Remember Me?

What? I haven't posted since February?!

Clockwise from top left: 
Jack Finsterer, Staten Evans, Caroline McKenzie, 
Jacinta Acevski, Felix Williamson and Aimee Horne in Swamplands 

Easy to do, when you get off a plane from London and walk straight into a rehearsal for a new play in Sydney - in this case, my new one Swamplands at the National Play Festival, which ran in March.
It's quite a departure from working on a new play about the CIA to continuing the saga of Sophie Morgan and her very complex family in my new novel White Rain, the sequel to Burnt Snow. That is, however, what I've been doing since the National Play Festival ended. Oh, that and devising a musical about a lizard (not joking), writing the occasional article and preparing a new play to start once White Rain is FINALLY FINISHED. Book fans, please note that release dates will CERTAINLY feature on this blog. And then I'll be writing the as-yet-untitled third book. Maybe I should open a competition to name it - what would you think OF THAT?

Unsurprisingly, a lot of deadlines has led to a lot of stress, and to calm myself I've been remorselessly feeding myself on this very special Lavender Cake invented by my friend Jess.

For those of you who haven't discovered the joy of lavender, do (unless you are pregnant or lactating, in which case don't, for a bit!). Long reputed for its relaxing properties, it was so precious to the Romans that they brought it with them to Britain, so precious to the Christians that they included it amongst the holy oils used to annoint the Temple and so precious to insomniacs like me that I spray it as an essential oil on my pillow at nighttime when even warm milk, almonds and turkey meat fail to knock me out (it works! Also handy to dab the oil on your temples if you're trying to fall asleep on a plane).

Lavender sachets in drawers keep away bugs, and a visit to a traditional Korean bathhouse is not complete without a lavender bath. Lavender oil on the temples can cure headaches and its mild antiseptic properties make it a good treatment for insect bites or acne if you mix it 1:10 with rosewater or witch hazel and dab. 

Did I mentioned that Jess' cake contains honey icing? Trust me - being stressed never had such a sweet consolation...

Here are some more pics from Swamplands. It was directed by Andrew Lewis, head of perforance at WAAPA... and it was the best fun a playwright can have.

Do it for Queensland!

Hi there. Remember me? I used to be your friendly neighbourhood blogger - but then I went into Deadline Mode for my new book, White Rain, and then I got swine flu. AGAIN.

It is no longer a family secret that my parents' nickname for me is 'Piglet'

So, I've been quiet for a while. But, then, a tragedy overtook all of my concerns about stressing about my new book or spending all my time in a stripy dressing-gown, greeting the postman with swollen eyeballs. Stuck here in London, I've been incredibly distressed to read about everything that's happening in flooded Queensland.

This was how high and violent the floodwaters got. That's a RUBBISH BIN in a POWERLINE.

Now, I really like Queensland. I spent a wonderful few days at the Brisbane Writers' Festival last year and it was fantastic. I've got some incredible friends who live there, and Brisbane in particular is a city I associate with fabulous food and youthfully wild times. The image of it with BINS IN POWERLINES breaks my heart.
Fortunately, some amazing writers who also love Brisbane had the brilliant idea of finding a way for writers (not exactly a group one first thinks of as coming to the rescue when the front lawn has washed away) to help the relief effort.
What Queensland needs to combat a disaster that has affected an area THE SIZE OF FRANCE AND GERMANY COMBINED is money. It needs lots and lots of money to rebuild, actually, everything. That's when writers Kate Gordon, Katrina Germein, Emily Gale and Fleur McDonald had the idea that what writers could do to help was auction their wares to raise money. You can read about them here, in this press release in the Tasmanian Times.
So I, like a GAZILLION writers from around the world, are giving what I can for flood relief. I am auctioning two specially-signed copies of Burnt Snow with original hand-drawn-by-me book plates, as well as a day-long script clinic for anyone out there who has written a play and wants to make it fabulous/maximise its chances of getting a production (I'm very good at this, I'm a theatre Literary Manager - I should point out if you love someone who writes plays, my expertise makes a GREAT PRESENT). Bids start at $0, and you bid just by signing up on the website.

You can start your bidding here.

Please do it for Queensland. If you love books, do it for Queensland - so many libraries and bookstores have been destroyed it is even more painful than having swine flu. And, trust me, that's saying something. Oink! Oink!

Hallowe'en Competwition: GIMME YO BEST SPOOKY STORY IN A TWEET

Why, hello!

The book tour is coming to close and OH BOY: six weeks, four festivals, some school appearances, LOTS of interviews and incessant talking about myself later, I fly off to Japan TOMORROW for more lurking around sites of magical activity. Then it's back to London to finish writing the Burnt Snow sequel, White Rain. What better way to celebrate the amazing time I've had with this book than to say LOOKY-LOOK! I'm having a twitter competition - just in time for Hallowe'en!

In my dreams I am actually this hot.

The #31witch Competwition: Concept! Judges! Rules! Prizes!

Okay, so the competition is this: we're looking for the world's spookiest story in tweet form. ALL YOU HAVE TO DO apart from, you know, set up a Twitter account and post the tweet is:

 

a.) include the hashtag "#31witch" in the tweet (so we can find it). If #31witch isn't there, we won't know your entry *exists*. 

b.) be COMPLETELY ORIGINAL (anyone ripping off another writer's work will be professionally doomed hereafter) and

c.) make sure we get it by (wait for it!) THE STROKE OF MIDNIGHT, THE NIGHT OF HALLOWEEN! (which is October 31, whichever hemisphere you are in). 

d.) no eye-gouging

We have made the rules so fantastically simple so you can devote all your magic mindpowers to composing spooky-story tweets.

There are FIVE prizes. First prize is a Pan Macmillan Australia SPOOKY BOOK PACK which contains an specially-inscribed copy of Burnt Snow amongst a selection of literary spooky treats. Four runners-up will receive a copy of Burnt Snow. All the winners will receive lifelong literary and Twitter glory and the ability to say "I was one of the winners of the Pan Macmillan Australia Spooky Story Competwition" for, like, ever.

Questions I Believe Will Be Frequently Asked:

I live in a strange and magical foreign country. Can I enter the competition even if the book is published in Australia?

YES, you can! This may indeed be an excellent chance to acquire a copy of Burnt Snow without having to mortgage your Nanna to pay postage.

Who are the judges?

The judges are way esteemed. They include ME (whahey!) and a crack literary evaluation team from my publishers, Pan Macmillan.

Can I enter more than once?

Yes, you can enter as many times as you like. Go crazy. Bring on the spooky. There are no fees, charges or obligations and your imagination is given free reign.

What is the history of Halloween, Van?

Well, funny you should ask. What we understand as the Halloween holiday had its origins in the Celtic "Samhain" or "Samuin" festival. In the Northern Hemisphere, the time it occurs marks the end of the summer and the conclusion of the lighter half of the year before the darker half starts - "Samuin" is an old Gaelic word that roughly translates to "summer's end". As a festival, Samhain celebrated the harvest at the end of summer, the storing of food to last for the winter and, as part of this, the slaughtering of animals. Perhaps because of the bloody (if practical) rituals of the season, as well as the transformation of the green summer landscape to the lifeless-looking winter, beliefs surround the holiday as being a time of the year where the wall between our world and others - like the realm of the dead - are particularly thin. The idea that the dead walk amongst us on this day found a cultural expression in dressing up as spooky things to either scare off the scary or blend amongst them. Some of the popular symbols of the holiday have a practical function: the Samhain bonfires were used to dispose of the bones of slaughtered animals, while, obviously, this time of the year in the North is the best time to harvest apples and pumpkins. Mmm... pumpkins.

"Halloween" is the name given to the Christian festival that was imposed to absorb the older pagan traditions: although the idea was to encourage people to worship all the Christian saints as part of festivities of All Soul's Day (on November 2nd), people just liked dressing up and dancing round bonfires way much more than a bit of appropriated ancestor veneration. Consequently, some evangelical Protestant denominations have incorporated the notion of a "Hell House" - like a walk-through diorama with staged scenes of the consequences of immoral activity - into their own Halloween celebrations so their flock still get to dress up in spooky costumes and light fires. So everyone wins. 

In Australia, although the Southern Hemisphere holiday should really be Beltane, or May Day (marking the passage of the seasons from winter to spring), Halloween traditions remain in place on October 31 because a.) people watch so much American television here and b.) see above points re: dressing up and dancing round bonfires.

See you in the #31witch competwition. While you're there, there's now a Burnt Snow news, events and surprises service running out of the handle @burntsnow. You DO NOT need to follow @burntsnow to enter the competition. :)

See you at midnight on Halloween! In the North! SO SPOOKY! Suggestions of fun places in the UK to go celebrate Samhain are gratefully received via the comments box below. 

xxx Van 

Me, me, me, Newcastle THIS IS NOT ART Festival Schedule, me, me, me...

Hey, blogfans!
It’s been absolutely crazy in my-book’s-just-come-out land. While it’s wonderful to travel the country signing and scribbling and pressing the flesh, there hasn’t been a lot of time to consider the other important things in life – like the rituals of the seasons (I think I just missed the Southern Hemisphere Candlemas) or what to do with a polished lump of forest jasper.

Secretly, forest jasper sustains and supports through times of stress.
And I have been so busy I have considered EATING THIS STONE.

Burnt Snow has been getting fantastic reviews, which is awesome. There’s now a handy Facebook fanpage for the book, where all the press and reviews and an upcoming *fun competition* get recorded and discussed. There’s also a Facebook group called Brody Meine is So Much Hotter than Edward Cullen which you can join if you wanna debate whether the guy in the video promo looks like Brody or Christian Slater does. This group was not actually started by me so you can imagine my surprise/delight/kinda-weirdness when I found out it was there. Remind me to talk about my Dark Half syndrome at some point.

The two big pieces of news at this end is that I’m having my FIRST GUEST BLOGGER appear on these pages shortly; my old friend and comics author Christian Read (who has written for Buffy, Star Wars Adventures and Batman, amongst other works of complete genius) will be donating a piece on Voodoo Queens of New Orleans. HOW FUN IS THAT?

ALSO: I will be attending the National Young Writers’ Festival AND Crack Theatre Festival which are part of the amazing TINA (This is Not Art) Festival in beautiful Newcastle (the Australian one)… as from Thursday, SEPTEMBER 30 until Sunday, OCTOBER 3. So if you wanna see me bang on about: me, my book, TV, literary fiction, me, performance poetry, theatre literary management, me and theatre for social change (sometimes simultaneously – I am so way versatile) NOW YOU CAN! And it's free! My full schedule is below.

Would love, love, love to see y’all there – and if we haven’t met personally before, do make sure to say hello.

Thursday, September 30th

15:00 – 16:15 / Special Event
Festival Club
Launch Pad: Burnt Snow 
Did I really think that this would ever happen to me? ELEVEN years after my first NWFY appearance as an angry young radical playwright, I have returned to launch a fun, chunky book about witches and spookiness.
I’m doing a Newcastle/NYWF launch of Burnt Snow for the sentimental reason that it was going to my first NYWF that convinced me I had the entitlement to call myself a writer.  Please come join me as I celebrate coming full circle and the 10-year journey that’s brought me back to TINA. I’ll read a bit of my witchy book, answer a few questions – and there’s a rumour of a celebrity launcher guest who may or may not drop in. (Ooh, he'd better).

Friday, October 1st 

12:00 – 13:00 / Panel
Crackhouse: Lodge of Research
Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Literary Management...  
This panel is part of the Crack Theatre Festival and it’s where I put my theatre-mafia hat on and bring out the violin case. Literary Management is what I do at my other job at the Finborough Theatre in London – that’s someone who selects scripts for development and programming and works with writers making their work better. Kinda useful to know about if you want to write for the theatre. My fellow panelists are Chris Mead (who runs Playwriting Australia) and Pater Matheson, who is not only my guru like Master Po to David Carridine in Kung Fu but also the former literary manager of the Melbourne Theatre Company.

16.00 – 17.00 / Panel
Crackhouse: Lodge of Research 
Theatre for social change 
On this, another theatre panel, I’ll be trying to answer the question: Can you use theatre to make the world a better place? … without cynicism. Hmm. Should be an interesting panel because the discussion of how much of this whacky artform can possibly change the world is certainly older than the Brecht/Lukacs stoushes of the 1950s (“Aristophanes is a big, fat fascist!” anyone?). Good panelists! Brenna Hobson from Company B Belvoir, Jane Gronow from Lowdown magazine and Alex Kelly from Ngapartji Ngapartji.

17:30 – 18:45 / Panel
City Hall: Mulubinba Room 
Debate: Free-To-Air Television is for Old People and Idiots 
This should be fun – though god knows why I was selected for this panel* – my experience of TV is appearing in crowd scenes at demos and writing some sick-child scenes for a BBC hospital drama. I only watch television to see live sport – but if you want to see a paranormal YA novelist/radical playwright talk about the upcoming NRL grand final with passion an integrity (CARN THE MIGHTY ROOSTERS), come along. The other people on either side of the debate are pretty cool – Zora Sanders who writes about TV, Alexandra Neill who is 9 or something and writes for Good News Week and William Kostakis who wrote the novel Loathing Lola. *I may be deliberately underplaying this because it is one of those comedy “Great Debate” things and I now have a comic persona to maintain. Sigh.

Saturday, October 2 

14:30 – 15:45 / Panel
Staple Manor
Vampires, Detectives and Rocket Ships: Oh My? 
This panel I’m REALLY looking forward to as it’s about that old chestnut of genre fiction vs literary fiction – and why one side often has a very negative attitude towards the other, and vice versa. It’s been a particularly interesting journey for me writing genre fiction because a lot of people who knew me as a playwright were (hopefully mock-) horrified when I announced my recent Burnt Snow career diversification. Again, the people on the panel are cool: Sommer Tothill, a writer who also reviews for the Brisbane Times; Kate Eltham, the CEO of the Queensland Writers’ Centre; microfictionista Daniel Walker; Krissy Kneen (who writes erotic memoirs, oh my!) and Thomas Benjamin Guerney, performance poet.

17:30 – 18:30 / Special Event
Crackhouse: Grand Lodge 
Performance vs Poetry 
Okay, so all I’m going to say about this debate thing is that my exboyfriend was a performance poet and I’ll be publicly releasing a lot of anxiety built up from three years of going to events that involved shoeless wankers screaming out nonsense like “I wanna be your dolphin!” during my debate speech allocation. I don’t even care who is on the rest of the panel because this one is all about ME... (although, some rather major poetry and performing people like writer/performer Tom Doig, poet/theatremaker Hadley, performance poet Steve Smart, poet/storyteller Candy Royalle, “drag king/queen wandering poltergeist” Di Drew and theatremaker Laura Scrivano are also rumoured to be involved). If you’ve ever heard the words “I want to explore the tundra of your womb” said to an audience without irony - and no, I am not joking - come stand with me.

Hope to see y’all soon. OH, and do feel free to follow me on Twitter if you’re curious to hear the kind of things I occasionally scream at the television.

Xxx

I had a book launch and nice people came! Wheee!

Oh, man: I've never been so tired in my life. Check it out, though - this is the scene as it went down at Shearer's Books in Leichhardt Sydney when we launched Burnt Snow.

Book launch: I'm at the far left, the Nice Bearded Man is playing Where's Wally. Photo courtesy of Alison Lyons. Rock.

It was exhausting. Amazing. Exhilarating. For those of you who haven't thrown a big party with a lot of people at it in a bookstore, I recommend it wholeheartedly. Shearer's is truly an awesome cafe and the catering was excellent, so I'm told - I was way too freaked out to actually eat anything.
For protection, I wore my big, fat turquoise amulet. According to the gemstone dictionary, "a string of turquoise gemstone crystal beads worn around the neck (also) absorbs all negativity from the body and mind and helps you develop your own natural powers". I think that's how I survived a room that contained four exboyfriends, most of my extended family and everyone from my best mate from high school's mum, my lawyer, publishers and the Mayor of Leichhardt, Jamie Parker, who launched the book. The emcee was James Beach, who did a marvellous job of extending a long welcome to the guests while I desperately tried to find the section of the book I'd planned to read.
More lovely shots from Alison Lyons:

That's me in the blue frock, greeting the fantastic Ms Hellen, friends from high school, stars of Sydney's musical theatre community, flatmates from uni, my former university students and EVERYONE I KNOW.

A huge thanks from me to Mum and Dad, who wrangled the launch organisation while I was between continents, the Nice Bearded Man (so nice, so bearded), James Beach and Jamie Parker who did the official business, Barbara and Jessica at Shearer's and all their staff, my publicist Louise and all at Pan Macmillan and, you know, my amazingly hot friends who made me look sexy and popular just by being there. Look how happy I am:

Thanks for these, Alison.

If you missed it, don't worry - two more books in the series means TWO MORE LAUNCHES. Am gonna maintain the mailing list in the right-hand sidebar if you wanna get an invitation.
Right, now I'm gonna sleep. xxx

Rosemary, that's for remembrance. No, for a book tour. A BOOK TOUR?!

Well, hello. Remember me? I feel like I've been away so long I've returned like an unexpected exgirlfriend at an engagement party.

This is me re-enacting The Prisoner at Portmeirion, Wales

Where've I been since last we spoke? I've been to some truly magical places in the UK...

- Stonehenge
- Glastonbury
- York
- Peterborough (ok, so Peterborough isn't PARTICULARLY magical, but it *does* have a good costume shop)
- London (duh, I live there)
- Portmeirion
- Betys-y-Coed
- Carnarvon

... and a few magical places in Japan...

- Yokohama
- Tokyo
- Kamakura
- Enoshima

... and now I'm in, um, magical Sans Souci, Sydney, Australia. Magical because I am staying with my parents while I'm back in Australia for six weeks and we haven't killed each other yet. It could be the mitigating presence of the Boy Next Door who, in addition to travelling with me to the furthest most geographical point from everything he knows, made himself into the Boy Indoors about the same time I disappeared offline. The two facts are not related, although this new and Very Grownup state of affairs means that I'll be referring to him as The Nice Bearded Man more or less consistently from this point.

For those of you who've been following this blog, you'd maybe guess that I've been away from my postings because not only have I been running around stone circles in the UK and Shinto shrines in Japan, but my book, Burnt Snow, is finally coming out. Like, this week. So it's been manic. Tomorrow, I'm in Melbourne for the Melbourne Writers' Festival, and then on the 31st I'm in Brisbane for the Brisbane Writers' Festival. Simultaneously, on September 1, I do my book show on Nabokov's Lolita for ABC 666 (still funny) in Canberra. On September 8 in Sydney, I launch my book at Shearer's Books in Leichhardt. Then I think I collapse. I get back up again, because then I'm in Newcastle for the Crack Theatre Festival as well as the National Young Writers Festival. Links to these last two when they work properly. Oh, and then I'm back in Canberra...

(By the way, check out the amazing Steph Bowe's blog here. I'm doing a panel with her on blogging - yes, okay, Dad, yes, heard it - at the Brisbane Writers Festival. She's written a beautiful book called Girl Saves Boy that would be a wonderful achievement even if she wasn't ONLY 17. Am I intimidated? Like, totally.)

It's all too crazy. I mean, it's MASSIVELY exciting but, sheesh, I'm tired. The book is, fortunately, finding some love in the jungle, and we got its first review 2 days ago. Australian Bookseller+Publisher VERY KINDLY wrote:

 FOUR STARS: This intriguing and well-crafted story slowly peels away the layers of normality to reveal a strange yet familiar darkness beneath... Addictive reading... Set aside a few hours and devour this book in one go. But be warned, the ending will leave you wanting more.

The publishers have also thrown their weight into the publicity behemoth, by providing information about the book via this handy page, while an extremely nice blogger called Rachel has a copy of Burnt Snow and is promoting it here. And for those of you who JUST CAN'T WAIT to read it you can either settle for the extract, OR you can pre-order/buy it RIGHT NOW from these fabulous bookstores (in alphabetical order because they are all awesome):

• Abbey's Books
• Booktopia
• Dymocks Books
• The Galaxy Bookshop
• Infinitas Bookshop
• Lamont
• QBD Books
• Readings Books
• ALSO: You can get an autographed copy pre-ordered by emailing Shearer's Bookshop here.

How's that? PLEASE don't freak out if they say the book isn't there yet - the book is being shipped AS WE SPEAK and and and I think all of these guys ship international. Whoo!

As of my exploration into the witch's world... it's actually been more important than ever that I rely on the mysteries of herbalism and meditation, what with the ongoing stress of travel, jetlag and a book tour.

Happy Sleeps

To get to sleep, I've learned the benefits of an easy sleeping balm. In addition to a glass of water (to stop dehydration) and a 15-minute walk (gentle muscle exertion), four (4) drops of lavender oil and four (4) drops of rosemary oil on a pillow knocks me flat. 

Lavender was known to the Greeks as "nard", and named in after the Syrian city of Naarda. It was an extremely precious herb to the ancients, due to the relaxing perfume it releases when crushed or burned, and its value as a holy herb meant not only that it was required to anoint the altars in the great Temple of the Old Testament, but both Mark and John reveal that a jar of it was cracked open and rubbed on Jesus' head (talk about bigness of brand association). The Romans named it "lavender" after the verb "lavare", meaning "to wash" and added it to baths. Today, you'll find a lavender bath as a traditional inclusion in a Korean bathhouse. Essential oil of lavender has anti-septic and anti-inflammatory properties - and Wikipedia informs me that in WW1 it was used in hospitals to disinfect floors and walls. Often credited with relieving headaches, it's recommended that you avoid it during pregnancy and lactation.

Rosemary I've written about briefly before, when I made a corndoll out of this herb to celebrate Lammas. From the Latin "ros marinus", it means "dew of the sea" - and is associated with smokin' hot love goddess Aphrodite, as it was apparently thrown over her naked body to cover her when she sprang full-formed out of the ocean. Rosemary is, unsurprisingly, used in lots of love charms - stuff a poppet with rosemary to make it representative of who you wish to attract, or plant several pots of it with potential lovers' names written on the pots - whichever grows highest is supposed to be your fated lover. It is also popular in wedding bouquets. It is long associated with the notion of remembrance, and credited with improving the memory. It is often placed on graves, is pinned to collars on Remembrance Day and students used to stick it in their hair as preparation for exams. Modern science credits rosemary with improving memory when pumped into cubicles in experiments - although it slows recall.

The benefit of sleeping in haze of lavender is well known, but the benefit of rosemary is that it (reputedly) stimulates good and memorable dreams. Like of finishing a book tour without a nervous breakdown...

Zzzzzzz..... Good night!

Book Launches: Not Tors, Not Stone Circles...

Why, hello there! CHECK - IT - OUT:

Yep, it's my book. MY BOOK. Coming soon - in September, in fact - to a bookstore near you. I can't believe it... Especially because we are still doing something complicated to the proofs, which is the reason that I have all but disappeared from view of late. If you're super-special eager to buy the book, you can ALREADY do that, via this link. The order page tells you nothing about the book, so the executive summary is: A Western-suburbs nerd is recruited to ranks of the popular girls at her new South Coast high school. While she tries to navigate the complex protocols of "popularity", a series of charged encounters with the untouchable school bad-boy propel her into a dark world of witchcraft, curses, ancient magic and dangerous loyalties. 

That's not the official blurb, but that's the premise. I can also promise that it offers explosions, fires, storms, animal phenomena, strange symbols and some old-school, high-school bitch behaviour. 

Exciting, exciting is that there will definitely be a  LAUNCH for the book - in Sydney, that's most likely on Wednesday, September 8. If you want to get a fancy-schmancy invitation to launches of the book, I've added a nifty "google groups subscribe" button just under the picture of me to the right on this blog; donate your email address to this single issue list, and "burnt-snow-events" will get you invited as soon as venues are confirmed. Technology, I love it. 

In other news, I've been confirmed as a guest for the Brisbane Writers' Festival now, too - in addition to the Melbourne Writers' Festival, and there are rumours of me doing something fun in Canberra in August/September as well. Ooh! 

Those of you who are interested in hearing me pontificate on Jean Rhys' spooky, sad Jane Eyre prequel, Wide Sargasso Sea need only tune to ABC 666 Canberra (yep, still funny) on July 1. 

... And, once more, ladies and gentlemen: OMG, I've written a book. Can't believe it... Can't believe it...

Out of the Blanket, but Still in the Bed

Hi there. I'm alive. Sorta.

This is my bed.

This is also where I've set myself up with a mountain of yoghurt, endless cups of tea, a large clock, a mobile, a laptop and a filing system that makes use of the mouldability of duvets.

There's rather a lot going on. I wish it was about the wonders of May Day, which is fast approaching. I wish it was about Beltane, jumping over fires and fertility rituals.

Instead, it's about editing notes, new plays and my other projects. Anyone who thinks that being a working writer begins and ends with some divine bolt of inspiration, a clean room in a Mediterranean villa and an Olivetti typewriter has been watching the wrong kinds of movies. I am not Ernest Hemingway. You are not Ernest Hemingway. Not even Ernest Hemingway was Ernest Hemingway, hence the gunshot in the final act.

The 5 Things That Are Making Me So Busy I am Not Leaving This Bed

1. My novel, Burnt Snow. It comes out in September, in Australia. There will be a launch in Sydney, and some other cities. All of that stuff is being planned now, and I'm coming back to Australia in August to prepare for the launch, do media interviews, run workshops, appear at festivals. OK, so it's a totally fun and awesome (if exhausting) prospect.

What is NOT awesome is having to go through all the editing notes. I lied when I said in an earlier post that there were 450 pages to go through - there are 800. The editing process of my book has gone like this:

- I wrote 50,000 words
- I went around meeting heaps of publishers
- I got a book deal
- I finished writing the book (200,000 words)
- the publishers read the book, we had a meeting about it, they gave me some notes
- I incorporated these notes into a redraft
- the publishers wrote back to me with more notes
- I did another redraft
- the copy editor has worked through the manuscript, suggesting cuts and making scribbles about punctuation, word choice, grammar and some content/meaning suggestions on every page. And I don't mean one or two squiggles. I mean 20-40. Per page.
- after receiving the paper manuscript with her notes from FedEx, I have been approving all of her corrections and making counter-suggestions where necessary, as well as cuts.
- I've FedExed back the first 200 pages, which are being edited ahead of schedule for a super-duper first-part-only advanced chunk of book that is going to book industry media to look at
- the honcho editor (different to the copy editor) is working through my rewrites of the copy editor's suggestions, and making her own counter-counter-suggestions. Then I write back with counter-counter-counter-suggestions. Then she writes back.
- ... meanwhile, I'm working through the next 650 pages.

To give you an example of the correspondence that's being exchanged, this is a sample. My notes are in red. From the Editor:

“Her neck-length hair was burgundy in the low light.”

Van, you queried why the copy-editor changed this to ‘shoulder-length’, wondering what was wrong with ‘neck-length’. I think ‘neck-length’ is a little ambiguous as a vertical guide; readers might wonder whether you mean the top, middle or bottom of the neck. Perhaps ‘chin-length’ might be more what you were thinking of, rather than ‘shoulder-length’?

Hmm.  This is difficult. “Chin-length” would be something like a bob, like Posh Spice. I guess it’s okay, though.

Every book you read (unless it's vanity published) goes through this process, this level of detail. Why? Because it matters. It matters that you, dear reader, know whether Taika's hair reaches to her jawline, mid-neck or higher-collarbone. This level of detail is required to make the fictional world believable, else fuzzy descriptions, cliches and poorly-worded sentences cause the literary equivalent of molten magma to ravage your villages.

Do not even get me started on the maps and houseplans I have had to draw.

2. My play, Swamplands. This play is NOT like Burnt Snow. It is not about witches. It is about the CIA and American spy scandals. I am writing it for this theatre company in America, the wonderful Wilma Theater in Philadelphia. When I am not editing my manuscript, I am reading books about the CIA and working on scenes. Which is just as well given that the play is starting rehearsal very soon, for a one-night only preview performance in the Vibrant Festival of New Writing at the Finborough Theatre in London. It is being directed by Ben Kidd, who is very good.

If you want to come along, it's on June 10, at 9pm, and you can book tickets here, and it's only £4. In London, that's actually cheaper than getting punched in the face.

3. The Classics Book Club I co-host on ABC Canberra Radio. Once a month I do something marvellous with communications technology and I chat 20th Century classic books with Genevieve Jacobs while I'm in London and she's in Canberra. Our last book was White Noise by Don Dellilo. If you want to hear the last show, you can follow this link, here.

Our next book, which I have to reread for our bookclub on May 4 (at 1pm EST, ABC Canberra 666) is my favourite book ever, Brideshead Revisted
by Evelyn Waugh. So if you want to talk "the operations of divine grace on a disparate group of characters", tune in, or catch the blogcast: details are here.

Do I sound busy enough yet? How about we throw in a full-time job?

4. Literary Management at the Finborough Theatre, London. I am very lucky to work for this prestigious new writing theatre in London. What I do is: read scripts we are considering for production, have script meetings with writers whose work we are developing or programming, maintain relationships with new writing programmes in London and new writing theatres across the world, scout writers, directors, actors and designers by attending a lot of productions and run development workshops of new scripts. Those of you who may have noticed that I am also having my show performed there for one night in June please note that this was programmed BEFORE I took over the job. Swear.

If you are a writer who has had the play in them removed, you may wish to consider sending it to our theatre. We've championed writers like Mark Ravenhill, Anthony Neilson, Susan Grochala, Joy Wilkinson, Laura Wade, Nicholas de Jongh, David Eldridge and James Graham, and you can aspire to their ranks by following the directions here. We accept plays from all around the world.

Upcoming fun business at the Finborough includes not only my play, but me "In Conversation With" the fabulous playwright Mark Ravenhill as part of the Vibrant Festival, at 9pm on May 29. To be in the audience for Mark's fabulousness, you can book here.

5. My play, Black Hands / Dead Section in Queensland. Actually, the wonderfulness of this event is that I don't have to write or read anything - I wrote the play five years ago, it won some nice awards and finally, finally, it's getting a production in my home country. It's the debut production in the new Geoffrey Rush Theatre at the University of Queensland, and it's about the Baader-Meinhof Gang and urban left-wing terrorism in 1970s West Germany. It's got lots of guns and pretty young people, and if you can get to Brisbane on May 19-22nd at 7.30pm you can see it for between AUD $5-$12.

The booking number is +61 7 3365 2552. You can read about it here. They get the name of the show wrong, but they get the name of the theatre RIGHT, which is always the most important thing.

... in addition to this, I'm working on the next book, and the screenplays of three films, and a TV series and pitching 4 large-cast plays to a theatre company. Because I am dealing with all of those next week... Well, let's just say I am NOT GETTING OUT OF THIS BED.

Back to the witch-world soon, I swear it.

xx Van

10 Things I Didn't Know About Writing a Book Before I Wrote a Book

Again, I apologise for my absence before my last post. I don't know if you missed me... but my dad did - a couple of days before my last blog, a cute email arrived reading: "Your mother and I have noticed you have not been posting your blog, but you are on Twitter. Yo, lady, what gives?" (he is so down with the street-talk, Dad).

What gave was that I had to retreat to the Organic Vegetable Cave to complete the first re-edit of my book. My book! Burnt Snow! First re-edit! Done! A little Twitter I can justify, but a blog takes - ahem - significantly more focus.

The "Michelle Ozolins" Page in my Burnt Snow Character Scrapbook

Not to mention, I've also started co-presenting a radio book club for Australia's ABC network. It's all getting a bit exciting: you can read about the radio show, and even make recommendations about what we read here.

But to give readers of this blog a thorough understanding of just what's been occupying my time, I present to you a special Book of the Witch literary feature:

10 Things I Didn't Know About Writing a Book

Before I Wrote a Book

1. Getting a Book Deal Doesn’t Write the Book For You
Burnt Snow was sent off by my agent to publishers when it was at 50,000 words; it’s true that publishers don’t need more than that to make a decision and my agent didn’t want me wasting my time. The deal process is agonizing, even if it is handled by an agent. There’s waiting for the thing to be read, reports at their end, meetings at their end, further enquiries, offers, meetings about offers, meetings about your book that you have to go to (that their marketing person also goes to), people come in, drop out, come back again. Money gets offered. Rights get negotiated. Choices have to be made – what they can afford, which publisher you want to go with. And after it all, after the meetings and the contracts and the money and the rights, they hand you a deadline, which comes as a bit of a shock. After all this effort, it’s overwhelming to think you have to finish the bloody book.

2. The Way You Work is the Way You Work: Stop Fighting It
It took Joseph Heller 8 years to write Catch-22 while he worked his day-job in an advertising agency. It took David Guterson 10 years, around the peripheries of his job as a teacher, to write Snow Falling on Cedars. Writing around your need for an income is admirable - and takes enormous discipline. I can’t do it, so while writing Burnt Snow I had to forgo an income and live on my credit card in disgusting poverty because I can’t – I just can’t – get any writing done without warming up for two hours. Sure, once I get through two hours of excruciating, staring-at-the-computer despair, something clicks and I can churn out 1000 words an hour until I pass out at my desk, but it makes working around anything difficult. Knowing how you write and reorganizing your life around it is how you ACTUALLY get the thing done.

3. Commercial Publishing Companies are NOT Charitable Organisations
Your book may indeed be a brave and brilliant reinvestigation of everything we know about the English language. You may have done several creative writing degrees, sailed through your PhD with structural flair and have difficult and uncomfortable truths about existence to share with the world. That’s awesome, but commercial publishers are still under NO obligation to publish your book, even if you’re really, really clever and really, really talented. If their books do not sell, their company fails and they lose their jobs. So when you present them with your book, their interest is in how they can sell it, and how many they can sell. From my experience, they ask:

• Who is the target market for this book? (tip: if YOU are lucky enough to get asked this question in person, the answer is not “people like me”, because that equates precisely to 1. You are a unique and beautiful individual, remember?)
• Are you familiar with other books in this genre? (tip: the answer to this question is YES, you CERTAINLY should be, because otherwise how do you articulate what the Unique Selling Point of your book is?)
• What IS the Unique Selling Point of this book? (they don’t ask this directly, but answering it anyway is VERY important)
• What do you understand of the commercial publishing industry? (the answer here is to know that it’s super-competitive, high-risk and with extremely tight margins, meaning that you will pledge to work like a lunatic within the meager resources of the company to make your book successful).

4. Knowing How To Answer a Marketing Question Does Not Undermine Your Credibility as a Writer
Do not, for one minute, think that there is a separation between literary excellence and marketing; literary excellence is marketing. The reason why a lot of talented fiction writers fail to sell a book is because:

• They have not thought about their market and can't actually articulate who would read the book except themselves. Not exactly a flag-flyer for a publishing option, this.
• They think that their book is so awesome, everyone will just flock to it. This is not borne out by reality. I think White Noise by Don Dellilo is one of the greatest books ever written - and even though it's sold well, and for 25 years, not everyone has either heard about it or read it, get me?
• They think they are smarter than the people who are reading the genre they are writing for, and believe they can cynically exploit an established market. The reverse usually proves to be true, as a patronising attitude is rewarded with staggering indifference, from publishers, readers and everyone else.

When you sit in the room with the people who are about to dedicate literally years of their professional life to your project, who are risking vast amounts of money and resources on getting your story out to the world, the heavy, heavy reality of what is involved here lands like a punch to the head. The obligation is to make something fantastic that your market will want to read, and it's the most demanding challenge to your literary skill in the world.


5. You Should Pencil in Some Thinking Time
When I was an undergraduate, I studied English Literature with a man called Richard Harland, who is now a full-time author. Richard came back to the university a couple of times after he left to give masterclasses on writing. One of the things he spoke about was how in his writing practise, he scheduled in thinking time; he would sit in a comfy chair for a couple of hours each afternoon, thinking about what he would write the next morning. Research shows that sleeping on a problem is one of the best ways to solve it, and doing some quality thinking for a defined period in the day will certainly help this. Narrative is HARD. Characterisation is TRICKY. Working your brain properly is the only way to survive.


6. Your Thinking Time is NOT Your Down Time 
It says in the Bible that the Sabbath should be a day of rest and it’s advice for healthy living. You can’t and shouldn’t work 7 days a week. Your brain needs rest. If you don’t spend a whole day NOT writing your book, you will enjoy it more when you get back to it. If you live breathe and eat your book 24/7 you will start to hate it and it will hate you back; your writing will become internal if you have no external stimuli, and internal writing is inaccessible to any reader who isn’t you. Whether you take your Sabbath in church, at the pool, or dressing up as a poodle, it is very, very necessary for your mental health and writing clarity.


7. The Printing Budget of a Fiction Book is Actually only 1% of its Total Budget 
This is one of the reasons the publishers are so worried about the impact of the iPad, the Kindle and digital downloading on the book market. If the digital books were only going to be priced 1% less than the print version, there’s be no problem – but the digital booksellers (like Amazon and soon Apple) have been trying to drive down the price of new books as downloads as being up to 33% cheaper than the print version. Which may be great for consumers price-wise, but which will lead to a staggering drop in either variety or quality as publishers struggle to make money on books by reducing their main cost-centre: labour. Editing labour and marketing labour.
A good book is as easy to read as it is emotionally engaging and intellectually challenging. This is such a difficult trick to pull off that it relies on an army of readers, senior editors, junior editors, copy editors and proof-readers to get right. Everything is scrutinised; are the characters consistent? Is the door of this room in the same place on page 43 as page 3? You have used the world “sentimental” eight times on one page. This comma doesn’t belong here. We are confused about the motivations of the central character…
This is also why vanity publishing is a risky proposition; people train and work through the ranks for years to become senior editors; do you really have comparable experience? Will your book be as good as it can be without it?

8. Your Editorial Report is Not Going to Fit In An Email
I was offered three deals from three different companies, and went with the team that I felt I had the best “click” with. They loved my book, they were enthusiastic about me. I knew there were fun times ahead.
Then I got the editorial report. 10,000 words of it. I almost fell off my chair. Pages and pages of criticism – everything from the fundamental story structure to questions about characterization, feedback on my writing style and some flat out rejections of plot points.
It’s about making the book better, but, like any recovery, it takes time. I sat on the couch with a printout of the manuscript and a biro and went through it page-by-page. It took me a month.


9. You Finishing the First Draft is Not the End. It is the Beginning.
I’m learning there are lots of beginnings in this business. I thought that everything was over when we got the deal – then I remembered I had to write the book. I thought everything was over when I finished the draft – then I got the editorial report. I thought everything was over when I incorporated all the changes… but, of course, there’ll be another report. And another draft. And then an uncorrected proof. And then a corrected proof. And even when Burnt Snow goes off to the printers, it will not be over… The marketing cycle will just be beginning. And then there’s TWO MORE BOOKS in the series to go. “You know, you and I are embarking on a three-year relationship?” said my publisher. I’ve had boyfriends that didn’t last that long. Oh, my!


10. Did I Mention That It’s Really Hard Work?
I had a burst of inspiration for Burnt Snow – an idea that crystallized into magic, literally. The words poured onto the keyboard in the first two weeks. At the beginning of the story, everything is possible.
But this process is demanding. The story goes places you don’t expect it to, and you have to keep up. Characters develop complex personalities and all of a sudden the thing you wanted them to do at a certain point in the novel they aren’t likely to do anymore. Outside of the actual story and plotting and characterization, there’s all the technical stuff. Is it okay to repeatedly use the word ‘said’? Are there other words for ‘face’? Which is the best preposition for the verb? Is the tense consistent? Is there a tonal shift in this metaphor?
It takes months, years - even with help - to get this right. It costs money in lost work, it costs time in dedication. You have to think in at least 10 directions… and your communication skills aren’t just for the page; they’re for the meetings, the questions, the conversations, the blogs (!), the tweets, the festivals, talks and workshops. It is a commitment of life, for life.
But, of course, this is what I’ve trained for. And I love. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.


Is that a good enough explanation, Dad?!

A Treatise on Folklore, Belief and Lucky Socks

It constantly shocks me that this blog is being read. To my own mind, I wander around London buying mystical teabags and getting into arguments with myself about whether Southern Fried Chicken counts as seasonal eating (the answer is no), I work on the edit of Burnt Snow and even, occasionally, do a bit of writing. I hang out with the Boy Next Door, who always makes me toasted cinnamon and raisin bagels for breakfast (being awesome) and whose passion for discussing conceptual art may never wane.

But I've started getting odd calls from people... and they arrive like bolts into the ocean of unawareness that I write this thing. "I need a potion!" demanded a pal on the phone the other night. "You know potions, don't you?". Another pal emailed in a request for a curse-breaking concoction. And then I got an upsetting message from someone suggesting that I was messing with ancient elemental forces, and to be careful.

Eh? Oh, she said, remembering; I write a blog about folk traditions and magical belief systems, plum cordial and this interesting green stuff that I spray on my hair, made in my blender. Occasionally, I talk about writing and I think about food PLAINLY ALL THE TIME.

I did make the point in my earliest post that it amazes and inspires me that in the post-industrial 21st Century our reality is still one where hushed whispers reveal that aunts can locate missing objects through visions, children talk openly about past life experiences and a lot of people swear to make contact with dead people in dreams after funerals.

I like a world where this happens. I find it exciting, unpredictable and romantic. As a paid storyteller, you can imagine that testimonies to the paranormal are ripe source-material for my creative work. My book is a work of fiction about witches and witchcraft, true love and the awesome power of personal will. Burnt Snow has shapeshifters, storm-summoners, indelible curses and lovespells and, you can imagine, that makes it very, very fun to write. I love the paranormal genre of literary fiction, because it indulges a yearning for the mysterious, unexplained and supernatural that a day-to-day life of weather forecasts, scientific reports, balance-of-trade figures and death-tolls in Iraq has long squeezed from our conscious minds.

There was a time, not so long ago, that the majority of people living in what we call "The West" genuinely believed in hexes and curses and Evil Eyes and lover's knots and passion potions and nifty uses for shed snakeskin. A lot still do - not because any concrete science informs hanging a blue glass amulet shaped like an eye on your front door to ward off evil... but perhaps in spite of it.

Science may be interesting - but folklore, folk traditions and folk belief are *fun*. Noone forgets how much fun they had as a small child, when they believed there was a giant rabbit hiding chocolate in the house, a fat man delivering presents from the rooftop or a fairy who replaces lost teeth with cash money.  This is why these beliefs and traditions are handed down from parent to child - because when fun is not harmful, of COURSE you want to share it with the people you love.

Decorations, ceremonies, symbols and rituals are fun, too. If they weren't, there'd be no weddings, no birthday parties, no naming ceremonies, no Christmas trees or Passover feasts, no boat launches or theatre opening nights, just to list a few. There was a reason that the Puritan interregnum didn't last particularly long in Britain; from 1649-1660 Christmas puddings, Easter eggs, the theatre and just about everything else that was fun to do on the weekend was banned. The English replaced the Puritans with the debauched Charles II at least in part, one suspects, because he could throw a good party.

To believe that a ritual is evil just because it is a ritual is a bit Dark Ages and silly. That kind of mentality would get a cricketer who attributes match success to lucky socks executed in a witch trial. As with anything else, a judgment of good vs evil must must be in the context of a.) motivation and b.) effects. No-one gets hurt if you make a wish about your future while blowing out birthday candles, and doing so may help you focus your energy towards the realisation of an important goal. Alternatively, sacrificing your neighbour's dog on an altar made of cheese because you want them to get pimples before the Year 12 formal is harmful behaviour for all concerned, not least for the dog.

This blog is my direct response to a suggestion to do something with the immense amount of research that I've compiled for Burnt Snow. One of the things I wanted to do with the book was to harvest the rich lore of witchcraft, mythology and symbology to give the story a level of detail that already exists within our literary and folk history. I didn't want to reinvent the witch - I wanted to locate her within a thriving, living narrative tradition, use the supernatural as a metaphor for the teenage experience and see what the witch did next.

It's a rewarding choice. The most wonderful surprise about writing my book is that everything I wanted to make up - about magic circles and flying ointment and passion potions - is already there, existing in fabulous dusty almanacs, and New Age magazines, and glossy spellbooks with art photography, the miraculous internet and anecdotes from wizened old women. The surplus of information I accumulated, I expanded; I just find this stuff fascinating.

This isn't for any religious or spiritual reason, but because I am a storyteller in love with the human capacity to believe the fantastic.

Ooh, it's getting exciting with the book now. There's a rumour that I'm going to get an invitation to a real, grown-up writers' festival - now that is *magical*. Watch this space...