Now that the Emerg­ing Writ­ers’ Fes­ti­val pro­gram for 2009 has been announced I can let y’all know that I’ll be par­tak­ing in a EWF ses­sion with YA author Anthony Eaton:

Into White Silence – Young adult fic­tion
Sun­day 31st May 11am to 12pm
Writ­ten after a res­i­dency in Antarc­tica, Anthony Eaton’s book com­bines his­tor­i­cal events with fic­tional ele­ments. He inter­laces of his­tory and the present through two young men’s jour­neys of cow­ardice and courage
In con­ver­sa­tion with Andrew McDonald

Anthony’s book Into White Silence has been short­listed for the CBCA Book of the Year for Older Read­ers and we’ll be chat­ting about the process the book went through from, well,  here to there, as the event title says.

It should be a fun con­ver­sa­tion. Anthony’s book is — I think — an excel­lent read that focuses on an anony­mous author’s quest to unravel the mys­tery of William Downes who joined an expe­di­tion to the Antarc­tic in 1920 and never returned.

www.emergingwritersfestival.org.au

LIVE MUSIC

It’s hard rub­bish col­lec­tion time in our street. Here’s the crap­ola we man­aged to throw away.

But all is not always as it seems on hard rub­bish piles. For exam­ple, there were a few items on our pile that were hid­den from my cam­era lens.

I can’t help but get emo­tional around hard rub­bish col­lec­tion time.

It has started again. This week I have kicked into gear mak­ing notes, draw­ing up plans and ‘brain­storm­ing’ ideas for book num­ber next. I put ‘brain­storm­ing’ into quote marks because when­ever I try to ‘brain­storm’ all I can think about is a flurry of brains rain­ing down from the sky and how it’s really not a help­ful thing at all – a full-sized human brain drop­ping from even just 20 metres above would kill any­one it lands on. Kill! So I avoid the term ‘brainstorm’.

Plus I think you need to be a math­e­mat­i­cal genius who writes on intra-office win­dows in black texta to really per­fect the art of ‘brainstorming’.

Instead I just think a lot and take notes in my lit­tle note­book and occa­sion­ally blurt at my housemates:

Me: Omigod, I just realised I don’t even have to let the fire hurt any­one if I give Balt­hazar tightrope-walking skills.
House­mate (over bowl of cereal, bits of sleep falling my eyes): Huh?

This part is pos­si­bly my favourite part of ‘the writ­ing process’. I put ‘the writ­ing process’ in quote marks because when­ever I try to use a process to write I end up with a time man­age­ment plan, a house full of tea leaves and, for some rea­son, the laun­dry done and hung out on the line.

It’s a lit­tle tricky to read but April 20 says:

Today Jenny Stoot (real name Stott) took her­self, Andrew Stoot, Alisa Stoot, Deanne and I to the movies to see Home­ward Bound The Incred­i­ble Journey.

What’s Home­ward Bound, you ask? Well, allow me to embed: