About a launch
Somehow it’s all happening at once, so to keep track of everything that’s happening, and to share some of the goodies, here’s a very rare mid-week Under the counter post. Firstly, just a reminder that my second novella with Blemish Books, I’m Ready Now, is being launched tomorrow (Thursday) night, at 5.30pm at Electric Shadows Bookshop, Mort Street, Braddon, ACT; it’s a thrill to have journalist and biographer Christine Wallace cutting the metaphorical ribbon. Cue sleepless nights and trembling hands.
Story leaks
Over the last few weeks I’ve been leaking bits and pieces about I’m Ready Now, so to keep the tradition going for a little while longer, this novella manages to meander its way between Hobart, Melbourne and Sydney, and northern Vietnam and south-west Ireland also get a mention. And ‘Sail On’ by The Commodores features, and this is a band that can apparently walk on clouds – make of that what you will.
Guesting, whispering
Relating to I’m Ready Now, the increasingly influential literary blog Whispering Gums recently asked me for a guest-post. I wrote about novellas (no surprises there), raising children (yes, you read that right), and how family-life is the raison d’etre of the contemporary Australian novel (I really believe that). Oh, I also mention zombies. Massive thanks to Sue Terry for the opportunity.
An anthology of giants
More broadly, I’ve mentioned before that a story of mine, ‘Severance’, which was first published in the Canberra Times in 2003 and republished in Island in 2004, has been included in The Invisible Thread: one hundred years of words (Halstead Press), which celebrates the Centenary of Canberra in 2013. Creative Director of the Centenary – and singer, writer, and arts-luminary-in-general – Robyn Archer says in her introduction: ‘The anthology includes names such as Roger McDonald, David Campbell, Blanche d’Alpuget, Barbara Blackman, Rhyll McMaster, Alan Gould and Jackie French; but there are also equally beautiful emerging voices such as those of Omar Musa, Nigel Featherstone, Sarah St Vincent Welch and Melinda Smith. That so much good writing, past and present, should emerge from this region is a powerful challenge to the silly cliché of Canberra as a city without a soul.’ Needless to say, it’s a real treat to have work included in these pages.
Oh look, I’m now on YouTube
The tireless editor and project-manager of The Invisible Thread, Irma Gold, who is a very fine author in her own right, has video-interviewed seventeen of the writers involved, including yours truly. You can watch the interview here. Mostly I talk about how ‘Severance’ (which, perhaps, has turned out to be my biggest hit) was written, the benefits of living in Canberra and now Goulburn, and juggling everything that life throws at us. The Invisible Thread is being launched in Canberra on Thursday 29 November.
I hope you enjoy the links, but it’d be great to cross paths with you in person at the I’m Ready Now launch tomorrow night, or The Invisible Thread launch next week.
Onwards.
Under the counter or a flutter in the dovecote 
8 comments
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November 20, 2012 at 9:16+00:00Nov
whisperinggums
Increasing influential is a bit of an exaggeration but thanks Nigel for the mention! And thanks for the guest post which I enjoyed immensley.
All being well, I will be at the launch tomorrow, having finished your lovely novella. I have less than 20 pages to go. It’s nicely produced too … Good on Blemish. I got halfway through your interview with Irma, on Sunday … And then my iPad – well the streaming I suppose – stuck. I was enjoying it and will try again … Irma’s done a lovely job with those I interviews. She’s right about the warmth in your stories … They’re not sentimental but they exude lovely fellow feeling for other people, warts and all.
November 20, 2012 at 9:16+00:00Nov
Nigel Featherstone
Hi Sue, I reckon when your blog gets quoted by high-end publishers you’re officially ‘increasingly influential’!
Thanks, as always, for your kind thoughts – on the guest-post but also on ‘I’m Ready Now’. I like that: ‘they’re not sentimental but they exude lovely fellow feeling for other people, warts and all’.
If our stars align, hopefully we’ll cross paths tomorrow.
Thanks again.
November 20, 2012 at 9:16+00:00Nov
Gabrielle Bryden
Writing a blog post on a fiction day – this will not do Nigel (does your mother know 😉 ) – really enjoyed that video interview. I am sure your launch will go splendiferously and would love to be there but being from another State you will probably never meet me in the flesh (maybe I’m just a very verbal computer spambot anyway – you never know – haha).
November 20, 2012 at 9:16+00:00Nov
Nigel Featherstone
Hi Gabe-shaped spambot, thanks for your comments on the interview (as Sue pointed out, Irma Gold does a wonderful job with these things) and also your warm wishes for the launch. Much appreciated.
November 22, 2012 at 9:16+00:00Nov
Dorothy Johnston
I’m sure your launch was a cracker, Nigel, and I look forward to reading the novella! It’s an interesting form, isn’t it? Charles May, in his blog, has some insightful ideas about it – more a long short story than a short novel, he reckons. It would be good to share some thoughts on writing novellas with you some time. And I agree with all the praise of Irma Gold. She’s done a marvellous job!
November 24, 2012 at 9:16+00:00Nov
Nigel Featherstone
Hi Dorothy, more on the ‘I’m Ready Now’ launch shortly, but yes it was a cracker! I’m always genuinely amazed that people turn up to these things.
About novella’s I’m not so sure about them being closer to a long short story. You might be interested in a piece I did for the Canberra Times last year where I interviewed John Clanchy about novellas; he says some really thoughtful things about the novella being its own special form https://nigelfeatherstone.wordpress.com/2011/08/20/the-little-book-of-suspicion/
November 26, 2012 at 9:16+00:00Nov
Dorothy Johnston
Thanks Nigel. I’ve read the Canberra Times piece now, and yes, John Clanchy’s comments are insightful; it’s a good piece overall. One of the things that interests me is whether a writer knows from the start that he or she is writing a novella – whether the particular kinds of compression and intensity, along with an idea that’s too big to be contained in a short story, are there from the beginning. I’ve only written one novella, ‘Ashes from the Headland’, but I never had any doubt that that’s what it was.
November 26, 2012 at 9:16+00:00Nov
Nigel Featherstone
Hi Dorothy, that’s a very interesting question: does a writer know from the start that he or she is writing a novella? With this series that I’m currently doing, ‘Fall on me’ and ‘I’m Ready Now’, I originally thought I was writing short stories, but then I didn’t worry about form or word-count and just wrote out the stories until they were finished. I was as surprised as anyone that they were about 40,000 in length, meaning they were more novella than anything else. However, I do love to read shorter novels or very long short stories; in fact I search them out – so perhaps there was some kind of subconscious thing going on? Certainly once the first drafts were done, I was very aware that these were novellas and for the two years that they’ve been edited and re-written I knew exactly what I was trying to create. Regardless, from now on I think I’ll be better at knowing from the outset which form I’m working to. I’m quietly amazed that you were so sure from the very beginning what ‘Ashes from the Headland’ was!