Struggling to find the time to write?
Today you can create a story - well, at least a line of it - in less than a minute.
Popular Queensland-based authors Nick Earls and Rebecca Sparrow are launching a tandem story on the online site of their own tandem novel, Joel and Cat Set the Story Straight.
They aim to create a story with multiple authors - all of whom contribute one line via SMS or email.
Stephen Colbert.
Former American Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky has moderated a cracking metaphor-off between anti-Bush activist and actor Sean Penn and comedian and faux right-wing commentator Stephen Colbert.
The contest on US comedy show The Colbert Report all has something to do with Bush's "soiled, blood-soaked underwear".
Colbert calls it a metafreephorall but you can just watch it here.
[Link via BookNinja.]
Check out our Photos page for a slideshow of images from the launch of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
(Photo: Vivien Cuttle)
Like millions of people around the world, I lined up this morning to get my copy of the seventh and final novel in the best-selling Harry Potter series.
In what sets an impressive precedent for any book launch, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was released simultaneously in 93 countries.
Orders for the book broke records around the world and one keen fan in Canberra had to be pulled from Lake Burley Griffin yesterday after he dropped his pre-order receipt in the water.
He was treated for hypothermia and wouldn't calm down until his rescuers called a bookstore to organise a replacement voucher.
Some shops staged parties, mystery train rides and magic shows to entice customers to their wares. Check out our Harry Potter photo gallery for glimpses of the commotion around the world.
(Photo: Vivien Cuttle).
Author JK Rowling says she feels relieved the long journey of writing the novels is finally over.
"I feel a heady mixture of excitement, nerves and relief," she said. "Deathly Hallows remains my favourite of the series, even after several re-reads; I cannot wait to share it with the readers who have stuck with me through six previous books."
Nicholas Lezard, a writer and critic with The Guardian in the UK, says the books are "clumsy" and "a little bit of editing wouldn't hurt" them.
"It's the kind of writing which a nine-year-old kid would probably be pretty chuffed at producing," he said. "The imaginative world itself isn't exactly original, it's sort of Tom Brown's Schooldays stuff mixed with not particularly first-rate magic stuff. I mean, wands and broomsticks, please."
Did you queue for Deathly Hallows? Or did you attend a Harry Potter party?
If so, Articulate wants to hear about it. Email us, or send us your photos.
We're also keen to hear your first impressions of Deathly Hallows. But please, no spoilers!
Last year, The Weekend Australian pulled a little stunt in which they sent off chapter three of Patrick White's Nobel prize-winning novel, The Eye of the Storm, to 12 different publishers under the pseudonym 'Wraith Picket'.
They got back 10 rejections and two didn't respond. The little stunt turned into a literary tempest...
Now, over in the UK, a similar experiment was carried out with the work of Jane Austen - or 'Alison Laydee' to be precise.
The Guardian reports that David Lassman, director of the Jane Austen Festival in Bath, sent off opening chapters of Austen's three most famous books - with some changes of course - to 18 of the biggest UK publishers.
They all came back as rejections.
Lassman says:
"I was staggered. Here is one of the greatest writers that has lived, with her oeuvre securely fixed in the English canon and yet only one recipient recognised them as Austen's work."
(Photo: doej15)
Some enterprising souls in San Francisco have created a "choose your own adventure" game using spraypainted footpath stencils.
On Flickr, one of the artists writes:
"It's a love story with two characters who start in different locations. His story starts at 16th and Valencia, in front of the Crown Hotel / Limon Restaurant with the text 'He Leaves his Lonely Apartment'. Her story starts at 21st and Guerrero in front of a stunning mansion with the text, 'She Leaves her Lonely Apartment'. Eventually their paths merge, at the point where they meet, and their paths travel together until drama pulls them apart."There are two possible endings, happy and tragic, and two other points where the story can end unexpectedly if the viewer chooses the wrong ending. All in all, there are four possible endings."
If you've seen some cool street art, tell us about it or upload a picture.
Jill Scott will play Precious Ramotswe (Photo: Getty).
Cold Mountain director Anthony Minghella is set to turn the best-selling fiction series The No 1 Ladies' Detective Agency into a film.
The six novels, written by Zimbabwe-born professor Alexander McCall Smith, follow the adventures of Precious Ramotswe, a Botswana woman who establishes a detective agency.
Work has already begun on the film, which stars American singer Jill Scott as Mma Ramotswe and Dreamgirls singer and actress Anika Noni Rose as Mma Ramotswe's secretary.
TV actor Lucian Msamati will play the implacable Mr J L B Matekoni, the mechanic who's in love with Mma Ramotswe.
The books themselves have sold more than 15 million English-language copies alone, although Gaborone book-store manager Martina Seetso said locals were not not so fussed on the stories.
"They are just popular enough, if you get what I mean," she said. But in the past three weeks the sales seem to have improved a bit because people are curious to know what the hype is all about."
Meg Rosoff (Photo: Penguin Group)
Meg Rosoff would never walk under a ladder. Not because she thinks something bad would happen, but she doesn't want to risk it, just in case. The London-based author published her first book, the prized How I Live Now almost three years ago after working in advertising for 15 years. Her second, Just In Case, was published last year. Both books look at how teenagers deal with war, terrorism, tragedy and fate's unkind hand. One of her most quirky characters, 15-year-old David Case, is so convinced doom looms before him that he assumes a new identity and changes his name to Justin, just in case. Meg's third novel, What I Was, will be published later this year. On her recent trip to Australia, she took time to speak to Articulate.
British writer Sebastian Faulks has been identified as the author chosen to continue on where Sir Ian Fleming left off.
Faulks will pen Devil May Care, a new officially-endorsed James Bond novel, which will be published in May next year to mark 100 years of Sir Ian's birth.
Faulks says the new book is "about 80 per cent Fleming" - which means no cheesy puns like you get in the movies.
The Birdsong and Charlotte Gray author doesn't want to give the new story away, but he does say:
"He is slightly more vulnerable than any previous Bond but at the same time he is both gallant and highly sexed, if you can be both."
Well you couldn't really have Bond any other way...
Adelaide-based writer David Conyers is following in the footsteps of H P Lovecraft, in the process becoming the first Australian author to publish a novel based on the Cthulhu Mythos.
In response to the recent blog post on reaction to Orbit's plans to launch in Australia, Orbit Australia publisher Bernadette Foley has reaffirmed Hachette Livre's commitment to supporting local writers.
"We believe that there are enough talented writers here to build a strong list. Equally there are dedicated readers who are looking for new voices, and general readers who we can introduce to the sci-fi and fantasy genres. It is very unusual for a new SF/F list to be established, but we are confident that there is room in the market for more local publishing in this area - particularly when it comes with such a strong platform for international publishing opportunities.
You can read her full response here.
Victorian author Peter Temple has won the world's biggest crime-writing prize - the Crime Writers Association's Duncan Lawrie Dagger Award.
Temple picked up the 20,000-pound award for The Broken Shore, which deals with racial tensions in a small town in coastal Victoria.
Released in Australia in 2005, The Broken Shore was lauded by critics and bloggers alike.
Temple told the ABC he didn't expect to win.
"[It's] fairly difficult to win it and over the years the galaxy of starts have won it. Yeah, it's rather nice to have come all the way from Oz and to win in. No Australian has ever been shortlisted for it."
Terry Dowling, one of Australia’s most awarded, versatile and internationally acclaimed writers of science fiction, fantasy, dark fantasy and horror, is answering questions at the Australian Speculative Fiction In Focus forum.
From The Book Show:
Sonya Hartnett's new novel The Ghost's Child is an evocative, poetic and dreamy story about an old lady who is visited one day by a young boy, the child of a ghost, and a ghostly child at the same time. And from there the story of the old lady evolves - the story of her growth from a girl to a woman and the doomed love she has for a strange young man.
Frustrated unpublished writers out there, take heart. Author Beth Webb, writing in The Guardian, heartily recommends the joy of being unpublished.
She points out that the joy of writing is about the writing itself, and she would keep on doing it even if no-one else was interested in reading or publishing her stories.
Webb advises a DIY approach to getting an audience for your writing.
"Define your audience and publish yourself. Get your books and anthologies into the hands of people who really want to hear from you - whether it's one copy, or a couple of dozen through print on demand."
In case you missed it on Friday, The Book Show took a look at the relationship between editors and writers.
Guests included editor Judith Lukin-Amundsen, Australian novelist Charlotte Wood and Jacquie Kent, editor and biographer of the late editor at Angus and Robertson, Beatrice Davis (1909-1992).
Talking Squid has asked Australian speculative fiction writers to nominate their favourite character names.
I think my favourite 'local' name is Rebus Ampersand (Shane Dix), although I also like the way Margo Lanagan pilfered some names for elves from Christmas crackers: Cap, Snap, Motto and Trinket.
But I have to say I'm with Nick Evans when he nominates P G Wodehouse as the champion of name-making - how can you go past Gussy Fink-Nottle and Catsmeat Potter-Pirbright?
In an interview with The Guardian, Irish novelist Maeve Binchy reveals how she fell into writing:
"I never wanted to write. I just wrote letters home from a kibbutz in Israel to reassure my parents that I was still alive and well fed and having a great time. They thought these letters were brilliant and sent them to a newspaper. So I became a writer by accident."
Read the full article here.
Those wishing to quiz Australian science fiction author Marianne de Pierres can do so now on the Australian Speculative Fiction in Focus forum.
De Pierres is the author of the award-nominated Parrish Plessis series: Nylon Angel, Code Noir and Crash Deluxe.
She has just released Dark Space, the first book of her new space opera series, and has another book coming out as part of The Lost Shimmaron children's series.
She is also working on a film project, Stalking Daylight, for a Sydney-based production company.
This year's Miles Franklin literary award has been won by Alexis Wright for her work, Carpentaria.
The judges described her work as "powerful, richly imagined and stylistically ambitious".
Early in May, Wright told the ABC she never thought her novel, about the Waanyi people of the Gulf of Carpentaria, would attract so much attention.
"Every day as you are trying to write a book like that there's nothing in there that ever tells you about prizes, I'm going to write this for a prize, or anything like that," she said."You wouldn't do it. It's actually a very strange way to reward writers in this country. It's a hard road to take, writing a book."
The 7.30 Report's Kerry O'Brien spoke with Wright about her epic, and you can read the transcript or watch the video here.
(Photo: Cat Sparks)
Bill Congreve is a Sydney-based writer, editor, book reviewer and publisher. He has a swag of speculative fiction awards in his trophy cabinet, including two Ditmar Awards he picked up recently - one for professional achievement (for his work with MirrorDanse Books and two issues of the Year’s Best Australian Science Fiction and Fantasy anthology) and the other for best collection (The Year’s Best Australian Science Fiction and Fantasy Vol. 2, with Michelle Marquardt). Congreve recently offered his insights into the Australian speculative fiction scene in a Q and A session at Australian Speculative Fiction in Focus. The following feature is based on that Q and A.
In an interview broadcast on 612 ABC Brisbane, former immigration worker Frederika Steen talks about her contribution to a book called Acting from the Heart: Australian advocates for asylum seekers tell their stories.
Thousands of Australians will flood into bookstores on July 21 to pick up a copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, writes News Online's Rebekah van Druten, but sharp discounts mean sellers will struggle to make a profit.
The Sydney Morning Herald has uncovered some details about The Chaser's Charles Firth's plans to launch a satirical magazine and website.
Basically, go here and view the source code, or go here and let the SMH do the work for you.
The SMH writes:
...in an email interview yesterday, Firth was coy about his plans for the new venture and revealed few serious details."Our website will only run stories related to Paris Hilton," he wrote. "So it's pretty much exactly the same model as the Herald's website."
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