Three little baubles of happy news to hang on your tree this December:
Firstly - huge congratulations to Isobel J Hillman for getting her first poem published at Ink, Sweat & Tears - I'm particularly thrilled for her as she's my daughter, and she wrote Avalanches when she was nine (she's the grand old age of ten now!).
Secondly - I have a story up at The Bactrian Room. I'd love your thoughts on this one. My thanks go to Russell Streur who has virtually adopted me this year!
Thirdly - the names have gone into the hat - the person receiving a copy of The Juno Charm is:
Congratulations, Dan - drop me an email at teaforthetiller [at] hotmail [dot] com and The Juno Charm will work its magical way to you.
Thanks to all who've read and or followed the blog this year - your support means so much to me. However you choose to celebrate this holiday, I hope you have a relaxing and meaningful time - and a heap of fun ;) You really are the trimmings on the tree for me.
25 comments:
Clever girls.
x
Congrats to you and your daughter! Just heading over to read the poems now. I hope you have a nice holiday season as well :)
Thanks, Rachel - apples and trees, eh? x
Thank you, Andrea - let me know what you think :) Season's joviality to you and yours, too x
Have a wonderful Xmas, Rachel.
You, too, Donna - hey, fancy co-writing - combining our literary powers could yiled dividends - I'm thinking, DeTamble; the footloose years? It could be the sequel prequel - where he has a premonition that there's doom afoot and takes reinforcement measures - gaffa taping fleece and bread bags to his trotters....could be a bestseller...
Congratulations on the publications. Have put your story on my Readability list to enjoy as soon as I have finished the story I am editing this week. Excited about receiving the Juno Charm too. Like the tension in the photos of the hat draw. Thanks again.
Thanks, Dan - let me know what you think of the story - Congratulations for the draw :)
Triple yay!!
Congrats mostest to Isobel (beautiful name) - a BRILLIANT poem!
I love your daughter's poem. Amazingly mature and polished. I'll get back to you after I read your short story.
A lovely poem, Avalanche. Plays guitar, I see. Great! (I teach guitar to loads of children in schools every week).
The combination of reading Escape Behaviours and Hiding From the Wolves made me imagine the latter as a graphic novel. (I keep imagining that scene where he's tied up by the police rendered graphically). I thought the story would really suit that medium.
Isobel says thank you, Nuala, Kass and Dominic, with a bashful grin :)
Dominic, it is the story of my next graphic novel! I'm amazed (and chuffed) you read it so visually and got that from it.
I tried to post a comment earlier, but I think the Internet may have eaten it.
Isobel's poem is wonderful. I hope she will write many more.
I enjoyed your story, yet I feel I need to read it at least one more time to be sure that I have 'got' it. Now I know that there is to be a graphic novel version, I may - sloven that I am - let the full richness of the story reveal itself to me that way!
Sorry your earlier comment got stuck in t'interweb, Tim, and thanks for giving it another go.
I hope Isobel will keep writing, too.
The story is a bit Monty Python meets Thomas Hardy. I'd better get a move on with Escape Behaviours to free me up to work on Hiding From the Wolves - thanks so much for taking the time to read it.
That's a good high-concept description, "Monty Python meets Thomas Hardy" - you could use it to pitch the story to Hollywood!
It's possible Hollywood would misunderstand, though... "I see Tom Cruise as Thomas Hardy - whaddya reckon to Samuel L. Jackson as this Python guy?"
Anything's possible ;)
You crack me up!
Clever girls, indeed! What a haunting poem and what a captivating story. Clearly a dynasty in the making here, Rachel!
Thanks for reading, Dick :)
While I was reading your story I was seeing shades of gray and black spattered with blood red. There was a very artistic quality to it.
I found the dialect authentic and colorful. I could imagine it was set in the hills somewhere here in America.
Congratulations. You've created an original. As Neil Gaiman said, "The world always seems brighter when you've just made something that wasn't there before."
Kass, I think you borrowed my eyes to read it.
The first few paragraphs came to me as a dream. I woke up and started writing and didn't stop for the whole day, then went over and wrote the ending the next day. It was a strange experience, though not entirely unknown to me (or many writers).
Writing is a very visual experience for me, and the colours, when I draw the story, will pattern it.
I'm very grateful you read it and thankful for the wonderful encouragement.
Happy Christmas Rachel to you and your family and congratulations to Isobel on her first publication. Lovely suggestive poem and your story made me feel freezing, kept seeing blood on snow and smelling wolves on the air - great work. Hope the New Year brings you everything you wish for. Best, xcat
Merry Christmas, Cat - been great to see you have so much success this year - long may it continue x
Congratulations to Isobel. May it be the first of many published pieces!
Very interesting story, quite sinister. I was suspicious of Mallick and his eye teeth and began to wonder if he'd been chomping on the lambs and not the wolves! It gave me goosebumps.
Thanks so much for reading my story, Helen - I like to mix the sinister with the downright bonkers!
Hi Rachel,
Thank you for the sweet Christmas greeting - and my best to you and yours in return. How lovely for our daughter to be published, and even more wonderful for her to have the ability to express herself with such grace - like mother, like daughter!
Thank you, GW - Isobel is so overwhelmed people like her poem - quite lovely.
Have a wonderful 2012!
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