Misrule's Adult Reading

"The beautiful thing about a book is that it comes alive in the act of grace that is reading."

Richard Flanagan, in an interview with Phillip Adams on Radio National.

Heard 28/11/08—I think it was a repeat of the previous night's Late Night Live.

Like children's and YA books, genre fiction (crime, fantasy, science fiction and so on) is usually reviewed in job lots of three or more books, so it's fantastic that Blood Ties got a decent review space all to itself—and positioned in prime a prime spot on the front page of Spectrum's book pages, directly under the featured author review.

HERE IS AN impressively different fantasy novel, challenging one of the most deep-seated and inappropriate fantasy conventions. Why is the monarchy the political default mode of contemporary fantasy? Why do fantasy heroes and heroines risk all to restore the rightful king? What happened to democracy in the mass-market field?

Blood Ties doesn't try to answer those questions - it disdainfully sweeps them aside and seeks to democratise itself from the core...

So good to see genre fiction treated with such intelligence and respect—and so happy for Pamela!

Blood Ties was launched by speculative fiction writer and Pamela's friend Marianne de Pierres. Marianne described her original meeting with Pamela at a book festival some years ago, recounting an incident at a restaurant where Pamela revealed her uncanny insight into human nature (by correctly observing that the waiter fancied Marianne). Marianne made a nice link to Pamela's natural "sixth sense" about people to her ability to create characters "right down to the bone". She also read a passage from the book, which Pamela went on to say was a scene that she'd more or less bled onto the page (and so was particularly pleased that it was the bit Marianne chose to read).

Pamela's response was to describe the long (11 years) gestation of Blood Ties, starting with the event (the auctioning of her flat in the Eastern suburbs, back about the time she and I first met and became friends) that triggered the opening chapter and sentence of the novel—The desire to know the future gnaws at our bones. Pamela read part of the opening chapter of the novel before fielding questions from the audience.

Book launches are often pseudo-swanky affairs, with lots of faff and bubble—and god knows, I love 'em. But I really liked that this launch was also an open, public event, that gave the "average punter" the opportunity to hear about the business of writing and publishing from the inside. Questions from the audience ranged from what is your writing routine like (cups of tea? computer game distractions?) to what is the best advice you can give to secondary school students with a talent for writing (get them to read widely was Pamela's answer—reading is more important than writing at this age) to is there a difference in your self-editing when writing for children and for adults (nope) to how do you go about submitting work for publication?

In the audience were family, friends, fellow writers and at least four of Pamela's publishers/editors (Bernadette Foley from Hachette Livre, publisher of Blood Ties; Cathie Tasker from Koala Books, Sarah Foster from Walker Books, who is republishing Pamela's wonderful junior novel Victor's Quest and its forth-coming sequel Victor's Challenge; and Jonathan Shaw, previous editor of The School Magazine—Pamela's first publisher of fiction for children).

Also at the launch were some of Pamela's students from the Sydney Writers' Centre, where I also teach.

Some of us went back to Pamela and her husband Stephen's house after the launch (just around the corner and down the street from my humble flat), where I had the opportunity to properly meet and drink champers and chat with (the fabulous) Marianne de Pierres.

Turns out (hardly surprisingly) that Marianne and I both know and count as a friend (as we also admire her as, simply, fans), the inordinately gifted Margo Lanagan. Marianne and Margo are in a writer's workshop group together, and Mariane and I shared our mutal appreciation of Margo's remarkable talents. Marianne believes that Margo is one the greatest living writers (with no "genre" disclaimer, or any other disclaimer, come to mention it)—and we both agree that "Singing My Sister Down" is a story that will still be talked about in decades to come, and held up as an example of perfection in the short story form.

But bringing this back to the woman of the hour—today belongs to Pamela, after all—Marianne also told me that she believes that Pamela is as gifted and original a writer as Margo (if more "marketable"). She sees a similarity in their creative vision, and their facility for story-telling.

Indeed. And may Blood Ties find the smart, warm and dedicated readership it so deserves. Oh, and a film deal would be good! (Although Pamela thinks it's better suited to a television series—are you reading, Joss Whedon?)

Pamela (left) and Marianne in Pamela's home library at the after-launch party.