The Great Book Sort (Part 1)
I’ve been reading mainly ebooks for many years, and now have over 700. I only recently realised I could and should sort them. The main categories I am now using are “Favourites” (happy to re-read frequently for the rest of my life), “Nah” (books that are good, but I dislike them for one reason or another—but if I get desperate I could still potentially re-read them). I also have categories for research (mainly non-fiction), and for “People I’ve Met” (mainly so I can quickly glance at them when I’m on a panel with someone, to remind myself of their books—but also so that if I hate a book by a friend, I can put it there rather than in the “Nope” section).
Here are some samples from the main three.
Favourites (currently 249)
“Notes From A Small Island” by Bill Bryson. It’s very rare for non-fiction to be so entertaining that it’s worth a regular re-read, but Bryson’s travel books are brilliant (and hazardous, because if I try to read one before I go to sleep I laugh so much I end up feeling more awake than when I started). Other than his travel books, I also love “At Home”, his book about his house and by extension the history of the home in the Western World. Highly recommended for historical authors, even though I don’t own a digital copy. His book “A Short History of Nearly Everything” isn’t nearly as fun (although definitely more fun than a textbook).
“Minimum Wage Magic” by Rachel Aaron. An incredibly relatable heroine fighting seemingly impossible odds to make rent. I like it. Haven’t bought the next book in the series, but I think that has more to do with cashflow than anything else. Or possibly because it wasn’t quite good enough to make me want to keep going and risk the quality falling in the sequel.
“Mr Malcolm’s List” by Suzanne Allain. Delightful and witty Austen-esque romance. I’ve been recommending it for years and now it’s getting made into a movie.
Nah (currently 89)
“Nice Dragons Finish Last” and “One Good Dragon Deserves Another” by…. Rachel Aaron. It’s rare for a writer to fall into two categories, but clearly these books were “tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me”. Maybe I won’t buy the second “Minimum Wage Magic” book after all. Sometimes it’s nice to take your reasonably-happy ending and pretend nothing of interest ever happened to the character again.
“Children of Blood and Bone” and “Children of Virtue and Vengeance” by Tomi Adeyemi. Really well written, but just a few shades too dark for my readerly palate.
“The Water Knife” by Paolo Bacigalupi
Really well written; very violent. It’s science fiction (my preferred reading genre is ‘YA fantasy that doesn’t go on and on excessively about how hot the romantic interest/s are’) and climate fiction, set in a very dry USA.
Nope (currently 116)
“The Sparrow” by Mary Doria Russell. This was recommended to me by a friend, and I can definitely see why. It is heart-rending and has a lot of kindness in it, and a very interesting exploration of faith. But some really bad stuff happens—too dark for me to stomach. TW: rape.
Almost all stories with rape in them (including flashbacks, spousal rape, or statutory rape) will go in the “Nope” pile for me. This book definitely earned its rape scene, but even so…. way too many writers think, “What shall I put in this female character’s backstory?” and go straight to sexual violence. I’ve done it myself (once, out of hundreds of stories). As someone with a vivid imagination and strong empathy, it is often traumatising for me to read. I am extremely fond of trigger warnings for this reason, and wish all books with sexual violence had them.
“The Wandering Inn” by Pirateaba. Great cover, terrible writing. I never read past the opening few pages. (If you think publishers are harsh for rejecting books based on a few pages, you should try giving a book to actual readers. We’re not here to find your diamond in the rough. We want diamonds from page one, sentence one.)
“Brilliant Devices”, “Her Own Devices”, “Lady of Devices”, and “Magnificent Devices” by Shelley Adina. This is light-hearted steampunk, and I obviously liked it enough to buy all four books the first time around. But the second time around the author’s admiration for the heroine was too grating, and the way she won over a bunch of streetkids struck me as both unrealistic and patronising. And yes, I know books aren’t meant to be exactly like real life, but the mix of dark problems and comical solutions bugged me so much I don’t want to go back.
Surprise!
It’s been a long, long time since I added any new content here, but since I mainly use blogging to talk to myself (just ask my 2.1 followers) I decided the blog needed to be separated from my vaguely professional-looking online store and (coming soon) Escape Room booking sessions, so the whole blog has been shifted over to this dusty old scene where only the devoted can find it. I’ll most likely play around with themes and stuff, so bear with me (my precious 2.1 followers). In a week or two, we’ll be back to our regular schedule at the new location aka here.
Meanwhile, here’s my son and I.
The income of the full-time author
Many years ago, I learned that the average full-time writer in Australia earns $12,000 per year (that is, considerably less than minimum wage).
Here’s what I earned over the last three years:
$20,000.
-$10,000.
$5000.
Soooo…. this year was better than last year. Yay?
The main reason I lost so much money last financial year was that I accidentally started a small business—”Murder in the Mail” and “Magic in the Mail”. Starting a small business is even more expensive than writing for a living—and yes, I’m still very behind financially on those stories (which, in small business terms, is perfectly normal).
Don’t start a small business, kids. (I mean, unless it’s what you really want to do, and you’ve saved up a huge pile of money to invest.)
As you can imagine, all this puts a huge strain on our finances. Which in turn puts a huge stress on my already-teetering mental health. Not to mention physical health (as a relatively minor example, I currently need a CPAP machine to treat my sleep apnea—that’s been on the ‘to-do’ list for about a year so far).
I’m relatively lucky, by writer standards. Weirdly enough, the main reason I’m able to write full time is that I’m not well enough to do anything else (so our finances would suck whether I wrote or not). And I also have a husband who works full-time. It’s a dirty secret that most full-time writers have a spouse who’s paying most of the bills.
The positive side of this is that writing doesn’t have to be expensive. You got a computer? at least one finger? Internet? That’s all you need. (Yes, it’s a good idea to do professional development and networking and so on, but you genuinely don’t need to bother until you’ve written and polished at least one novel, which most people will never do.)
(Yes, writing takes time. If you care about it, you find time. If not, then why fight it? Watch TV instead, or garden, or whatever.)
If you want to write, write. But remember that every dream has a cost.
IRON LIGHTS review
My fellow Odyssey Books author, Carmel Bendon, reviewed IRON LIGHTS for me on Goodreads. Here’s what she said:
Iron Lights is the third book in Felicity Banks’ The Antipodean Queen trilogy and the next in the adventures of the series’ heroine, Emmeline Muchamore. Iron Lights, however, stands alone as a cohesive read and there is sufficient reference to key elements of the earlier works – mainly in terms of characters common to all three books – to orientate readers who have not read the first two books.
Emmeline is a very appealing lead character, full of energy, optimism and conviction, and totally human in her devotion to her sweetheart, Matilda Newry, and an array of disparate and revolutionary friends, and all this powered by her amazing steam-fired heart of brass. When Emmeline is called into action by the quicksilver-generated vision of the impending fiery and brutal destruction of Melbourne and its inhabitants by an invading [mechanised] army, she responds with courage and determination, gathering her own extraordinary army of humans and machines.
Banks’ imagination has filled the story with mechanical wonders – activated metals with magical qualities and inventions that extend far beyond the usual machines to include such marvels as (deadly) Australian spiders with activated metal inserts that enable them to carry out their mistress’s bidding.
Banks’ evocation, and then subversion and manipulation, of small details of Australian colonial history is clever and got me checking (historical) names and details on more than one occasion. The story’s action is fast-paced & drives the plot forward with a precision akin to the machinery it embraces. At times the pace was almost too fast and I found it hard to keep up with Emmeline’s quickly-made plans and their even quicker implementation that saw her dashing across (and above) grand exhibitions and battlefields, and building and overseeing an extraordinary laboratory in an even more remarkable fortress but, in some ways, the rush added to the fun. In all, Iron Lights is well-written, imaginative, energetic, and a very enjoyable read.
“Iron Lights” Book Launch
Book launches are like holidays*: You look forward to them like crazy, and then when they’re over you’re deeply relieved. Win-win?
The first and third books of my steampunk trilogy were launched at the Canberra Writers Festival (2016 & 2018; the middle book was launched at Conflux 2017).
In 2016 the venue was the National Library of Australia, which was very cool!
This year the venue was Kings Hall in Old Parliament House (aka the Museum of Australian Democracy). It is, technically, a hallway between the senate and the hall of representatives. It’s a very nice hallway.
The pic on the left was taken by a good friend of mine. It’s King George in his Order of the Garter outfit. I’ve never wanted to give ‘best steampunk costume’ to a statue before.
Here’s my friend’s son out the front:
And one of the chambers, which I was entirely blasé about beforehand, but found very impressive when I actually walked in. The whole museum is brilliant.
The rest of the pics in this blog entry were taken by the brilliant writer and photographer Cat Sparks.
The selfies I took were blurry, but these photos are great. As is this:
This picture is an absolute classic. TJ was in a stroppy mood all day and his face and posture is so him I adore it. And I like the way my skirt looks, too.
I brought an adorable waistcoat for him, and offered several bribes for him to wear it—all to no avail. Oh well.
The mischief continued throughout the day, although between pouts TJ was not-so-secretly having a grand time. And Cat Sparks caught it all.
But this is my favourite TJ sequence (with my friend’s kid—Louisette was deeply missed but TJ adores him):
There were events in the rooms to either side, so foot traffic had a very dramatic ebb and flow as sessions started and ended. I gave TJ a balloon to play with, and many fond looks were cast his way by the passing crowds. Then the balloon popped.
Kings Hall has a highly polished floor and very little furniture. It echoes, amplifying sounds in an incredibly dramatic manner.
The balloon popped… like a gunshot.
The room paused, subtly, as everyone there (and in rooms beyond the hall) thought, “That wasn’t a gunshot. . . was it?”
I called out, “It was a balloon!” so nobody properly freaked out, but even so a couple of security types came and checked that yes, it was harmless.
So that certainly livened things up. I imagine that if a balloon had popped in the foyer across the road (that is, in the current Parliament House, where Barnaby Joyce was speaking) then the response might have been even more exciting.
Moving on.
Dymocks Belconnen supplied all the books for the festival, and did a great job organising everything at their end. (They now have IRON LIGHTS in stock—signed—by the way.)
Here’s the crowd desperately trying to restrain their ecstasy at the very presence of the famous authoress Felicity Banks.
Here’s a compilation of volunteers and audience, most of whom are wonderful friends of mine:
And here’s Katie, aka the writer KJ Taylor, another Odyssey author who assisted me in editing Iron Lights and then volunteered to introduce me.
You can actually see from the pics why I like her (and not just coz she’s a good editor, a flattering reader, and she bought me flowers).
I did the typical launch thing of blabbing briefly, and then doing a reading. I tend to read opening chapters so the text can explain itself, but I felt there was a bit of exposition and fourth-wall-cracking in the first few pages so I was planning to skip some bits. But then I did my practice reading**. My launch took place after a week of transparently selfish machinations among the Liberal party (turfing out yet another Prime Minister), while also forcing moderates to face the horrifying spectre of the awful Dutton and/or Scott Morrison and/or Tony Abbott (three of the most racist politicians of our time) gaining in power (we now have ScoMo as PM, who is the best of the three… which is not saying much). And it was all too appropriate to read every bit my opening chapter, especially standing in Old Parliament House. Things like. . .
‘I can hardly give your precious police force credit for catching me, since I appeared as expected at the door of Parliament, along with tens of thousands of signatures on the grand petition for women’s suffrage.’ I suppressed a shiver, remembering how frightened I was that day. ‘And what is more, that impressive battalion of police utterly failed to stop me’—I waved generally at myself, indicating my small stature and misbehaving red hair—’giving said petition to the relevant gentleman… which led directly to universal adult suffrage in this great colony.’
Dry clenched his teeth in a manner I found highly amusing.
‘In fact, if it wasn’t for sweet little Emmeline Muchamore getting shot,’ I said, ‘my own dear Matilda might not have been included in the victory for women’s suffrage.’
Dry wasn’t the only man to hate the original residents of Australia. I wondered what I would have done if the parliamentarians had spent longer thinking about who they wished to exclude from political rights, and was glad I didn’t have to live in that world.
and. . .
In a darker world, men like Dry would have made sure natives could never have a true political voice. Not as long as white men lived, or as long as their children and their children’s children readily took on the burden of hatred.
If ever my own book was going to make me weep, that was the moment.
—–
Back when PM Kevid Rudd finally apologised to the Stolen Generation, Peter Dutton walked out of the chamber, visibly showing his loathing for a simple apology.
Is there any more damning indictment on the man’s character?
Unfortunately yes. There is his treatment of asylum seekers. But I digress.
I said my bit, signed my books, lurked about the place in case the literary- and politics-loving crowd would like a bit of steampunk, and then went home.
The pic on the left above has a quote in the background that begins, “I’ve always loved politics”. It’s part of an exhibition celebrating female politicians.
More than one person has pointed out that Julie Bishop was virtually ignored by her own part during the leadership chaos last week.
What a time to release a (slightly) historical novel. We have come so far, and yet there is so far to go for Australia to be a decent and fair country.
I hope that my over-optimistic, magical, cheerful books can show a little of what Australia could be.
And I’m so glad I write fiction.
*when you have children and/or disabilities.
** on the way to the launch, naturally.
Say what??
This weekend is the Canberra Writers Festival, and I have not one but TWO book launches.
Saturday is the official launch of MURDER IN THE MAIL: A BLOODY BIRTHDAY (complete with a week-long art installation) at The Front cafe & gallery (Lyneham shops, 3:30-5pm). It’s not officially connected to the Canberra Writers Festival at all, just happening on the same weekend.
Sunday is the official launch of ANTIPODEAN QUEEN 3: IRON LIGHTS at Kings Hall in Old Parliament House (2:45-3:15pm).
Here’s where it gets interesting.
The organiser told me that Kings Hall had standing room only for up to fifty people, and no catering available.
This is a pic of Kings Hall from the Museum of Australian Democracy (aka Old Parliament House) web site:
So it looks like there may have been a typo in the organiser’s info. Just a zero. Nothing much.
The space is suitable for FIVE HUNDRED PEOPLE.
From the MOAD web site: “The bronze statue of King George V in the regalia of the Order of the Garter has been a central feature of the hall since the opening of the building in 1927. Open to the public from the earliest days and situated between the House of Representatives and Senate Chambers, it was a busy crossroads. During parliamentary sittings King’s Hall was a hive of activity swarming with members and senators, officers, journalists, secretaries, public servants, lobbyists and tourists.”
It’s really just a foyer/hallway. But WHAT a foyer (from the same web site).
Since then I’ve spoken to the organiser again, who assured me there’s lots of other stuff going on, and that his description of “standing room only for 50 people” was accurate.
So, in conclusion, the space is SOMEWHERE between tiny and enormous. We may or may not have a microphone. We may have all of Old Parliament House mostly to ourselves, or we may be cramped behind a column in the foyer. Anything could happen!
See you Sunday?
Author Photo
Every so often I get asked for an author photo. Here are some that I use pretty often:
Nice and steampunky, but WILDLY out of date.
Amusing – captured just as the whistle blew, scaring the crap out of me. I’m actually (just barely) pregnant with Louisette in this photo.
Generally author pics want to see one’s face in perilous close-up, however.
A fairly nice pic… but of course having a kid in an author pic is a no-no for anyone who’s not writing picture books. So this is what I use:
These two were taken by Cat Sparks at Conflux 2017. I had makeup on and everythink. Cat Sparks must be acknowledged by anyone who uses these (which is sometimes awkward).
Selfie taken on a miniature train.
Selfie taken in the mirror, in costume, after my operation.
What would you use if these were your choices, and you were an author trying to look super interesting and absolutely worth reading?
I think my favourite is the miniature train selfie. I look happy, and pretty nice despite the lack of makeup. Good hair and background, and looking away implies imagination.
I always take pics of myself at appearances (when I’m Properly Dressed) but so far they’ve never turned out well. Usually the lighting is bad, and I’ve begged a random passer-by to take the picture. Plus they’re generally full length, so even if my face is looking good it’s not high enough quality for an author photo.
UPDATE: The brilliant Cat Sparks (yes, her again!) took a billion photos of me at my latest book launch. These are the best, and I think the one that I accidentally posted twice is the absolute winner.
Reading My Reviews
It’s no secret that I read my reviews. I enjoy an enraged negative review, as a rule, and I pay attention if the same criticisms come up more than once.
Tin Man Games has an app called “Choices that Matter” on iOS and Google Play, which is an interactive serial story app. I wrote about half of the first story (“And the Sun Went Out”) with Alyce Potter and KG Tan, all of the second story (“And Their Souls Were Eaten”, set in the same universe as all my steampunk fantasy), and I’m editing the third story (“And Their Heroes Were Lost” by Phill Berrie). Google Play has a LOT of reviews, so I spent literally hours last night getting up to date. I made a collection of some of my favourites.
MAJOR SPOILERS FOR “AND THE SUN WENT OUT”.
It warms my writerly heart to hear that interactive fiction is making people get back into reading. We hear this a lot!
I love the poetry of the first one, and the insight of the second. Gonna make sure KG Tan and the others see these ones.
This just amused me. More than once.
I kinda like it when people get hysterical with need as they wait for updates. ‘Heroes’ is still going strong, just slowly.
I adore making readers cry.
Chosen because it’s fun to see contrasting opinions right next to each other.
“Action-packed, intelligent stories shrouded in mystery” is quite the poster quote.
Yay, more crying readers. Love it.
Poor, tormented reader.
It’s amazing how positive and negative reviews say exactly the same thing (except in reverse).
I love interactive fiction for its inclusivity, particularly on gender and sexuality.
I love a detailed compliment. It’s always fascinating to see how people see the characters I’ve played a part in writing.
I wish I could reply and let them know that there IS a villain path in the third story.
That’s startlingly deep.
I love it when people favour “Souls” because of course it’s my baby.
I just love that last sentence. And yes, that is a sentiment expressed quite often. Yay?
I agree 🙂 Phill and I both have novels published.
It’s funny how many people want to turn stories (my novels, too) into movies. I think “And The Sun Went Out” is unfilmable because of Moti, but my steampunk novels could easily be a movie someday (if they caught the right person’s eye, which is vanishingly unlikely).
“And The Sun Went Out” makes a LOT of people cry, so hearing that “And Their Souls Were Eaten” had that kind of impact is absolutely wonderful.
The way it tells you how common your ending is, is a really cool & unique thing in this app. Kudos to Tin Man Games.
I love it when readers play a story over and over to get different pieces of the story or different endings.
Aw!
A LOT of people (including the writers) want a Moti-con. I like this review because most people automatically default to male with gender-neutral characters, but Wendy has defaulted to female. Yay!
I do write books! Comments like this are both great and frustrating, since I can’t immediately sell them a pile of my novels.
It’s funny (and good) how many people have an awareness of the game developers needing to be paid.
“Not epic” is a perfect burn. And then the next review is totally different.
*love*
Turning people gay is *takes off sunnies* what I do.
It’s funny to eavesdrop on a discussion of story methods.
Same. We writers are just as in love with Moti as the readers. And yes, we cried too. And we badly want our own Moti-con devices.
I am also human *wink*.
Not MANY children could write a 600,000+ word branching narrative, but sure. You do you.
Lol, that’s certainly an up side to interactive fiction.
I love that she assumes a female writer, and reckons my novels would “storm the shelves”.
I get WAY more reviews (literally thousands more) for my interactive stories than for my novels. It shows how lucky I am to have been born in the right moment to flourish in the digital interactive fiction sphere.
Felicity Banks 