Part Three

My Part Three of The Event is up now. People who leave comments will be bathed in the dazzling joy of rainbows, sunshine and unicorns...

Writing a children's book

Woot! I’ve just completed my first draft for my kids’ book – one day before my self-imposed deadline. More incredibly I only exceeded my planned word count by 3000 words – 23,000 when I had planned 15,000 – 20,000. This is fantastic for me – normally my bloated first drafts turn out way bigger than they were meant to be. Of course, I suspect a good 10-20% of the word count to end up cut out, especially the overly hefty chapter 14 but it shouldn’t be too hard. It was interesting writing a children’s book. Both harder and more fun than I anticipated. It turns out that I have very little idea of what is appropriate in terms of scary content and language complexity for specific age groups for children. Having taught English at high school, I feel fairly confident about the specific tastes and average reading levels* of each year group. When it comes to primary aged kids though, I’m flying completely blind. Of course I can try to remember what I read back then, and at least with a lot of my favourite books I can work out what year of school I must have been in when I read it. So in many ways I can write for the 9 year old version of myself which is more or less what I did. I also raided the children’s section of the library a few times. They have one of those colour-coding sticker systems so a lot of the books are labelled and recommended as being for a two year age bracket. This was more troubling however. Some of the books were familiar old ones by Judy Blume, Margaret Mahy and Roald Dahl. I still feel now as I did back then that those authors perfectly pitched their material so that the story content was interesting to children and the plot was paced to move quickly. The books they wrote didn’t talk down to kids but they were still easy to read, and often quite conversational and humorous. However, I found some of the books I picked up to be either dull or patronising. I would have hated a lot of them when I was a kid and even now couldn’t be bothered to finish them. I suspect that many children who read are, as I was, rather fussy. The children’s books that get it right become popular classics and are frequently taken out of the library no matter how old or battered the book is. Great children’s books don’t date, they sometimes get made into appalling movies but the books will always strike a chord with those who read them. So after my time in the children’s section of the library, I started thinking about what I had wanted in a book when I was a kid. What made a children’s book a good one. The problem, I fearfully realised, is that as a kid, I wanted my books to have and be everything that a book could be. Now as an adult I have limited expectations from books. If I pick up a murder mystery, I don’t expect the detective character to have striking relevance to me as a person or it to be littered with insightful social commentary. If the mystery has some good, intriguing twists and keeps me turning pages, I’m happy. I don’t expect humorous subplots in all horror books, or touching moments about romance or friendship in action-packed thrillers or SF, and I’ve completely given up hope of finding any epic fantasy that is fast-paced and doesn't require wrist support to hold up the hefty weight of many, many pages. Back when I was a kid though, my demands and expectations from books were higher. The main character had to be likeable and believable. I was easily annoyed by characters who were children that came across as annoying brats like the ones in bad Hollywood TV and movies. I wanted my hero or heroine to be someone I could relate to. Relevance is a word that is often chucked about as the Holy Grail in children’s and young adult fiction, and it’s true that if you ask students what they want from a story, personal relevance is often high on the list. However, for me relevance wasn’t ever about the superficial and mundane aspects of a character’s life. It didn’t matter whether they were a boy or a girl, lived in New Zealand or a different country or a different time or world for that that matter. What made a character relevant to me was that they shared some of the same aspects as me in their lives. If the character was facing similar issues with their friends, parents or family members, growing up or anything else from the multitude of joys, problems, conflicts and passions of a young person’s life, I could relate. Other stuff like age, gender, race, social background or cultural beliefs didn’t matter nearly so much. Adventure was an important if not essential element as well. While the character had to have some realistic qualities to connect to, I didn’t just want to read about them doing normal everyday stuff. They had to be thrown into some exciting storyline filled with conflicts (the best were usually with some unjust authority figure), struggles to overcome seemingly impossible hurdles, finding out the truth about a mystery or secret or discovering what’s really behind some misunderstood character’s behaviour and finally saving the day against all odds. The scale and scope of the adventure wasn’t really a key factor for me. It didn’t matter if the adventure was in an epic fantasy world, a real life struggle in school with bullies and teachers, or the fight to save a beloved pet. What mattered was that the adventure was fast-paced and exciting, and that whatever the character was fighting for was something that really mattered to them. It had to be difficult for the hero. The stakes had to be high; it had to mean something when they finally came out on top. I don’t know if it was something that I even noticed let alone cared about as a child, but another thing I’ve come to realise is a common feature in the children’s books I loved is the personal growth of the main character. They had to not only solve the mystery, defeat their enemy or fulfil their quest - they had to learn something about themselves and the world around them through their adventure. I liked books where the main character was wiser, more confident or better in some other way at the end of the book. I wanted books to cover a range of emotions. I wanted to books to be scary, exciting, heart-warming, funny and ultimately triumphant in the conclusion. Charming or humorous comic relief characters are frequently the ones I loved best but the books that had touches of tragedy, the ones that made me cry at the sad parts, are the ones that stayed with me the most. The best loved books of my childhood did it all – they made me laugh, cry, get spooked, fear for the life of the protagonist and rejoice at their happy endings. I doubt I would have been able to express it back then but as a child I always liked books with a social commentary. The books that appealed to me had a strong sense of the injustice that I considered myself to have observed in life. As a kid, like many others I suspect, I had an over-developed awareness of whenever things were not fair. The books I enjoyed reflected the inequity of the world. Adults misjudged children; kids were not listened to or believed when they cried out the truth; authority figures abused their power; the big and strong bullied the small and weak; rules were not enforced consistently or they were unjust in the first place. That’s not to say that the books I read were all filled with adults as the bad guys or all rules were unfair. It’s just that I think children do have a passionate awareness of the potential for any power to be exploited by those who hold it. They’re always ready to spot unfairness and I think it’s a good thing for fiction to encourage the notion that we should never follow any rules or rulers blindly or without question. So when you put everything together it makes for an intimidating task. Write a book that covers a wide range of emotions, preferably with enough feeling that the reader empathises completely; write a main character who is completely believable, likeable and relevant to a modern child reader; plot out a thrilling adventure for the hero or heroine that not only provides that book with a variety of conflicts and situations to produce the aforementioned emotional spectrum but also helps the character to grow and develop as a person (but ensure that it is still fast-moving and exciting at the same time); chuck in a couple of loveable humorous characters and some insightful observational commentary about the injustice that today’s children face in the real world. Phew. I guess that's why only a few authors seem to have measured up to the quality of what I used to consider a good children’s book. I’m very grateful eight year old Debbie isn’t around to read my book. I fear she would have chucked it away on page 2. * That is the average reading levels of the students who actually read for pleasure. There are a whole bunch of kids who say they’ve never read a whole book and AssTLe test with the reading ability of very young kid. I figure as a young adult writer you’re either targeting the books that teens are taught in English classes or you’re actually targeting the more select group of teens who actually read books for pleasure and don’t regard reading as a form of torture. The light genre stuff that I write are not the type of books that make their way into studied texts lists, so I figure I can actually pitch the length and writing at the lovely literate bunch. You know, the kind of teens who don’t actually complain if a chapter is longer than six pages and the book hasn’t been made into a movie.

Eventful Monday

Phew, yesterday was crazy. We had an extra early morning with Dom (who it must be said is not usually one for sleep-ins), and had to take the zombie-like bleary eyed looking after him in two shifts. He ended up waking up from his morning nap about the time he usually goes down for a nap and it kind of left me feeling like the whole day was slightly out of whack.

We were busy though and went for two rompy walks (one to the park to feed ducks, another to Kotuku park and playground). We saw swans, pukeko, a sun-bathing kotuku and a pair of dappled greys being ridden down towards the beach. Of course Dom was most excited by the various dogs that we spotted and an affectionate neighbourhood Siamese cat who sauntered over to the buggy to purr loudly and demand fusses from us.

Then there was an exciting email. It seems that my brilliant hubby is going to have an article he wrote published towards the end of the year. I was super impressed at how speedy their response was and how glowing the acceptance email was. (Man, I want an acceptance letter – not just for the obvious glee at getting published and paid for writing, but to see if they often include praise of your writing as well).

It eerily followed on from a dream I had not long after Matt sent the article off. In my dream, he had it accepted but was then insisting on sending the magazine a picture of a cartoon dragon he had drawn (it didn’t look dissimilar to Trogdor). I tried to tell him not to, that dragons had nothing to do with the article but he was adamanet that the magazine would think it was cool. I was unaccountably really upset and worried by this in the dream.

I now seem to recall that I was the one who told Matt to write the article back in the holidays and suggested the magazine to send it to (and found the correct email address). I vaguely remember him promising to buy his wife a pressie with the money if it was accepted but maybe that was in the dream rather than real life. Such a promise is somewhat wishful thinking but it is at least more plausible than the cartoon dragon incident.

At the end of the busy day, we decided to have an early dinner and it was just as well. For at the exact moment that Matt was taking Dom out of his high chair, there was a power cut. There was just enough light to stumble around and find things but it was still somewhat inconvenient. It turns out baby-proofing your home so that there are no matches anywhere in reach of young hands actually is a bit of a pain in a dark power cut.

Luckily, we located torches and then could find matches as well. I was worried that Dom would be freaked out by the whole situation but he thought it was fantastic. We went out onto the street to check it wasn’t just our house and he loved watching the headlights of the cars driving by. We set up a bright lantern in the lounge and Matt and I performed a cabaret of song and dance for Dom. He thought it was great but I doubt many would share his opinion. We have no plans to start touring with our act at this stage and I think everyone should be grateful of that.

It turns out playing with various toys by torch and lantern light is just as fun for little toddlers.





The power came back on after a while. We breathed a sigh of relief and I went to switch on a heater in the bedroom as it was getting cold. I was just remarking that “I love electricity” when the power went out again. I believe it went out when I was exactly half-way through the word electricity.

Important life lesson. Never say ‘I love electricity’ after a power cut. It angers the gods of all things electric and they take your power away again.

It was now close to Dom’s bedtime. We chose to forego the usual bath and went straight to the bedroom. We let him watch an episode of Yo Gabba Gabba on the laptop while we all snuggled on the bed under the duvet. Even the cat came and joined us.

I was beginning to give up hope of the power coming back on after a while. We had ourselves warmly set up in the bedroom with enough light to read by and started to settle Dom down to sleep. He went to sleep a little later than usual but was wonderfully behaved throughout so that’s a bonus. The power came on a while after he went to sleep so we even got to watch a bit of TV and have nice evening with heaters, lights, clocks, hot drinks and various other benefits of modern living.

It really made me appreciate the many creature comforts that we have these days. While they may not be essential to survival, they sure make winter nights more pleasant.

I love electri… you know what I mean.

The Event Part Two

My Part Two is up now and so are other people's. The Event

Ice cream cookie sandwich

Ice cream is delicious. Chocolate chip cookies are also full of deliciousness. So naturally I was pretty excited when I saw that you can buy Chocolate chip cookie ice cream sandwiches. We bought one for Dom (on the grounds that he would probably only want a couple of bites then we could have the rest - which didn't exactly go to plan.)



Unfortunately, Dom was rather keen on his ice cream sandwich.



There appeared to be little hope of him ever giving it up.



Fortunately, he did at least stop munching for a second so I got to sample a quick bite or two of stolen ice cream goodness.

However, I have to say it did not meet my high expectations. The ice cream was yummy and creamy but the cookie was dry and lack flavour. Obviously many biscuits don't stand up well to being frozen but I still expected it to be moister and more cookie doughish.

It got me thinking as to what would be the perfect cookie to create an ice cream sandwich. The cookie would have to be reasonably soft or else all the ice cream would squish out the sides whenever you bit into it. Entirely chocolate coated biscuits would leave you with melted chocolatey fingers.

I suppose a cookie time cookie would be great but they're huge. Eating two of those with a slab of ice cream between them would probably be more than I could manage.

Maybe it requires freshly baked choc chip cookies? I don't know I'm struggling to think of a packet biscuit you can buy that isn't unsuitable for ice cream sandwich purposes.

Such are deep and complex dilemmas are the things I grieve over on long winter nights...

Top five sentences

In a recent issue of Empire, Frank Darabont contributed his top ten lists of movies of various genres. He wrote a interesting introduction about how subjective these lists are and how they fill him with anxiety because they depend on the mood you’re in at the time and then someone always comes up and says, ‘I can’t believe you didn’t include _____’. So with that in mind, this is a very subjective list. It only includes books from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries written in English. It's a while since I last read some of these books and there may possibly be better sentences in them, or indeed in other books. However, these sentences are ones that consistently affect me powerfully when I read the books and have etched themselves into my memory strongly enough that even if I can’t remember them exactly word for word, I can at least find them within a minute of grabbing the book off my shelf. I suppose these sentences have been included because they’re from books that I love and have read many times. Interestingly, each one is from a book I first read in my teens and then have returned to over the years. These passages are ones that continue to affect me as I have grown up and gone back over them, some times it’s because of the emotional context of the sentences, or the character they involve is one I love but I also like the sentences on their own as effective and beautiful crafting of language. (Besides, it’s raining outside, the Dom is sleeping peacefully and my brain is trying to sort out exactly what should happen in Chapter 12 of my book. I can’t think of a more pleasant form of reflective meditation (OK, procrastination is probably a more accurate description) than to pull out my old books and mull through them…) 1. I lingered round them, under the benign sky: watched the moths fluttering among the heath and the hare-bells; listened to the soft wind breathing through the grass; and wondered how any one could ever imagine unquiet slumbers for the sleepers in that quiet earth. - Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte Possibly one of the most famous last lines in English literature but stuns me every time I read that book. Not only is the sentence itself beautifully composed and rich in imagery but it shows the incredible skill of Bronte to create a satisfying resolution and a happy ending to a book that seemed impossible to do either for. I’m still to this day gobsmacked that you can close that book with a sense of hope and peace when it predominantly a story focussed on death, abuse, tragically parted lovers, more abuse, more death, betrayals, hatred, alcoholism, iniquitous and unreasonable inter-generational revenge surrounded with more abuse and death, really messed-up unhappy marriages, hauntings, imprisonment, and then finally more death. The ending is extraordinary in that with Heathcliff’s death, there is a sense that the next generation are free to be happy and peace is restored to Wuthering Heights but also Cathy and Heathcliff can be reunited as ghostly heathen lovers to roam the moors once more. In spite of everything, Heathcliff gets both the ending he wants (to be tormented by Cathy’s ghost until he dies to be with her) and the ending he deserves (weakening so that he can’t completely destroy the prospect of the younger Catherine’s and Hareton’s love and then dying to leave them in peace). The love between Catherine and Hareton happily reflects the love between Cathy and Heathcliff because she represents her mother and Hareton is more like Heathcliff than his own son was, but they are also a Linton and an Earnshaw so Edgar and Cathy are connected through them again also. When Lockwood sees the three tombstones of Cathy, Edgar and Heathcliff it is in some sense validating both of Cathy’s loves. One the socially acceptable, polite but still caring marriage with Edgar, and also the deeper, intense, primal connection she had with Heathcliff. Lockwood’s assertion that he couldn’t imagine ghosts lying in the quiet earth is again neatly tying up his limited perspective on the things around him. He can no more believe the notion of unquiet slumbers than he could understand the love Cathy felt for Heathcliff being as necessary as the ‘eternal rocks beneath’. With the wild and untamed heaths themselves being such powerful symbols throughout the book, it’s hard not to feel serene at the closing description of them in such a quiet and peaceful state. 2. I was aghast to realise that something within me, long sickening, had quietly died, and felt as a husband might feel, who, in the fourth year of his marriage, suddenly knew that he had no longer any desire, or tenderness, or esteem, for a once-beloved wife; no pleasure in her company, no wish to please, no curiosity about anything she might ever do or say or think; no hope of setting things right, no self-reproach for the disaster. -Brideshead Revisted by Evelyn Waugh It’s surprising for me that when I look back on this book, the bleak opening is often more powerful for me than the seductive and charming descriptions of Oxford, Venice and indeed Brideshead itself, not to mention the equally seductive and charming characters he encounters. (‘Aloysius wouldn’t approve of that at all, would you, you pompous old bear?’ – nearly beat out this sentence because it’s such a great Sebastian line and everyone loves pompous teddy bears.) I was about 16 or 17 when I first read this book and became obsessed with it from the first page. Something about the description of how Charles Ryder ‘at the age of thirty-nine, began to be old’ really struck a chord with me. This book had me hooked before it launched its powerful charm offensive and I’m always impressed with any book that can make me care deeply for depressed or apathetic characters when I’m normally drawn to lively, funny or passionate ones who would never acquiesce or give up. Charles describing how his ‘last love’ – his love for the army – died does really get to me though, every time I read it. The metaphor is extended throughout the opening of the book and it remains most of the most compelling prologues of any book I’ve ever read. I probably could have picked just about any sentence from it to be in the top five actually. (Other faves include : ‘I would go on with my job, but I could bring to it nothing more than acquiescence.’ and of course, ‘Here my last love died.’) What I love about the sentence however is how acutely it gets across the pain not of a love dying but the worse moment of realisation that it has already died and you didn’t notice its death until now. I also like the list of what Waugh refers to as ‘the whole drab compass of marital disillusion’. It’s not merely the end of affection and desire, but the complete and utter end of any connection or wish to be connected to the other person. For me, the most powerful and bleak element is ‘no curiosity about anything she might ever do or say or think’ – curiosity is often an unrecognised aspect of any relationship but it’s an important one. If you ever got to that point with another person, I suspect that there really would be no hope of setting things right. The final phrase ‘no self-reproach for the disaster’ is really effective at driving a final nail in the coffin. 3. He found her agitated and low – Frank Churchill was a villain; - He heard her declare that she had never loved him – Frank Churchill’s character was not so desperate; - She was his own Emma, by hand and word, when they returned into the house; and if he could have thought of Frank Churchill then, he might have deemed him a very good sort of fellow. - Emma by Jane Austen I love how this comically shows how jealousy can somewhat impair our judgement of others, and also rather typically of Austen, it’s a rather sweet but also realistic portrayal of how people in love behave. However, what I really like about this sentence though is it’s the first time Austen mocks Knightley at all, and I feel he deserves a bit of authorial hassling. As romantic heroes go, Knightley’s not my favourite. It’s not that there’s anything wrong with him and he seems like an honourable, kind and decent guy with his heart in the right place and he’s certainly not a snob like Emma. I just worry that ending up with him might be a bit like being married to Jimminy Cricket. I fear for Emma and worry that her marriage might end up being a series of lengthy lectures on propriety and being nice as Knightley continues on his mission to mould her into the perfect woman. I like to imagine that this sentence is dear old Aunty Jane reassuring me that Knightley is as susceptible to having his good judgement clouded by affections as anyone else and Emma will be able to manipulate him as easily as she does her father. I take comfort in the hope that Emma might never be entirely reformed. She might have learnt to be more considerate of other’s feelings and lost some of her snobbish attitudes but I like to think that she’ll be back to scheming and match-making before long. After all, she and Knightley already have nieces and nephews who’ll be grown up in a few years. As an affectionate Aunt, I’m sure Emma would be unable to resist a bit of romantic interference on their behalf and then if she and Knightley had children, I doubt they’d be safe from her plotting. 4. To find oneself locked out of a country-house at half-two in the morning in lemon-coloured pyjamas can never be an unmixedly agreeable experience, and Baxter was a man less fitted by nature to endure it with equanimity than most men. - Leave it to Smith by PG Wodehouse There are a lot of fantastic sentences in any Wodehouse books but this was one of the first I read and has remained a favourite. (I also like Psmith’s explanation of why he was avoiding going into the family business of fish: I like to be surrounded by joy and life, and I know nothing more joyless and lifeless than a dead fish. Multiply that dead fish by a million, and you have an environment which only Dante could contemplate with equanimity.) Baxter is an excellent character in this book. While normally it is left to Aunts to fill the role of nemesis and villain, in this book the efficient Baxter makes for a terrific Malovolio-like antagonist. He is Emworth’s secretary and organises him with ruthless efficiency but to the dismay of his employer. Baxter soon becomes suspicious of Psmith when he arrives, and sets out to expose him which of course leads to much chaos and eventually Emsworth becomes convinced of Baxter’s ‘pottiness’ much to the relief of everyone except his sister. I love the artful understatement of this line. I always enjoy Wodehouse’s ability to describe even the mundane in colourful and humourously poetic terms. (He once described a character with a hangover as looking like the poet Shelly after he’d had a night out on the town with Lord Byron.) 5. Having been through the Total Perspective Vortex, Zaphod Beeblebrox now knows himself to be the most important being in the entire universe – something he had hitherto only suspected. - The Restaurant at the end of the Universe by Douglas Adams Adams is another one of those authors with whom I could easily find dozens of sentences to be included in a favourites list. I still really like the anti-simile (is there a term for such a thing?) ‘…hung in the air the same way that bricks don’t’. This line makes it in though because it’s about Zaphod who is my favourite Hitchhikers character and this sentence pretty much encapsulates everything that makes him awesome. I particularly enjoy Peter Jones’ delivery of the line in the radio series and always hear his voice when I read the books now. Why do I like this line so much? I love the set up of the extreme superlative of Zaphod’s importance and then comic undercutting of the final phrase. His suspicion of his own greatness being tacked on as a throwaway aside is brilliant. Who wants a modest and humble hero to become the most important being in the universe when you can have Zaphod?

The Event Part One

Part 1 of The Event is up on its blog now. www.theeventwellington.blogspot.com/ It's a collaborative writing project where five writers follow five different characters through a strange event that unfolds in Wellington. The contributors are all awesome folk and I was impressed and humbled by how cool their work was. You should go and read it. Part Two to follow soon... Here endth the plug.

Te Papa

On Friday we went to Te Papa and meet up with Angelo and his parents for a fun (and action packed) visit. Two busy little chaps equals a fast and active romp around but we snapped a few pictures that weren't a complete blur of toddler zooming past.



Climbing up stairs is fun.



So is climbing up the ramp.



Looking out the glass overbridge at the water.



Dom with his Dad at Te Papa.



Huge white light circle on the ground. Very cool.



The boys chill with their dads in the Discovery centre.



Playing with giant lego. Far more interesting that the ice cream in the bottom left corner.



Chompy-chomp on giant lego.



Dom is not one to be intimidated by large birds.



Dom has to be held back from crawling all over the giant squid.



Dom next to a big rock...



... inevitably leads to Dom trying to chomp the big rock.



A rare photo in which Dom is in focus and the background is blurry.

Last day of the Holidays

Well, the holidays are nearly over but they have been wonderful. Amazingly neither Matt or myself got sick as usually happens on any winter holiday so we've been able to pack in a lot of fun into every day. The weather has also been fantastic (well, cold but not raining most days) so we've been able to go out for lots of walks which is great.

I've think these holidays can chiefly be remembered for the plentiful walks to parks and playgrounds, and that fact that I have been baking (and of course eating) muffins obsessively throughout the two weeks.

Matt and I have both managed to squeeze a productive amount of writing into everyday except the middle Sunday so that's good too, and the whole family got haircuts.

Photo Highlights:



Dom helpfully modelled a stylish Tutu that Giffy had made.



Dom enjoyed his visits to Kotuku park and playground. Lots of stones and bark to grab as souvenirs...



... or to throw into the water.



Climbing up the slide is always fun.



Dom and his dad walk around Kotuku park towards the playground.



The ducks at the park got so used to our daily visits that they started spotting across from the other side of the park and race over to meet us. Dom enjoys their rowdy quacky greetings.



Another daily ritual is stump walking. Dom steps up and down over every tree stump. Lots of fun.

Randomness

I got back from the hairdressers to discover that Matt and Dom have gone out on an adventure. It's very strange to be in an empty house and not running around after a rampaging little dude so I figured I'd cease the opportunity to blog. Items of random: 1. I got some 'Yummy yummy yummy' wash from Lush yesterday. I had heard it was good as a shampoo/body wash. Dom was starting to get a dry scalp so I shampooed him with the Yummy yesterday and it was brillant and seems to have cleaned up his scalp as well. The dangerous side effect though is that it left him smelling like a strawberry and cream flavoured chuppa chup so I keep obsessively sniffing his head. 2. I have decided to do a rough Word Count of everything I've written this year. Matt has been impressive meeting his word count goals and Morgue has inspiring updates on his writing this year. I fear that my 2009 word count may not be as impressive as I feel it should be. I've been writing or editing for an hour or two every day but possibly the overall output may not reflect that. 2009 Writing Poxbridge - young adult novel (technically started after Christmas 2008 but the majority of it was 2009) approx WC 66 000. Status - needs editing. Living with Iris - short story. WC 2104. Status - two for two rejections. Need to find a new place to send. Savage Crimes - children's story. WC 1195. Status - one rejection, waiting to hear back. The dragon in the library - kids' book. WC 800. Status - one rejection, waiting to hear back. The Changeling's mother - 2000 words written but still incomplete. The Mission - 450 word short story for local newspaper competition. Waiting to hear result of competition (next month). Taking back the night - WC 3516. Status - completed edit. Need to find somewhere to send it. Could be difficult. No obvious markets for wannabe Vampire slayer bromance. Baldren the Mighty's son - 4000 words or so written but still incomplete. Edited 'How to be a Teenage Fairy Godmother' down to 60,000 from 94,000. WC -34000 Status - sent off to readers for comments before I do next edit. The Land beneath the Shadows - children's book (aiming for 15 000 - 20 000 word length). Status - 8000 words and the first 6 chapters done so far. Writing for 2009 - just over 88 000. Not bad but not that impressive when I wrote 94, 000 in four or five months last year. I blame editing - it's a huge time suck but not all progress can be measured by word counts I suppose. I think I'll definitely be over 100 000 words written in 2009 but I may not manage 150 000. It would be a good goal to aim for though. Yay, Matt and Dom are back. I shall leave him to blog about his ideas for guber-dad stand up.

Holiday Excursion Number 1

This morning Dom had a super short nap and Matt had to go into school to help a bunch of students with their SADD filming, so we decided on a short afternoon trip.

It was a particularly ambitious adventure. Catch the bus from round the corner, go to the Paraparaumu beach shops, and come back home again. Still it was a lot of fun.



Waiting for the bus.



The bus is here! Dom got very excited and clapped its arrival.



Dom was impressed that the bus came fully equipped with cool yellow poles to hang onto.



Hanging out on the bus with Dad. (Even if Dad is somewhat obscured in this photo).



At the shops, walking up the slope in the courtyard.



Dom attempts to lean in for some splashing in the fountain.



Looking down on the fountain. Just as fun and slightly less risk of him jumping in.



Ambience cafe. A nice cafe across the road from the bus stop. After picking up some DVDs from the video store we headed in for a snack. They have an excellent corner fro people with younguns - couches, a basket of toys and a nearby table that doubles as a road block if you want to safely trap in roaming toddler.



Who enjoys the toys more? Dom or his dad?



Dom plays with wind-up lion. Roar.



Delicous chocolate and caramel cake and mochaccino arrives complete with chocolate fish.



The couches are comfy and easy to clamber onto, just ask Dom.



Dom rejected the cake in favour of a Chocolate fish - om nom nom.



Parents sit down while they stuff their faces while Dom prefers to combine chomping his chocy fish with his playtime.



Back on the bus and it's home we go!

The Event

After the fun I had with the Exquisite Corpse, I'm keen to do more collaborative writing stuff. I like the idea of writing a shared world story where each writer takes up the viewpoint of one character. The stories would be set in modern day Wellington. Characters can be of any description, from any walk of life but their lives will all become linked eventually by The Event. Only rule is that you have to write in past tense, restricted third person (you follow your main character) and you can't kill off or seriously mess with someone's else character without their permission. The Event is some catastrophic occurance for these characters. It may be apocalypctic or it may be smaller and more personal to them. It could be supernatural or mundane. Whatever The Event is, it affects them all and changes their life forever. What is The Event? That is what the writers will decide after they have all written and read the first scenes. Each writer would be responsible for writing 5 scenes from their character's point of view. The only rule is that you must read everyone's scene from a section before you start writing the next section scene. Sequence of The Event Section 1: Before the event Everyone writes a scene from their character's point of view on the day of but before the event has occured. Section 2: During the event What happens to the character as the event unfolds. Section 3: Aftermath What the character does immediately after the event finishes Section 4: Survival How does the character cope with the days that follow? Section 5: Brought together One by one the characters come together to face what happens next. Comment if you're keen.