Links | scribbling damselfly

we interrupt this silence for a brief message

I read somewhere once that it was terribly poor form to start a blog post with an apology for the silence. Now, whenever I feel I've let one too many days slip by without blogging, I'm paralysed for how to start, since apparently I can't start with an apology.

On such quibbling social anxieties my world turns.

Anyrate, at the risk of being passé, apologies for the silence. Life threw the pterosaur's family a bit of a curve ball, and I've been required offline lately. In fact, I'm currently stealing a quiet moment in the sewing room to dash this off from my phone (how did I ever live without the Internet on my phone?).

First, FREE STUFF!

There's an interview of me up at the blog of the fabulous Rowena, where I mostly talk about The Binding books, but also talk a little bit about other topics. There's also a chance to win a free copy of both Shadow Queen and Shadow Bound, simply by commenting. So if you've always wanted to read the books and never got around to it, head on over and leave a comment. Or, if you've already read the books but can think of someone who might enjoy them, send them linkwards!

Second, only partial self-promotion:

I came across a link to Gnod's Literature Map in my tweetstream. (If you'd like the link that led me there, it was via Publisher's Weekly, which link contains a brief explanation of how it works.)

It's an awesome idea for finding the next book to read, since us authors write so slowly and you readers read so swiftly!

Of course, since I am but a little Australian fledgeling, my name is not recognised in the literature map yet — so if you do happen to head over there, help a girl out by searching for me and, when the site displays the "I don't know this author", click the offered link to confirm I exist.

And while you're at it, add in some unknown antipodean authors like Rowena Cory Daniells, or Tansy Raynor Roberts, or Jo Anderton, or Karen Healey, to name but a handful. I've added them myself, but the site needs more than a single vote to believe it.

And now, I really must get back to the fray, so I leave you with 8 prehistoric creatures from your nightmares, to which the pterosaur would like me to add a ninth: YOUR SKULL, DEB.

3 July 2011 @ 15:42 |

yes, this is how i spend my creative energy – what of it?

We interrupt our normal blog practices to briefly toot my own horn: this GoodReads review popped up in my browsing this morning, and I can't decide what I love more: the shelves she's chosen (books worth your time! kick ass heroines!) or that she's read the book twice in the space of two weeks. It's a good way to start the day. (Ladies and gentlemen, your author, quietly glowing for the rest of the week.)

But now, people, on to matters of EXTREME importance: Nutella: Bread? Or spoon?

It has come to my attention that some people, some clearly confused and misguided people, think this hazelnet paste is to be used solely as some kind of spread, and that it is indeed best when consumed via bread delivery means. And my response is this: why, why, for the love of all things vegetable oil, would you bother smearing it on bread and thereby making it too dry, when you could just eat it straight off the spoon?¹

But, judging from the fact that my family apparently eat all sorts of foods "the wrong way", it is just possible that I'm the freak in this scenario. So, Internets, set me straight: bread or spoon?²

I have also heard of nutella on crepes. I am less averse to this scenario, because crepes are not as dry nor as thick as bread, and therefore I assume the crepe would not suck all the moisture out of the nutella. [↩]
I reserve the right, if all y'all turn out to be freaks who prefer bread to spoon, to blithely ignore you and go on with my spoonish ways. Just so you know. [↩]

14 February 2010 @ 10:25 | 16 Comments

i'm not afraid of a little chemical reset

My circadian rhythms responded to Tuesday's punishment by waking me up at 5:29 both yesterday and this morning. Oh, circadian rhythms, this means war, and you're going down. (At least no one has greeted me this morning at work with a horrified expression and the diffident, "Are you OK? Do you need to go home?" which I normally earn after a day or so of interrupted sleep patterns.)

Today I am going to do something I don't often do: link to a review.¹ Mainly because that bit down the bottom, all in capitals, is the entire content of the email Karen sent me directly on finishing the book and, well, it's my favourite summary of Shadow Queen ever. And now you can all enjoy it too

Speaking of Karen, she also has smart things to say about the author's position in the whitewashing fracas, as does Justine.

And Caitlin Kittredge has smart things to say about the "write every day" mantra, and how that works for her. And how you can make it work for you.

That was it. Quick, wasn't it? Didja catch it? [↩]

28 January 2010 @ 16:53 | 4 Comments

normal schedule hopefully to resume soon(ish)

Yesterday hit 39°C¹ — and today hovered around 20°C² and bucketing down. That's … quite a range for 24 hours. Ah Melbourne, city of extreme mood swings. No wonder I loff you so.

I've been a bit silent/absent from the interwebs lately because of, well, because of all the work I'm drowning under, so forgive me if this isn't news to you but I found this so unspeakably cool I had to share: Tool-Using Octopus!

Octopuses have been discovered tip-toeing with coconut-shell halves suctioned to their undersides, then reassembling the halves and disappearing inside for protection or deception

i can see it all unfolding...THESE GUYS ARE THE FUTURE RULERS OF EARTH

At 4pm — right when the broken-down tram stranded me two and a half kilometres from where I needed to be. [↩]
Technically the maximum was 26°C, but that occurred at 12:01am and was actually just yesterday's temperature still dropping [↩]

17 December 2009 @ 19:47 | 2 Comments

true dat

I'm a little broken-brained today, on account of an extracurricular stint at the dayjob,¹ and I still have edits and a few more edits to do, so by way of content I offer you Jennifer Crusie — Ten Tips for Writers.

This is some sterling publishing-related wisdom. My favourite is point 5 and/or 6: measure your worth as a writer on your work, not on your ability to publish, or your sales. Because writers are in control of the quality of their work. But the ability to publish, or sales once published, is not, in this crazy-subjective and unpredictable industry, directly correlatable to said quality.

And don't miss the comments, while you're over there.

on a Sunday! I am SUCH a good child, aren't I? [↩]

13 December 2009 @ 19:07 |

this means i need to remember what happened

Tomorrow, it begins.

"It" in this case would be the publication edits on Book 2 of The Binding series. Just in time for Christmas! Which is good, as it means there'll be a whole week during which I only have one job, not two. Almost like a real holiday

It's also just in time to coincide with a rather high-pressure period at the dayjob, otherwise known as a two-month examination, during which period I need to get a minimum of 95% to pass. This is distinctly less good. But unavoidable. C'est la vie.

This means tonight is (probably) the last night I'll be able to get words on the faerie novel for a whiles to come. Poor faerie novel. It's been picked up and put down so many times now… No wonder I have no idea what's going on in that story.

And, because these articles rock, I give you Justine Musk on why you need to write like a bad girl, part one:

We are all born into ways of thinking that we take for granted. We are raised within certain belief systems. We take the dominating voices of the adults around us and internalize them until those perceptions of us become what we are to ourselves.

But when you become your own rebellion you say a healthy Fuck You to all of that.

And part two:

The double standard for selfishness still amazes me. The same culture that celebrates Ayn Rand’s “virtues of selfishness” will turn around and call women selfish and not exactly mean it as a compliment. Call a man ’selfish’ and he’ll shrug his shoulders; call a woman ’selfish’ and she’ll feel so shamed and cut to the core she’ll twist herself inside out to prove otherwise.

And to be a writer, or any artist, is to be inherently selfish. You must claim time for yourself, away from family and friends and jobs and so-called productive activity. You must claim that your art is important because it is important to you. You must make it a priority even though years will pass before you achieve anything that other people might recognize as ’success’, assuming you achieve it at all.

6 December 2009 @ 19:39 | 2 Comments

look who's had a makeover

An email from Allen & Unwin yesterday informs me that the A format paperback¹ version of Shadow Queen is back from the printers. Official publication date is 1 September 2009, which means copies should start appearing on bookshelves… well, anytime over the next few weeks, actually.

Complete with the new format comes a new cover. Well, new cover design, since it's the same fabulous artwork:

I am otherwise bereft of content today, because I have spent the day doing such exciting things as arranging optometry appointments and discovering the electricity company has been very helpfully sending my bills to an address at which I have never lived.

So in lieu of content, I shall point you towards Simon & Schuster, who are offering a free pdf download of Scott Westerfeld's Uglies! (The sign-up form asks for a zip code, which in the US is 5 numbers — but I put in a 4-number Australian post code and it worked fine for me.)

for those not familiar with publishing-speak, the A format in Australia is (roughly) equivalent to the North American mass market paperback – think your small/normal sized paperback. Shadow Queen has to date only been available in the C format, or trade paperback, which is the larger-sized paperbacks. You know the ones, same size as a hardcover but without the hardcover binding. [↩]

6 August 2009 @ 17:59 |

remember what she does when you're asleep

Today, I practiced Not Wanting things.

It worked really well — right up until lunch, when I decidedly did not want what I had brought, but equally did not want to shell out money for something else. QUANDARY. Apathy forced me to eat the lunch I had brought, albeit with much grumbling about the sub-par situation.¹

In other news, Tess talks here of her and my participation in the freeze frame project, which I link you to because it's easier than telling the story again myself. The first photo of us has shown up online: here you can see me gawking at Postscripts #18 while Tess gawks at Shadow Queen. (The reading of the books was Tess's brilliant idea. She is clearly a marketing genius. Everyone who came near wanted to know what we were reading. Quite a few went beyond gawking at the covers of the book and started reading over my shoulder. In fact, close as that fellow was standing, he was perhaps the least obtrusive of the folks that hovered around us.)

I suppose the presence of me in this photo does put paid to the theory that I have the vampire-like ability of not appearing on film, however. Which is a touch sad. I was kinda hopeful I could hone that and never have to worry about being photographed again.

Oh, and yeah — I'll be watching Ponyo:

Work laid on gourmet pizza for lunch yesterday. Now I am discontent with anything I can muster up and drag in for myself. [↩]

A Cautionary Song (The Decemberists — Castaways & Cutouts)

24 June 2009 @ 18:28 | 7 Comments

this totally counts as content

Courtesy of Holy Robot (whose work I found via PixelGirl), my new desktop:

(Click on the piccie to get the full impact. The website provides several resolutions.)

I must say, Nemesis looks quite fetching decked out in balancing panda.

10 June 2009 @ 19:37 | 7 Comments

i promise to check more often in future

I just discovered a few questions had been sitting in my FAQ queue for who knows how long. Perhaps foolishly, I expected my FAQ plugin to send me an alert, either by email or through the dashboard, when it needed my attention. So if you've been checking the FAQ, wondering why I was ignoring you, my apologies. It was not deliberate; I'm simply a touch inattentive and forgetful at the best of times. And clearly I put far too much trust in "lite"¹ software programs.

By way of apology, I offer up a link to goodies:

My cousin has been learning everything she can about photography in recent years, and has just set up a site to sell some of her prints. My favourite of those she's offering for sale (at least so far) is Playtimes Past.

Incidentally, am I the only one driven to grinding my teeth by this word? [↩]

22 May 2009 @ 18:54 |