North Melbourne Books Newsletter - featuring Hilary Rogers

In the September edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we talk to local North Melbourne writer and publisher Hilary Rogers about her new children's book Girltopia.

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North Melbourne Books talks to Hilary Rogers

One day twelve-year-old Clara Bloom turns up to school only to find that there are no boys present. The male teachers are absent too. What could be going on? It appears a mysterious illness has afflicted all the men and boys in the city of Melbourne. No one can figure out why. When Clara realises that her father, who has gone on a fishing trip to regional Victoria, is at risk of catching the mysterious virus, she takes to the road with some girl friends to sort things out. How did you come up with the idea for the story?

When I was working as a publisher, I found myself tiring of the dystopian manuscripts that were streaming across my desk. Dystopian fiction can be utterly compelling and a fantastic way to explore issues that are relevant to young teenagers, but reading one existentially depressing idea after another does get you down after a while.

I hated scary books and films when I was a kid (frankly, I still do) – and I know lots of kids who are the same. I started to wonder what utopian fiction might look like. What would the perfect world for a kid be like? And where would the drama come from in such a world? There are countless stories where the adults are absent or killed off, so I didn’t feel drawn to rehashing that scenario. But, I wondered, what if we got rid of the boys and men? It made me think of all the amazing things women had done in times of crises, particularly when men were all off at war. Of course, a world without boys and men isn’t actually a utopia – nor is it a viable or sustainable idea! – but that’s what is so interesting about it. As soon as I started thinking about it, I was hooked.

Clara has an interesting backstory. Her parents are breaking up and – while she loves them both - she’s also quite angry about it. How did you create her character, or is she based on anyone you know?

Clara isn’t based on anyone I know, but she has a smattering of many people I know – including myself. I have vivid memories of being a kid. I’m not anxious like Clara, but I know a lot of highly anxious kids and I well remember the classic childhood feeling of having no control over your world.

In terms of Clara’s parents splitting up, this is something many kids experience, and I like it because it means Clara is going through a mini-version of what the whole city will go through: her dad is suddenly not there. Just as she is struggling to come to terms with him leaving, the virus hits Melbourne and every woman and girl has to get used to life without the boys and men. Every mother is suddenly a single mum. Every girl loses her dad or her brother.

There’s lot of adventure and laughs as the girls try to evade the police and break through road blockades. It’s a real page-turner of a story. What was the writing process like?

Fingers crossed kids agree with you! For me the writing process is a fabulous shambles. I have days when everything falls into place, the words tumble out and time flies – there’s nothing as good as a good day of writing. But I also have days when nothing seems to work and I’m suddenly enthused about the washing or googling what to do with celeriac. The saving grace for me is that I am always
working on a few projects at a time – including books I’m co-writing with my writing partner Josh Lefers. This means I rarely have time to get too weird or worried about how the writing is going.

Girltopia is your first novel, although you’ve worked in publishing for many years. Has it long been an ambition to write a book yourself?

Strangely, no. I’ve always loved my work as editor and publisher, and I’ve never felt that was less interesting or less creative than writing. But I do think working in-house in publishing has given me invaluable insight into the whole crazy business of book-making. A successful book is so much more than just a great story, and the team required is so much bigger than an author and editor. It needs just the right cover, title, text design, price, marketing material, distribution – and mystifyingly, it also needs a generous sprinkle of pixie dust. But of course, no-one knows where to get the pixie dust. It can’t be bought! Sometimes a project just has a certain magic to it; others have all the right parts but somehow fall flat. I think knowing all this probably helps and hinders in equal parts!

What books are you enjoying reading at the moment? 

I recently read Less (Andrew Sean Greer) and The Female Persuasion (Meg Wolitzer) – both of which I loved. And I’ve just started the new Barbara Kingsolver, Unsheltered – it’s off to a fairly traumatic start, and is too early to call.

Girltopia, by Hilary Rogers. Published by Scholastic. RRP: $14.99

North Melbourne Books August Newsletter - featuring Beck Dorey-Stein

In the August edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we talk to former Obama administration staffer and writer, Beck Dorey-Stein, about her tell-all memoir From the Corner of the Oval Office.

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North Melbourne Books Talks to Beck Dorey-Stein

North Melbourne Books: In 2012, quite by accident, you found yourself employed in the Obama administration as a stenographer. From the Corner of the Oval Office covers your five years travelling, recording and transcribing President Obama’s interviews, briefings, conference calls and speeches. The book is rich in detail: people, conversations and fly-on-the-wall observations. How did you get so much of it down on the page? Did you have any particular method?

Beck Dorey-Stein: My particular method was a frantic and inconsistent purging of emotion, mostly when I was feeling the most alienated. Whether it was writing at my kitchen table at sunrise or journaling in my bed at night, writing has always been my salve for scorching isolation. And while working at the White House as a stenographer was thrilling and a blindside tackle of honor and privilege, it was also profoundly isolating. I constantly thought to myself, “What am I doing here? And how did I get here? And where am I going?” Feeling like a weirdo outsider makes for lonely moments but also inspires lovely reasons to write.

NMB: The book is in many ways confessional. You reveal in compelling  detail the many twists and turns of your romantic relationships while working at the White House, in particular one with a fellow staffer. What made you want to write with such brutal honesty?

BDS: It’s the only way I will write. My tolerance for polished veneers is not great — mostly because perfect or impersonal is boring. Life is tough and magical and gross and funny and awkward and heartbreaking and beautiful...why pretend it’s anything less complicated when all the imperfections and struggles are what connect us?

NMB: It was interesting to read about the ambitious and career hungry people who throng the halls of power: despite their success, many are not particularly happy. Was that an irony that struck you particularly while working at such a high level? 

BDS: Yes, very much so, although Tennessee Williams had warned me in his essay, “The Catastrophe of Success,” which I thankfully read on a beach the year before I moved to Washington.  Success is dangerous because, as Williams wrote, “Security is a kind of death...” My politically-driven friends knew they had peaked when they arrived at the White House and that’s as upsetting as it is wonderful. Struggle is key to survival because it sharpens our senses. It makes us fight tougher and love harder. Complacency, which so often chases success, is the true soul-crusher — not struggle or even failure.

NMB: Your book, while being essentially a memoir, is also a search for meaning. It asks what should we do with our working lives, how to spend our time most effectively. Is there a message you hope people take away from the book?

BDS: I learned from President Obama no one is too busy or important to be kind and respectful. It’s important to look up and recognize the humanity in each other. Be kind. It’s not that difficult.

I also learned from President Obama that you need to do the work if you want to get what you want. I lucked out with a Craigslist ad, but I’d still be typing other people’s thoughts and not writing my own words if I hadn’t hustled. Fight for what you want, sure, but more importantly, work for what you want. Our biggest adversaries are so often ourselves.

NMB: What books are you enjoying reading at the moment?

BDS: I’m concurrently reading Alisyn Camerota’s Amanda Wakes Up  and Margalit Fox’s Conan Doyle for the Defense. They are both a true joy and gift to read.

From the Corner of the Oval Office: One Woman's True Story of her Accidental Career in the Obama White House, by Beck Dorey-Stein. RRP: $35

North Melbourne Books July Newsletter - featuring Robyn Cadwallader

In the July edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we talk to novelist and poet Robyn Cadwallader.

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North Melbourne Books talks to Robyn Cadwallader

London, 1321. A group of manuscript illuminators are working in a small stationer’s shop in Paternoster Row to complete a commission for a noblewoman, Mathilda. It is to be a prayer book, called a Book of Hours. John Dancaster, the master limner, is struggling to produce his best work, while the two apprentices Nick (John’s son) and Will, a haunted man with a past, all have problems of their own which threaten the completion of the manuscript. John’s wife, Gemma, a formidable intellect and talent in her own right, must hide her own considerable input into the creation of the manuscript.

What inspired you to write this story?

The initial inspiration for Book of Colours was curiosity and a question. I’ve been studying medieval literature for many years, and I’ve often come across beautifully decorated manuscripts, especially books of hours, prayer books made for the devotions of noble women. They are beautiful: all written on parchment, prayers copied carefully, and decorated by hand: a finely decorated capital or a larger picture, illuminated with gold leaf, of Christ, Mary or the saints, and some delicate foliage in the borders.

But it was the surprise of seeing thirteenth- and fourteenth-century manuscripts with a carnival of life in the margins that really had me intrigued: jugglers, dancers, cock fights, ball games; animal fables, where animals apparently wreak revenge on humans (Monty Python’s killer rabbit comes straight from a medieval manuscript!); dragons and all manner of fantastical beasts, and even scenes of sin, like a monk and a nun having sex.

All of this in a beautiful and expensive prayer book intended for a woman! How could this be? What was the purpose of such play and fantasy? Scholars have theories, but no one knows for sure. The margins seemed to resist the authority of the centre, to say that there is more to devotion than paintings of holy figures. I love those fault lines, the places where expectations are undermined, forcing us to rethink our assumptions. What rich material to explore!

Book of Colours is richly imagined, everything from the sensuous descriptions of manuscript making to the turbulent politics of the time. How did you go about researching the book?

First of all, I was fortunate to have visited London and Cambridge. London has obviously grown enormously, and most of the original buildings are gone. But with my map of fourteenth-century London in my hand, I walked the streets — Cheapside, Old Change and Paternoster Row, and tried to imagine what it would have been like. Even when the city has changed, there’s something about the feeling of old streets and lanes, and especially the churches, of course, that give a sense of age sunken into the stones.

Beyond that, it was reading, reading, reading. And my imagination. I read about drainage, public hygiene, hospitals, health, markets, by-laws about privies, court rolls describing crimes, the penalties for fraudulent trading, brothels, prostitution, ale-making …. on and on. But the details about the book trade are fairly sparse, so I had to infer from the little I did know. I had to read enough to find my framework and then imagine inside that. In the end, it was me and my imagination. We’ll never know exactly what Paternoster Row looked like, but I know what my Paternoster Row and the Dancaster atelier are like.

For the illuminations themselves, I was incredibly fortunate to hold and turn the pages of some of the original fourteenth-century manuscripts in the Manuscripts Room of the British Library. I watched artists paint delicate and ornate capitals and gild the page, and I tried my hand with a quill. I read all about the various kinds of pigments and their preparation in the medieval world; the program of decoration, and the reasons why particular illuminations were included in books for women. But finally, once I had all that information, I imagined the sensuous relationship each of my limners had with the page and the paint at their desk.

Your novel has a lot of feminist themes. The reader can’t help but feel deeply for Gemma, the wife of the master limner, John Dancaster. She’s a great creative force, but must keep up appearances as a devout medieval wife. What did you hope to show with your portrayal of
Gemma and her struggles? 

History is, as they say, written by the winners, so our information about the lives and experiences of women is limited — although there is now, fortunately, a strong wave of scholarly research on women in the Middle Ages. I’m intrigued by the ways ordinary women encountered and perhaps challenged the patriarchal structures of the medieval world. What happened when a woman’s own desires, interests and talents would not be accepted or enabled by social structures?

I would like to give such women a voice and, as far as possible, to honour their experience. My starting point in writing fiction set in the Middle Ages is to be as authentic to the period as I can be; I do not want to exploit women of the past in order to tell a story the way I would like it to be. It is clear from research that women involved in crafts worked alongside men, usually a family member such as husband or father, but were unable to become full members of craft guilds, organisations similar to our unions. So, many of them would have straddled the world of home and work, and possessed many of the same skills as men, but without the power to influence their work situation.

My interest in portraying Gemma is to explore that territory, and to do so in a way that is true to the period, inferring from thorough research. I imagine many women were simply frustrated and many others were never able to find their way beyond the everyday struggle for survival to even contemplate exploring their own talent. Perhaps some challenged social structures head-on, but I think it is more likely (and a more interesting area to explore in a novel) that women, like Gemma, sought to explore their own abilities within the limitations of their situation, nudging the limits where possible.

I’ve also sought to make Gemma a whole character, with strengths and limitations —more than simply a cipher for the lack of recognition of women. As I began writing, Gemma’s voice arose quite quickly as someone with energy and intelligence, shot through with anger. Her frustration at having her skills unrecognised has an effect on her behavior toward those around her, and she learns a bitter lesson about the need to separate her own needs from those of her children, her daughter especially. Her struggles feel very human to me. As the novel continues, it is apparent that the impact of patriarchy is not only felt by women, but will impact her husband and the family business.

The novel has a rather complicated structure, as it moves back and forth between two time periods in the 1320s. What was the writing process like? Was there a lot of planning? 

I don’t plan my novels, so there is a lot of editing and adjusting after the first draft! Nonetheless, I was clear from the outset that I wanted to show the ways that the book could create a kind of ‘conversation’ between the illuminators and the book’s patron, even though they would most likely never meet. The pictures are the meeting point for both creator and reader, and show up their similarities and their  differences.

Mathilda, the book’s patron, and Gemma, one of the illuminators, are from quite distinct classes and I was interested in the ways in which their experiences were different, and yet, as women in a patriarchal world, also very alike. In terms of the creation of the decorated book, I wanted to explore the idea that, no matter how authoritative a text (both word and image) might be, especially a religious one, the writer and artist cannot control the way a reader will understand their work. Thus, even though the illuminators are instructed to paint according to strict conventions, Mathilda, understands and interprets each picture both according to what she has been taught, but more importantly, thorough her own needs and concerns at the time. In a similar way, as the illuminators paint, each image has the potential to stir memories and concerns, and these will be reflected in the details of the pictures they create.

So I did have a general structure in mind where Mathilda’s experience of reading the book, page by page, would be woven through the main narrative of the book’s creation, and the two timelines would dovetail toward the end. It was, of course, easier in theory than in practice, and I needed to rethink and reorganise many chapters.

I used the pictures in the book as ‘touchstones’, the points where the two timelines would meet. I especially enjoyed writing these parts of the novel — the scenes where an illuminator would paint a picture, and I could explore their feelings and memories, but in the next chapter or so, describe Mathilda viewing the very same picture with different, or perhaps similar thoughts and feelings.

The hardest aspect was that the timelines move at a different pace, but both needed to maintain forward movement. This theme is a reminder that once a work of art is made and sent into the world, the creator has no control over the ways it will be received — salutary for a novelist, but very true, I think.

And I can’t finish without a word of praise for Scrivener, a word-processing program for writers. It was a huge help, enabling me to see the big picture of the whole novel, and its various chapters and their dates, in outline, and then to shift around scenes or even paragraphs.

What books are you enjoying reading at the moment?

I have just finished Jenny Ackland’s Little Gods and enjoyed it immensely. Jenny has such a talent for dialogue and for noticing the fine, incidental details that make up so much of our lives. So often I felt myself in a lounge room, or in a garden, standing among the characters.

I’ve just begun George Saunders’ Lincoln in the Bardo and, even though I’ve read that it’s difficult, I feel completely absorbed in its world. What extraordinary imagination. It encourages me to take more risks in my writing!

And even though I normally don’t read more than one novel at a time, I’m also reading The Last Days of Jeanne d’Arc by Ali Alizedah because I’ve been asked to review it. I do like its shifting narratives and various voices, though I find the details of battles and military negotiations less interesting than Jeanne herself.

Book of Colours, by Robyn Cadwallader. Published by HarperCollins. $32.99

North Melbourne Books May Newsletter - featuring Anne Aly

In the May edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we talk to counter-terrorism expert and Labor MP, Anne Aly.

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North Melbourne Books talks to Anne Aly

North Melbourne Books: Finding My Place tells an amazing story. From Cairo to the suburbs of Australia, then back to Egypt, the hard years as a single mother raising two children, a successful life in academia and finally politics.

What made you want to write a book about your life?

Anne Aly: It wasn’t entirely my idea. I was approached to write a book and responded to the request with “sure. I’ll write a book about terrorism. I’ve got some new research I can give you 100 000 words in a couple of weeks.” Well, they responded with “No. We’d like you to write a book about yourself.”

I don’t consider myself a great story teller and it certainly wasn’t on my radar to write a memoir but I considered it and my husband convinced me that I do have a story to tell.

NMB: Although the book has wide appeal, strong themes emerge about how women - especially Muslim women - are defined. Do you hope these aspects of the book may inspire younger women who are entering work and university?

AA: Absolutely. I couldn’t write a book about my journey without exploring themes around my cultural and religious heritage and the impact on the person I am today. I wanted the book to speak to younger women who, like my younger self, may be struggling to find their place and their voice- not just Muslim women but all women. It’s also about looking at how we are defined by those around us and how we navigate the inevitable expectations that come with being defined in ways which may not always align with how we see ourselves or what we want for ourselves. I think that’s a theme that can also appeal to men as well as women.

NMB: Some of the writing is very personal. Did you find you find the writing process difficult at times?

AA: Yes. It was hard. And very confronting. I haven’t really ever looked back at my  life and where I’ve come from or how I got to where I am. I’ve kind of always had my eye on the road ahead as opposed to the road I’ve travelled. So that was confronting. It is a very personal story. And I probably could have curbed some of it but I decided that if I was going to write this then I was going to lay it all out- warts and all. That’s scary because we get judged on so many levels as public figures- on how we look, what we say, what we wear etc. And this book is like saying “well here I am. This is me. Judge me.”

There are moments when I wish I had chosen a quieter life. But then I think about all those years I stayed silent about the physical violence in my first marriage and I realise that nothing ever changes if you stay silent. I’m incredibly privileged to have a platform and a voice and I don’t want to waste that by being silent or having reservations.

NMB: You write that you have always liked literature and the arts. Do you have any favourite writers or books that particularly inspired you?

AA: I have an embarrassing obsession with true crime books that I tend to purchase at airport book shops!

But I also love Camus, Kafka and Satre.

My favourite book of all time is Gertrude Stein’s Three Lives. In my book I also talk about how Kafka’s Metamorphosis really spoke to me. It’s about a man who wakes up one day and finds he has turned into a giant insect. He spends the rest of his days locked in his bedroom because his family are so ashamed of him.

NMB: What books are you enjoying reading at the moment?

I don’t get a lot of time to read but right now I’m about ¾ of the way through The Dry by Jane Harper. It’s a crime thriller (of course. What else!) set in outback Australia and it’s Harper’s first book. I love Aussie novels and we have some fantastic literary talent.

Finding My Place: From Cairo to Canberra – The Irresistible Story of an Irrepressible Woman, by Anne Aly. Published by ABC books. RRP: $32.99

North Melbourne Books April Newsletter - featuring Elizabeth Crook

In the April edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we talk to American writer Elizabeth Crook about new novel, The Which Way Tree.

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North Melbourne Books talks to Elizabeth Crook

North Melbourne Books: Set in 19th century Texas, The Which Way Tree tells the story of a young girl, Samantha and her half –brother Benjamin who set off in pursuit of a panther that has viciously killed Samantha’s mother and left the girl badly scarred.  In order to avenge her mother’s death the children are joined by a Mexican outlaw and a preacher with a bullheaded aging tracking dog. Their journey is made even more dangerous with the realisation that they themselves are being pursued by a Confederate soldier with a score to settle. 

The Which Way Tree is wonderfully narrated by Benjamin in a plain speaking voice that brings to life the story’s many thrilling, humorous and frightening moments  At no stage do we sense a contemporary author at work.  How hard a task was that to achieve?

Elizabeth Crook: Benjamin’s voice came to me from reading so many letters and journals written in that time. And once I had the voice in my head, telling the story was surprisingly easy-- almost like listening instead of writing. Benjamin is an earnest character, and although he relates events that are often violent, and traumatic, his straightforward narration and total lack of self pity or self absorption and his kind, steady nature gave me the sense I could pretty much turn the story over to him and just let him tell it. From chapter to chapter, I had only a vague idea of what would be happening next, and was often, I think, as surprised as readers will be. In other words, I had a lot of fun writing this book.

NMB: The  American West has always been a popular setting for characters in pursuit of something be it treasure, justice or revenge.  What do you think it is about this aspect of American history that continues to fascinate?

EC: I think it’s the allure of the unknown at the edge of what’s familiar. In the old American West survival was more determined by the laws of mother nature and raw human nature than by laws mandated on paper. Life was harder and yet simpler, in that it was more basic and centered on the greatest challenge of all—that of survival. There was always the heart-pumping question of what, exactly, one would encounter around the curve in the trail or over the slope of the hill—would it be a life-saving source of water, or, instead, a violent surprise attack? The extremes posed by weather and violence and by the the vast, endless nature of the landscape tested people in harsh ways, and I think many of us, as readers today, like to watch our characters manoeuvre through these extremes and wonder how we would hold up if we were in their situations.

NMB: In your novel it is the search for the elusive killer panther that helps propel the narrative. At what stage did you decide to have an animal play such an integral part?

EC: It wasn’t as if I had a sense of the story and decided that the mountain lion—or panther, as these cats were then called—would play a pivotal role. It was the other way around. I simply had the cat in my head first. The characters and the story were built around that central image of the cat. It happened this way because of an event in my own life: many years ago my son, at the age of fourteen, became lost with a friend while camping in the rough hill country of Texas. We searched for the boys all night, and during the search the deputy sheriff spotted an enormous mountain lion trailing alongside him in the canyon where the boys had disappeared. Near daylight, the boys were located by helicopter and the deputy sheriff hiked down into a narrow ravine to retrieve them. He told me afterwards that when he reached their little campsite, where they had built a small campfire, the cat was there watching them. They had no idea of its presence. Almost certainly, it was only curious and the boys weren’t in danger. But the idea of those eyes on my son stayed with me and became the spark for The Which Way Tree.

NMB: Benjamin and Samantha are two children placed in extremely dangerous situations. Your depiction of  Samantha, still nursing the physical and emotional scars of a violent attack, is one of a child trying to sort out a mixture of grief, anger and insecurity. How important was it to create young characters who retain realistic childhood traits despite immersing them in such dramatic adult
events. 

EC: It’s important to me that characters act like real people rooted in their own time, not ours, and think and behave in accordance with their background and ages. If they don’t then I can’t believe in them. And of course, if an author doesn’t believe in his or her characters, then readers won’t either, and won’t care about them or care what happens to them—and this would render the plot, as well as the characters, irrelevant. Readers would simply put they book down. So it’s essential to keep the characters authentic and their actions plausible. A writer has to think at every turn: Is this what these characters would do if they were real people? Is this how they would feel and how they would behave in the situation I’ve put them in? If, as the author, I’m not getting that right, I have to re-think the characters or back up and approach the scene again.

NMB: What books are you enjoying reading at the moment?

EC: I’m a slow, slow reader, and therefore I have to spend most of my time reading research material rather than fiction. I just don’t have enough time to read both. So on the top of my reading stack there’s a journal of a trip across the southwest in 1858 and a history of a Texas town called Indianola that was an important coastal port before it was wiped out by a hurricane. I’m not sure what I’m going to write next, so I’m casting about, reading these histories and plucking out interesting facts and events that might help to make a good story.

The Which Way Tree, by Elizabeth Crook. Published by Scribe. RRP: $29.99

North Melbourne Books March Newsletter - featuring Dervla McTiernan

In the March edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we have a terrific scoop! We talk to debut crime novelist Dervla McTiernan. Dervla was born in Ireland, but has called Australia home for the last decade. She lives with her family in Perth.

The Rúin is a page-turning crime thriller that tackles dark aspects of Ireland's recent history. It has an authentic sense of place and people, coupled with a wonderfully gloomy, moody atmosphere of moral decay. This is a noir thriller sure to please crime aficionados, and even those who aren’t.

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North Melbourne Books talks to Dervla McTiernan

North Melbourne Books: When investigator Cormac Reilly is stationed at a new police station, he is thrown back into an old case from twenty years ago involving two children whose mother died of an overdose. Now the children, grown adults, are possibly the victims of another crime. As Reilly re-opens an investigation into their mother’s death, he is plunged back into some of the uglier aspects of Ireland’s past – drugs, poverty and the abuses of the church. The Rúin has a soul searching tone, as it tries to fathom black spots in Ireland’s recent history. 

What does the novel mean to you?

Dervla McTiernan: I heard Don Winslow being interviewed by Kate Evans recently. He was talking about his novel The Force, and he said that in writing The Force he didn’t set out to write a cop novel, he set out to write a New York cop book. I suppose that stuck with me. When I set out to write The Rúin it wasn’t in my mind to examine any particular social issue. I just wanted to write a great story. But the decision to set it in Ireland inevitably brought with it a whole context. You used the term soul-searching and that is what I found myself doing as I wrote the book. 

I grew up with a great love of my country, and great pride in my  nationality, but the reality is that the same country that gave me a happy, stable childhood allowed for institutionalised neglect and abuse of thousands of children over many decades. I’ve struggled to get my head around that, struggled to understand why good people allow terrible things to be done in their name. I think in a way that is a universal question, not just an Irish one. And in the novel I found myself coming back to that question, trying to find an answer to it. I think I understand it now, or at least I have my own theory about it, though I certainly didn’t find a solution.

NMB: Your characters are very believable and psychologically complex. How did you get such an authentic tone for your characters?

DM: Thank you! For me a book starts with the characters. I usually have a very strong feeling about at least one character in a possible story before I know that I have something that has the potential to become a novel. If I have one character I feel strongly about, then I will sit down and start working on the other characters before I do begin to outline or even begin to start writing scenes. I really need to understand who the characters are before I start working on the book. A really well-developed character feels like a real person to me when I’m writing, and they’ll almost write the book for me. Whereas, if I haven’t done enough work the character feels wooden, and will stop the story in its tracks.

NMB: You’ve said the story started as a single image: a brother and sister sitting together, holding hands, on the stairs of a crumbling Georgian house. It’s such a simple idea, yet the novel is so layered and multi-faceted, with a wide cast of complex characters. What was the writing process like? 

DM: The Rúin is my first novel, so the process of writing it was a little all over the place! I think I took that old maxim about terrible first drafts a little too seriously. My first draft really was awful. I had no process, and just started with a blank page and an idea, and kept going until I got to the end. I could tell in reading it that it wasn’t very good, but I struggled to pinpoint exactly what was wrong. I had so much to learn! I went to writing workshops here in Perth, which helped, but I also learned so much from reading books on the craft of writing, and then re-reading my favourite authors and trying to understand how they do what they do. For the second draft I scrapped 90% of my draft and started again. For the third draft I think I only scrapped about 40%, so that was progress! I kept going like that, scrapping and rewriting until it started to feel a little bit more like something worth submitting.

NMB: The Rúin is a very accomplished and technically assured first novel. Are there any writers who you count as influences?

DM: Thank you, that’s very kind of you. I think every writer I’ve ever read has influenced me to some degree. It’s quite difficult to think of writers that have directly influenced my writing, possibly because the writers that first come to mind are all quite different. I am a big Tana French fan – she commits so completely to her characterisation so that every book has a very distinct voice, and each voice is so utterly convincing. She also knows how to tell a great story! And then there’s Michael Connelly. I think it’s the clarity of his writing that makes it special, something I didn’t fully appreciate until I started writing myself. There are times as a writer when you think you know what you want to say, but you haven’t fully and completely examined the thought or the idea, so the writing is muddy. It takes work and revision to fully understand what it is you are trying to say and get that idea firmly on the page, and Michael Connelly makes that seem effortless. Those are just two of the many writers I admire and whose work I think about a lot. In terms of technical approach, the writer who has influenced me most is Elizabeth George. I read her book Write Away (her book on craft) for the first time a couple of years ago, and was a bit intimidated by it. Her writing process is so complete, and she does so much up-front work before she ever puts her fingers to the keyboard to write a scene, that I thought initially that I wouldn’t have time for it. But I found myself coming back to Write Away again and again, and by the time I was writing my second book, this time on a deadline, I found that I really didn’t have the time not to do that work. I would say I’ve adopted at least 70% or more of her process and most of it is so embedded into the way I work that I don’t even think about it anymore.

NMB: What books are you enjoying reading at the moment?

DM: As usual, I have a few on the go! I’m reading Alex Gray’s Still Dark, which is dark and atmospheric and brilliant. For research I’m reading Forensics – The Anatomy of a Crime, by Val McDermid, an absolute must read for any writer of crime fiction. On audio I just finished Force of Nature, which was brilliant, and I’ve just started Jane Casey’s The Last Girl. I very belatedly discovered Jane Casey last year, so I’ve been catching up on her Maeve Kerrigan series, and loving it. The Book of Dust (Philip Pullman) and Sleeping Beauties (Stephen and Owen King) are top of my to be read pile after that.

The Rúin, by Dervla McTiernan. Published by HarperCollins. RRP: $32.99

North Melbourne Books January Newsletter - featuring Daniel Shand

In the January edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we talk to Scottish author Daniel Shand about his debut novel, Fallow, which sees its Australian release this month.

It tells the story of Paul and Mikey, two brothers who are on the run. Part hair-raising thriller and part absurdist romp, Fallow mixes Patricia Highsmith’s moreish prose with the existential madness of Charles Portis and Samuel Beckett.

You can read our staff review of Fallow here.

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North Melbourne Books talks to Daniel Shand

North Melbourne Books: Fallow tells the story of two brothers in their twenties, Mikey and Paul, who are on the run from the authorities. Paul, the older brother by a few years, narrates the story. He tells of their exploits on the road, often describing his ability to dominate and win in any situation. But as the story continues, Paul’s character changes in unimaginable ways.

How did the idea for Fallow come to you?

Daniel Shand: The book’s origins lie in a short story I wrote, which now makes up the first two chapters of Fallow, give or take. It was the two brothers, hiding out in their tent, in the countryside, all the way up to… Well, I won’t spoil it.

I thought it would be a self-contained piece, but I was so curious about how Mikey and Paul ended up there, and about what they would do next, that the story started to sprawl from there. But the heart was always with this odd couple, bickering in a tent. It was a dynamic that really amused me and one that I knew had a lot of potential.

NMB: The most compelling aspect of the novel is of course the narrative voice of Paul. He’s so believable and menacing, his misanthropy sometimes darkly comic, and then we learn he’s not all that he seems. How did you imagine his character and what was the writing process like?

DS: I have to say, writing Paul was disturbing and fun at the same time. When you get inside the mind of an ‘evil’ person, it gives you permission to voice the worst things that human beings think about each other, and there is something entertaining about being so free. Having said that, it was also quite draining and tended to leave a bad taste in your mouth.

NMB: When the brothers; travels take them to a peace camp run by warring hippie and religious factions, the novel changes register from thriller to theatre of the absurd. These sections are quite satirical and humorous. Are they based on personal experience of any kind?

DS: No, not really. The kernel of truth is that in Scotland there is a permanent protest camp near to a nuclear submarine base called Faslane, which I did visit as a kid, but everything else was pure invention.

NMB: Fallow has been likened to the work of Cormac McCarthy and Iain Banks. Do you have any writers you count as major influences?

DS: Both of those actually, it was such a compliment to have those names brought up in comparison to Fallow. McCarthy’s All the Pretty Horses was one of the first books where I thought, I could do something like this. Not that I’m arrogant enough to say I could match the quality, but there was something in the style that spoke to me.

Some others would be George Saunders and Alan Warner. Alan was kind enough to write a positive blurb for the UK cover, which was another highlight in the process.

NMB: What books are you enjoying reading at the moment?

DS: I got a copy of Fever Dream by Samanta Schweblin for Christmas. I’ve only just started but it seems to be up my street so far.

After that, I have Sally Rooney’s Conversations with Friends lined up, as well as Reservoir 13 by Jon McGregor—I’m looking forward to both of those.

Fallow, by Daniel Shand. Published by Picador. RRP $17.99

Released 11th January 2018

North Melbourne Books December Newsletter - featuring Andy Mulligan

In the December edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we talk to English children's author Andy Mulligan about his new novel, DOG.

It's a wonderful story about eleven-year-old Tom who is having a hard time of it at school. He's also having personal troubles due to the fact his parents have broken up. When his father reluctantly buys him a dog, he couldn't be happier. But the dog, named Spider, has personal issues of his own. When Spider runs away from home, Tom must do all he can to be reunited.

This is a sweet and sensitive story about a boy and his dog, sure to appeal to all readers 9 years and up.

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North Melbourne Books talks to Andy Mulligan

North Melbourne Books: DOG tells the story of eleven-year-old Tom. He's being bullied at school, his parents have broken up and he's not talking to his mother. His father has reluctantly promised him a dog as a pet. When the promised dog finally arrives, he is named Spider. Like his owner, Spider is a bit of a sensitive soul and is worried about his place in the world. Despite wanting so much to be a good and obedient dog, Spider keeps getting himself into trouble. Worried at all the trouble he is causing Tom and his father, Spider decides to run away. What made you want to write a story with such vulnerable central characters?

Andy Mulligan: I’m interested in them, I suppose – and work on the assumption that we are all very anxious and very vulnerable most of the time, even if we get extremely good at hiding it. My memory of being a child is that going to a big new school is fraught with worries, and Tom/Spider is undoubtedly a version of me as I jumped to the wrong conclusions, got confused, lashed out, got hurt, sad and happy again. Sometimes we ache to go back to our childhood, but I think that’s usually because we ache to put things right, or have another go and do less damage. Writing DOG was very much about re-visiting anxious times, and remembering the wondrous relief when things turned out to be not as bad as you’d feared!

NMB: The cast of characters in DOG is so varied and vibrant. There's the self-absorbed cat Moonlight, Hilda the goofy fish, Buster the noble yet tough pit bull, Thread the menacing spider, Jesse the fox and Flea, who is of course a flea. How did you come up with all the characters? Did you choose favourite animals and insects to portray?

AM: Not really. I find the characters emerge instinctively as you hit obstacles in the story, or spot opportunities. Naturally, you want contrasts. The pit-bull was inspired by a terrifying poster on a train, inviting me to donate money to a charity that supported fighting dogs - dogs that had been mutilated in dog-fights. The poor creature staring at me looked so brain-damaged and sad I knew she had to come into the novel. As for the flea, I wanted someone strong, straight-forward and honest and loved the idea that something so tiny and despised could be that character. When you’ve spent time with a cruel, manipulative character – such as the spider, Thread – you yearn to balance it with someone as pure as the little moth. Writing DOG was a real joy.

NMB: The theme of the novel seems to be the importance of true friendship, despite the hardships. What does the story mean to you?

AM: It means a lot to me. It’s a love story, for one thing, and the pulse beating throughout is ‘be kind, and value those around you’ – which is hardly a profound thing to say, but it’s probably the most important thing one can ever learn. It’s very hard to sustain kindness, and live up to the standards we aspire to - because we all get distracted, let ourselves down and take advantage of other people. But the book is about people trying to be better. Tom and Spider discover unconditional love, and in the course of their odysseys learn to be a little wiser in the choices they make. ‘It’s a story about friendship’ sounds trite, but that’s exactly what it is. There is nothing more important than the bonds we forge with those around us, and if we can’t accept and value the love that’s offered we’re in for a very grim time. I’m not interested in getting other people to realize that: I’m trying to realize it myself. That doesn’t mean DOG is personal therapy: it means that just like most writers I raid the personal experiences I’ve had, and work through all those things that still torment and fascinate me.

NMB: DOG in some ways is reminiscent of children's books such as Piers Torday's Last Wild series, with its colorful animal characters, and R.J. Palacio's Wonder for its sensitive portrayal of troubled childhood. What children's writers do you count as influences?

AM: I’m afraid I stay away from other children’s writers, for fear of being frozen with envy – and I dread accidentally copying or stealing. So my influences are from a long time ago – Enid Blyton, who told good, quick stories. I love AA Milne for the profundity of such simple-seeming characters and tales, and there’s a truly terrifying book called Marianne Dreams by Catherine Storr that often comes back to me. I read it when I was 10 and it haunted me – I think it made me realize how psychologically powerful books could be. But the great Anthony Buckeridge is always a ghost in my study, too – a beautiful writer of school stories, that still make me cry with laughter. He was the children’s PG Wodehouse. When I’m writing, I always have a Dickens on the go. If I ever get stuck, twenty minutes with Charles unsticks me.

NMB: What books are you enjoying reading at the moment?

AM: I’m re-reading Great Expectations and have just started Monica Ali’s Brick Lane having heard a lovely interview with her.

DOG, by Andy Mulligan. Published by Pushkin Children's. RRP: $19.99

Release date 18th December

North Melbourne Books October Newsletter - featuring Charles Massy

In the October edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we talk to farmer, environmentalist and writer Charles Massy about his new book, The Call of the Reed Warbler. In this remarkable book, Massy argues for five regenerative landscape functions to restore life and health to the soil: solar, water, soil, dynamic eco-systems and the human-social.

It's hard not to think that Call of the Reed Warbler is destined to become a classic of its kind. Massy has clearly spent years thinking and talking about the land and our relationship to it. His book has echoes of Thoreau's Walden, Rachel Carson's Silent Spring and Jared Diamond's Collapse.

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North Melbourne Books talks to Charles Massy

North Melbourne Books: In Call of the Reed Warbler, you argue that industrial farming methods have seriously degraded our soils. To revive the land we need to embrace five regenerative landscape functions: solar, water, soil, dynamic eco-sytems and the human-social. The book feels like a passionate labour of love, with its impressively rich mixture of research , farmer interviews, personal stories and an appreciation of the natural history literature. What was the writing process like?

Charles Massy: The writing process – aside from the usual blood, sweat and tears etc. – was more enjoyable than the other books I have done, which were a bigger slog. This is because – and as you allude to – it was a passionate labour of love, and I was able to write creatively about landscape, imagery, feelings etc. in those aspects of my book that were more personal, and also about the Australian landscape. The passion also came through because of the urgent issues facing our planet’s systems and humanity.

NMB: There's a wonderful story in your book about a mysterious kurrajong tree on your property and how it got there. It took Aboriginal Ngarigo elder, Rod Mason, to properly "read" the tree and tell you it's long history. How much has Aboriginal knowledge influenced your thinking?

CM: Aboriginal thinking has been very significant. Through having Rod Mason and others teach me their ancient view of our landscape and its stories, the scales have come off my eyes as to its deeper, cultural and more ancient nature and stories. Combined with other writers like Bill Gammage, Bruce Pascoe, and friends like Prof. Kerry Arabena (Prof. Indigenous Health at Melbourne Uni), knowledge about 60 millennia or more of indigenous management and caring/interacting/surviving in Country completely changed my understanding of this land, how it functions, and how we current land managers are inheritors of a great and long tradition that sought to maintain and regenerate ‘Country’.

NMB: You make a compelling argument that our thoughtless modern economy has created an "Industrial Mind". We think it quite normal to intensively spray the land with herbicides and pesticides. Instead we need to cultivate an "Emergent Mind", one that uses technology and science, but also allows nature space to find its own self-expression. How do you we start to take those first steps?

CM: Taking those first steps begins with re-engaging with nature; getting our hands in the soil; growing our own vegies; getting involved with the new food movements and healthy food; allowing children to get outdoors, climb rocks and trees again and discover the wonder of the outdoors and beautiful birds and so on. It has to be a tactile, sensory engagement before the heart can respond. Other first steps involve becoming better informed about the Anthropocene issues, and coming to understand how self-organizing systems work – and their amazing and wonderful attributes.

NMB: Call of the Reed Warbler has echoes of Rachel Carson, Thoreau and Jared Diamond. Which writers inspire you?

CM: Those writers you mentioned; plus people Aldo Leopold; Annie Dillard, Nicholas Rothwell; Bill Gammage & Bruce Pascoe; poets like the Tang Chinese poets, Basho and other Haiku poets; Les Murray of course, and many others.

NMB: What books are you enjoying reading at the moment?

CM: Don Watson’s The Bush; Clive Hamilton’s Defiant Earth; Ian Argus’ Facing the Anthropocene; Charles Montgomery’s Happy City; and Nicholas Rothwell’s Wings of the Kite-Hawk.

Call of the Reed Warbler: A New Agriculture, A New Earth, by Charles Massy. Published by UQP. $39.95

North Melbourne Books September Newsletter - featuring Anna Broinowski

In the September edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we talk to filmmaker and writer Anna Broinowski about her new book, Please Explain. It's a compelling, up close and personal portrait of Pauline Hanson.

After twenty years of watching Pauline's rise and fall, and rise again, you might think you know it all. Not so. Broinowski had close access to Hanson on her 2015 election bid, what was called the "Fed Up Tour", and she paints an extraordinarily detailed picture of her subject.

Please Explain is a must read for anyone interested in Australian politics.

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North Melbourne Books talks to Anna Broinowski

North Melbourne Books: Your documentary which aired on SBS, Pauline Hanson: Please Explain, covered Hanson’s 2015 Fed Up Tour. What made you want to write a book about your experiences? Did you have a book in mind at the time of the filming?

Anna Broinowski: When I began filming Hanson in January 2015 during her campaign for Lockyer in the Queensland  state election, I never imagined I’d write a book. At the time, Hanson was flying under the political radar - despite her regular paid spots on commercial breakfast TV, most pundits saw her as a serial candidate going nowhere. But Hanson ended up losing Lockyer by less than 120 votes, and with renewed confidence, she mounted a new campaign, for a Queensland Senate seat in the 2016 Federal election. With her bespoke Jabiru 2-seater and pilot-cum- spin doctor, James Ashby, in the cockpit, Hanson flew around regional Queensland on the “Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Fed Up Tour”, promoting herself as the only candidate prepared to stand up for neglected rural voters. People who felt ignored by the major parties, and those who had carried a torch for Hanson since her first foray into politics in the 1990s, flocked to her.

It was while I was filming Hanson at a Reclaim Australia rally in Rockhampton in late 2015 that the idea of a book first sparked to life. Rusted-on supporters, many carrying flags and tee shirts that she’d signed as the leader of One Nation in 1998, mobbed her. But younger voters who only knew her as a celebrity from Dancing with the Stars and Celebrity Apprentice were equally enamoured. I was struck by the absolute banality of the scene. The passionate anti-racism protesters who’d plagued Hanson’s public appearances with violent rallies in the late 1990s were absent. Hanson was spouting the same divisive rhetoric against minorities, refugees and the ‘politically correct’ elites, but this time, a handful of Cops looked on lazily from the shade as Hanson’s ultra-nationalist, flag-waving audience clapped and cheered. It was clear that Hanson hadn’t changed, but Australia had. This was the theme I explored in my 2016 SBS film, Pauline Hanson: Please Explain – but television is a fairly unsubtle medium. I knew a book would enable me to tease out in more depth the indelible impact that Hanson has had on this country.

NMB: Please Explain has an amazing amount of detail, building up an at times lavish portrait – Hanson's frocks, make-up, home furnishings and sprawling estate. Why did you decide to round out what is essentially a political story with such fine attention to detail?

AB: Because the kinds of stories I like to read or watch – especially political ones – are driven by character. Any political analysis – whether it’s about Roosevelt, Kim Jong Il, Gillard, Putin, the Clintons, Catherine the Great or Ghandi – is, in my mind, far more revealing if you learn about the personality behind the power. And in the case of Hanson, you couldn’t ask for a more Machiavellian, devious, passionate and conniving cast of characters. I have always been interested in anti-heroes and unbelievable-but-true stories. Hanson’s rags to riches journey – from fish and chip shop owner, to populist politician, to prison, to celebrity redemption on Dancing with the Stars and mainstream legitimacy in the Federal senate - is one of the most bizarre stories in modern Australian politics. The fact that Hanson’s trajectory from 1996 to 2017 also parallels Australia’s own swing to the right under Howard and his successors sealed the deal for me. Understand Hanson and what’s driving her, and you start to understand the ultra-nationalist ideologies currently sweeping the West under Hanson’s populist contemporaries: Le Penn, Farrage, Wilders and Trump.

NMB: You spend much time during the book trying to get Hanson to see that some of her views, on race especially, are damaging and harsh. Yet she seems to be locked behind a fortress of confirmation bias, refusing to speak to Muslim leaders or even read alternative views. Why do you think she refused to meet anyone?

AB: Because, ultimately, remaining “strong” on Muslims and refugees continues to win Hanson support. She is no longer the “unpolished politician” she claimed to be in her infamous Maiden Speech in the House of Representatives 1996: she is battle-scarred and wily, and knows how to stay on message. Hanson often claims she will “listen to anyone” and simply wants all Aussies to get a “Fair Go,” but this is disingenuous. The “Aussies” of Hanson’s tribe are a narrow section of the population. They do not include Muslim Australians, anti-racists, Refugee advocates, progressives, female domestic abuse survivors, Indigenous rights activists, asylum seekers, human rights campaigners, marriage equality supporters, environmentalists and even – if Hanson’s fat shaming of the global anti-Trump protesters who marched last year is to be taken at face value - overweight women. These groups all fall under that convenient, catch-all label which conservatives have used to stifle their adversaries since the end of the Keating era, the “politically correct”. But the Australia Hanson is fighting for is a mirage. It has not existed since the 1950s, the decade in which her unique brand of patriotism was formed. Each time Hanson claims she is speaking for “all Australians” on TV, she is selling the myth that her views are not marginal, but dominant. If she had to debate with former NSW Chinese-Australian MP Helen Sham Ho, or with Muslim writer Randa Abdel Fatteh, both of whom she refused to meet in my film, the mantle of mainstream relevance in which she’s worked so assiduously to cloak herself would fall apart. At 63, Hanson is not interested in “fair and balanced” debates. Absolutism is her greatest political asset. It’s worked for her so far, it continues to get her media, and she’s not prepared to let it go.

NMB: Please Explain paints perhaps one of the fullest pictures we've yet seen of Pauline Hanson – her strengths, her weaknesses, her vulnerabilities, her doggedness. What do you hope the book will contribute to the public debate?

AB: I have always been torn about writing this book. The idea of giving Hanson more oxygen doesn’t sit easily with me, as I disagree with most of her views. But if I hadn’t written it, someone else would. Love her or hate her, Hanson changed this country, and she and her supporters are still going strong. If you’re on the left side of politics, you can’t in good conscience shun and ignore her (as the majority of progressives attempted to do in the 1990s), without also shunning and ignoring the one million plus Australians who continue to endorse her views. It’s time we understood where Hanson has come from, why she thinks the way she does, and how she manages to continue to resonate with a significant part of the population. If you care, like I do, about resurrecting the inclusive, multicultural values that once drove mainstream debate in this country, and want to protect these values from being further eroded by the amoral, neo-liberal right, then understanding Hanson – and how she helps fuel the conservative agenda – is perhaps a good place to start. I guess I hope, naiively perhaps, given how many books are out there - that Please Explain will spark a deeper, more future-focused debate about Australia and where we’re headed, than the truncated offerings of the 24-hour news cycle. I hope it will prompt people to have robust chats with their friends and relatives about Hanson and her views – without wrecking dinner of course! Many Australians who vote for Hanson and One Nation do so secretly – which is partly why Hanson’s 2016 victory blindsided so many pundits. You’ll be surprised, once you dig, by who of the people you know despise Hanson, and who thinks she has a point.

NMB: What books are you enjoying reading at the moment?

AB: Jane Mayer’s Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right, about the secret takeover of America’s institutions of power by the Koch brothers and their allies. I recently finished Stanley Kubrick and Me: Thirty Years at His Side, a 2016 biography of the filmmaker by his ex-chauffeur, Emilio D'Alessandro. And Human Acts, Han Kang’s harrowing novel about the brutal oppression of protesters in the 1980 Gwangju uprising in South Korea.

But I have to confess - and I hope North Melbourne Books readers won’t ask for a Please Explain - I am also addicted to thrillers, satire and Sci Fi – the more formulaic and plot driven the better. It’s literary fast food, for when I’m too fried at the end of the day to think. I raid Gould’s second hand books in Newtown regularly, and devour anything from old William Gibson, James Elroy and John le Carré paperbacks to Lee Childs, Colin Harrison, Jon Ronson and Patricia Cornwell.

Please Explain: The Rise, Fall and Rise Again of Pauline Hanson, by Anna Broinowski. RRP: $34.99

North Melbourne Books July Newsletter - featuring Jarvis

In the July edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we talk to writer and illustrator Jarvis about his hilarious and utterly brilliant new picture book for children, Mrs Mole, I'm Home!.

It's the story of Morris Mole. He is tired from waiting tables at Gordon Ratzy's nightclub and so goes home. The only problem is he can't find his glasses. Never mind, Morris Mole thinks, he should know the way by now. And so off he burrows. "Mrs Mole, I'm home!" he cheerfully exclaims, but every time he always finds himself in the wrong home - with a family of rabbits, then owls, then penguins and finally crocodiles.

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North Melbourne Books talks to Jarvis 

North Melbourne Books:  Morris Mole is tired from working all day serving tables at Gordon Ratzy's nightclub. He now has to get home but can't find his glasses. Never mind, Morris Mole thinks, he should know the way by now. And so off he burrows. "Mrs Mole, I'm home!" he cheerfully exclaims, but every time he always finds himself in the wrong home - with a family of rabbits, then owls, then penguins and finally crocodiles. Will he ever get home and enjoy some worm soup? Where did you get the idea for the story?

Jarvis: As with most of my ideas I think of an image first. The image that popped in my head was a little mole popping out of the ground somewhere he shouldn’t be shouting ‘I’m home!’. It’s a very simple idea, but there was lots of room for humour!

NMB: Morris Mole is wonderfully cheerful and optimistic that he'll get home eventually. Is he based on anyone you know?

J: He is a trier! I hadn’t really based him on someone but my wife, Jenna, is always optimistic and cheerful ….and without her glasses is completely lost…hmm you’ve got me thinking now...

NMB: There's always so much humour in your picture books. There's some terrific gags in Mrs Mole, I'm Home! Are you the sort of person that likes to make jokes and have a laugh?

J: Unfortunately yes I’m one of those annoying people who tries to make jokes….ALL the time, but fortunately that helps when I do kids events and school visits!

NMB: Your illustrations are always wonderfully vibrant, colourful and happy. Who are the artists you draw inspiration from?

J: I love Miroslav Sasek, Quentin Blake, Ralph Steadman, Peter Blake, and lots of newer artists too….Marta Altes, Yasmeen Ismail and Keith Negley. All these people have colourful work that jumps out at you, and they all feel honest and handmade. Im just more comfortable with bright colours!

NMB:  What books are you enjoying reading at the moment?

J: Recent reads: John le Carre – The Spy Who Came in From the Cold; Ali Smith – There but for the; and I’m looking forward to starting Limmy – That’s Your Lot.

I’m always nosey when it comes to picture books, and although I don’t have kids I do buy a picture book now and again…NO! by Marta Altes is one I pick up again and again.

Mrs Mole, I'm Home! by Jarvis. Published by Walker Books. RRP: $16.99

North Melbourne Books May Newsletter - featuring Benjamin Ludwig

In the May edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we talk to American writer Benjamin Ludwig about his debut novel, Ginny Moon.

Ginny Moon is a fourteen-year-old girl with autism. At the age of nine she was taken away from her abusive birth mother, Gloria. Since then she has been living with different sets of foster parents, but due to her behavioural issues these arrangements have not worked out.

Written entirely in the voice of a fourteen-year-old autistic girl, Ginny Moon is a brilliant achievement.

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North Melbourne Books talks to Benjamin Ludwig

Photo credit: Perry Smith

North Melbourne Books: Ginny Moon is a 14-year-old girl with autism, who was taken away from her abusive birth mother Gloria at the age of nine and is now living with her ‘forever’ parents Maura and Brian. Despite having a stable home with two caring parents, Ginny is determined to run away and live with Gloria, who has a restraining order placed against her. As the story develops, we learn some of the complex psychological reasons as to why Ginny wants to run away. What inspired you to write this story?

Benjamin Ludwig: The story was inspired by the world my daughter exposed me to. Every Wednesday night, I’d take my daughter to the Special Olympics basketball practices, sit on the bleachers, and listen to the athletes talk. The way they communicated with one another—and keep in mind not all of them were autistic—turned my understanding inside-out. Many people with intellectual disabilities use language in what looks to us like a purely expressive way. We assume that their verbal expression is enough for us to know how to help. For example, when I’m hungry, I might say, ‘Hey, let’s go get something to eat. I’m starving.’ It’s all right there, the desired action coupled with an explanation as to why we should take it. But people with intellectual disabilities sometimes aren’t always capable of that level of complexity. A person with autism might stand there with a hand on his stomach, saying, ‘My belly.’ And we think, What, does it hurt? Ah yes! It must hurt! Let’s get you to the bathroom! And the truth may very well be that he’s hungry. So he’s used language to state what he thinks is a complete expression, but it’s missing a whole host of beats. The missing-beat dynamic, if I can call it that, helped me create Ginny, a young lady who wanted to say something, was trying to say something, but whose disabilities caused her to miss at least half the beats needed to say it.

NMB: The novel is written in the voice of 14-year-old Ginny Moon. Sustaining the perspective of an autistic child for 360 pages must have been a daunting challenge. It also carries a heavy responsibility to get it right. How did you go about creating Ginny’s voice?

BL: Ginny’s voice drove the story. It came to me fully-formed, and charged onto the page. If I’m honest, it wasn’t her voice that propelled the narrative. In that sense, writing it was really a matter of keeping up with her. The plot, which of course exists separate from the voice, was sort of pre-determined. I’d ask myself, Why does she emphasise that particular word? or What is it that’s really bothering her, when she picks at her fingers? The answers to those questions, and others like them, composed the major plot-points in the book.

NMB: The ‘forever’ parents Maura and Brian are shown in a very realistic light. You really sympathise with them. How much of your own experiences went into the novel?

BL: I couldn’t have written Ginny Moon if I hadn’t become a foster parent and adopted a special-needs teenager, but my own personal experiences aren’t in the book. When we adopted our daughter, my wife and I found ourselves immersed in a world of social workers, therapists, special educators and adoption specialists. We heard a lot of stories from a lot of people who take care of kids. All those stories helped inform the story’s background, though not in a conscious way. I should also say that we were tremendously supported by the people we met through social services and at our daughter’s school, so I hope people see that everyone needs a network when they do the kind of work that Maura and Brian do. Adoption isn’t something you do on your own. It takes the active participation of lots of different groups and individuals.

NMB: What do you hope the book will teach readers about autism?

BL: People with autism are individuals, and really can’t be lumped together in terms of behaviors that some of them exhibit. The autism spectrum itself is truly vast. One time the mom of an autistic child said to me, ‘You know, if you’ve met one kid with autism, then you’ve met one kid with autism.’ And she was right. People with autism are as different from one another as two neurotypical people are from one another. They’re not all great at math, though that’s the stereotype. They tend to love math because math is consistent and predictable, but having a need for consistency and predictability doesn’t make a person automatically gifted.

NMB: What books are you enjoying reading at the moment?

BL: Since I just finished a pre-pub tour, I wanted to read something grounding, so I’m just finishing The Hobbit. There are several books that I re-read every year, and that’s one of them. Others include two of Shakespeare’s plays (Twelfth Night and Hamlet) and a collection of short stories by Jim Heynen, called The One-Room Schoolhouse.

Ginny Moon, by Benjamin Ludwig. Published by Harlequin. RRP: $29.99

North Melbourne Books April Newsletter - featuring Anna Walker

In the April edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we talk to writer and illustrator Anna Walker about her exquisitely beautiful new children's picture book, Florette.

It's the touching story of a young girl who longs to create a garden in her city apartment. With its lovely, delicate drawings and moving themes of renewal, Florette can by enjoyed by child and adult alike.

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North Melbourne Books talks to Anna Walker

North Melbourne Books: When Mae moves to a new home in an apartment block in the city she wants to bring her beloved garden with her. Mae misses the apple-tree birds and the butterflies in the wavy grass, but there is no room for these delights on the city's balconies and roof tops. Then, on a walk through the city with her mother, Mae comes across an apple-tree bird. She follows the bird and is led to what seems to be a leafy forest, but which is in fact a beautiful garden shop called Florette. Mae plants a stalk she finds near the shop and so starts a garden in her apartment. How did the idea for the story come to you?

Anna Walker: In 2015 I was travelling with my family in Europe, when one morning in Paris we came across a window filled with plants. The shop was on the other side of the street across the lanes of traffic. I stopped to look for a moment and then ran to catch up with the kids. It was only a few seconds, but when we returned home I kept thinking about the forest behind glass in the middle of the city.  This moment was the beginning of Florette.

NMB  Florette is a beautiful story about making gardens in unlikely environments and using your imagination. What message do you hope to convey to readers?

AW: When I travel I sometimes feel a bit anxious about leaving home. To feel more at ease I draw in my visual diary. In Florette I wanted to explore the idea of noticing tiny details in the world around us and using imagination to create a world in which we belong. For me a big part of childhood is the discovery of the tiny creatures in our environment and I hope all children can experience this.

NMB: Your book makes you want to go out and create a magical garden space. Are you a keen gardener yourself?

AW: We have a beautiful garden, mainly due to my clever husband. I enjoy spending time among the plants. In late Autumn I am looking forward to planting daffodil bulbs - they are in the fridge now preparing to be planted!

NMB: The city garden store depicted in Florette is wonderfully green and lush. Did you base it on any places you've been to yourself or visited as a child?

AW: My grandmother used to say that when I was very little I would take her by the hand and pull her out into our garden which apparently was a wild tangle of plants. I would point for her to sit down and then tell her a big story (even though I couldn't speak a clear word)! I don't remember this but the story has become part of who I am.  One of my favourite childhood books was The Secret Garden, I felt a connection with the characters and asked my mum for seeds so that I too could have my own 'bit of earth'. Florette in many ways is a celebration of the stories I loved as a child.

NMB: What books are you enjoying reading at the moment?

AW: I just finished reading Wormwood Mire by Judith Rossell which I highly recommend. I had been looking forward to further adventures of Stella ever since reading Withering-By-Sea. Both books are a wonderful mix of adventure and curious intrigue!

I feel a bit guilty that I am not reading an adult book at the moment. . . Instead I have just begun Pax by Sara Pennypacker Illustrated by Jon Klassen. Such superb illustrations.

And speaking of superb illustrations, I am also looking forward to getting my paws on Under The Love Umbrella by Davina Bell, illustrated by Allison Colpoys!

Florette, by Anna Walker. Published by Viking. RRP: $24.99

North Melbourne Books March Newsletter - featuring Jarett Kobek

In the March edition of the North Melbourne Books newsletter we talk to Turkish-American novelist Jarett Kobek about his novel, I Hate the Internet. It's a savage satire on technology, media, celebrity, big business, politics and just about everything.

Don't miss this incendiary bomb of a book, a genuine rarity today. You may not agree with everything in it, but it's a book that will challenge your every assumption. (You can read our staff review here.)

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North Melbourne Books talks to Jarett Kobek

North Melbourne Books: I Hate the Internet centres around Adeline, a forty-five-year-old comic book creator. Her main claim to fame is a comic called Trill, published in the 1990s, which made her somewhat famous. Fast forward twenty years and things go awry when she gives a talk and in a sudden flight of fancy goes off on a rant. Someone in the audience records the outburst, uploads it onto the Internet and before Adeline knows it, she's involved in Twitter wars with the fans of Beyonce and Rhianna. The story is told in a rather fragmented, almost cubist or dadaist fashion, interspersed with a lot of freewheeling commentary on just about everything - politics, poverty, economics, the social status of minorities, technology. The style is the very opposite of your regular literary novel. How did you come up with the book's design?

Jarett Kobek: I wish that I could say that this was an entirely conscious approach, but it wasn’t. My time in San Francisco gave me a little bit of a nervous breakdown—both in terms of what seemed to be my inability to make good as a writer and in terms of having to deal with the endless bullshit of that one industry town—and so when I started writing I Hate the Internet, it came out in the hyperfragmented style that you mention.

Very shortly thereafter, I realized that this approach worked really well in addressing the Internet, as it mirrors the way that the Internet presents itself. So I ran with it and commodified my temporary mental illness into a reasonably lucrative cultural artifact. If you must go nuts, you should probably try and make it pay.

NMB: I Hate the Internet has a lot to say about the patriarchy and how women are treated as second class citizens. At one stage in the book there are calls for women to turn their back on the Internet and create their own version of it. In some parts the novel reads like a feminist treatise. How did you come to have such strong views on the status of women in society?

JK: I personally don’t apply the term feminist for two reasons: (1) every time I hear a man call himself a feminist, it’s the sound of someone trying to get laid, and (2) feminism at its heart is an argument about establishing the total equality of the two sexes, which is something that I reject because I believe that women are better than men.

I don’t know how anyone could get past a certain age—say 25, 30 tops—and not be just achingly aware of how incredibly unfair and full of shit the world is when it comes to its treatment of women, both on a macro economic and micro interpersonal scale. Heterosexuality is a millennia-long con job. The alternates are a bit better, but only just.

The irony here is that the positive reception of I Hate the Internet has been inherently predicated on the sexism it purports to critique. There’s no way that a woman who wrote the same book, word for word, would have been taken as seriously. She would have opened herself up to a world of unfathomable abuse and summarily dismissed.

NMB: There are a few digs taken at science fiction novels and writers in your novel, yet clearly you know your stuff on the subject. The influence of Kurt Vonnegut seems to be strongest on I Hate the Internet. How much of an influence has science fiction been on your work?

JK: Like every American teenaged boy of a certain age and specific levels of sexual frustration and intelligence, I had a Science Fiction phase. Mine was a little weird because I read, primarily, the authors of the so-called New Wave, which was a brief bloom of drug use and weird sex in the ‘60s and early ‘70s. People like Thomas M. Disch and Philip K. Dick and Harlan Ellison. This convinced me that Science Fiction was a radical literature—which is the exact opposite of the truth. There is no more conservative literature than Science Fiction. There came a long period of disabusement when I branched out into the putative Masters of the Genre.

These days, I think the only real influence other than Vonnegut (though he would have rejected the label as a writer of Science Fiction) is Philip K. Dick. There’s a chapter in IHTI which is so indebted to him that it’s crazy.

NMB: There's a wonderful scene at the end of I Hate the Internet where the character J. Karacehennem gives an extraordinary speech to a group of tourists. Amongst other things he declares, “Book people are the only people who have a half-way interesting argument to make against the Internet!” and “...no technology can overwhelm Charlotte Bronte!” For many years we were told that the information age would make libraries and books redundant, but (thankfully) that hasn't happened. Why do you think books survived the Internet?

JK: The arguments you mention tend to originate either from the people who have a vested economic interest in destroying books or an economic worry that publishing will be destroyed. So propaganda or fear.

All the arguments rest on the assumption that there’s a difference between new tech and the book. But the book itself is just technology, a piece of hardware that’s been developed over 1500 years by countless numbers of individuals. It’s not going to be erased by something developed over five months in a Palo Alto garage.

The real threat to the book is not smartphones or the Internet—the real threat is bad governance by malefactors who hate the idea of a literate poor.

NMB: What books are you enjoying reading at the moment?

JK: The Kardashian Dynasty by Ian Halpern.

I Hate the Internet is published by Serpent's Tail. RRP $27.99