiled egg (what's a picnic without a hard-boiled egg? I was, after all, brought up on Enid Blyton, though I admit I don't take lashings of ginger ale with me), a piece of chocolate of some variety (again - taken from Blyton), some of the Christmassy baked-goods given me by friends, fresh summer fruit and a thermos of coffee. c. head for the beach with the above-mentioned lunch and whatever book or six that I'm reading at the time. d. wave at people having picnics in the park on the way. e. arrive at the beach, have my picnic and read, occasionally waving at other beach-picnickers. On the way, I enjoy the peace of the streets, hearing only the odd rattle of crockery from the houses as someone prepares lunch.

One year, a kindly lady invited me into her garden where she and her friends were having lunch together, probably thinking I was a poor soul forced to spend the day alone. I appreciated the thought, but declined the offer politely, not telling her about the yummy lunch in my backpack or the pure pleasure I get from spending the day doing just what I want.

Another year, there was a storm on Christmas Day. I had my picnic in the living-room, bingeing on episodes of Angel.

Last year, unfortunately, my family and I were in the palliative care unit where my father was spending his last days. :-(

This year, because I'd spent the Friday night at my mother's home, I managed to drag her along to enjoy the picnic with me. I did offer to bake some bread, but she thought I'd be better off having a rest, so I bought a baguette for us to share and we had it with Gorgonzola and Brie cheeses, the thermos of coffee, fruit and the world's best vanilla slice, bought from a wonderful bakery near my home.

Mum dozed a while after lunch and I read my new book, a very readable history of gladiators - anything to help with the research. Not that I have any fiction planned set in ancient Rome, but you never know. According to this book,the movie Spartacus was more or less correct, with a few exceptions (such as the ending, of course, and the fact that they didn't have retiarii for sixty years after the time of Spartacus) but Gladiator got it completely wrong - fascinating!

A peaceful day, and Mum enjoyed it too.

Seer Of Sevenwaters By Juliet Marillier. Pan MacMillan, 2010.

Reviewed by guest blogger Thando Bhebe.


Seer of Sevenwaters is about Sibeal, a girl committed to becoming a druid. Before her final vows she travelled to the northen island of Inis Eala to spend some time with her sisters. An unusual storm sinks a ship and there are only three survivors, one of which she stumbled across. He is an amnesiac with no name that the other survivors knew. Sibeal names him Ardal and he's fighting for his life.

The island community discovers that there is something strange about the shipwreck survivors. Strange things happen and secrets unravel. Sibeal is drawn into a perilous quest and has to face a decision that may break her heart. Spiritual life or love?

It's the fifth book of a series. I have read the first three before this one, but for those who haven't, there is a family tree that may help you along.

First of all, the front cover and the blurb drew me in. I liked the prologue. It went straight to the action. The way the author wrote it was so that the first chapter is fairly interesting, but then after that it keeps getting better and bigger. I liked how it sort of got a little twisted and out of control. The lies of some of the characters, the secrets and each time I flipped to the next page, it was what kept it rolling.

The good thing was that the author showed the amnesiac's point of view as well, because the reader had a bit of an idea about his struggle to stay alive, the things that happened to him when to one else was there which was added clues. Some of the clues the author gave were a bit obvious but the major ones were much harder to decipher.

The author kept to the point and didn't wander off into anything else, which was one of the things I enjoyed. To me, the ending was perfect, though a little bit predictable considering what the main characters had gone
through.

The book wasn't confusing at all, the language was proper and was very descriptive. I thoroughly enjoyed the book and sympathised with Ardal the amnesiac. It's a book worth re-reading.

If I were to rate it, I'd rate it four and a half stars.

Interview with Juliet Marillier

This interview was conducted by guest blogger Thando Bhebe. Thando is a passionate reader who is currently diving into 30 library books she took home for the holidays. She is also an emerging writer whose work is up on Internet writing community Inkpop.

Thando is a major fan of the wonderful fantasy novelist Juliet Marillier, who has kindly agreed to an interview. Welcome to The Great Raven, Thando and Juliet.

Interview questions by Thando Bhebe, a teenage reader of the Sevenwaters books and Heart’s Blood.

1.Why is the Sevenwater series set in Ireland?

Daughter of the Forest (first book in the series) is based on a traditional story called The Six Swans, a fairytale set somewhere in Europe. Irish folklore contains many stories about swans, and in particular people turning into swans. The Irish landscape suited the sort of tale I wanted to tell, with a mysterious forest and lake. So I chose Ireland as the setting for the first novel and then, of course, for the ongoing series.

2. Is it in the south or the North of Ireland?

It’s the north. Sevenwaters is based on an area called the Ring of Gullion in County Armagh. There used to be a very big forest there, though in the past it was cut down for grazing. They’re currently replanting the hillside with trees.

3. What types of books do you enjoy reading?

I like a wide variety of books and I always have. I think that’s essential for a writer! I enjoy books with strong female characters, ranging from classics such as Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women right through to recent novels such as The Distant Hours by Australian author Kate Morton. I read a lot of non-fiction, partly as research for my writing. I like books that are original and well-crafted. I have a small list of writers from whom I read every new book: Iain Banks, David Mitchell, Jodi Picoult.

4. The women of Sevenwaters seem to go through a lot – why is this?

Human journeys and relationship are at the heart of storytelling for me. My characters feel quite real as I travel with them on their adventures. I think real life is all about meeting challenges and finding out how brave you can be in times of adversity. Would you want to read a book in which the central character lived happily at home the whole time?

5. How did you think up Bran the Painted Man?

Bran’s tattoos are based on the Maori traditional tattoos of my homeland, New Zealand. Tattoos have a lot of meaning in tribal cultures and I liked the idea that Bran made a new identity for himself this way. I’d also been reading a lot about men who were traumatised by experiences in the past, for instance, servicemen returning from active duty who could not escape their memories of what they’d seen on the battlefield. All of this combined to create Bran. From the start I saw Son of the Shadows as a story about peeling away layers of memory one by one to get at the heart of his fear and alienation.

6. Are any of the characters of your books based on people you know?

No, though I use characteristics of people I’ve met. But I mix them up so no character is exactly like anyone in real life.

7. Are any of the characters based on yourself?

Oh, no! Of course a certain amount of my own experience and attitudes is going to make its way into the characters, more in some books than others. The character with whom I have the most empathy is Caitrin, the protagonist of Heart’s Blood, who is struggling to get back her sense of self after suffering a breakdown. There are also a few older women in the books who are a little like me. I’d like to be Draguţa, the witch of the wood from Wildwood Dancing, and ride around on a white fox!

8. Do you ever write a certain scene, then get emotional over it (if it’s a sad one for example)?

Scenes in which good characters have bad things happen to them are always hard to write, and can be very hard to re-read. When I’m editing my own work I often have to go over a scene many times. There is a death scene in Blade of Fortriu that I found extremely hard to revisit. The person in question was one of my all-time favourite characters. But the plot required him to die in particularly cruel circumstances.

9. Heart’s Blood is based on Beauty And The Beast – why set it in Ireland?

I was originally going to set Heart’s Blood in Eastern Europe, either in Romania or Bulgaria. My American editor thought would not be very appealing for US readers, and so the setting was revised to Ireland. There are many people in the USA with Irish ancestors and they tend to love my Irish stories. The new setting worked pretty well, and allowed me to include the historical context of the Anglo-Normans moving into Ireland and helping themselves to the territory of the Irish chieftains such as Anluan.

10. With the Sevenwaters series did you make it a big family because you wanted to make it a series or because you like big families? Do you have one yourself?

I have quite a small family, though it’s getting bigger as I acquire more grandchildren! The story of The Six Swans features a girl with six brothers, so the big family was there even before I began writing. The whole Sevenwaters saga simply grew from there. I had originally intended writing only one book. The story got longer because I thought I should investigate the effects of the swan transformation on future generations of the family. Happy endings are usually not happy for every single character, only some, and that is certainly true of Daughter of the Forest. I wanted to go down the paths of some of the characters whose lives were forever changed by what had happened. Once you get into the third and fourth generations of a family, as I’ve done with Sevenwaters, you have a big cast of characters to choose from.

11. I have noticed that in your books (Sevenwaters series and Heart’s Blood) there is always some romance. Is this because you enjoy romance or is there another reason?

I love reading a book with a good romance in it, and I think that’s my main reason for including a love story in every novel. As I mentioned earlier, I am fascinated by human journeys and human relationships, and love stories are a vital part of that.

12. Which is your favourite book, if any, and why? Your favourite character and why? For what age group do you recommend them?

My favourite book is usually the one I’m currently writing – at present that is the first instalment in a new series for young adults, called Shadowfell. If I was pushed to choose a favourite from the earlier books it would probably be Son of the Shadows because I really loved creating Bran and his motley band of warriors, and Liadan is the heroine I would most like to be. Favourite character: I have so many … Perhaps Faolan, the anti-hero from the Bridei Chronicles.

Age group for readers: Wildwood Dancing and Cybele’s Secret are written for young adults, age 13+. They are also a good read for adults. The Shadowfell series, first book due out in 2012, will suit age 14+.

All the other books are intended for adults, but they do have a keen readership among young adults, age 14+. They include ‘adult’ content, so it really depends very much on the individual reader. I’d suggest young adult readers start with Wildwood Dancing and Cybele’s Secret, and then try Daughter of the Forest or Heart’s Blood.

13. Would you like it if people wanted to turn one of your books into movies?
Only if it was really well done. A bad movie with cheap special effects would be ghastly. Now if Peter Jackson were interested …
14. If they asked you, which book would you most like to be made into a movie?

Wildwood Dancing, which is very loosely based on The Twelve Dancing Princesses, would make a great animated movie. I’d love to see my Viking novel, Wolfskin, as an action adventure film.

15. In the first Sevenwaters book the brothers turn into swans. Why swans?

The book is based on a traditional fairytale about a girl whose brothers are turned into swans by their jealous stepmother. The girl has to make shirts for each of them from a prickly plant and throw them over their necks, to win her brothers back their human form. While performing this task, which takes years, she is not allowed to utter a word.

16. In Sevenwaters, there seem to be an awful lot of twins. Is it in the Sevenwaters gene to have twins?

Yes, twins are definitely in the family’s genetic makeup. Both girl/boy twins like Sean and Liadan, and same sex twins like Conor and Cormack, and Deirdre and Clodagh. They’d be fraternal twins, not identical twins.

17. If you had a choice to pick one of your characters to come to life, which one would it be?

Gosh, difficult question! I’d have to consider who would cope well when transplanted into the extremely different setting of the twenty-first century. It might have to be one of the uncanny characters.

18. My favourite Sevenwaters women are Sorcha, Liadan and Sibeal.
Is there a reason why these women are more or less similar? Sorcha’s husband’s from Harrowfield, Liadan’s husband was once an out law and although I have not finished SEER OF SEVENWATERS , Sibeal meets Felix (Ardal ) who’s from another island. Is this because you like that type of romance, with people from different places coming and joining the Sevenwaters family?

Because the series is based around the Sevenwaters family, and because the central characters are women, their romantic partners will tend to be people from somewhere else. Sevenwaters itself is quite a big territory, so it’s not surrounded by close neighbours whose sons can provide a handy social circle for the Sevenwaters girls. In those days, young women from a chieftain’s family would usually have arranged marriages to men of similar social rank, perhaps the sons of other local chieftains. But of course, the Sevenwaters girls are unusually strong-minded young women and many of them end up on rather different paths in life, Liadan and Clodagh especially.

DYMOCK’S BOOK-SIGNING AT SOUTHLAND

I organised this months ago, with Alice, the lovely lady who arranged the mass-event for Ford Street. It could have gone better than just a few copies, given that it was Christmas and a teen paranormal book and I was in costume – but it was still a nice day.

I arrived very early and parked my stuff in the back room. Alice told me that, as I’d explained why I couldn’t get any books from the publisher (they’d run out – gloat!) her boss had kindly agreed to let me have the needed copies for my launch for 25% discount.

Last night, I sat up late, watching a guilty-pleasure DVD and sewing myself a new kaftan to use for today and my launch. I embroidered it just a little around the neck, as it was already getting late, but I thought it would be nice to wear a costume. Alice said that was fine – they’d had another writer come dressed as a dog! I experimented with wearing a cloak and a veil and ended up just putting a silver cord around my head. That worked okay. I wore my silver Cyndi Smith wolf’s-head brooch – a gorgeous piece of jewellery which I commissioned her at Aussiecon, as a birthday gift to myself.

In the end, I gave away a lot more bookmarks – including Crime Time bookmarks – than I sold books, but never mind. I talked with people, I was friendly and perhaps they will come back for a copy. I signed quite a few for the shop – they had bought an embarrassingly large number of copies – and asked if they might put some in the paranormal. YA is good, but paranormal teen is also good – even better. So you cover two places and have two chances to sell..

Best of all today, I got to meet Romy of Lost In Stories blog (here we are in a photo) and her delightful parents, who took the trouble to come and support me. Romy offered to take some bookmarks (signed, of course) to use for a give-away on her web site and I also gave her several Crime Time bookmarks. It will work well there. It has occurred to me that, apart from Tina and Dylan, I’m fairly sure that most of my regular readers are older than Romy’s – and Dylan is my student, Tina found me through Romy. So when I do my next bit – a “cast Wolfborn the movie” competition, I might ask Romy if she’d like to run it on her site as well.

That’s for later. Meanwhile, it was fun to meet her – thanks for coming, Romy!

Wolfborn - lots of happy-making stuff

It finally came out officially on December 1st, although the shops had it before then. I wandered into Dymock's in the city, where I had been told they would be getting it in, and offered to sign any copies they had. "Yes, please!" said Zoe, the lady at the special orders counter, and her manager brought twelve copies out. I then offered bookmarks to go with them, because the bookmarks counter has been cleared for Christmas wrapping. This offer was happily accepted and then I had another thought: since the counter usually used to put advertising bookmarks was being used for wrapping - why not give away a few signed bookmarks with the first few wrapped gifts? Zoe liked that idea too, so I signed a dozen bookmarks for those. Nice!

Tomorrow I will be going to another Dymock's, at Southland in Melbourne, to do a book-signing, and see how that goes.

Meanwhile, the reviews and interview offers continue - very nice! George Ivanoff reviewed it in Literary Clutter, the blog connected with Boomerang Books,AND did an interview, there was, of course, the very first one in AsIf, written by Tehani Wessely, teacher-librarian extraordinaire, editor, reviewer and former ASIMite. There is a fabulous one in ReadPlus and Tehani has done a very nice extra review for Fiction Focus.

But two especially exciting promos - a wonderful rave review on Marianne de Pierres' blog,Burn Bright, by reviewer Belinda Hamilton, not to mention the lovely interview.The other bit of excitement came the other day when one of my students looked up from her Dolly Magazine and said, "Miss, your book is in this!" You really know you've scored when you get a mention in Dolly - think of the thousands of girls who read it, not to mention quite a few boys. For any of them who might be reading this, Wolfborn has lots of adventure and a touch of romance. Well, it has to - it's based on a story that was one of a bunch of tales with romantic elements, not just the standard "mediaeval romance" which might not be what we think of by the term, although it often is.

The nicest thing of the lot is the reason why I couldn't get extra copies from the publisher to hand out at my school book launch on Monday and will have to buy a few at full price: the book was out of stock. I'm told it has already gone into reprint. After a week! Okay, it just means shops have bought up big for Christmas. There could be returns afterwards. I hope not. Fingers crossed!

Watch This Space for Juliet Marillier

Recently, the publicist at Macmillan sent out a press release offering the latest of Juliet Marillier's Sevenwaters novels and an interview. I have only just discovered this writer myself (see my review) but one of my students, Thando, has been reading and loving all of them. The publicist was fine with Thando doing the review and interview, so Thando and I sat down during a Book Club meeting to prepare her questions for the interview. When they're done, Thando will become my guest blogger and the questions will be posted right here on this web site!

I must say, I am enjoying this writer's work. She knows her mediaeval Ireland and uses fairytales to start off her books, and it works. There's something reminiscent of Caiseal Mor, another Irish fantasy writer living in Australia, only his books are mostly set in a much earlier Ireland, around the time Christianity wandered into town.(Well, there are later ones. I simply adored Carolan's Concerto!)

Stand by for a very interesting interview, followed by the review when Thando has finished the book.

What I'm re-reading: Sword At Sunset

After all the stuff I have been saying about Rosemary Sutcliff, I felt in the mood. I went to my overflowing bookcases in my lovely but messy study and found my Tor Publishing copy of this book, with the American spelling. For quite some years you could only get the abridged version which left out the gay lovers and Artos and Guenhumara's wedding night, when he finally gets it that his half-sister Ygerna has really damaged him. It was meant for kids to read, but really, it made me scratch my head when I was near the end and Artos is stressed out because he's only once been more than half a man to her, he says when he finds her with Bedwyr. The author, when interviewed, said that she had met kids who had read and loved the full version.

It's set three days after the end of The Lantern Bearers, but it's Aquila's son, Flavian, who appears in most of this book. A beautiful, beautiful novel. You feel so strongly for Artos - and it was the first time I'd read an Arthurian novel told by Arthur, though since then there has been Parke Godwin's fabulous Firelord.

There have been others, wonderful others, but Sword At Sunset is my favourite.There are some books you just know you will have to read over and over again.

My student who has just finished The Lantern Bearers agreed it was wonderful, but he will now have to wait for next year for this one, unless he can find it in the Sunshine Library. After that I might wave the books of Mary Stewart and maybe Jack Whyte under his nose. Parke Godwin later.

Meanwhile, I will curl up with Artos the Bear and his friends at bedtime tonight. Lovely!