post-teen trauma

I will be at the CBCA conference this weekend signing (mooching) at the Pan Macmillan stand Saturday lunchtime - come and say hi!


Also I'm hosting what may well turn into hearty, balls-to-the-wall, bunfight at the Emerging Writers Festival: The panel is:

Critics are just failed artists…aren’t they?

Looking at the art of the critique; writing it, surviving it and thriving on it. Told from those that do it and those who have been done by it.

Matthew Clayfield, Rjurick Davidson Ryan Paine and Alison Croggon.

Hosted by Simmone Howell

Saturday May 18 at 1pm


The festival looks great. Check out the program and be sure to listen to 3RRR's Max Headroom on Thursday May 8 between 7 and 8pm where Lisa Greenaway and Stella Glorie will talking in and around and over and under and through the whole shebang with voxpop from various writer-types, emerging and otherwise.

T'was an intimate gathering at Sandy library today - and the DVD was kaput so I had to go live without props. I read Raymond Carver's 'Popular Mechanics' as an example of a great short story - it is direct, has velocity, it demands the reader's attention without being at all showy. Here's the mini-documentary I was going to show:




And for the writergals who showed today, here are the links I promised:
Sticky Zine Shop is situated at shop 10 Campbell Arcade (under Flinders St Station) and is open 11am-6pm Wednesday to Friday and 12-5pm on Saturdays. A good little article here.
The Emerging Writer's Festival runs from May 9-11

Re: Book 2. I have about 60 pages of revisions to go. I have to say that I love revisions. It could be the closest I come to being a cad.

In other news I watched The Getaway last night. Steve McQueen doesn't even need to speak. Ali MacGraw has two expressions and one tone. She was, I think, ahead of her time. The Getaway is one of those films where the personal life of the stars somehow becomes a character. (I once read Ali MacGraw and her ex-husband, Robert Evans' biographies back to back. Ouch and ouch.)