Thanks very much, Teresa Stenson, for presenting me with this blog award and giving me something to post in February!
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Where do you usually write/create?
In
writing terms, the creating and the writing often occur at different times,
though not always. Often an idea will present itself to me when I’m out and
about, or when reading or listening to other people’s conversations – I am a
dreadful earwigger! In that sense, the creating part happens anywhere. But the
writing gets done during school hours, and evenings after the kids are in bed,
and at weekends, usually at a table I bagged at a charity shop for this very
purpose, though I used to have to write on my bed (which is far more
uncomfortable that one would imagine if one hadn’t spent all day there). I
carry a notebook with me everywhere I go, too, so I do take notes and jot lines
to add to story drafts-in-progress as I potter around Auckland and its
environs. Comic creating gets done, predominantly in my car, outside the house
of my daughter’s guitar tutor or on the settee of an evening, and the painting
part I do at the aforementioned desk. I should have just written “Anywhere,”
ay?
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Describe your ideal writing/making day.
I
wake naturally, it’s still very early, I have clarity of thought, my eyes aren't sore and the kids are
out with their dad for the day and miraculously my neighbours are not felling
trees or using petrol mowers or leaf blowers. I open my laptop and the next
thing I notice is the kids opening the door, they’ve had a great day and are
asking why I haven’t put the lights on.
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What are you really enjoying working on at the moment?
A
short story about food and cross-cultural social etiquette, and a comic/graphic
interview with a writer whose work I am in awe of.
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What, if anything, stops you from writing?
Insects.
And biscuits. Insects in my biscuits would be a definite game ender, unless
they were dead fly biscuits, which would only cause a temporary hiatus.
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If you could choose a writer to be your mentor (share work with, chat about the
process) who would it be?
I
have to choose just one? I was lucky when I won the AUT Graphic Fiction Competition
that part of my prize was mentoring from Dylan Horrocks, who is revered as
something of a comics Buddha, though I doubt he would be keen on followers
rubbing his tummy for luck. Writing wise, I love everything I’ve read of Nuala
Nà Chonchúir, David Constantine and Adnan Mahmutovic, they can do no wrong in
my eyes, and I’d love to natter with Alison Moore, Toni Morrison, Michael
Ondaatje and Audrey Niffenegger, ask them about structure.
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Do you believe in writer's block? If you get it, how do you overcome it?
I
think it’s very real for a lot of writers, I don’t doubt it when they say they
have it, but I haven’t experienced it. The nearest to it I can imagine is when
I spend too much time on my opening paragraph and I find I put a
disproportionate amount of pressure on myself to have the following sentences
perfect in a first draft. I think something like writer’s block can also happen,
conversely, when the opening is all wrong and I haven’t thought something out
as well as I should have before writing, in which case the writing bumps me out
and I find it difficult to press on until I’ve resolved the issue.
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Tell us a good thing that happened to you today.
I
got this blog award!
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What's the first thing you do in the morning?
Pretend
to be asleep.
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What's your most listened to song?
Today
it’s “Birds” by The Veils (Finn Andrews
and his younger brother were at a recent literary gathering I attended, apparently
I wasn’t the first person to mistake the latter for the former and my mention
of the younger being the spit of my kid brother did little to redeem me). Previous
obsessive plays include “Animal Life” by Shearwater;
Rokia Traoré’s “Laidu”; Christine McVie’s “Songbird”; “Have You Got It In You?”
by Imogen Heap; Cat Stevens’ “The First Cut”; “Yes” by McAlmont and Butler; “Tonight
Will Be Fine” by Leonard Cohen (I was lucky enough that Mr Cohen gave me
permission to use his lyrics in my fiction, and my fave cover of this track is
Teddy Thompson’s); “The Witch of Pittenweem” by Emily Barker; and of course,
Jamez Chang’s “Fifteen Years” which features a sample of my voice (who doesn’t
like the sound of it?)!
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Who would play you in the movie of your life?
Vickie
Bak Laursen, better known as Pernille Lindegaard from The Bridge – Danish is a lot like Barnsley dialect: en kop te, tak –
sorted. But if I wanted a blockbuster, Rachel Weisz, because a) then people
would flock to watch it, and b) I think Rachel doing a northern English accent
is a feather she cannot omit from her acting cap and can only improve relations
with him indoors, from whom she can take lessons, and c) she’s already called
Rachel – bonus. Kate Winslet might be good, too, for the upside-down smile
ability. Ideally, if you get all three of them in the Brundle-pod and splice
them, without accidentally including a fly in the mix, I think a good me-alike
would be the result.
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What would the title of your autobiography be?
I’m slowly cobbling together a comic memoir currently and that’s called New Shoes, but a
written autobiography could be called Alter Thy Face – you read it here first,
folks.
Apparently I have to pass this on, and the nominees are:
Helen Caldwell
Nominees - if you choose to accept the award, here's what you need to do:
Thank the person who nominated you, and
post a link to their blog on your blog.
Display the award on your blog — by
including it in your post and/or displaying it using a “widget” or a “gadget”.
(Note that the best way to do this is to save the image to your own computer
and then upload it to your blog post.)
Answer 11 questions about yourself, which
will be provided to you by the person who nominated you.
Provide 11 random facts about yourself. (I've omitted this part as I feel it's beyond the call of duty)
Nominate 5 – 11 blogs that you feel deserve
the award, who have a less than 1000 followers. (Note that you can always ask
the blog owner this since not all blogs display a widget that lets the readers
know this information!)
Create a new list of questions for the blogger
to answer.
List these rules in your post (You can copy
and paste from here.) Once you have written and published it, you then have to:
Inform the people/blogs that you nominated
that they have been nominated for the Liebster award and provide a link for
them to your post so that they can learn about it (they might not have ever
heard of it!)
The new questions are (I couldn't think of eleven and wanted to get this posted today!):
~Who
or what motivates you?
~If
you weren’t doing what you do, what would you do?
~You’re
on a desert island, what have you taken with you?
~Describe
in one sentence your work area.
~What
are the barriers to your creativity?
~What’s
your definition of success?
