… so what a good time to catch up on my blog! It’s been a busy week, so it’s nice to have time to curl up in the warm with a good book – I’m actually reading Wilkie Collins’ Woman in White at the moment – a book I’d often heard of but had never read, so I’m making up for it now. So dated – but still a page-turner!
I had a most memorable day on Wednesday at the Society of Women Writers, conducting a workshop on Writing Historical Fiction for Y/A. For the first time in the society’s history, we had eight students present, four from Sydney Girls High and four from Ascham – and they were terrific! Really keen to take part in everything, and having the courage to read out what they’d written at the end of the session. Great stories from everyone. Well done! Just wish there’d been time to hear all of them. Libby Hathorn was the guest speaker, talking primarily about poetry and her new book of Australian poetry published with the ABC – a fascinating talk from a gifted author and poet.
On Thursday I visited Manly West P.S. to talk to students about ghosts, my novel Ghost Boy, and their visit to the Quarantine Station here in Sydney and the special Ghost Boy tour – always fun. I talked about where ideas come from, and how I came to research and write Ghost Boy, and I showed them my VERY messy first handwritten draft of the story (and the equally messy subsequent drafts) as an example of not getting it right first time! But I also stressed that it’s important to write down the story while it flows, because you can always fix up mistakes afterwards.
On Friday, I met Lauris Pandolfini from Booked Out speakers agency in Melbourne, with a view to joining them. It’s always a pleasure to have the opportunity to talk about my books and the sorts of things I do, and I look forward to working with them in the future.
Hope you’re all enjoying the long weekend!
