Tobography

On Saturday morning, while I was attempting to get through a mountain of laundry, Toby was wandering around the house with a toy camera pointing and clicking. Which gave me an idea;

Take my iPhone
Turn off the wireless
Fire up my 'Hipstamatic' photography app, which puts all sorts of funky filters across your pictures, all of which are designed – oddly enough – to make your high-tech digital photographs resemble old-fashioned analogue ones.
Set said application to randomise
Give phone/camera to 3-year-old

So off went my son, happily clicking away for about 45 min, during which time he managed to catch all manner of weird and crazy images. Going back through them, though, I found it fascinating viewing the world through his eyes–both looking at the subjects he chose, and the way he captured them.

And because sharing is caring, here they are:

Barbecue #1.


Barbecue #2


An extreme close-up of our (very tolerant) dog


An extreme close-up of his (very tolerant) mother


playground/kitchen


to be honest, I'm not hundred percent certain what this is. But it's pretty, nevertheless.


Weeds growing out of our patio. ( What can I say, it's been a rainy summer)


The back steps.


A table, and a toy box.


Toys #1


toys #2

aside from the fact that most of his photos are better than anything I could take, it was great fun just watching him taking these. From the point of view of someone who writes for children (whatever that means) I think this was also a useful reminder of the value of seeing the world through different eyes whenever possible.

The Artist

Something's Gotta Give…

So you might have noticed but I haven't been posting an awful lot here of late. This is not because I don't like you all, nor because I don't have anything to post about, but simply because of outright busyness.

The last few weeks have been what I can only describe as chaotic. In addition to the start of our teaching semester (and this semester I have 300 students, in 2 different units, in 3 different teaching modes), I've also been ramping up the organisation of the ACLAR conference which we are holding here in June, rewriting The Hunter to get it back to my agent, Cheryl (who made some awesome suggestions!) by next month, reworking my literary studies unit pretty much from the ground up, wrestling with the new online learning system that we have installed at the uni, putting together a couple of research grant applications with a colleague of mine, and, of course, trying to be a good dad.

So, of course, something had to give and sadly it's turned out to be ‘Musings…’

But don't abandon me quite yet! With a bit of luck the next few weeks are going to settle down somewhat, and I'll be back to some regular blogging. There's a few things I really want to write about, including the nature of criticism, some observations on the gender of characters, and I will probably mention horse riding (just for something different :-)

And if you are craving some slightly more regular blog updates from our family then I'm pleased to report that my gorgeous wife, Imogen, has rather taken up the blogging reins during the last month or so. One of the other things we've decided to do as a family this year is to try and visit at least one of the very many local fairs that happen around Canberra per month.Min will be blogging these as we do them, (as well as other random bits and pieces). So far we have visited the Lucky Dragon Chinese Cultural day at the National Museum, and the International Festival which takes over the centre of civic every year for a weekend.

So, anyway, that's just a quick update, apology, and explanation for my absence, but I will be back more regularly soon. Promise

Perhaps.

New Year's Resolution... (plus chickens, bikes and...other stuff)

I'm going to blog every week this year. Without exception. Except, obviously, for most of January...

Actually, I've been wanting to blog since the start of January – have had all sorts of things lined up to write about, but for some reason every time I start I get oddly ‘blocked’. Still, it doesn't matter, we're here now, and that's what's important.

So, first things first, Happy (very belated) New Year everyone! I hope you all had a lovely break, and my sincere wish for you all is that unlike me, you haven't had to go back to work yet.

This, by nature, is going to be something of a ‘newsy infodump’ of a post – so feel free to skip over it and come back next week if you wish.

Item 1 on the agenda: because this is a writing blog, after all, and because I know that you're all terribly interested in my desk, here's a link to the fantastic blog of Tristan Bancks (who, unlike other bloggers I could name, actually updates regularly) and the contribution he asked me to do for his ‘the writer's studio’ series of posts. I've always really enjoyed these particular columns on Tristan's blog – it's fascinating the multitude of environments and methods by which writers and artists and other creative people all accomplish similar goals. And, of course, it was lovely to be invited to be part of it.

Item 2: (and moving away from writing now, and into family news) we have chickens! For a few years now Imogen and I have talked about getting some chooks for the yard, but for various reasons (slightly insane dog, lack of chicken coop etc…) we have put off doing anything about it. Late last year, though, while wandering around at the fantastic Murrumbateman field day, we spotted these beautifully designed mobile chicken runs, and that (combined with the fact that our previously-mentioned dog had knee surgery last year and is no longer nearly as mobile as she used to be) inspired us to get our poultry acts together. So last week we picked up our 4 ‘girls’ (I use the quote marks there because, to be honest, there's about a 20% chance that at least one of them will turn out to be a rooster and then, soon after, dinner...) who are now happily scratching around in the yard. Their names (because I'm sure you all want to know) are Charlotte, Spot, Hedwig and Rosie Primrose. 100 points for anyone who can spot the theme…

Charlotte (or, Lottie - as she likes to be known)

L-R: Spot, Hedwig and Rosie Primrose

Item 3: just in case you're interested. Later this year I'll be turning 40 (Shock! Horror! (And, to be honest, parental amazement, I suspect))* by that point I would like to be just a little bit fitter than I am at the moment and so Toby and I, inspired by my sister's bicycle-powered lifestyle in Holland, have set ourselves up and started cycling into work/daycare every morning. There are lots of birds, playgrounds to explore, things to look at, creeks and lakes and, of course, singing. And I'm quite certain that riding along pulling an extra 30 odd kilos of boy, bags, and child seat on my already heavy bike is probably going to do my fitness ambitions no harm at all. One of these mornings, I'll take my camera along and post some pictures of the ride. In the meantime, here we are, arriving home after ride on a 34 degree, windy afternoon...


Item 4: 2012. It's going to be a very big, and busy year for me this year – semester starts again in just a couple of weeks, and then it will be into the usual breakneck world of teaching. In June I'm convening the biennial ACLAR conference here in Canberra (with my friend Shaun Tan and the incredible Professors Clare Bradford and Kerry Mallan as our keynote speakers) the organisation of which should make the first half of this year particularly ‘interesting’. After that, our little family are off for a three-week holiday in Vietnam and Indonesia, at least one week of which will be spent on a beach with my sister, her husband, their 3 girls, my parents, and an assortment of other friends and relatives. I've also got the 2nd of my ‘Hunter’ books to get written, and my fantastic new agent and I will no doubt get to work on finding a home for the 1st one.

Plus, as promised, weekly blog posts here :-)

So, anyway–that's pretty much everything happening in my world, at the moment. From next week I'll try and get back to some more regular and focused blog posts. Welcome back to Musings… for 2012, everyone.

*I'd also like to take this opportunity to apologise for the overuse of parenthesis in this post, and particularly for the awful nested example indicated here. (I know this bugs some people...)

Christmas, Something cool I made, plus a book...

Hi Everyone,

I've been on holidays from everything for the last two weeks - including the blog (not that that probably made a noticeable difference, given my consistency here this year...), but I wanted to pop by quickly and say a happy pre-emptive Christmas, and to show off a couple of things.

We like Christmas in our house, but this year, with a 3 year old who is suddenly really understanding lots of concepts like 'Father Christmas' and 'Presents', it's proving more fun than ever. So much so, that I've spent a good chunk of this week down in my shed making him this hobby horse:


I'm really proud of it. I made it from scratch, working without plans or a template, apart from doing a bit of googling and stealing several ideas from several different pictures on line. I love working with wood - there's something ineffably theraputic about it, I think. It also gave me an excuse to buy myself the hand router that I've been wanting for about five years....

My other little bit of book related news arrived in a postpack from UQP today. I mentioned earlier this year that I'd been re-reading my 2001 novel A New Kind of Dreaming ahead of a new edition. Well, the new edition is done, and it looks just great!



Actually, I'm pretty happy to see this book all dressed up and updated. It's been a consistent performer for me for a decade now, and it's still one of the books I'm proudest of. I wrote ANKOD at a very different time in my life, when I was very, very pissed off about a lot of things, and trying to work out how I felt about them. I also wrote it at the same time as the whole issue of boat refugees was being really politicised for the first time, and I'm pleased (though also rather sad) that it still reads as fresh and relevent today as it did back when I wrote it in the late 1990's.

Anyway, that's my little pre-christmas contribution. I'm planning to bash out something else next week, but before then I hope you all have a lovely, restful and joyous Christmas.

(Not so secret) Agent!

so I guess that if I'm going to maintain my spectacular 2-posts-per-month average, then I better get something done here this afternoon…

As you may have gathered from the ongoing drought of blog posts here, I'm keeping as busy as ever of late. Tomorrow, for example, I'm heading up to Sydney for the day to run an all-day masterclass with the students at Sydney Girls High School, concentrating on tips and tricks for writing character (make them real, put a piece of yourself into every character, find the ‘truth’ in every character, make sure they have a relationship with the environment of the story… and so on)

I've also, of course, been buried in a veritable pile of marking for the last couple of weeks.

Oh, and (unbelievably) Toby turned 3 last week. This event was heralded by several parties, a trip up Black Mountain tower, a really quite ludicrous number of presents, more sugar than a 3-year-old's system can reasonably handle, one incredibly over-catered barbecue lunch, and two exhausted and somewhat confused parents asking themselves; “where on earth did the last 3 years of our lives disappear to?"

And, in the midst of all that, I do actually have a bit of writing related news.

You might remember me mentioning a while ago that I finally finished my most recent book. (Of course you remember, the damn thing has taken close to 2 years, and during that time I've been constantly banging on about it being ‘almost finished’.)

You might also remember me mentioning that this time, instead of pitching it to publishers myself, I had decided to submit it to a literary agent in New York to see if they were interested in representing it (and me).

Well I'm pleased to be able to announce that they liked it. So much so in fact that I'm now happily represented by Cheryl Pientka, of Jill Grinberg Literary Management! I don't mind admitting how thrilled, and completely surprised, I was to get such a positive response from Cheryl and Jill, as during the nerve-wracking wait for a response from them I managed, pretty effectively, to convince myself that the book had no merit whatsoever. I'm also excited because my new managers handle a lot of Australian writers, including several of my friends. (Actually, I owe a huge thanks to Melina Marchetta, who did the introducing here…)

And that's where I'm at. Early in the new year I expect to be launching myself back into The Hunter, and among the other things keeping me busy at the moment is the detailed planning and mapping out of the next 3 books in the series, which I should start writing in January.

In the meantime, I have a keynote speech to write, my teaching and grading for this semester to finalise, and then in a couple of weeks the family and I are off to Perth for holidays and weddings (not ours, obviously, we did that a while ago, now.)

So that's my news, and my litany of excuses for not keeping you all up-to-date. Hope everything is good with everyone who reads this (that is, of course, assuming I have any readers left), and that you are managing to ease your way into the festive season with a minimum of stress.

Going 'Live'...

You may have noticed something of a drop-off in the number of posts I've managed to put up here in the last couple of months. There are many, various, and largely uninteresting reasons for this, most of which don't bear discussion.

One of the contributing factors, though, is the fact that the special edition of the British Journal Write4Children which I have been putting together for the last 12 months (and which I believe I've mentioned here just once or twice) was due for publication at the start of November.

This, of course, meant that the last few weeks have been an ungodly world of proofreading, editing, chasing up small details, and compiling the finished journal. Hence, in part, by prolonged absence here at Musings…

But, I'm glad to say, it's all done now and the special edition went live in the middle of the night earlier this week. (For those of you who are about to click the link, it's volume 3, number 1)

I also have to say that (despite swearing several times during the process that I would never do this again) it's definitely all been worth it. I'm really thrilled at the end result, and everyone who contributed to the edition worked so hard to get it up and running (and, to everyone's surprise - especially mine - published on time!)

There are, I think (though as editor, I would) some fantastic papers in the edition. I was particularly thrilled to receive abstracts from a number of really fantastic Australian writers, as well as practising academics in the field of children's writing, and the topics exploit any addition are as diverse and wide ranging as Australian children's writing itself. Among the offerings you will find in the edition are a fantastic paper by Lucy Christopher on Stolen, one by Lili Wilkinson on her novel Pink, Rosanne Hawke discussing the role of faith in several of her books, but most notably Marrying Amira, Mark Carthew talking about Australian poetry – and paying particular attention to the state of publishing poetry for children, Kate Deller-Evans on the rising prominence of junior verse novels in Australia , and a really interesting piece by Anna Kurian from the University of Hyderabad, which takes you into the booming world of writing and publishing young adult fiction in India. For the foodies amongst you there is also a really fascinating paper by Donna Lee Brien and Adele Wessell documenting the history and impact of cookbooks written for children in Australia from the earliest colonial days through the junior Masterchef.

All in all, putting this together has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my academic career (such as it is) to date. One of the things I didn't expect was the buzz that I would get from gathering together such an interesting and diverse range of writing, having it all peer-reviewed, and in putting out into the public are. It was also a really interesting experience for me to sit on the editorial side of the desk, and experience life on the other side. I've also made a number of really interesting new friends in the process, including Andy* and Vanessa, the journal founders and editors who were brave enough (or, depending on your perspective, silly enough) to hand their baby over to my care for a while.

In any case, now that's out of the way I'm hoping to get back to a little bit of writing and, of course, in a week marking season begins!

*who also has a very cool blog somewhere on blogger, which for some bizarre reason I can't seem to find at the moment, but will update this link when I do...

Sunset Kangaroo - University of Canberra.

One of the things I love about UC is that we have a couple of large mobs of kangaroos living on the campus. I took this photo just outside my office last night, on my way out the door.