tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13920062678932024872024-03-19T14:50:00.227+11:00Ian Irvine on The Business of WritingOn the art of storytelling, getting published, the business of writing and publishing, and the future of books.Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.comBlogger57125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-50006569869664592682012-11-17T12:02:00.000+11:002012-11-17T12:02:09.673+11:00My LATEST NEWS Page<br />
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Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-57168214904612019292012-06-04T09:03:00.002+10:002012-06-09T18:03:45.716+10:00First Chapter of RebellionThe first chapter of <i>Rebellion</i>, Book 2 of <b>The Tainted Realm</b>. I'll put it on my website with better formatting shortly, but in the meantime, here it is.<br />
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Rebellion will be published in Australia in October 2012, and in the UK and US in early 2013. <a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/taintedrealm.html">http://www.ian-irvine.com/taintedrealm.html</a><br />
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande'; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 150%;">THE TAINTED
REALM TRILOGY<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 14pt;">BOOK 2. REBELLION<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande'; font-size: 11pt;">Copyright © Ian Irvine, 2012.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;"><o:p> </o:p></span></h1>
<h1 style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">CHAPTER 1<o:p></o:p></span></h1>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Lord Rixium?’ The girl sounded desperate. ‘You gotta get up
now. The enemy are coming. Coming fast.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Rix’s right wrist throbbed abominably, and so did the back of
his head. He groaned, rolled over and cracked his ear on a stone edge. His
cheek and chest were numb, as if he’d been lying on ice. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘What …?’ he mumbled. ‘Where –?’ His eyes were gummed shut and
he didn’t want to open them. Didn’t want to see.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Chancellor’s stolen Tali and Rannilt away, to milk their
healing blood.’ <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">He recognised her voice now. A maidservant, Glynnie. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘And Lord Tobry’s been chucked off the tower, head-first.
Splat!’ said a boy’s voice from behind Rix.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Benn!’ Glynnie said sharply.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Rix winced. Did he have to be so matter-of-fact about it?
‘Tobe was my oldest friend.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘I’m sorry, Lord,’ said Glynnie.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘How long was I out?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Only five minutes, but you’re first on their death list,
Lord. If we don’t go now, we’re gonna die.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Don’t call me Lord, Glynnie.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Lord?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘My parents were executed for high treason,’ he said softly.
‘House Ricinus has fallen, the palace lies in ruins and I betrayed my own
mother. I am utterly dishonoured. Don’t – call – me – Lord!’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘R-Rixium?’ She tugged at his arm, the good one.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘That’s what my murdering mother called me. Call me Rix.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Glynnie rubbed his eyelids with her fingertips. The sticky
secretions parted to reveal a slender servant girl, seventeen years old.
Tangled masses of flame-coloured hair, dark green eyes and a scatter of
freckles on her nose. Rix had not yet turned twenty yet he felt a lifetime
older. Foul and corrupt. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Get up,’ she said.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Give me a minute.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">They were on the top of his tower, at the rear of what
remained of Palace Ricinus. From where Rix lay he could not see over the
surrounding wall, and did not want to. Did not want to see the ruin a
hundred-foot fall had done to his dearest friend. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">A freezing wind carried the stink of burned deer meat, the
forgotten skewers Glynnie had been cooking over the embers of Rix’s artist’s
easel. He would never paint again. Beside the fire stood a wide-eyed boy of
ten, her little brother. A metal drinking cup sat on the stone floor. Some
distance away lay a bloody sword. And a small puddle of blood, already frozen
over. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">And a right hand, severed at the wrist. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Rix’s right hand.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Something collapsed with a thundering crash not far away, and
the tower shook.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘What was that?’ said Rix.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">She ran to the wall, went up on tiptoes and looked over.
‘Enemy’s blasting down the palace towers.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘What about Caulderon?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Her small head turned this way and that, surveying the great
city. What was left of it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘There’s smoke and flame everywhere. Rix, they’re coming. Tell
me what to do.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Take your brother and run for your life. Don’t look back.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘We’ve nowhere to go, Lord.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Go anywhere. It’s all the same now.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Not for us. We served House Ricinus; we’re condemned with our
house.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘As am I,’ said Rix.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘We swore to serve you. We’re not running away.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Lyf hates Herovians, especially me. He plans to put me to
death. But he doesn’t know you exist.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘I’m not leaving you, Lord – Rix.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Rix did not have the strength to argue. ‘What about Benn? If
the Cythonians find him with me, they’ll kill him too.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Not runnin’ either,’ said Benn. ‘We can’t break our sworn
word, Lord.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Unlike me, Rix thought bitterly. The servants outreach the
master. ‘Ah, my head aches.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘That mongrel captain knocked you out,’ said Glynnie. ‘And the
chancellor – he –’ Her small jaw tightened. ‘He’s a useless, evil old windbag.
He’s lost Caulderon and he’s going to lose the war. No one can save us now.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">You</i> can, Lord,’
said Benn, his eyes shining. ‘You can lead Hightspall to victory, I know it.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Hush, Benn,’ said Glynnie. ‘Poor Rix has enough troubles as
it is.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">But he could see the light in her eyes as well, her absolute
belief in him. It was an impossible burden for a condemned man and he had to
strike it down. Hightspall was lost; nothing could be done about it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Benn,’ he said softly, speaking to them both. ‘I can’t lead <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">anyone</i>. The chancellor has destroyed my
name and all Hightspall despises me –’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Not all, Rix,’ said Glynnie. ‘Not us. We know you can –’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘No!’ he roared, trying to get up but crashing painfully onto
his knees. ‘I don’t even believe in myself. No army would follow me.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Benn’s face crumpled. ‘But, Lord –’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Shhh, Benn,’ said Glynnie hastily. ‘Let me help you up,
Lord.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">She was stronger than she looked, but Rix was a huge man and
it was a struggle for her to raise him to his feet. The moment he stood upright
it felt as though his head was going to crack open. Through a haze of pain and
dizziness he heard someone shouting orders. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Search the rear towers next.’ The man had a heavy Cythonian
accent. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Where are we going, Rix?’ said Glynnie.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">He swayed. She steadied him. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Don’t know.’ He looked around. ‘I need Maloch. It’s enchanted
to protect me.’ <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">That was ironic. A command spell cast on Rix when he was a boy
of ten had left him with a deep-seated fear of magery, and recent events had
proven his fear to be justified.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Didn’t do a very good job,’ she sniffed. ‘Benn, get Rix’s
sword. And … and bring his hand.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘His hand?’ Benn said in a squeaky voice. ‘But – it’s all
bloody … and dead …’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘I’m not leaving it for the crows to peck. Fetch the cup,
too.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Benn handed the ancient, wire-handled sword to Rix, who
sheathed it left-handed. The roof door stood open. Glynnie helped him through
it and onto the steep stair that wound down his tower. Rix swayed, threw out
his right arm to steady himself and his bloody stump cracked against the wall. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Aaarrgh!’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Sorry, Lord,’ whispered Glynnie. ‘I’ll be more careful.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Stop apologising. It’s not your damn fault.’ Rix pulled away
from her. ‘I’ve got to stand on my own feet. It’s only a hand. Plenty of people
have survived worse.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Yes, Lord.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">But few men had lost more than Rix. He’d been heir to the
biggest fortune in the land, and now he had nothing. His family had been one of
the noblest – for a few moments, House Ricinus had even been a member of the
First Circle, the founding families of Hightspall. Then the chancellor, out of
malice, had torn it all down. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Rix’s parents had been hung from the front gates of the
palace, then ritually disembowelled for high treason and murder, and everything
they owned had been confiscated. Now, not even the most debased beggar or
street girl was lower than the sole surviving member of House Ricinus. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Rix had also been physically perfect – tall, handsome,
immensely strong, yet dextrous and fleet – and accomplished. Not just a
brilliant swordsman, but a masterful artist – the best of the new generation,
the chancellor had said in happier times. Now Rix was maimed, tainted, useless.
And soon to die, which was only right for a man so dishonourable that he had
betrayed his own mother. As soon as Glynnie and Benn got away, he planned to
take the only way out left to him – hurl himself at the enemy, sword in hand,
and end it all.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">He reached the bottom of the tower stair, ignored Glynnie’s silent
offer of help and lurched into his ruined studio. When Tobry had smashed the
great heatstone in Rix’s chambers the other day, and it burst asunder, it had
brought down several of the palace walls. There were cracks in the walls and
part of the ceiling had fallen. The scattered paints, brushes and canvases were
coated in grey dust. He crunched across chunks of plaster, stolidly looking
ahead. He yearned for the solace of his art but had to put it behind him.
Forever.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Where we going, Lord?’ Glynnie repeated.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘How the hell would I know?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Not far away, sledge hammers thudded against stone and axes
rang on timber. The Cythonians were breaking in and they would come straight
here.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘We’re trapped,’ said Glynnie, her jaw trembling. She
stretched an arm around Benn and hugged him to her. ‘They’re going to kill us,
Lord.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘You could go out the window –’ <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Rix looked down. From here the drop was nearly thirty feet. If
they weren’t killed outright, they’d break their legs, and in a city at war
that meant the same thing. He cursed inwardly, for it left him with no choice.
Glynnie and Benn were his people, all he had left, and as their former lord he
had a duty to protect them. A duty that outweighed his longing for oblivion. He
would devote his strength to getting them out of Caulderon, and to safety. And
then …<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">He headed down the steps into his once-magnificent, six-sided
salon, now filled with rubble, dust and smashed, charred furniture. The
crashing was louder here. The enemy would soon break through. The only hope of
escape, and that a feeble one, was to go underground. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Get warm clothing for yourself and Benn,’ he said to Glynnie.
‘And your money. Hurry!’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Got no money,’ said Glynnie, trembling with every hammer and
axe blow. ‘We got nothing, Lord.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Tobry –’ Rix choked. How was he ever going to do without
Tobry? ‘Tobry brought in spare clothes for Tali. She’s nearly your size. Take
them.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">She stood there, trembling. ‘Where, Lord?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘In the closet in my bedchamber. Run.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">He still had coin, at least. Rix filled a canvas money belt
with gold and other small, precious items and buckled it on one-handed. He
packed spare clothing into an oilskin bag to keep it dry, and put it, plus
various other useful items, into a pack. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">The crashing grew louder, closer. Glynnie filled two another
oilskin bags, packed two small packs and dressed herself and Benn in such warm
clothes as would fit. She strapped on a knife the length of her forearm and
collected the dusty food in the salon.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘They’re nearly through,’ she said, white-faced. ‘Where are we
going, Lord?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Benn still held Rix’s severed hand in his own small, freckled
hand. His wide grey eyes were fixed on Rix’s bloody stump. Benn caught Rix’s
gaze, flushed and looked away.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Rix gestured to a broad crack, low down in the wall at the
back of the salon. The edges resembled bubbly melted cheese, the plaster and
stonework etched away and stained in mottled greens and yellows.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">He hacked away the foamy muck to reveal fresh stone, though
when he flicked the clinging stuff off the knife the blade was so corroded that
it snapped. He tossed it into the rubble. Benn ran back and fetched him another
knife.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Go through,’ said Rix. ‘Don’t touch the edges.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘What is that stuff?’ said Benn.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Alkoyl. Mad Wil squirted it around the crack to stop us
following him.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘What’s alkoyl?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘An alchymical fluid, the most dangerous in the world.
Dissolves anything. Even stone, even metal – even the flesh of a ten-year-old
boy.’ Rix took Benn’s free hand and helped him though.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘We’ll need a lantern,’ said Glynnie.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘No, they’d track us by its smell,’ said Rix.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">He handed the boy a glowstone disc, though its light was so
feeble it barely illuminated his arm. Tobry, an accomplished magian, could have
coaxed more light from it, but – Rix avoided the rest of the thought. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘We’ll need more light than that,’ said Glynnie.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">She bundled some pieces of wood together from a broken chair,
tied them together with strips of fabric, tied on more fabric at one end and
shoved it in her pack.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">They went through, holding their breath. The crack snaked ever
down, shortly intersecting a network of other cracks that appeared to have
freshly opened, and might close again just as suddenly.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘If they shut, they’ll squeeze the juice out of us like a
turnip,’ whispered Glynnie.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Rix stopped, frowning. ‘Can you smell alkoyl?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘No,’ she said softly, ‘but I <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">can</i> smell stink-damp.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘That’s bad.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Stink-damp smelled like rotten eggs. The deadly vapour seeped
up from deep underground and collected in caverns, from where it was piped to
the street lamps of Caulderon and the great houses, such as Palace Ricinus.
Stink-damp was heavier than air, however. It settled in sumps, basements and
other low places, and sometimes exploded.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I</i> can smell
alkoyl,’ said Benn.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Good man,’ said Rix. ‘Can you follow it?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘I think so.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Benn sniffed the air and moved down the crack. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Why are we following alkoyl?’ said Glynnie.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Wil was carrying a tube of it,’ said Rix. ‘He also stole
Lyf’s iron book, and if anyone can find a safe way out of here, Wil the Sump
can, the little weasel.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Isn’t he dangerous?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Not as dangerous as I am.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">The boast was hollow. Down here, Rix’s size put him at a
disadvantage, whereas Wil could hide in any crevice and reach out to a naked
throat with those powerful strangler’s hands. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">They squeezed down cracks so narrow that Rix could not take a
full breath, under a tilted slab of stone that quivered at the touch, then
through an oval stonework pipe coated with feathery mould. Dust tickled the
back of Rix’s throat; he suppressed a sneeze. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">After half an hour, Benn could no longer smell alkoyl. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Have we gone the wrong way?’ said Rix. ‘Or is Wil in hiding,
waiting to strike?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Neither Glynnie nor Benn answered. They were at the
intersection of two low passages that burrowed like rat holes through native
rock. Many tunnels were known to run under the palace and the ancient city of
Caulderon, some dating back thousands of years to when it had been the enemy’s
royal city, Lucidand; others had been forgotten long ago. Rix’s wrist, which
had struck many obstacles in the dark, was oozing blood and throbbing
mercilessly. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Lord?’ said Glynnie. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">He did not have the energy to correct her. ‘Yes?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘I don’t think anyone’s following. Let me bandage your wrist.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘It hardly matters,’ he said carelessly. ‘Someone is bound to
kill me before an infection could.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Sit down!’ she snapped. ‘Hold out your arm.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">An angry retort sprang to his lips, but he did not utter it.
He had been about to scathe Glynnie the way his late mother, Lady Ricinus, had
crushed any servant with the temerity to speak back to her. Yet Rix was
forsworn and a condemned man, while Glynnie had never done other than to serve
as best she could. She was the worthy one; he should be serving her.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Not here. They can come at us four ways. We need a hiding
place with an escape route.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">It took another half hour of creeping and crawling before they
found somewhere safe, a vault excavated from the bedrock. It must have dated
back to ancient times, judging by the stonework and the crumbling wall
carvings. A second stone door stood half open on the other side, its hinges
frozen with rust. To the left, water seeped from a crack into a basin carved
into the wall, its overflow leaving orange streaks down the stone. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘I don’t like this place,’ said Benn, huddling on a dusty
stone bench, one of two.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Shh,’ said Glynnie.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">In the far right corner a pile of ash was scattered with wood
charcoal and pieces of burnt bone, as if someone had cooked meat there and
tossed the bones on the fire afterwards.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Rix perched on the other bench and extended his wrist to
Glynnie. ‘Do you know how to treat wounds?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘I can do <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">everything</i>.’
It was a statement, not a boast.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘But you’re just – you’re a maidservant. How do you know
healing?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">She pursed her lips. ‘I watch. I listen. I learn. Benn, bring
the glowstone. Rix, hold this.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Gingerly, as though she would have preferred not to touch it,
she pressed Maloch’s hilt into Rix’s left hand. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Why?’ he said. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘It’s supposed to protect you.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Only against magery.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">She knelt in the dust before him, then took a bottle of
priceless brandy from her pack, Rix’s last surviving bottle, and rinsed her
hands with it. She laid a little bundle containing rags, needle and thread and
scissors on her pack, poured a slug of brandy onto a piece of linen and began
to clean his stump. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Rix tried not to groan. Blood began to drip from several
places. By the time she finished, Glynnie was red to the elbows.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">He leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes, for once
content to do as he was told. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Hold his wrist steady, Benn,’ said Glynnie.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">A pair of smaller, colder hands took hold of Rix’s lower arm.
He heard Glynnie moving about but did not open his eyes. She began to tear
linen into strips. Liquid gurgled and he caught a whiff of the brandy, then a
chink as she set down a metal cup.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘I could do with a drop of that,’ he murmured. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Glynnie gave a disapproving sniff. She was washing her hands
again. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Steady now,’ she said. ‘Hold the sword. This could hurt.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">She began to spread something over his stump, an unguent that
stung worse than the brandy. Rix’s fingers clenched around Maloch’s hilt. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Ready, Benn?’ said Glynnie.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘Yes,’ he whispered. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Her hand steadied his wrist. There came a gentle, painful
pressure on the stump. Where his fingers touched the hilt, they tingled like a
nettle sting. Then Rix felt a burning pain as though she had poured brandy over
his stump and set it alight. His eyes sprang open. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">Glynnie had pressed his severed hand against the stump, and
now the pain was running up his arm and down into his fingers. Blue were-flames
flickered around the amputation then, with the most shocking pain Rix had ever
experienced, the bones of his severed hand ground against his wrist bones – <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">and seemed to fuse</i>. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">He had the good sense not to move, though he could not hold
back the agony. It burst out in a bellow that sifted dust down from the roof
onto them, like a million tiny drops falling through a sunbeam.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: 1.0cm; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria;">‘<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">What are you doing to
me?</i>’ <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<h1 align="left" style="line-height: 150%; margin-right: -10.25pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Cambria; font-weight: normal;"><o:p> </o:p></span></h1>
<br />Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-91522030891503523002011-12-10T09:47:00.001+11:002011-12-10T10:38:14.482+11:00Kim Wilkins' Top Writing Tips<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">In the past 15 years Kim Wilkins has written 21 novels, including supernatural thrillers, horror, fantasy, books for young adults, books for children and, in recent years, contemporary epic romances. Her books are published in a dozen countries. She teaches at the University of Queensland in the postgraduate writing program, and at the Queensland Writer's Centre, and also mentors emerging writers, some of whom have gone on to brilliant success. </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Kim has also won a shelf full of awards including multiple Aurealis Awards for her speculative fiction, a Romantic Book of the Year award, plus awards for Teaching Excellence, Research Excellence, and Criticism/Review. Topping it off, Kim's latest book, <i>Wildflower Hill</i>, recently made the <i>USA Today</i> bestseller list, so when she talks about writing, it's a good idea to listen.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">These are my top quick writing tips
of all time that I think every writer should know. They represent, of course,
my opinions, but I think you'll find I'm always right. ;)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://kimberleyfreeman.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/new-image2.jpg?w=180&h=275" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://kimberleyfreeman.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/new-image2.jpg?w=180&h=275" /></a></div>
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<ul>
<li>Look to your verbs. If you read a
page back and it seems lifeless and flabby, find every verb on the page and see
if you can improve it. Make a point of collecting great verbs every time you
read or watch a movie or have a conversation. Verbs like <i>gasp</i>, <i>surge</i>, <i>quiver</i>,
and <i>drench</i> work so hard. Verbs are the muscle of a sentence, and can punch up
dull writing in a moment.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Chillax on chapter one. Easily the
most common writing problem I see is the writer trying far too hard to impress
in the first few pages of a story. Many stories warm up and get fantastic after
page five, but by then the publisher has already put you on the
"reject" pile. Often your first chapter is so overworked that it's
uncomfortable to read. My advice is to finish the book, then scrap the first
chapter all together and write it again without looking at the original.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Don't write all your fun scenes
first. Write in order. If you give a child her custard first, she's probably
not going to be all that interested in her Brussels sprouts.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Be in a viewpoint, always. At the
start of every scene make sure you know exactly whose viewpoint you are going
to be in, and write the scene from inside their head. A story details a
relationship between characters and events. The most impact is always achieved
from describing that relationship from the inside.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Plan your story in advance, even if
it's only loosely. It will save you so much time and heartache and, contrary to
popular belief, it's actually MORE fun to do it this way. When you know that an
exciting turning point is approaching, the scene and the ones around it can
play out in your mind over and over as you think them through, becoming richer
the more you anticipate it.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Most important of all: keep going.
This is a tough craft, and it's an even tougher business. Dream big if you
want, but your dreams can't sustain you on a day-to-day basis. The only thing
that can sustain you is the work. Do it because you love it; because not to
write hurts. Do it because you are mad about your story and obsessed with your
characters. Don't make it another chore to fit into your busy day: make it the
special place you go when your day has been rubbish. Keep going and keep going,
and then keep going some more.</li>
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Thanks very much, Kim. I've made a note to work on my own flabby and under-exercised verbs. </div>
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Kim's pictorial guide to editing: <a href="http://fantasticthoughts.wordpress.com/2011/12/02/how-to-edit-a-pictorial-guide/">http://fantasticthoughts.wordpress.com/2011/12/02/how-to-edit-a-pictorial-guide/</a>. Kim's main website is here, <a href="http://fantasticthoughts.wordpress.com/">http://fantasticthoughts.wordpress.com/</a>. And the Kimberley Freeman site, for Kim's epic romances, here: <a href="http://kimberleyfreeman.com/">http://kimberleyfreeman.com/</a></div>
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<ul style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 2.5em; padding-right: 2.5em; padding-top: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US">
<li style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444;">For a chance to win one of 3 copies of my latest book, <i>Vengeance</i>, on Goodreads, <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #555555; font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><a href="http://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/17741-vengeance" rel="nofollow nofollow" style="color: #3b5998; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">http://www.goodreads.com/<wbr></wbr><span class="word_break" style="display: inline-block;"></span>giveaway/show/17741-vengeance</a></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;">.</span></span></li>
</span></ul>
<span lang="EN-US"><ul style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 2.5em; padding-right: 2.5em; padding-top: 0px;">
<li style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></li>
<li style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">My blog about the novels I write, and the writing life: <a href="http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/</a></span></li>
</ul>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span></span></div>
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<!--EndFragment-->Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-14587568420810039562011-12-07T21:57:00.001+11:002011-12-07T22:03:40.246+11:00Robyn Wardlaw on Running a Fan Site<br />
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Robyn Wardlaw set up the fan site, <i>Triune</i>, way back in 2002, when she was 16 – well before I had my own site up and running! She has been running<i>Triune</i> ever since. Who could be better qualified to talk about the challenges, the troubles and the rewards of running a fan site. </span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Robyn is 25 years old and runs the Ian Irvine fan site <i>Triune</i> from her home in Scotland. She has a degree in Maths along with a vast array of skills and talents that people are currently refusing to pay her for.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<a href="http://www.triunelives.co.uk/img/blogprofilepic" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; color: #1d8aa4; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none;"><img border="0" height="212" src="http://www.triunelives.co.uk/img/blogprofilepic" style="-webkit-box-shadow: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0976562) 1px 1px 5px; background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(235, 235, 235); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-color: initial; border-left-color: rgb(235, 235, 235); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(235, 235, 235); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; border-top-color: rgb(235, 235, 235); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; border-width: initial; box-shadow: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0976562) 1px 1px 5px; padding-bottom: 5px; padding-left: 5px; padding-right: 5px; padding-top: 5px; position: relative;" width="320" /></a><span lang="EN-US"></span><br />
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<span lang="EN-US">Imagine you open up your inbox one day to find an email from one of your favourite authors. Imagine that you're not entirely surprised by this because you have, after all, been running a website about this author for over nine years – wait what, nine? – and you've had semi-regular contact with the author throughout that. Then imagine the email is a very polite invitation asking if you'd be interested in doing a guest-post on the author's own newly started blog.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">…<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">If you're anything like me your response to this would be an incoherent garble of keyboard mashes followed, some very long time later, by a quiet “Yes please.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">This is not something I could have imagined happening nine years ago - come on, seriously, <i>nine</i>? I started my site for one reason and one reason only: because nowhere on the vast internet could I find another site devoted to Ian Irvine. I had been using the internet pretty heavily for about three years at that point, and had some use of it for a couple of years before that. Being a teenager with somewhat geekish tendencies I used it mainly as a source of information and to socialise with other geeks. A friend of mine that I met on one such discussion forum had recommended a series of books to me and I had hunted them down, devoured them, and desperately desired more. I took to Google (at least I think I was using Google at the time) and searched high and low for information on these new books.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Other than online book stores selling the books, I found all of three pages. They were all interviews that had been conducted with Ian about the time of the initial releases of the <i>View from the Mirror</i> books, on various book news/reviews sites. They had a complete lack of useful bits of information – more books were planned, three whole different series even – but nothing particularly recent.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">This was somewhat aggravating. The internet had never before failed me in such a catastrophic manner. I couldn't believe there was not one single website out there devoted solely to the works of Ian Irvine.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I decided to do something about it.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Aside from my heroic attempts to rescue the internet from this dire lack-of-author-website predicament, my desire to make the site also probably had something to do with the fact that I'd been wanting to make a site for ages but never found a good subject matter. Finally getting to put these new found HTML skills to use, I began constructing the layout for the site. But then came the next problem – content. I didn't really know how to go about finding out the information that I wanted to put on my site. My experience of finding out information mostly consisted of Googling it, and that just got me right back where I started.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">So I opened the book again, and I re-read the “About the Author” page, which I recalled had an email address in it. Scrounging up some courage I sent an email telling Ian I was making a website about the <i>View from the Mirror</i> series and asking for some information on his forthcoming books. Although I probably didn't use the word 'forthcoming' – I tried to check, but apparently Hotmail has taken to deleting emails from accounts that are largely inactive. [Ian: The date of that fateful email was August 17, 2002, and you're right, Robyn, you didn't. You said 'new']<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">To my great surprise I received a response within about a day. It had never occurred to me that I would hear back from him so soon, him being a busy famous author and all, but there it was, in my inbox, Ian telling me he'd be delighted to give me whatever information I wanted for the website. Awesome.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">The first site that went up looked atrocious. I can barely remember it but I know that much. That said, it had the most up to date information of any version since then, so its key desired outcome was a success. It didn't take me long to revamp it into something less offensive to the eye, and it was at the point that I added something else: a forum. A horrible, freely hosted by someone else piece of discussion board software, but a forum all the same.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">That particular version of the board probably had in total about ten registered members, and maybe about five of them posted regularly, but it was the start of a real community. I always felt we were limited by the board software and I wanted to host my own forums, but that would involve actually paying for my own web host, and I was an unemployed teenager living off of pocket money. It was almost a year before I got a job and could convince my parents to loan me the use of their credit card (since that's the only payment method the hosting companies took).<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">With the move to a new host, I was going all-out. No longer would this be some childishly-designed, Geocities-hosted, unprofessional array of large buttons. This thing would have its own domain name, and that's a coming of age for a website. It got a new name, it got a new look, and – yes – it got its own forums.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">So was born <i>Triune</i>. The original layout of the site is what I would consider the alpha version of the current look (it's still essentially the same layout and colour scheme, just with some added functionality as I picked up one or two more bits of web design knowledge). The improvements from the previous site were tremendous, and the forums provided the ideal place for the newly formed community of Ian Irvine fans to grow.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I learned something then that I've recently re-learned in Real World work: communities are hard. They require a lot of time and effort to keep them going. Mostly they have one or two key individuals that put in this time and effort, and when sufficient time and effort are put in the whole thing just looks effortless. But as soon as your life starts getting a bit busier – the very moment that you decide you just can't be bothered for a while – you come back and find it's gone.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">The <i>Triune</i> Forums have always been like that. There are periods of high activity – usually surrounding the release of new books, but not always – and there are times when you'll be lucky to see a tumbleweed. Occasional events such as The Great Web Host Screw Up of 2008, which included three months of site-wide downtime and precipitated a change of hosts, not to mention domain names, haven't exactly help such matters.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Or alternatively the What The Hell Has Happened To My Database of 2011 (Ongoing), an issue I had hoped to have resolved before sending this off (and in fact delayed its writing somewhat – sorry Ian!). I am almost at the point where I don't know if it can be fixed, and I'm wondering if I should just start fresh. At the same time, I'm not sure exactly how much discussion forums fit in to the Ian Irvine fan community these days. He's gotten much better at it himself recently – his website is updated frequently (far more frequently than mine), he blogs often, and he's even gotten on-board with this newfangled Facebook concept.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://triunelives.co.uk/images/meandian.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; color: #1d8aa4; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-decoration: none;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://triunelives.co.uk/images/meandian.jpg" style="-webkit-box-shadow: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0976562) 0px 0px 0px; background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: transparent; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; border-bottom-style: none; border-color: initial; border-color: initial; border-left-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-top-style: none; border-width: initial; border-width: initial; box-shadow: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0976562) 0px 0px 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; position: relative;" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 11px; text-align: center;">Robyn and Ian at Worldcon, Glasgow, 2005</td></tr>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">During the bad days it's easy to start thinking about packing it all in, letting someone else take over, maybe just shutting it down altogether. Not too long ago, after spending almost an entire day trying countless fixes for my current problems, I thought to myself “Why am I doing this?” But then you remember the good days. Making friends. Meeting Ian at WorldCon. Silly word association games. Marriage proposals based on internet-rare good grammar (and refused because that's no reason to get married). Invitations to post on Ian's blog. Yes, today is a very good day.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Imagine that all this happened to you, then go and check your emails. Maybe tomorrow will be a good day for you.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #555555; font-family: inherit; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;">In 05, Robyn travelled right across Scotland to meet me at Worldcon in Glasgow, and kindly came to my exclusive 'reading for one' there – the most focused audience I've ever had. Thank you for that, Robyn, </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 24px;">and for the past 9+ years of <i>Triune</i>.</span></span><br />
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Triune can be found at <a href="http://triunelives.co.uk/index.html" style="color: #1d8aa4; text-decoration: none;">http://triunelives.co.uk/index.html</a>.</span></span></div>
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<li style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></li>
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</div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-48496895574694294232011-12-05T09:44:00.001+11:002011-12-05T10:25:50.549+11:00Trent Jamieson on World-Building Hell<div style="text-align: justify;">
Today Trent Jamieson, who in his own write is a sombre, contemplative fellow with just a hint of edge, is talking about how he created the world of his marvellous Death Works trilogy.</div>
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<b>World-Building as an Obsession - a Not Particularly Helpful Guide </b></div>
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Sometimes worlds are built through assiduous research, and other times they're just part of what you are.</div>
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<a href="http://www.trentjamieson.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/Trent-Wall-e1285988688153-682x1024.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://www.trentjamieson.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/Trent-Wall-e1285988688153-682x1024.jpg" width="212" /></a>If you're a writer, particularly if you're a fantasy writer, you like to build worlds - actually build in this case is too weak a verb, you like to inhabit them. And, like anything you inhabit, it starts to inhabit you a bit, too. You close your eyes and you're suddenly standing beneath the great creaking branches of a giant Moreton Bay Fig Tree (otherwise known as the One Tree), its root buttresses the size of hills. A dead soul, glowing slightly blue, bumps you, you turn to apologise but it's already marching towards the base of the tree. </div>
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Well, that's how it is for me. And the world of the Death Works is one that I've inhabited for a long time.</div>
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I grew up fascinated by the afterlife, and stories about the Underworld. The first time I heard the story of Eurydice and Orpheus shivers ran down my spine. The first time I looked at Brueghel's Triumph of Death - with all those crazy skeletons - I knew I had found a kindred spirit. It seemed inevitable that I would go to those places in my writing.</div>
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The world of the Death Works books isn't the only place I hang out in, of course, but it's the only one that is so closely focused on the Underworld, it's also the only one that has Brisbane as a setting. Which is appropriate, because Brisbane is my home, and these are some of the most personal stories I've ever written. Mixing my home with a fantasy land version of Hell didn't just seem appropriate, it was vital - I needed both to ground the other, any hesitancy and the books would just feel unbalanced.</div>
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When you're writing about Psychopomps and Stirrers and scone eating deities and belligerent talking tattoos you need to ground it in a place that's familiar, that has great coffee, pubs, and a lot of bridges (death and bridges go hand in hand, you see).</div>
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My Underworld is a mixture of mythologies and folk law. Everything from Norse to African, Sumerian, Greek and French is in there. Which made sense to me because I imagined all of these mythologies would hold a piece of truth in my world. But I also wanted to throw in my own bits and pieces, the Hungry Death, Wal the talking cherub, the nature of Mog, Death's Scythe, and the way Regional Deaths are promoted.</div>
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The One Tree is in part Norse, but it also borrows from European Folklore that looks at the journey of a soul as being of three parts, one of which is a journey to a tree - the World Axis - where the souls live in the branches. There was also the idea of reincarnation as a tree common to a lot of different cultures and fairytales, see the Grimm's "Juniper Tree" - which also uses birds in an interesting way (birds feature quite prominently in my books as well).</div>
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But it wasn't just folklore that I used. The books are loaded with references to other books that concern themselves with the underworld, too, I couldn't help myself - Mr D's bicycle and Steve's surname come from the book the Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien. The blue glow of the dead comes from The Master and the Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov. There's even touches of Ursula Le Guin's Underworld in the Earthsea books. And that's not even mentioning Fritz Leiber's Death or Neil Gaiman's or Terry Pratchett's or the dozens of other novelists that I can't think of now, all of which have left their mark on the novels.</div>
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Which brings me back to the beginning, these Death Works books chart my reading of fantasy, the world is built on a lifetime's obsession. Sometimes that's all the research you need.</div>
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Thanks very much for those insights, Trent. A revelation – my worlds have a complete lack of scone-eating deities and I now realise what a flaw that is. Trent's next book is <i>Roil</i> –</div>
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I've read <i>The Business of Death</i>, and loved it. For more info on Trent, <i>The Business of Death</i> and his other writing, where else would you go but the Trentonomicon, <a href="http://www.trentjamieson.com/">http://www.trentjamieson.com/</a></div>
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<li style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></li>
<li style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">My blog about the novels I write, and the writing life: <a href="http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/</a></span></li>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span></div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-40152647543792571712011-11-30T14:41:00.001+11:002011-11-30T14:43:07.788+11:00Ian Irvine is Grilled by Fans<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was going to interview myself today, but my Facebook fans asked such good questions that I've given them full rein.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ian Irvine:</b> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;">This may seem a bit of a lol, but I'm doing an interview with Ian Irvine for my blog and I need some really curly questions, because I've heard he's a slippery customer. Tricky questions would be much appreciated; I really want to put the scoundrel on the spot.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333;"><span class="commentBody" data-jsid="text"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ami:</b> Have you developed multiple personalities or something???</span></span></span></span></div>
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<a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/images/Ian_age4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; color: #1d8aa4; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-decoration: none;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://www.ian-irvine.com/images/Ian_age4.jpg" style="-webkit-box-shadow: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0976562) 1px 1px 5px; background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(235, 235, 235); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-color: initial; border-left-color: rgb(235, 235, 235); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(235, 235, 235); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; border-top-color: rgb(235, 235, 235); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; border-width: initial; box-shadow: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0976562) 1px 1px 5px; padding-bottom: 5px; padding-left: 5px; padding-right: 5px; padding-top: 5px; position: relative;" width="228" /></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333;"><span class="commentBody" data-jsid="text"><b>Ian:</b> </span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;">Ha ha, yes I have, says Ian. No I haven't, says Ian. I don't understand the question, says Ian. Are we there yet? says Ian. Need we go on, Ami? chorus the Ians, sweetly.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><b>Alison:</b> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;">Who would you ask to finish your novels if you ever (heaven forbid) died before they were completed (e.g. Brandon Sanderson for Robert Jordan).</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ian:</b> I have no idea, Alison. I don't know of any fantasy novelists who write the way I do, or about the kinds of things I write about. But maybe someone else does. I might have to throw that one back to my Facebook page and see if anyone comes up. In the meantime, i'll try hard not to die.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><b>John:</b> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;">Or would you actually want someone else finishing them off in that situation?</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ian:</b> To be honest, John, I don't think I'd want anyone finishing off a series of mine. Perhaps I'm a control freak. But I think the story would end up very differently to the way I'd imagined it. But then, since I've been so inconsiderate as to die in the middle of a series, instead of waiting until the story is completely wrapped up, I guess I can't complain. I'd certainly want to see it finished rather than just left hanging ...</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><b>John:</b> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;">Who is your favourite (or favourites if you can't choose one) of the characters you've created?</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ian:</b> It changes all the time. At the moment I'd say it's Tali, the slave girl from <i>Vengeance</i> who, when just a little girl, saw her mother murdered and some mysterious object taken from her. Now she's 18, she's full of a burning rage and an utter determination to see justice done to the killers. I've spent a long time inside her head and really like her. I also like Tobry, from that story, because he's scarred, reckless, thinks the whole universe is a joke, yet is utterly loyal to his friends. But at other times it can be any of my heroes or heroines, even the alien Ryll from the Three Worlds, or Useless Ike from Grim and Grimmer.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><b>Renee:</b> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="commentBody" data-jsid="text">If there was one thing you had to change about your favourite character what would it be?</span></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="commentBody" data-jsid="text"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ian:</b> Depends on the character, Renee. If Tali, I think I'd make her a little bit less nice (not that she's completely nice; she has her flaws) and a lot more conflicted about every aspect of her life. Make everything she does, and every choice she makes, a struggle between incompatibles. She can have one or the other, but not both, and she HAS to choose.</span></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="commentBody" data-jsid="text"><b>Dusty:</b> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;">What character do you associate yourself with the most??</span></span></div>
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<a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/images/Dark_med.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; color: #1d8aa4; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-decoration: none;"><img border="0" src="http://www.ian-irvine.com/images/Dark_med.jpg" style="-webkit-box-shadow: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0976562) 1px 1px 5px; background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: white; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; border-bottom-color: rgb(235, 235, 235); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-color: initial; border-left-color: rgb(235, 235, 235); border-left-style: solid; border-left-width: 1px; border-right-color: rgb(235, 235, 235); border-right-style: solid; border-right-width: 1px; border-top-color: rgb(235, 235, 235); border-top-style: solid; border-top-width: 1px; border-width: initial; box-shadow: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0976562) 1px 1px 5px; padding-bottom: 5px; padding-left: 5px; padding-right: 5px; padding-top: 5px; position: relative;" /></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ian:</b> Dusty, I suspect that would be Llian from <i>The View from the Mirror</i>. There's a lot of me in most of my characters (especially the evil ones, glee, glee! says the bad Ian) because I'm the only person I know, or can know, from the inside. But I think in Llian, because he was one of my first characters, it's closer to the surface. Pity he's such an idiot at times.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Deborah:</b> Why did Ian decide to write fantasy, other than any other genre? What does family think of his novels? Does he envisage that he will still be writing them when he is in 70s? Does Ian believe that the dark side of his personality is expressed in his evil characters?..... (will stop for now,......)</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ian:</b> Why fantasy, Deborah? Because that's what I most enjoyed reading back in the far-off days when I began writing. And though I read far less fantasy these days, I still love it, and especially love writing it. </span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What does my family think? See my sister Kathy's reply, below. I come from a large family, and so does my wife, and most of the people in our families love books and reading. They're very supportive, and constantly talking about my books to others, and rearranging them in bookshops so they face out, etc.</span></span></div>
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<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px;"><b>Kathy:</b> Yes Deborah, family think he is awesome, totally talented, amazingly intuitive, and sensitive to the needs of his characters. Appreciate that he can poke fun at himself and has remained level headed throughout. Love his wicked sense of humour and his imagination. I also hope he will be writing for many years to come. :-)</span></span></li>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When will I stop writing? I certainly hope to be still writing in my 70s, and even in my 80s should I live that long. Most of the people in my family live to ripe and reasonably healthy old age, so if I have that good fortune I'll keep writing.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The dark side of my personality? What are you talking about? What dark side? All 27 of my personalities are glowing with light – 'Hey, what about me?' says evil Ian. 'Glmph!' He's bound, gagged and thrust under the table out of sight. 'Now, where was i ...?'</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><b>Traci:</b> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;">Who would Ian turn gay for? (Weeeelll, you did ask for tricky questions & there was no specifications on the questions being 'work' related).</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ian:</b> Apart from Bridget Jones, and Elizabeth Bennet from <i>Pride and Prejudice</i>. But wait, that wouldn't be turning gay, would it? I guess no one. </span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><b>Sue:</b> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;">Ian, can you ask Ian for me... does he believe in in life forms beyond earth and how did life on earth begin? Thanks Ians.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><b>Brian:</b> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;">Do you think the world will end in 2012, if so, are you a believer in he zombie apocalypse or just the plain old destruction of the planet?</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ian:</b> No, I don't, Brian. I can't say I'm a great fan of zombies, though a zombie apocalypse does have a certain ikky charm. I don't think the planet is going to be destroyed any time soon, unless there's a nearby supernova. Earth is pretty resilient. Of course, that doesn't mean we can't make it unsuitable for a vast range of advanced life, including ourselves.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><b>Marta:</b> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;">Why do some writers use a pseudonym to write different books. Is there a particular reason for that because sometimes it can get confusing if your favourite author writes under a pseudonym and you don't know about it. You miss out on reading those books unless you accidentally come across it.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ian:</b> Marta, if an author is well known for a certain kind of books (say, fantasy) but wants to write something completely different, say, crime or thrillers or romance, they often use a pseudonym to avoid confusing readers and booksellers (otherwise booksellers will often shelve their books in the wrong place). But also, if an author's first book or two have gone really badly, bookshops aren't going to order many of the next book, because they always order based on sales of the last book by that author. It may not be possible to get published at all unless the author changes their name, which wipes the slate.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><b>Danny:</b> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;">Would you ever consider taking on a protege... What would your code names be?</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ian:</b> Do you mean a co-writer, Danny? No, I don't think so. I just want to write my own books in my own way.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ian:</b> That's a continent-sized question, Cassandra. If I really needed to update any of my books, I imagine I'd change many things, and I'd certain cut out a lot of verbal flab, when I did the revised editions of the 3 Human Rites eco-thrillers. But if I'm rewriting old books, I'm not writing new ones, so it's not the best use of my time.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><b>Mitchell:</b> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;">Have you ever had a thought like this? About how strange things happen, when your going around the twist?</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>Ian:</b> If I thought I was going round the twist, Mitchell, do you really think I'd post it on the internet? [Sidles off, twitching and laughing maniacally]</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; line-height: 14px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Thanks very much, Guys, great questions, as always.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif;"><ul style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 2.5em; padding-right: 2.5em; padding-top: 0px;">
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To follow me on Twitter: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"> </span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">My blog about the novels I write, and the writing life: <a href="http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/</a></span></span></li>
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</span></div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-51793353560040007542011-11-28T15:08:00.001+11:002011-11-28T15:59:01.625+11:00Josephine Pennicott on Obstacles and InspirationsJosephine Pennicott is a multi-award winning crime writer who has won the Scarlet Stiletto and (twice) the wonderfully named Kerry Greenwood Domestic Malice Prize. Jo has also written a dark fantasy trilogy, <i>Circle of Nine</i>. Today she reflects on writing obstacles and inspirations.<br />
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Thank you Ian, for inviting me to submit to your Blog. Those of us lucky enough to know Ian personally, know that he’s a gentleman who is incredibly generous with his support for other writers. Being part of an online writing community of fellow Selwa Anthony authors, I’ve read and gleaned a lot from Ian’s experience and wisdom over the years. So, of course I couldn’t refuse his invitation to be a part of his online project to help others.</div>
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<a href="http://josephinetalepeddler.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/circle.jpg?w=132&h=209" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://josephinetalepeddler.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/circle.jpg?w=132&h=209" /></a>My first novels were Dark Fantasy, published by Simon and Schuster (Earthlight imprint) - <i>Circle of Nine</i> (2001), <i>Bride of the Stone</i> (2002) and <i>A Fire in the Shell</i> (2004). They were the result of years studying painting at the College of Fine Arts in Sydney. They evolved from my own artwork, my interest in Surrealism, fairy tales, mythology and comparative religions, in particular Paganism. Circle of Nine was selected by Terri Windling and Ellen Datlow as one of the top ten debut books for their prestigious 2001 anthology, <i>The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror</i>. They will soon be republished by Pan Macmillan as e-books.</div>
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Afterwards I spent three years – a very difficult time with all sorts of obstacles in the way of my writing - working on what I shall jokingly refer to as my ‘masterpiece.’ You know when you read authors saying they wrote a list of all the things they loved, put all those elements in their book, and it became a bestseller? Well, that’s what I was after! I began writing a historical, supernatural murder mystery called <i>The Witches of Paris</i>. I submitted the proposal to Selwa, who was very keen. Sophia Coppola was rumoured to be directing a movie based on Marie Antoinette; my book was set in a similar location and so it seemed like a timely idea.</div>
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But in 2007, when <i>The Witches of Paris</i> was still not quite done, I went on holiday with my family to Stanley on the North-West Coast of Tasmania and fell in love with a white house by the sea. A house that became incredibly important to my writing career. It gave me an idea for a new book, <i>Poet’s Cottage</i>, which Selwa encouraged me to start while I was waiting for an editor’s report on <i>The Witches Of Paris</i>.</div>
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The more I worked on <i>Poet’s Cottage</i>, the more the characters came to me. I had been to India in my early twenties and stayed at a well-known spiritual Guru’s ashram who had a saying, ‘Take one step towards me and I’ll take a thousand towards you.’ This book was exactly like that. My characters literally dragged me into the story. They were waiting for me every morning and the process became very exciting.</div>
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I forgot my previous project for the time being as I began to lose myself in the mystery of who killed Pearl Tatlow, bohemian children’s writer, in her dark and eerie cellar on a foggy day in Pencubitt, Tasmania in July 1936. Was she really murdered by ‘the Tasmanian devil that Mummy kept in the cellar to threaten us with when she was writing?’ as her daughter Thomasina, who witnessed the murder, claimed. Or, did something far more sinister cross the threshold of Poet’s Cottage? A stranger to the town, as the local people kept insisting – or someone Pearl knew and trusted?</div>
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As I mentioned, I was on holiday with my family when I first spotted the house that ignited the spark that became the book <i>Poet’s Cottage</i>.</div>
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In my Sydney life, I live with my daughter and my writer husband, David Levell, in a small, historic brick house in the inner-west. It’s like a tiny doll’s house and my husband is used to me falling in love with houses on all my trips. I’m a very proud fifth generation Tasmanian - and often homesick for my home state.</div>
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<a href="http://josephinetalepeddler.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/blog-photo-two.jpg?w=225&h=300" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://josephinetalepeddler.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/blog-photo-two.jpg?w=225&h=300" /></a>This particular house ticked all my boxes – it was a white Georgian-style home that looked like something the Bronte sisters would have lived in. It overlooked the sea, in a picturesque, Tasmanian sea-fishing village. A village that was a combination of wild gothic, isolated coastline contrasted with a very Cornish looking, cosy village that could have come straight from an Enid Blyton or Daphne du Maurier novel!</div>
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I felt that this house had a story to tell me. There didn’t appear to be anybody living there and so my imagination was free to conjure up a myriad of scenarios. I spent a lot of time standing outside the gates, listening for the secrets and stories that I felt sure the house was trying to whisper to me.</div>
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There was a friendly gentleman who said hello to me in the street every day. On one of our meetings, I confided I’d fallen in love with the house, and he beamed, ‘That’s Poet’s Cottage! And I’m the poet who used to live there!’ This friendly local was Lin Eldridge – when he discovered I was a writer - he introduced me to his 90-something year old wife, whose name is Marguerite Eldridge. Marguerite and Lin live in Gull Cottage; my Birdie Pinkerton lives in Seagull Cottage in the novel. I had no idea when first meeting this charming, pretty and twinkly eyed lady that she was actually quite a well-known identity in Tasmania. Marguerite, who has never left her fishing village (and I can easily understand why) has self-published several books on life in Stanley. She has been instrumental in her town for starting creative ventures. In January 2011, she was awarded an Australia Day Award, for her service to the creative arts and her community.</div>
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They were a most welcoming couple, just as Birdie does in <i>Poet’s Cottage</i>, Marguerite urged me to ‘help yourself to my Daphne’ and they tolerated with good spirits my small daughter running amuck in Gull Cottage. Marguerite helped to inspire my character of Birdie Pinkerton - as did another elderly lady that I knew and visited in my high school years in Tasmania. But Birdie Pinkerton is not Marguerite - despite sharing several things in common.</div>
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Over the years I was always fascinated by the story of Enid Blyton’s two daughters, Gillian and Imogen, having opposing views of their mother. I remember one story in the UK <i>Telegraph</i>, Was Enid Blyton the Mother from Hell? I’ve seen in my own family how different members could all have totally variant views of an incident- and how sometimes it was impossible to fathom what was truth.</div>
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<a href="http://josephinetalepeddler.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/sscover.jpg?w=140&h=208" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://josephinetalepeddler.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/sscover.jpg?w=140&h=208" /></a>I’m also addicted to the UK TV show <i>Midsomer Murders</i>, with its surreal but quite realistic juxtaposition of pretty English villages and murder most foul. Daphne du Maurier and Agatha Christie are both writers I love. I’ve won quite a few awards over the years for my crime writing short stories, which were always very dark. I love reading cosy, English-style mysteries and I wanted to set myself the challenge of writing an English style mystery but with an Australian setting. All these elements came together at Stanley. Tasmania was a perfect place to set the book as it’s so English looking!</div>
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I used elements of two Tasmanian towns for my imaginary town of Pencubitt for <i>Poet’s Cottage</i>, Stanley in the North-West and also Oatlands, which is the very pretty midlands Georgian village where I spent my high school years. My early years were spent in Papua New Guinea. Generations of Pennicotts have settled in Oatlands and the name seems to belong to the town and area.</div>
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It was a joy to escape into my imaginary fishing village of Pencubitt every day from my garden writing shed in Sydney with planes flying overhead and heavy traffic outside the front door of our brick house. I based the character of Sadie (in the present day thread of the book) and her daughter, Betty on a lot of mothers I saw around me in Sydney’s inner-west. A majority were older mothers and trying to parent in a different way to their mother’s generation. They weren’t trying to be friends so much with their children but there was a difference in the dynamic that I was trying to capture. Sadie also helped to partially satisfy my own longing for a sea-change.</div>
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Pearl Tatlow in the 30s thread evolved from years of watching crime dramas set in the 1930s. And also a little of Enid Blyton and Jerry Hall, the Texan model went into my boho Pearl. I once saw Jerry Hall strut her stuff down a Sydney street and never forgot the impact her beauty and sassy attitude had on the gawping crowd of normally too-cool-for-school city folk.</div>
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Birdie Pinkerton was inspired by the two older ladies mentioned above. She was always very strong and quite stern with me when I wasn’t capturing some aspect of her character.</div>
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Maxwell was inspired by a gentlemanly, kind and caring Uncle of mine. I always enjoyed Maxwell’s sweet and considerate manners when I was working.</div>
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Thomasina just came striding in to the writing shed, with her beanie on her head, filled with a terrible memory and some really fun scenes for me to write for her. She was always strong, always unpredictable and very touching to connect with. I grew to care for all my characters very deeply over the three years it took to write <i>Poet’s Cottage</i>.</div>
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Looking back, I’m thrilled with how things worked out. <i>The Witches of Paris</i> was a love letter to France and I still hope to see it published one day. <i>Poet’s Cottage</i> is a love letter to Tasmania, my home state. My father, who had always been one of my most staunch believers of my writing from when I was a little girl, has been battling a very aggressive cancer for five years. I realised towards the end of writing <i>Poet’s Cottage</i> – the cancer reached his liver just as I finished the copy edit - that <i>Poet’s Cottage</i> itself had become not just another historic house I had fallen in love with - but rather it represented something a lot more personal. It was a dwelling between the worlds where my ancestors resided and represented all the secrets, dramas, misunderstanding, passions and mysteries (not to mention the enormous family love) that we all have hidden in our respective family cupboards.</div>
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If you’re in need of some inspiration to get you out of any pity-tea party you may be enjoying when it comes to your writing, I hope you can find it in my post. I was determined, focused and able to walk away from three years of working on a dream and start again for another three years with a different book. If I can do it –so can you. Sometimes whether we realise it or not - and however it may seem at the time – everything does work for our greater good. If you get rejected and your ‘masterpiece’ is knocked back – then write another. If it takes you years as it did me – that’ s fine. Your ego will live with it if you’re following your spirit’s path.</div>
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We’re all conditioned to believe all the success stories on writers the media broadcast but the reality is much grimmer for working writers that I know. They may get a few books published and then they have to go back to the drawing board. It’s a touch business, it can crack your heart open - and you do have to be tough as old boots to cope with it at times.</div>
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Looking back, I can see how all the characters in my writing career played their parts perfectly. I’m forever grateful that <i>Poet’s Cottage</i> beat <i>The Witches of Paris</i> to publication because it meant so much to my father to see me finally get taken seriously with a book set in Tasmania. And, I do plan on returning to my Parisian witches with all the new skills I’ve learnt over the last seven years. But first I have another mystery novel to complete for Pan Macmillan.</div>
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<a href="http://a2.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/226363_6428787547_738337547_288034_5625_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://a2.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/226363_6428787547_738337547_288034_5625_n.jpg" /></a>Writing can be a tough, bitchy, hard, isolating, heart-breaking profession at times. And that’s the good days. But I’m very honoured to be a Tale Peddler and to experience the joyful bliss of characters flowing, manifesting and telling their story. So give thanks for it all. The good fortune, the set-backs, the rejections and the awards. Don’t believe books and your career have to follow a set path. Keep open to your own personal timing and rhythm. No matter how things may appear at the time – use the experience. Both the so-called ‘good’ and the ‘bad’ can honour a higher purpose - and if you are patient and diligent enough – and believe in a little bit of pixie and glittery wishing dust - the seeds you scatter will be harvested.</div>
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Thanks very much, Jo, that's a lovely and inspiring story. <i>Poet’s Cottage</i> will be published by Pan Macmillan in May 2012.</div>
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Josephine Pennicott's site is here: <a href="http://www.josephinepennicott.com/">http://www.josephinepennicott.com/</a></div>
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You can find Josephine on her blog Tale Peddler, <a href="http://talepeddler.blogspot.com/">http://talepeddler.blogspot.com/</a></div>
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and on Twitter, Facebook or Good Reads.</div>
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<br /></div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-81756060709964480642011-11-24T15:03:00.001+11:002011-11-24T15:29:43.809+11:00Jason Nahrung on Writing Joy and FrustrationsJason Nahrung has been a newspaper journalist for more than two decades. He's also a fiction editor, judge of speculative fiction, and writer of darkly themed tales including the supernatural thriller, <i>The Darkness Within</i>. Today, Jason muses on the joys and frustrations of being a writer.<br />
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">It’s not you, it’s us.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bhceX6eeXys/Ts3EYCUm_FI/AAAAAAAAAKc/9N6meC0yE2M/s1600/red_couch.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bhceX6eeXys/Ts3EYCUm_FI/AAAAAAAAAKc/9N6meC0yE2M/s320/red_couch.jpg" width="320" /></a><span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">It has been an ... interesting past couple of
months. My wife, Kirstyn, has been devoting every spare moment to her novel –
by coincidence, her publisher’s deadline coincides with our departure for a wee
break. And I’ve had a self-imposed deadline, knowing it will be good for my
morale to be able to go away and leave my agent with the latest iteration of
the novel I’ve been trying to get right for more than 10 years. This time,
please Writing Gods, may it all make sense...<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">All of which means we’ve been fairly
anti-social. I’ve stayed in partly out of sympathy, not wanting my wife to feel
like some kind of pariah while I’m off gallivanting around the country. Plus,
it’s a great excuse for me to stay home and be indulgent: a short story here,
that pesky novel mostly there.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">So why the guilt?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Why the compulsion to explain in rigorous
details about publishers and deadlines and day jobs and available time and word
counts? Why the compulsion to apologise?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">After all, if I said we weren’t attending some
soiree or event because I had to train for the grand final, there’d be nothing
but words of encouragement. If I said I was pulling serious over-time because
the office was understaffed, there’d be nods of knowing understanding. But <i>not</i>
doing something because you’re <i>writing</i>? In my case, without even a
deadline? Without even the certainty of a pay packet at the end of it?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">What sort of alien must I be?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Writing is, after all, at my level of the vocation,
something to be fitted in around the day job. Around life. You pay the bills,
you catch up with the people you care about, you be entertained ... and then
you write.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I hate that I am so used to the arts not
mattering that I automatically become defensive when explaining how I’ve made
my art, if I may be high-falutin’ for a moment and call what I do art (hm, is
that that defensiveness coming in? It’s a nice story, dahlink, but <i>is it art</i>?),
a priority. How, like sport, it needs to be practised and trained for; how,
like a day job, it needs regular attention and commitment. How, sometimes,
especially towards the end of a project, it can require a degree of sacrifice.
No telly. No cinema. No gigs (no gigs!).<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-om8BxYn9b8Q/Ts3EYA5bIVI/AAAAAAAAAKg/qR1ijY_11cw/s1600/smudge-the-varmint.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-om8BxYn9b8Q/Ts3EYA5bIVI/AAAAAAAAAKg/qR1ijY_11cw/s200/smudge-the-varmint.jpg" width="150" /></a><span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">You can take it too far, just as you can with
sport and your career. You can sacrifice the enjoyment of life, the company of
friends and family, for a supposedly loftier goal, and therein lies the risk of
a pyrrhic victory. But sometimes, you have to give in order to get – sometimes,
the enjoyment of life means having to give something up – even if those around
you might not understand.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Fortunately, most of our friends and family do.
Without that acceptance, it’d make the job that much harder. It’s important, I
think, if you’re going to snub someone, that they understand exactly why; that
they know that the job’s important – not <i>more</i> important, just, at this
moment, important enough to skip lunch.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I have to take my hat off to Kirstyn. I don’t
know how she can work her day job and then switch over for a six-hour writing
stint, night after night. By knock-off time, my eyes are dripping out of my
skull, the keyboard is an arcane thing, but there she sits, crafting, crafting,
crafting. Occasionally fending off the cat, who hasn’t had lap time for, like, <i>forever</i>.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<a href="http://jasonnahrung.files.wordpress.com/2008/12/darknesswithinlowres.jpg?w=192&h=300" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://jasonnahrung.files.wordpress.com/2008/12/darknesswithinlowres.jpg?w=192&h=300" width="128" /></a><span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I’m looking forward to going out once more. I’m
looking forward to our holiday. I’m looking forward to seeing Kirstyn’s book
upon the shelf, and maybe mine, too (please Writing Gods, this time...?). Bear
with us, gentle friends; we will return to the scheduled program, right after
these messages... but I’m trying not to apologise for the interruption. I’m
sure you’ll understand.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US">Jason Nahrung's only novel, <i>The Darkness
Within</i>, can be difficult to find these days (you can try the Book
Depository UK), but he's got a bunch of short stories out this year in various
Australian anthologies, and a couple due out next year, too. Track him down at </span><a href="http://www.jasonnahrung.com/"><span lang="EN-US">www.jasonnahrung.com</span></a><span lang="EN-US">. Kirstyn McDermott's debut novel, <i>Madigan Mine</i>, came out
last year. She's almost finished her second novel, working title <i>Perfections</i>.
Almost. You'll hear the shout of joy first at </span><a href="http://www.kirstynmcdermott.com/"><span lang="EN-US">www.kirstynmcdermott.com</span></a><span lang="EN-US">.</span></span><span style="font-family: Arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US">Thanks, Jason. A timely reminder that (believe it or not) we writers are people like everyone else. Well, except that we can go to work in our underwear and have afternoon naps by the fire, ha! Beat that, commuting work slaves!</span></span></span></div>
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</span>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-84794942782949855292011-11-23T09:20:00.001+11:002011-11-23T09:22:30.354+11:00THE TRUTH ABOUT PUBLISHING – 17<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">Lesson 16: It’s
just been printed and you can’t bear to look at it<o:p></o:p></span></h1>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Rare authors fall in love with their book once
it’s published, but more common are feelings of self-consciousness,
embarrassment or even mortification. The tiniest flaws now appear gigantic,
while the typos, errors and inconsistencies that no one noticed despite all the
editing and proofreading are numerous and glaringly obvious.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Don’t expect adulation. The public has a curious
attitude to authors – those who know how small most book sales are will display
a pitying admiration for you, because you’re doing what you love even though
you can’t make any money at it. Others confuse ‘published author’ with ‘famous
author’ and assume you’re stinking rich. Either way, take what pleasure you can
– after all, you <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">are</i> doing what you
love and thousands of people are aching to get there themselves.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Don’t expect your brand new book to be stocked by
every bookshop, much less displayed prominently. If it’s in the shop at all,
there’s a good chance it’ll be shelved spine-out and practically invisible.
Neither expect bookshop staff to recognise your name when you drop in to say hi,
even if you have a few books out. Hundreds of books come in every month and
they probably won’t remember yours, or your name, or know what to say to you. They
may not want you to sign copies of your book either, in case they don’t sell
and they have to send them back for a refund. They can’t return them if the
book has been signed.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Their attitude will change if your books have sold
well; they’ll be glad to see you because their customers will be asking after
your next book, and signed copies will sell more quickly . Take a leaflet
showing your book cover anyway, as a reminder. It helps to break the ice.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">If you have a book launch or a signing, don’t
expect a lot of people to come unless you round up all your friends and
relatives. The average number of people attending a book signing in the US is
four, and it’s much the same here (though you’ll generally do better in towns
than in big cities). That doesn’t mean book signings aren’t worthwhile; your
books get good display space and promotion, and the shop will sell quite a few
of them over the next few weeks (especially if you sign them).</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif;"></span></span></div>
<ul style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 2.5em; padding-right: 2.5em; padding-top: 0px;">
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To follow me on Twitter: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"> </span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">My blog about the novels I write, and the writing life: <a href="http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/</a></span></span></li>
</ul>
<div>
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<!--EndFragment-->Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-59036407200160340332011-11-22T13:37:00.001+11:002011-11-22T13:42:15.527+11:00500 BOOKS IN 300 DAYS – WEEK 33 WINNERS<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I've been running this weekly competition on my Facebook fan page all year, and it'll run into 2012. Each week all year I've been giving away three of my trilogies and quartets, signed, except for breaks where I've given away two iPad 2s.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Total number of books won so far: <b>359</b>.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">To enter, go here, <a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a>, Like my page then enter from the Promos tab.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">For the next few weeks I'll be giving away 3 copies of my brand new book,<i>Vengeance</i>, each week.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.4;"><b>WEEK 33 QUESTION</b> – </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; color: #333333; line-height: 15px;">Do you prefer heroes or villains? Why? </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.4;"> The cleverest, funniest, most moving or wittiest entries win. No knowledge of my books needed.
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.4;">THERE ARE THREE FIRST PRIZES – each a copy of my latest book, VENGEANCE, signed. </span></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Week 33 (44 entries). </span></span></div>
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<b style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.4;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Winners</span></b></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black; line-height: normal;">1<sup>st</sup>, Stephanie Elizabeth Kirsch, 2<sup>nd</sup>,
Scott Mooney, 3<sup>rd</sup>, Amber Charlene Craddock.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 1.4;"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.4;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.4;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Honourable Mentions</b> (get 3 HMs and you also win). </span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;">
<span lang="EN-US">Lisa Leigh, Julie Strahan, Sue Knight, Thijs
Roeloffs.</span>
</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br />The complete list of winners for 2011 can be found here: <a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/winners.html" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/winners.html</a></span></div>
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<ul style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 2.5em; padding-right: 2.5em; padding-top: 0px;">
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To follow me on Twitter: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"> </span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">My blog about the novels I write, and the writing life: <a href="http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/</a></span></li>
</ul>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span></div>
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</div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-68412405012053068052011-11-17T08:48:00.001+11:002011-11-17T09:25:03.608+11:00Katherine Howell – Story is King<br />
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<span lang="EN-US">Suspense is everything.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Katherine
Howell was once told that her manuscript lacked suspense. She promptly studied
the subject for her Masters degree, and now rereads her thesis when she starts each
new book, to remind herself of the techniques of developing suspense in
fiction. Katherine was a paramedic in the ambulance service for 15 years. She
writes high-adrenaline tales of murder and intrigue, has twice won the Davitt
Award for best novel, and her novels are published in many countries and
languages. </span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Today, she's talking about finding the right protagonist.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">My first
novel, <i>Frantic</i>, was published in Australia in 2007 and features police
detective Ella Marconi alongside paramedics. It’s since been followed by three
more novels, with the fifth in the series, <i>Silent Fear</i>, due for release
in February. Each continues the angle of using paramedics as protagonists,
something that not only provides a point of difference for the books but also
draws on my experience of doing that job for fifteen years.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US">I’m often
asked about the process of turning that real-life experience into fiction and I
always answer that it wasn’t easy. I initially resisted the idea completely,
and instead wrote bottom-drawer manuscripts about - variously - cults, forensic
science students, and cops chasing a killer while being assisted by a ghost.
When I did start to recognise the drama and inherent story value in the world I
worked in, my first attempts to put any of it on paper overflowed with my grief
and anger about the situations I faced daily and the people I tried to save. It
took counselling and my eventual resignation to manage these emotions, and even
then it was months before they disappeared completely from my writing. Once
that happened, however, I was faced with the next problem: how to use these
paramedic stories in the procedural crime series I was determined to write.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">I’d wanted
to have a paramedic as my protagonist, but I couldn’t see how to have her
plausibly solving crime, and I had no clue what could then happen in the next
book. I came to realise that I needed a police detective; a scary thought at
first, because my reason for using the ghost in that earlier ms was because of
the difficulty in learning the details of how exactly police solve a particular
crime. Even when I started researching, I felt a huge gap in my knowledge—I
knew the paramedic’s world so well, it seemed wrong to not have the same
understanding of the detective’s. I wanted to be true to these jobs, and to not
know it all made me think I couldn’t do it justice. I saw, however, how many
crime novels are written by non-cops (ie, most of them), and decided I had to
at least give it a try, being as true along the way as I could.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://www.katherinehowell.com/uploads/8/0/0/1/8001441/1226151.jpg?160" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: justify;"><img border="0" src="http://www.katherinehowell.com/uploads/8/0/0/1/8001441/1226151.jpg?160" /></a><span lang="EN-US"></span><br />
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<span lang="EN-US">This then
brought up another problem: to me, being true to the job of paramedic meant
putting in every moment of a case, every question and answer, every action, every
step of treatment. But as my manuscript grew longer, with scenes rolling on
interminably for pages, I realised this wouldn’t work. I reread some of my
favourite crime novels, analysed how the authors delivered information, and saw
that I needed verisimilitude rather than total adherence to the facts. The
real-life details were like a garnish, to be sprinkled in here and there to add
flavour and impact. Too much of it overwhelmed the most important element of
all, the reason people pick up a book: story.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">I went back
to the start of the manuscript and changed how I incorporated my experiences,
and finally saw the work come alive. Months of hard work later, and a year
after I quit that job, the ms sold as part of a two book deal to Pan Macmillan,
and as I write now I keep the ideas of ‘detail is garnish’ and ‘story is king’
foremost in my mind.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Thanks, Katherine – I guess the right protagonist isn't necessarily the one you know inside out. Katherine's site: <a href="http://www.katherinehowell.com/">http://www.katherinehowell.com/</a></div>
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<ul style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 2.5em; padding-right: 2.5em; padding-top: 0px;">
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></li>
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<span lang="EN-US"><o:p><br /></o:p></span></div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-17210703484108633962011-11-15T10:13:00.001+11:002011-11-15T10:53:16.982+11:00Conjuring Nonsense by Sam Bowring<div style="text-align: justify;">
Sam Bowring is a writer and standup comedian living in Sydney. He has written for TV, including <i>Rove</i> and <i>The</i> <i>Comedy Channel</i>, as well as stage plays, books for children, and fantasy. Sam's fantasy series, <b>The Broken Well Trilogy</b>, is published by Orbit. Today, Sam is channelling loose thoughts on fantasy names.</div>
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<a href="http://sambowring.com/publicityshots/publicityshots/files/blocks_image_1_1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://sambowring.com/publicityshots/publicityshots/files/blocks_image_1_1.png" width="213" /></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">For me, one of the hardest parts of writing a fantasy
story is thinking up names - for characters, places, magical swords and such -
that do not sound completely cringe-worthy. I’m sure I’m not the only one who,
upon inspecting the blurb of a potential read, has flung it back on the
bookshelf in disgust because it said something about a hero called ‘Nynmn’dryhl
of the Xyl’turym’. Can I buy a vowel, please?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">That said, appreciation of fantasy names is a personal
thing, about as subjective as it gets. How can anyone guess what collection of
randomly spliced letters will prove pleasing to the ear of another? One
person’s ‘Nynmn’dryhl’ might be another’s ‘Bilbo Baggins’. It would be arrogant
to stand here (sometimes I write standing up) and tell you what does or does
not make a good fantasy name. Especially when I myself have created names that
look like I tossed the alphabet against the wall, and whatever stuck to the
peanut butter was what I went with. It’s very hard to get these things right
by everyone. One of my good friends, for instance, never lets me forgot that I
named a place ‘Whisperwood’. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">‘Whisperwood,’ he will say, years later, out of the
blue, shaking his head in dismay. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">What I can give are tips on approaches, if not
results. The best way to decide results, I find, is to simply ask people you
trust, ‘does this name work for you, or does it make you want to jump out of
your skin into an acid bath?’ <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">One approach, which I imagine is a common starting
point for many authors, is to simply diddle around with syllables, putting them
together in various ways, saying the words aloud until striking upon a pleasing
combination. I do not own the patent for this, and drugs are optional. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="http://sambowring.com/books/files/blocks_image_11_1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://sambowring.com/books/files/blocks_image_11_1.png" /></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Another approach is to be derivative in some way. For
example, in my book <i>Prophecy’s Ruin</i>, there is a nasty little talking bird who
revels in lies and manipulation, and generally screwing things up for everyone.
His name is Iassia, which is very much inspired by that classic silver-tongued
Shakespearean villain, Iago. Such derivation need not be based on another
character, of course, but may take as its basis a descriptive word for the
character’s persona. My character ‘Malevot’, for example, is taken from
‘malicious’, ‘malevolent’, and possibly, ‘Malcolm’ (see next point). <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">A third approach I use is to take a real-world name,
and simply change a letter or two. I find this especially useful when it comes
to small-time characters, and means I wind up with a lot of farmers called
things like Borry. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Incidentally, I find small-time characters the most
difficult to name. The reason is, it still takes time to come up with something
good, and when I finally do, I don’t want to waste it on some two-line nobody.
Thus I am forever transplanting good names from incidentals to mains, leaving
all guards-who-are-about-to-get-killed with necessarily dubious monikers that I
have no fear of becoming attached to. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">On the subject of real-world names, one thing I always
find jarring in fantasy is when a real name is mixed in with the made-up ones.
Amongst the Nynmn’dryhls and Dakurs, why, here’s Mary everyone. ‘Let me
introduce you to Mary, Nynmn’dryhl!’ Whether this incongruity reeks of
laziness, or the author just liked the name Mary a lot, I’m never really sure
... but I just don’t buy Zeddicus Zul Zorander having a grandson called Dick. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Something rarely seen in fantasy is two characters sharing
the same name. In the real world we have plenty of Johns and Susans. If you can
believe it, we even have plenty of Schapelles and Mercedes. In fantasy, however,
you just don’t get such realistic repetition. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">‘I am Zarrakvah, Lord of Darkness.’ <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">‘Hello there, my lord. I’m Zarrakvah too, shearer of
sheep.’ <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">‘Ah. Well, that seems to undermine my mystique a
little, does it not?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">‘Aye, sorry lord. I was named after my uncle Zarrakvah,
actually.’ <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">You never get this scene in fantasy, maybe at a
cocktail party:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">‘Greetings.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">‘Oh, greetings to you … er … sorry, was it Teremond?’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">‘Actually it’s Deridas.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">‘Sorry, of course. That was going to be my next
guess.’ <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Parents of fantasy book characters are like the worst
of movie stars, forever trying to bestow their spawn with unique and original
names, to signify their amazing individuality. Did <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">they </i>go through the approaches I have previously described? Two
high elves sitting by the cradle, thuggishly ramming letters together in ways
their makers never intended, until all that’s left to decide is where to flick
the arbitrary apostrophe? ‘Well,’ they gush later to their friends, ‘we just
thought, you know, she <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">looks </i>like a
Gwyn’talamodrin!’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">It’s something I have pondered at length (I need to
get out more), and I can appreciate why this one-off naming system exists. It
would be confusing, of course, to have two Gwyn’talamodrins running about in
any given universe, especially if they rent from the same video store. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I recently decided to buck this trend, however (though
no one in particular was challenging me to), and am proud to announce that in
my upcoming books, there are <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not one</i>,
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not two</i>, but <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">three </i>characters who share the same name. Which is Hanry, by the
way. So good on me, eh?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">EH?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">At least, when all is said and done, no matter what
names you have come up with, be assured that any given reader probably won’t
pronounce them in the way that you intended. The way someone reads a name the
first time is how they will remember it for life - even if they’ve
subconsciously added extra letters, recklessly ignoring all laws of phonetic
pronunciation. It’s kind of an inbuilt safety mechanism for the author, as
readers superimpose their own preferences over the utter nonsense you have
dished up to them, to make it more personally palatable. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">It even happens with seemingly innocuous names. I have
a friend who pronounces Fazel as ‘Fah-zel’, as opposed to ‘Fay-zel’ and do you
think I ever once cleared my throat to inform her, in haughty tones, that she
isn’t saying it right? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Ho ho, no. I’d rather she say it how she wants, and
think me cleverer than I am, at coming up with names she likes. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Finally, the best way to know that you have gotten a
name right - or, at least, are happy with it yourself - is when you finally add
it to your spellchecker as a real word. This way your word processor is not
constantly underlining it red, as if to ask, ‘Are you <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">sure </i>about this? Really? Are you <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">sure</i>?’ <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I have not yet done this with Nynmn’dryhl. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Also, I do not really write standing up. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">One of the most frequent FAQs is how fantasy authors come up with names. Thanks for answering it for me, Sam. And for the laughs.</span></o:p></div>
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<o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></o:p></div>
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<o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Sam's website is <a href="http://sambowring.com/">http://sambowring.com/</a></span></o:p></div>
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<o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></o:p></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-7021021264375479262011-11-14T07:34:00.001+11:002011-11-14T07:52:57.290+11:00George Ivanoff on Setting Novels in a Virtual World<br />
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<span lang="EN-US">George Ivanoff has written more than 50 books for children and teenagers, both fiction and non-fiction, novels, short stories (including a <i>Doctor Who</i> story), articles and school readers. He also moonlights as an actor and has been in numerous productions including <i>Neighbours</i>. His teen SF novel, <i>Gamer's Quest</i>, won a 2010 Chronos award. Today he's talking about writing novels set inside a computer game. Thanks, George.</span></div>
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It all started with a documentary about
online gaming. Watching it reminded me of how much I loved computer games as a
kid and teen — how I loved blasting aliens in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Space Invaders</i> and dodging large chunks of space-rock in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Asteroids</i>. I was obsessed! But it was
more than the actual games. I loved the concept of playing on or with a
computer. Consequently, I also loved any sort of fiction that used computer
games as part of its narrative. Gillian Rubinstein’s novel <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Space Demons</i> was a favourite. I also loved films like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">TRON</i> and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Last Starfighter</i>.<br />
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After watching the documentary, I decided
that I wanted to recapture my childhood excitement about computer games. I wanted
to write some fiction that used games as an integral part of its narrative. And
so I came to write a short story called “Game Plan” (published in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Trust Me!</i>, Ford Street Publishing,
2008), which I then expanded into a novel called <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Gamers’ Quest</i>, followed by a sequel, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Gamers’ Challenge</i>.</div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Both novels follow the adventures of two
teenage thieves, Tark and Zyra, who live in a computer game world. In <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Gamers’ Quest</i>, they don’t realise that
they are characters within a computer game. To them, their world is very real;
their adventures a matter of life and death. By the beginning of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Gamers’ Challenge</i>, they know they are
inside a game… and they want out!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Setting novels inside a computer game
allowed me a great deal of freedom. I was able to play with the clichés of
various genres and introduce some rather over-the-top characters — warrior
monks, homicidal computer viruses, mages young and old, and some really evil
villains.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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I was also able to indulge my childhood
interests. Thinking back to when I was a teenager, I dug out from my memory all
those things that I enjoyed in books and films and games, and then put them all
into these novels. And so, we have magic swords, powerful mages, killer
cyborgs, zombies, dragons, various mythical creatures, a giant robot spider, an
invading army of Roman Centurions, and a climactic video game battle.</div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Perhaps the most interesting part of
writing these novels, has been the challenge of structuring them in the way of
a computer game. Part of that is the pace — the story progresses at break-neck
speed, the characters moving from one challenge to the next, with short
chapters and quick scene changes. Then there is the matter of time —
specifically the passage of time. As <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Gamers’
Quest</i> begins, and Tark and Zyra set off on their adventures, I deliberately
made sure to exclude any sense of night and day passing. They never stop to eat
or sleep. Their only concern is the quest and the challenges they face along
the way. Just like a computer game, the novel progress from one level of challenge
to the next. They never have to worry about getting older or dealing with the
problems of teenage-hood. They are perpetually perfect 16-years-olds, devoid of
acne and angst, their only concern, the rules of game and the challenge of
their quest.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span lang="EN-US">Gamers’
Challenge</span></i><span lang="EN-US"> allowed me to play with this concept a
little more. Because Tark and Zyra now know they are in a game, they are able
to observe the peculiarities of their environment (and I was able to make
observations about gaming). They now notice that night never falls, unless it
is required for the game narrative; they get tired and feel the after-effects
of a fight; they get hungry and need to search for food; pimples now become an
issue and hair does not remain in perfect place without product; and they begin
to age. So even though they are still within the environs of the game, they are
no longer bound by its rules — they are within the game, but now living more
‘real’ lives.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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As a writer I am bound by the rules of a
very different game — the publishing game! Although I have a third book
planned, it won’t get written unless book two sells enough for my publisher to
warrant the publishing of another. I’m desperately hoping that I do get to
write it because it will allow me to play even further with the concept of
computer games. In the third installment, Tark and Zyra will get out of the
game and step into the ‘real world’. Readers will find out who controls the
game, why it was made and what its sinister purpose is. </div>
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I look forward to
stepping out of the virtual world and presenting a very different view of
computer games in this novel.</div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Thanks, George. I must be the only person in the world who's never played a computer game, so the world you're writing about is alien, but fascinating.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">George's website is here: <a href="http://georgeivanoff.com.au/">http://georgeivanoff.com.au/</a></span></div>
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<br />Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-18055486366763528212011-11-13T08:29:00.001+11:002011-11-13T08:37:23.314+11:00The Truth About Publishing – 16<b>PART 2. SURVIVING PUBLICATION</b><br />
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<b>Lesson 15: Is that all you’re printing?</b><br />
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Your favourite author gets a 200,000 copy print run, but don’t even dream about doing the same. She’s spent 20 years building her name and sales. Besides, she got in first, and lots of other authors in your chosen genre have prospered since, and there’s relentless competition from hundreds of thousands of people self-publishing their own ebooks. There’s not much room in the market for newcomers these days.<br />
<br />
Print runs are surprisingly low in Australia and other English speaking countries – in fact everywhere. The initial paperback print run for a popular fiction title by a new author in Australia would typically be 3,000 – 8,000 copies. For literary fiction, it might only be 1,000 – 2,000 copies. In the UK, initial paperback print runs for popular fiction by new authors are typically 10,000 or less, and in the US, 25,000 or less. Again, for literary novels, print runs can be considerably lower. If you sell translations, print runs for European countries, except the largest, are likely to be in the range 1-4,000 copies.<br />
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In Australia, only major bestsellers are published in hardcover because consumers are reluctant to pay for them. It’s much the same in the UK. A lot of authors are published in hardcover in the US, where it’s a sign that your publisher is enthusiastic about your book. Even there, typical hardcover print runs are 10,000 or less.<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span></div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-75408643382443706422011-11-10T09:34:00.000+11:002011-11-10T10:58:07.429+11:00500 BOOKS TO BE WON IN 300 DAYS - WEEK 32 WINNERS<br />
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I've been running this weekly competition on my Facebook fan page all year, and it'll run into 2012. Each week all year I've been giving away three of my trilogies and quartets, signed, except for breaks where I've given away two iPad 2s.</div>
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Total number of books won so far: <b>356</b>.</div>
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To enter, go here, <a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a>, Like my page then enter from the Promos tab.</div>
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For the next few weeks I'll be giving away 3 copies of my brand new book,<i>Vengeance</i>, each week.</div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4;">WEEK 32 QUESTION – </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="-webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 2px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 2px; color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 15px;">What do you hope to discover in Vengeance? </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4;"> The cleverest, funniest, most moving or wittiest entries win. No knowledge of my books needed.
</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4;">THERE ARE THREE FIRST PRIZES – each a copy of my latest book, VENGEANCE, signed. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">Week 32 (63 entries). </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">There are equal third places again this week, so in fact there are 4 winners.</span></div>
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<b style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4;">Winners</b></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4;">First, Courtney 'Toffee' Rohde, Second, Rebecca Cairns, Equal Third, Rebecca J Fleming and Vivian Mercadal. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4;"><b>Honourable Mentions</b> (get 3 HMs and you also win). </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4;">Jane Domagala, Martin Ellis and Marc Burdon.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4;">Congratulations, everyone.</span></div>
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The complete list of winners for 2011 can be found here: <a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/winners.html">http://www.ian-irvine.com/winners.html</a></div>
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<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To follow me on Twitter: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"> </span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">My blog about the novels I write, and the writing life: <a href="http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/</a></span></li>
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</div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-86853712085544543912011-11-09T07:34:00.002+11:002011-11-15T11:27:13.012+11:00On Reading Like a Writer – Claire Corbett<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Claire Corbett has worked as a government policy adviser on water, genetically modified organisms and child and family health. She has had essays and stories broadcast on Radio National and published in <i>Cinema Papers</i>, <i>Picador New Writing</i> and <i>The Sydney Morning Herald, </i>among others. She completed the MA Writing (UTS) in 1997 and a Varuna Mentorship in 2000. <i>When We Have Wings, </i>her first novel, was published by Allen & Unwin in July 2011 to rave reviews. Today Claire is talking about reading like a writer.</span></div>
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Every writer, on being asked to give advice for emerging writers, will emphasise the importance of reading widely.</div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">There is something to be said about the kind of reader you become once you start writing seriously, though, especially once you start to feel surer of your own style. At first it seems hard enough to write a decent sentence; then there are struggles with tense, point of view, and structuring a plot. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">As I began to become more confident with some of the technical challenges of writing narrative fiction I noticed to my surprise that the way I read began to change. If a story impressed me, instead of just surrendering to it, I began to look more closely, to take it apart to see how it worked. Visual artists do this all the time, perhaps more consciously than many writers. An integral part of art training is (was?) to copy old masters until their tricks and techniques were known, understood and could be incorporated into the student artist’s repertoire. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I had already been through this process with film; I studied film-making during my Communications degree and went on to crew on feature films. I was fascinated by the technical difficulties of film-making, devouring issues of <i>American Cinematographer</i> and books written by directors. I learned deep respect for craft as I studied film stocks, lighting, processing, sound effects, mixing soundtracks and so on. I could watch a film, analysing the skills with which it was made while still enjoying the story and artistry. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Oddly, it took years before it occurred to me to do this with reading. I was so enthralled by writers I admired that I was swept away every time. I was aware that some writers I’d read and re-read obsessively had influenced my very sentence structures by osmosis, and I thought this was the only way to learn to write. I still think this is true of the way a writer’s deepest self is formed – through childhood reading. This is the way your ‘ear’ is trained for the sound and rhythm of the English language. Clearly that training can occur in other languages as some writers whose first language is not English, such as Conrad and Nabokov, are among our finest.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I remember the first time I wondered about the skill in a particular technique and considered whether I might teach myself how to do it. I was reading Kazuo Ishiguro’s <i>Remains of the Day</i> and marvelling at how readers know only what Ishiguro’s narrator, the butler Stevens, tells us and yet we have a completely different view of events and of Stevens’ actions than he does. The writer never speaks to us directly, all we have are Stevens’ words, and yet we have at least two views of the events in the novel, the butler’s and our own (or possibly Ishiguro’s). </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Most writers would probably try to give us a different view through the perspective of another character but somehow Ishiguro manages to give us at least two views through only the one lens. The subtlety of the technique is breathtaking and Stevens is proof you don’t have to find a character ‘likable’ to empathise with him. Stevens would refuse the reader’s sympathy. Yet still, you feel. No wonder that novel won a Booker prize.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Another writer whose technique I tried to unravel is possibly the world’s greatest short story writer, Alice Munro. Her stories end with a punch to the heart but she rarely relies on the ‘twist’ so beloved of short story writers. It took me many re-readings to pin down exactly how she does it and in the process I worked out why her style and her emotional power depends so heavily on the stories being shorter, why what she does would not work in novels. Ah, I hear you say. And how does she do it? I can do no better than point you in the direction of collections such as <i>Runaway</i> or <i>The Love of A Good Woman</i> or <i>The Progress of Love</i>.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">A technique I had to consciously teach myself – painfully at first but I like to think I mastered it – was free indirect speech. Critic James Wood lays out how free indirect speech works brilliantly in his discussion of Jane Austen in his book of essays <i>The Broken Estate</i>. In <i>When We Have Wings</i> I have two narrators, the young flier Peri and the private investigator searching for her, Zeke. Zeke had to speak in first person because he is the reader’s guide through the new, strange world of the winged. </span></div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-t-4dbN5zsG8/TsGxaxcdkWI/AAAAAAAAAJw/eva-U_WrPlY/s1600/Front+Page+Book+Cover+COMPRESSED+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-t-4dbN5zsG8/TsGxaxcdkWI/AAAAAAAAAJw/eva-U_WrPlY/s320/Front+Page+Book+Cover+COMPRESSED+1.jpg" width="208" /></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I felt I needed to write Peri’s part of the story in third person but in early drafts she was too remote, lacking in feeling, and the word choice was more mine than hers as the character. Using free indirect speech, where the third person can occasionally slip in and out of first person, brought Peri closer and allowed her to express her thoughts directly. This technique takes practice to make it supple but may have erased that distance so well that readers barely seem to notice that one strand of the book is in first person and one in third. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">So my message is: read widely, read at least some work that is difficult, not because it’s badly done but because it’s trying to do difficult things, and most importantly read beyond whatever genres you like and want to write in, including literary fiction. I can’t stress this enough. Just reading young adult won’t give you anything new to bring to young adult fiction, you might get an amazing idea for a fantasy tale from a business book (this seems to be the secret to much of Terry Pratchett’s comedy!) and if you read something you love, experiment with trying to make that technique your own. I don’t read much crime fiction and yet a crime novel gave me one of the most thorough master classes in style I’ve ever had. It’s a lesson I’ll never forget. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Thank you, Claire. I definitely need more practice in reading like a writer. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Claire's website is here: <a href="http://www.clairecorbett.com/">http://www.clairecorbett.com/</a></span></div>
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<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing:</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To follow me on Twitter: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"></span></span></span></li>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Calibri;"><br /></span></div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-71507138421506936812011-11-08T16:42:00.002+11:002011-11-14T12:18:07.252+11:00Reaching your Readers Part 3 – New Authors<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;">In Part 2 of this series, </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;"><a href="http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/11/reaching-your-readers-part-2.html">http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/11/reaching-your-readers-part-2.html</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;">,</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;"> I asked my Facebook fans and readers how they found out about their favourite authors' next books.</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;"><br /></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;">I also asked my fans what factors led them to choose a </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;"><i>new author</i></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;">. There were 66 replies. The most important factors in the decision to choose a new author's book were:</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<ul style="color: #444444; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 2.5em; padding-right: 2.5em; padding-top: 0px;">
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">The cover, back cover and blurb, and first few pages (by far the most important)</span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Recommendations from people they know (a lot of people said this)</span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Recommendations from people in bookshops (a few people said this)</span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Online forums, blogs, Twitter or book sites (a few people said this)</span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Print book reviews (one person said this)</span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Book shows on radio (one person said this).</span></li>
</ul>
<div style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<div style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">No one mentioned book advertising or other promotional materials. No one mentioned author websites, author newsletters, author blogs, author tweets or social media sites either, though that may have been due to the way I framed the question. </span><br />
<br />
Interestingly, though, people find out about new authors in a different way than they discover new books by their favourite authors. Presumably because fans actively seek out new books by their favourite authors, while discovering new authors by a more random process.</div>
<div style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Here's the data (it sums to more than 100% because many people listed several factors, often in order of importance).</span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><b>New Author Chosen From % of Responses</b></span></div>
<div style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px;">Book Cover/title/blurb/first
few pages 64%</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Friend/family
recommendations 33%<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Reviews/blog
reviews/internet 7.5%<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">NOT from reviews 7.5%<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Bookshop
recommendations 6%<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Author
recommendations on cover of the book 6%<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Radio
interviews 1.5%<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Short
stories by the author 1.5%<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Library 1.5%<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">For two-thirds of responders, the book was chosen (or partly chosen) based on the book cover either physically or online (which induced them to read the back of the book), the title and blurb, and, for some people, after reading a few pages of the book. Recommendations from family and friends, including online friends, were also hugely important.</span></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">All other means were relatively minor.</span></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Thanks very much to all those people who kindly gave detailed answers to the question. Part 1 can be found here: <a href="http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/11/reaching-your-readers.html">http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/11/reaching-your-readers.html</a></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="color: #444444; line-height: 18px; margin-right: -24.45pt;">
<br /></div>
<ul style="color: #666666; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 2.5em; padding-right: 2.5em; padding-top: 0px;">
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing:</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To follow me on Twitter: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"></span></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px;">My blog about the novels I write, and the writing life: <a href="http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/</a></span></li>
</ul>
<br /></div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-28184446566623396612011-11-08T12:51:00.001+11:002011-11-13T10:28:36.380+11:00Reaching your Readers Part 2 – Reaching Your FansFollowing on from Part 1 of this post, <a href="http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/11/reaching-your-readers.html">http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/11/reaching-your-readers.html</a>, I asked this question on my Facebook page, <a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a>.<br />
<br />
<i>How do you find out about your favourite author’s next book? Bookshops? Personal recommendations? Book reviews? Author's web site? Author's social media presence, on Facebook or blogs or Twitter or GoodReads? Author newsletters? Publisher's sites? Advertising?</i><br />
<br />
There have been 50 responses so far (note, people usually gave more than one answer so the sum is more than 100%).<br />
<br />
Author’s Website 44%<br />
<br />
Physical bookshops (but often as a last resort) 26%<br />
<br />
Wikipedia 22%<br />
<br />
Author’s social media/Facebook/blog/Twitter 22%<br />
(mainly Facebook)<br />
<br />
Search engines 16%<br />
<br />
Online bookshops/Amazon 14%<br />
<br />
Email newsletters from authors/publishers 10%<br />
<br />
Recommendations from friends and fans of other authors 8%<br />
(other authors they like)<br />
<br />
‘Internet’ 8%<br />
<br />
Publisher’s website 4%<br />
<br />
GoodReads and similar sites 4%<br />
<br />
Authors’ recommendations (of other authors) 2%<br />
<br />
Reviews (online or print) 2%<br />
<br />
Facebook ads 2%<br />
<br />
<br />
There are some important lessons here:<br />
<ol>
<li>Fans get the vast majority of their info via the net (no surprise there).</li>
<li>The author's website is by far the most important source of information about their books, yet many author websites are either out of date, or all show and no substance, or don't provide the information and detail readers and fans are looking for. </li>
<li>Wikipedia is one of the top three sources of information, yet many authors haven't corrected their Wikipedia entries or supplemented them with the right level of detail about their books, particularly new books.</li>
<li>Social media (particularly Facebook) are as important as Wikipedia, yet few authors have a fan page on Facebook, and of those that do, many don't use it effectively. Most personal Facebook pages are useless for communicating with fans. For info on using Facebook effectively, <a href="http://ripping-ozzie-reads.com/2011/07/30/ian-irvines-adventures-using-facebook/">http://ripping-ozzie-reads.com/2011/07/30/ian-irvines-adventures-using-facebook/</a></li>
<li>Search engines and online bookshops are important sources of information and places to buy immediately. Authors should make sure their information is easily found by search engines, and that the details on online bookshops and other places on the net are correct – they often aren't!</li>
<li>Email newsletters to people who have subscribed are a simple but effective way to market your books to your existing readers. </li>
</ol>
<div>
Thanks very much to all those people who kindly gave detailed answers to the question. Part 3 of this post, which deals with reaching new readers, can be found here: <a href="http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/11/reaching-your-readers-part-3.html">http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/11/reaching-your-readers-part-3.html</a><br />
<br />
<ul style="color: #666666; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 2.5em; padding-right: 2.5em; padding-top: 0px;">
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing:</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To follow me on Twitter: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"></span></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px;">My blog about the novels I write, and the writing life: <a href="http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/</a></span></li>
</ul>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span></div>
</div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-52888065833141298452011-11-08T11:30:00.002+11:002011-11-08T11:56:24.111+11:00My Tortuous Path to Publication<a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/images/Ian-76.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="256" src="http://www.ian-irvine.com/images/Ian-76.jpg" width="320" /></a><br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
I’m not sure exactly when I had the idea of writing a fantasy novel, though it must have been sometime after July 1977, because that’s when I bought and read Terry Brooks’ <i>The Sword of Shannara</i>.</div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
It wasn’t the story that inspired me, though. I’d read a huge amount of fantasy by then and found the plot to be too close to <i>The Lord of the Ring</i>s. My inspiration was the map – but not in a good way.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/images/Early_map.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: justify;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://www.ian-irvine.com/images/Early_map.jpg" width="290" /></a><br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
The map in <i>The Sword of Shannara</i> so irritated me (because it seemed so clichéd, and so wrong) that I sat down on the spot and began to create my own, based on what I believed a real fantasy world should look like. Here’s a small, early version, done in 1978.</div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
This soon became an obsession. At a time when I was supposed to be writing my thesis, I redrew the maps in greater and greater detail, until they were the size of house doors, then began to work out 10,000 years of history (as one does), the politics and economies of some of the countries therein, the peoples and ecosystems. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
And then, snatches of characters, many of whom would appear in <i>The View from the Mirror</i> a decade later – Mendark, Shuthdar and the Golden Flute, Yggur, Faelamor, Kandor (who became Rulke), Kyllian the bard, who became Llian the master chronicler, Karan, my favourite character, and Yfanna, who became Maigraith.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Finally, on June 25, 1979, on a train in Finland, I wrote the first snatch of the story – Kyllian leaving Chanthed for the mountain inn at Tullin. Not very good, is it? But at the time it wasn't intended as part of a novel. It was just a moment that occurred to me.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: justify;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-4sIIEGWk1Gs/Trh3drRshuI/AAAAAAAAAJY/N2GreP5pFuA/s1600/First+words+written.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="195" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-4sIIEGWk1Gs/Trh3drRshuI/AAAAAAAAAJY/N2GreP5pFuA/s400/First+words+written.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
What with finishing my thesis, taking a demanding consulting job, looking after little children and renovating a lovely but decrepit Victorian house in Sydney, 8 years went by before I had the time to formally begin writing – <i>in longhand</i>. It was September 1987 and I figured if I wrote 3 pages a day, I’d have a first draft done by Christmas.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
By the time I was halfway through the story, then called <i>The Mirror of Aachan</i>, I knew that I wanted to spend the rest of my life writing stories. I finished the first draft 5 days early but, to my astonishment, the story ended on a cliff-hanger with possibilities exploding out in all directions.</div>
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A month later I’d worked out that there would be four books to the story, now called <i>The View from the Mirror</i>, their titles and, in some detail, what would happen in each book. I did several more drafts of the first book then, in 1989, looked around for a publisher.</div>
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At the time, no Australian publishers were publishing science fiction or fantasy for the adult market – see my post on the Golden Age of Aussie Publishing, <a href="http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/10/golden-age-of-publishing.html">http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/10/golden-age-of-publishing.html</a>.</div>
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But I probably wouldn’t have sent it there anyway – I’d decided to try Unwin Hyman, in London, publishers of <i>The Lord of the Rings</i> and a number of other great fantasy novels. They knocked it back, but very kindly, saying that they’d be happy to see a revised version, or anything else I cared to send them. However when I sent a much revised version, months later, they had just been taken over by Harper Collins, who had closed their list.</div>
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Various other disappointments followed from the UK and US, sometimes after agonisingly long times – one NY publisher took 13 months to respond. I never sent the same manuscript out twice – I always revised it several more times, and kept working on the other three volumes of the story. </div>
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In the early 90s, Australian publishers, particularly Pan Macmillan, began publishing speculative fiction. By this time my story was complete – I’d done about 18 tough drafts of <i>A Shadow on the Glass</i> and even 4 or 5 of the final book, <i>The Way Between the Worlds</i>. </div>
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Unfortunately, by the time my manuscript of <i>A Shadow on the Glass</i> arrived, Pan had been burned by a number of failures and were pulling back. They wrote me a nice but painful rejection letter, to the effect that, ‘We agonised about whether to publish your book, but decided not to.’ </div>
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However they also did me a favour by suggesting I commission Dr Van Ikin, the long-time speculative fiction reviewer for the <i>Sydney Morning Herald</i>, to assess the manuscript and provide suggestions for improvement. I did so, followed Van’s many suggestions to the letter and when he looked at the revised version he said, 'You've got it! Send it out.'</div>
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By this time (January 1996) Harper Collins had had a big success with Sara Douglass’s <i>Battleaxe</i>, so I sent the mss to them, along with a copy of Van Ikin’s effusive letter. They rejected it, saying they’d be willing to consider a revised version. They also included comments from an unnamed external reviewer who thoroughly disagreed with Van’s assessment, and made a series of what I considered to be ill-informed critical comments about the book.</div>
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I didn’t bother to send them a revised version; instead I looked for another publisher. My father-in-law, John Rummery, a former English lecturer who had enjoyed the story, contacted a friend and colleague, John Cohen. John Cohen has an encyclopaedic knowledge of fantasy and for many years had been the editor of <i>Reading Time</i>, the book review journal of the Children’s Book Council of Australia (and he still is). </div>
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<a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/images/Shadow_med.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: justify;"><img border="0" src="http://www.ian-irvine.com/images/Shadow_med.jpg" /></a><br />
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John loved the book and contacted Nancy Mortimer, then the education publisher at Penguin Australia, who asked to see it. In May 1996 I sent her the huge manuscripts of the first two books – a cardboard box full of paper. After looking the manuscripts over, Nancy agreed and gave them to Kay Ronai, a vastly experienced editor who had also edited some fantasy authors, asking for a book report. Kay loved the story and recommended that Penguin publish it. However she didn’t think they would, because Penguin hadn’t published fantasy for the adult market before, and they would have to commit to 4 very large books.</div>
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Kay’s report went to Erica Irving, then the publisher for the Children and Young Adults Department at Penguin. Erica wasn’t sure, and asked Isobelle Carmody, one of their star authors who wrote fantasy for younger readers, to take a look. Isobelle read the first book and said, ‘If you don’t publish this, someone else will.’ </div>
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That’s how I came to be published. </div>
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I signed a contract with Penguin in October 1996 and the four books were published between February 1998 and September 1999. Only 11 years after I started writing, and 9 years after I began sending manuscripts.</div>
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<i>The View from the Mirror</i> is still in print in Australia 13 years later, incidentally. And in the UK.</div>
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<ul style="color: #666666; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 13px; line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 2.5em; padding-right: 2.5em; padding-top: 0px;">
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing:</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To follow me on Twitter: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"></span></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px;">My blog about the novels I write, and the writing life: <a href="http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/</a></span></li>
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</div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-67763453850893426862011-11-07T16:47:00.002+11:002011-11-13T10:32:52.367+11:00Reaching your Readers Part 1<div style="text-align: justify;">
How does one reach one's readers and fans to tell them about a new book? I've been a full-time novelist for 12 years now, and this is one of the questions that most vexes me.</div>
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It's easy for readers to contact me. My email address is in all my books and on my website, and can be googled in an instant. I also have a huge, frequently updated website, two blogs, a very active Facebook fan page, a Twitter account, and presences in various other places on the net. But not many people do contact me.</div>
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How many?</div>
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Some years ago, when email was still king, I divided the number of books I'd sold (a million) by the number of different people who had emailed me about them (a little over 3,000). I was being contacted by roughly 1 individual for every 300 books sold. But many of my readers had bought lots of my books, so the real question was, what proportion of my readers were communicating with me?</div>
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For that matter, how many readers do I have? To work that out, I've used actual sales data from my royalty statements, plus some educated guesses, thus:</div>
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<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify;">My biggest selling book, <i>A Shadow on the Glass</i>, has been published in 11 countries and has net sales of around 190,000 copies. But I've written a lot of other books, some of which appeal to different audiences where there's little crossover – my eco-thrillers, for instance, and my kids' books. </li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Adding a proportion of these in, my best guess is that around 250,000 different people in the world have bought at least one of my books. </li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">To estimate the number of unique readers, I multiplied the above number by 2. I think that's probably conservative, since many people share books, some end up in second-hand bookshops, and I've a lot of books in libraries – more than 25,000 copies in Australia alone. </li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">That calculation gives me half a million readers, most of whom are in Australia, the UK, US, Canada, New Zealand, Ireland and South Africa.</li>
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Dividing my email numbers into half a million readers, one reader out of every 170 has contacted me – 0.6%. But readers don't use email much any more – most contact comes via social media, for those writers who have a presence there.</div>
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I currently have 3,370 members of my Facebook fan page, <a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a>. That is, one in 150 of my readers has joined my page – 0.67%. Actually it would be less than that, since many people have fanned my page due to advertising targeted at fantasy readers. Using the Facebook ad creator and published data for various big-name authors' sales, I discovered that their figures are similar to mine – less than 1% of their estimated readers have expressed interest in them on Facebook.</div>
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My website, <a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a>, gets more traffic than my Facebook page – so far this year it's had over 10,000 unique visitors. My blogs, Twitter and other sites on the net add more contacts. Even so, the total number of people who have visited one or more of my sites can't possibly be more than 15,000, ie 3% of my readers.</div>
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Even assuming that half of those 500,000 readers are no longer interested, it still leaves 250,000 – yet only 6% are seeking me or my sites out in a year. How do I contact the remaining 94% of my readers to tell them about my new book?</div>
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As far as I can tell, the only way for me to get through to them is:</div>
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<li style="text-align: justify;">By writing an absolute cracker of a book, one so good that they'll hear about it by word of mouth. </li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Making sure that the first few pages grab them by the throat and don't let go.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Then, crafting a fantastic, engaging blurb.</li>
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But I'd be doing all that anyway, wouldn't I?<br />
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Thanks very much to all the people who answered my question on Facebook.<br />
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Part 2 of this post, which deals with reaching your fans, can be found here: <a href="http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/11/reaching-your-readers-part-2.html">http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/11/reaching-your-readers-part-2.html</a>.<br />
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And Part 3, Reaching New Readers, here: <a href="http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/11/reaching-your-readers-part-3.html">http://ianirvine.blogspot.com/2011/11/reaching-your-readers-part-3.html</a>.</div>
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<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing:</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To follow me on Twitter: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"></span></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px;">My blog about the novels I write, and the writing life: <a href="http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/</a></span></li>
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</div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-33295301625878509332011-11-04T11:21:00.001+11:002011-11-07T09:21:22.834+11:00The Truth About Publishing – 15<b>Lesson 14: Putting your money where your manuscript is</b><br />
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Despite what the hucksters say, it’s better for a publisher to publish your novel than for you to do it yourself. Why? Because publishers have a vast knowledge of the market and what it takes to succeed in it. You don’t, and this knowledge of book editing, cover design, placement and marketing for any particular niche of the fiction market isn’t easily or cheaply acquired. Yes, you can buy these services, but how do you know you’re getting something worthwhile. More critically, how do you know it’s going to be right for your particular book?</div>
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Several new authors have achieved fame and fortune in recent years by publishing their own novels and promoting them relentlessly. Now it’s widely believed that this is the best option for all authors – a 70% royalty on Amazon and iBookstore is far better than the 10% royalty on a printed book, or 25% on a publisher’s eBook, isn’t it?</div>
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That depends on how many books you can sell by your own efforts. The authors who have succeeded spend a lot more time promoting their books than they do writing them – they’re professional promoters who write books rather than professional authors who are good at promoting. If you’re a professional promoter, maybe you can succeed too. But if you just want to write great books, and looking on promoting as a painful chore, you’re better off with a publisher.</div>
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One exception – if you’re a published writer with a backlist and a strong writer’s platform (e.g. popular blog, website, Facebook page, identity as an expert or public speaker, etc). If you can no longer get your books published with a traditional publisher, publish them yourself and you might do well. But it’s getting harder.</div>
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<b>Explosion of EBooks</b></div>
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The barriers to self-publishing both print books and eBooks have fallen dramatically over the past decade. Has this made it easier to succeed? Not on your life. It’s made it much, much more difficult. Why?</div>
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Because the size of the book market (the number of books sold a year) hasn’t changed significantly, but the number of new titles published has exploded – in the US from 215,000 in 2002 to 2.7 million in 2010. <a href="http://www.bkconnection.com/static/10%20Awful%20Truths%20About%20Book%20Publishing%206-20-11.pdf">http://www.bkconnection.com/static/10%20Awful%20Truths%20About%20Book%20Publishing%206-20-11.pdf</a></div>
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<b>Average Sales Falling Every Year</b></div>
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Most of those titles are self-published eBooks, and probably only sell a handful of copies, but since there’s millions of them, they’re taking a sizeable slice of the pie. Every year it becomes harder to make your book stand out.</div>
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And it gets worse. Books used to go out of print when they stopped selling, but many eBooks stay in print forever. Every year it gets harder for you to sell the number of books you sold last year, and since the price of books isn’t going up, but your cost of living is, if you can’t sell more you’re going to be worse off. <br />
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Of course, most of those titles aren't fiction. Matt Wilkens estimates that there were about 100,000 unique, novel-length fiction titles published worldwide in English in 2007. <a href="http://mattwilkens.com/2009/10/14/how-many-novels-are-published-each-year/">http://mattwilkens.com/2009/10/14/how-many-novels-are-published-each-year/</a>. With the ease of self-publishing eBooks that number has probably risen greatly in the past few years, though currently no one seems to know what the true number of fiction titles is.</div>
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<b>Self-Publishing</b></div>
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If you can’t get a traditional publisher, and you’re really sure you’ve written a good book, you can publish it yourself. </div>
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<i>Print Self-Publishing</i></div>
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This isn’t easy, and it definitely isn’t cheap, but if you’ve got months to spare and $10,000 lying around with nothing to spend it on, you could consider self-publishing a printed book. Several of Australia’s best selling novelists began that way, and many other writers have in other countries. There are many options, Lulu being one of the biggest. <a href="http://www.lulu.com/publish/index.php?cid=en_tab_publish">http://www.lulu.com/publish/index.php?cid=en_tab_publish</a>. </div>
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But the vast majority of self-publishers do their dough, so if you are going to do it, do it right, and get the right advice. Otherwise, you might as well tear your money up and flush it down the toilet. You must employ a professional editor, a professional cover designer and have the book typeset. This will cost you several thousand dollars, or more if your book is long and requires a lot of editing. Printing will cost you several thousand more dollars, or even more if it’s long or you have a lot of copies printed. For instance, 500 copies of a 400 page paperback at Lulu will cost $US 4,375, i.e. $8.75 each. Shipping will be extra. But paperbacks sell on Amazon for less than that price, so you’re already uncompetitive.</div>
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Don’t print more than 500. The biggest problem of all is distribution, which is why publishers have invested millions in it. It takes the most monumental effort for an individual to sell more than 300 - 400 copies, even if you get some good publicity and a few bookshops stock your books. Print too many and they’ll still be rotting in your garage in a decade.<br />
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<i>Print On Demand</i><br />
Margaret has pointed out, in the comments, that it may be cheaper to use a print on demand publisher. Here are some recent articles: <a href="http://smartwrite.com.au/2011/11/03/print-on-demand-publishing-is-it-for-you/">http://smartwrite.com.au/2011/11/03/print-on-demand-publishing-is-it-for-you/</a>, <a href="http://www.insearchofdesign.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=908:self-publishprint-on-demand-what-they-dont-tell-you&catid=291:printers&Itemid=121">http://www.insearchofdesign.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=908:self-publishprint-on-demand-what-they-dont-tell-you&catid=291:printers&Itemid=121</a>.</div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
<i>EBook Self-Publishing</i></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Publishing an eBook solves both the printing and distribution problems, but you still have to spend the money on editing and cover design. The following article tells you how to do it, and what you get. </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="http://reviews.cnet.com/how-to-self-publish-an-e-book">http://reviews.cnet.com/how-to-self-publish-an-e-book</a></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
And you still have to promote it, but that’s another article – or ten. To get you started, you can download this free marketing eBook from Smashwords: <a href="http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/305">http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/305</a>. You’ll also find lots of useful advice and guides here: <a href="http://bookmarketingmaven.typepad.com/">http://bookmarketingmaven.typepad.com/</a>.</div>
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Being a published writer is a great and perilous adventure. Good luck!</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Next, in PART 2 of this series, I'll be talking about <i>Surviving Publication</i>.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Disagree with what I've said? Or would like more information? Please post a comment.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<ul style="color: #666666; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 2.5em; padding-right: 2.5em; padding-top: 0px;">
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing:</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To follow me on Twitter: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"></span></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px;">My blog about the novels I write, and the writing life: <a href="http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/">http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/</a></span></li>
</ul>
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<div style="text-align: left;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span></div>
</div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-26130076645474625282011-11-03T08:21:00.000+11:002011-11-07T09:21:41.333+11:00Karen Brooks on Giving Birth to a Book<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Is there anything Karen Brooks hasn't done? An academic known internationally for her work on popular culture, an award-winning teacher who's also written eight novels and an acclaimed non-fiction book, <i>Consuming Innocence – Popular Culture and Our Children</i>, Karen is also a social commentator who appears regularly in print media, radio and TV. Oh, and among many other things she's been a checkout chick, an actress and an army officer. Whatever Karen has to say is worth listening to and today she's talking about giving birth to a book – and a bit on the side.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="http://www.karenrbrooks.com/images/temp/pic1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://www.karenrbrooks.com/images/temp/pic1.jpg" width="132" /></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Many authors
liken the process of writing a book, never mind finishing one, to giving birth.
Having just completed my ninth one, I’ve had cause to examine this analogy and,
for the most part, wholeheartedly agree. Just like childbirth, books or
word-babies are brought into the world amidst great joy, pain, struggle,
exhaustion and with the aid of assorted medicinals – usually, the liquid kind.
The latter self-administered and in varying quantities. For a lucky few, some
books make their entry more easily and with less hangovers. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Whichever
way the work arrives and no matter how many you’ve written, the end result is
fundamentally the same: you’re the mother or father of a beautiful lexical
child. At least, that’s how you consider it until someone tells you otherwise.
The one guarantee about being a writer and birthing a book, as opposed to a
human, is that there’s always someone out there prepared to tell you that’s one
ugly baby you delivered. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="http://rha.chookdigital.net/cache/140x210/titles/9781742752280.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://rha.chookdigital.net/cache/140x210/titles/9781742752280.jpg" /></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Now that
I’ve reached the end of <b>The Curse of the
Bond Riders</b> trilogy, having recently handed to my publisher my 220,00
word-child, titled <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Illumination</i>,
replete with structural flaws, grammatical foibles and syntactical problems
(that like a good midwife/paediatrician, she’ll help me smooth over so people
don’t scream when they peep in the crib), I’ve decided that completing Book
Three wasn’t so much like giving birth as ending a long-term but deliciously
complex and demanding relationship. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">It’s not
that I’m going through a divorce so much as a separation – one I’ve initiated –
but that doesn’t make it any easier. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I’m
heartbroken. I find myself turning to Shakespeare and quoting <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Romeo and Juliet</i> to describe how I feel:
“parting is such sweet sorrow” seems to almost capture it. I feel the wrench of
disconnection, the void of absence.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">But, there’s
another emotion alongside all these roiling ones and it’s threatening to
dominate. To be utterly frank, I’m also experiencing relief – relief that after
all this time, it’s finally over.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">And that
makes me feel guilty. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">For the last
six years, I’ve devoted most of my waking hours and spare time, some of it very
intimate, to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bond Riders</i>, and its
rich and decadent world. I’ve neglected my partner, children and friends and
been immersed in a different time and space and come to know all these
wonderful and diverse characters who leapt from my imagination and onto the
page. I’ve seen them and they’ve seen me, on our finest and very worst days.
I’d even reached the stage of dreaming about them. I think it’s understandable
then that I have a sense of ambivalence about our time together drawing to a
close. On the one hand, I’m despondent about saying farewell to my beloved, but
on the other, there’s also a tiny bit of me that feels liberated. Well,
actually, a big part. You see, I have a confession to make… <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">For a short
time, I’ve not been true to this relationship. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I’ve been
having a bit on the side. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="http://rha.chookdigital.net/cache/140x210/titles/9781864719437.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://rha.chookdigital.net/cache/140x210/titles/9781864719437.jpg" /></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">There, I
admit it. Like an unfaithful lover, when I should have been focussed on <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bond Riders</i>, my thoughts wandered into a
different tale. I started to fantasise about spending time with these new
people and ideas. It’s not that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bond
Riders</i> lost its appeal; on the contrary, I loved it more than ever. But I
also knew that just as my relationship with it must end, so a fresh one had to
begin. It’s part of the deal of being a writer: that as one book cover closes,
another opens. That this process started before I’d broken up with my last
novel wasn’t intended. Really. I didn’t go looking for this. I didn’t ask for
it to happen. It just did. Despite setting my trilogy in Renaissance Venice, I
am no Casanova. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Call me a
scarlet writer, a fallen novelist, I really don’t care. I am so thankful. You
see, by moving on before my last writing affair is over, I’ve avoided something
many authors, me included, fear: that when one piece of work is finished, there
will be no inspiration or ideas for another one. That somehow, the old Writer’s
Block will erect itself, the muse will take a holiday or resign in disgust, or
the well of imagination will dry. I know some authors who wait months if not
years before finding their next tale. So to discover mine when I did is beyond
a reprieve: it’s a gift and I will take it with gratitude. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Now, I
straddle an imaginary crossroads, where one book ends and another commences. I
know the paths in both directions are beset with challenges even though they
disappear into a mist-bound distance. It’s both a comfortable and awkward
position to be in. I am Janus-faced: looking forwards to a virgin story and
backwards to my old flame and its publication and reception simultaneously.
Second-guessing my familiar work on the one hand, wondering what changes I’ll
have to make, where I’ll spit and polish the manuscript, while on the other,
creating afresh the triumphs and tragedies of a new world. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">With <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Illumination</i>
off being edited and farewells almost complete, I’m just about free to
consummate this new literary relationship. Currently, we’re still flirting,
with ideas, characters and plotlines. At present, my tentative, rather shy
steps have taken me into Fourteenth Century Britain and Flanders, the Hanseatic
League, trade in various commodities, and into the lives of a strict merchant
family with a dark and wonderful secret. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">I am all
a-tingle over this. One would think I should behave with more decorum, act my
age and in a manner more appropriate to my writing experience. Truth is, I
can’t help myself. Maybe it’s too strong a comparison to suggest I relate to
the poet John Keats when he first read Chapman’s Homer and likened the encounter
to being “some watcher of the skies/When a new planet swims into his ken…”, or
the explorer Cortez who shared with this men the vista of the Pacific and was
stunned into silence. There’s no doubt, I’m dazzled; I feel like I’m voyaging
through untrammelled frontiers and the excitement is visceral and acute. It’s
hard not to shout for joy from a mountain peak and become lost in the journey. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Even so, I
won’t forget what brought me to this point, the relationship I laboured over
with love and impatience for so many years. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Like all my
books past, present and future, no matter whether it’s regarded by others as
beautiful, ugly or with indifference, <i>The
Curse of the Bond Riders</i> will always hold a special place in my writing
life and heart.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri;"><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Thank you for those lovely insights, Karen. It's left me with much to think about, and I welcome readers' comments.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;">Karen's website is <a href="http://www.karenrbrooks.com/books.html">http://www.karenrbrooks.com/books.html</a>.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><br />
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<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing:</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To follow me on Twitter: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"></span></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px;">My blog about the novels I write, and the writing life: <a href="http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/">http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/</a></span></li>
</ul>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span></div>
</div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-92166494697589942792011-11-02T10:48:00.002+11:002011-11-07T09:21:55.514+11:00The Truth About Publishing – 14<b>Lesson 13: You’re not published until you’re in print (and sometimes not even then)</b><br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Deals fall over for all sorts of reasons, so don’t count your chickens until they’re roosting in a thousand bookshops. Here are some of the most common deal breakers, all of which have happened to writers I know or have heard about:</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
</div>
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify;">There was a ‘misunderstanding’ when the publisher made your agent an offer for your book. You don’t get a publishing contract after all, or you get a contract but a worse deal than originally offered.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">The publisher goes bankrupt before your book is published. If they’ve paid the advance, you keep it. If they haven’t, you’re back in the queue.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Your editor leaves or is fired and her replacement hates your book and decides not to publish it. You keep the advance though.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">The publisher is having a tough time and decides that they would lose money publishing your book, so cans it. You keep the advance and, if you’re lucky, they might pay you a small sum in lieu.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">The editor loves your book and offers a terrific hardcover deal and great promotion, but the sales department or the major book buyers don’t agree that it has big sales potential. You get downgraded to paperback, with little or no promotion, and your potential income and sales are massively reduced.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Your book is found to be libellous and the publisher doesn’t want to get sued, so they cancel publication, or if it’s been printed, they withdraw the book and pulp it. You’ve violated your contract and have to pay back the advance, and they could even sue you for their losses.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Your non-fiction book is proven to be fraudulent, ditto.</li>
</ul>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Keep your expectations low and you won’t be disappointed. With sky-high expectations, you’ll be disappointed even if the book does well.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"></span><br />
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<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></span></li>
<li style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing:</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></span></li>
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</div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-27928817409742462472011-11-02T09:45:00.000+11:002011-11-07T09:22:11.742+11:00Website Updates<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;">I've made quite a few updates to my website including sharing and bookmarking buttons, a blog menu, a more user-friendly menu for finding <i>Ian On the Net</i>, updated the Competition Winners and provided a new link for Bookings.</span></div>
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<a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/index.html#.TrB2U7dW8yc.blogger">Ian Irvine</a></div>
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<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To follow me on Twitter: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"> </span></span></span></li>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Calibri; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span></span></span></div>
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</div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1392006267893202487.post-85955944845387255062011-10-31T15:36:00.000+11:002011-11-01T16:25:16.668+11:00500 BOOKS TO BE WON IN 300 DAYS - WEEK 31 WINNERSI've been running this weekly competition on my Facebook fan page all year, and it'll run into 2012. Each week all year I've been giving away three of my trilogies and quartets, signed, except for two breaks where I've given away greater prizes.<br />
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Total number of books won so far: <b>352</b>.<br />
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To enter, go here, <a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a>, Like my page then enter from the Promos tab.<br />
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For the next few weeks I'll be giving away 3 copies of my brand new book, <i>Vengeance</i>, each week.<br />
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WEEK 31 QUESTION – Why do you read fantasy? The cleverest, funniest, most moving or wittiest entries win. No knowledge of my books needed.
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THERE ARE THREE FIRST PRIZES – each a copy of my latest book, VENGEANCE, signed. <br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-oUAXuU84w7E/Tq8eTBlbhwI/AAAAAAAAAG4/1STH5VHrXGU/s1600/Cover+montageFB.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="105" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-oUAXuU84w7E/Tq8eTBlbhwI/AAAAAAAAAG4/1STH5VHrXGU/s400/Cover+montageFB.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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Week 31 (117 entries – the largest number by far for any of the weekly comps). <br />
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<b>Winners</b><br />
First, Sonja Mackay, Second, Charmaine Cree, Equal Third, Christine Bolton and Cameron Edwards. Honourable Mentions (get 3 HMs and you also win), Kaylon Fleay, Scott Mooney, Stephanie Elizabeth Kirsch and Joshua Lowe.<br />
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There are equal third places this week, so in fact there are 4 winners.<br />
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Congratulations, everyone.<br />
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<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">For more about me and my books: </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.ian-irvine.com/" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.ian-irvine.com/</a></span></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To say Hi or talk to me about books and writing: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://www.facebook.com/ianirvine.author</a></span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">To follow me on Twitter: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"><a href="http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor" style="color: #2288bb; text-decoration: none;">http://twitter.com/#!/ianirvineauthor</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;"> </span></li>
<li style="margin-bottom: 0.25em; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; text-indent: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px;">My blog about the novels I write, and the writing life: <a href="http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/">http://ian-irvine.blogspot.com/</a></span></li>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #666666; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span></div>Ian Irvinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09463406973938971158noreply@blogger.com0