Go Little Gecko Go!

A couple more roughs of pages from Jan D’Silva for Go Go Gecko and your previewing pleasure:

(removed as book is now published)

If you want to see more of what Jan D’Silva is doing head over to the studio at Moving Ideas Animation

Anchovy Circus, coming to a field near you soon!

Anchovy Circus is on the move! This is Connah’s rough of anchovies mashed together to make an elephant. Love this elephant!

(Removed as book is now published)

Remember, you can find Connah at www.connahbrecon.com and www.GetDead.Etsy.com

Anchovy Circus… Roll Up! Roll Up!

Who in their right mind would think up a circus made of dried anchovies?

Anchovy Circus… it’s the kind of story a mad person might dream up if they were sitting around one day putting random unrelated words together just to see if it would spark story ideas… oh, while we’re on the subject, do you have any thing for Cosmic Lobster? No?

Anyway, some odd person made up a story called Anchovy Circus, and some extremely farsighted publisher thought it was a good idea and challenged a very talented illustrator to make the story come alive.

Connah Brecon is doing sensational things with anchovies and characters and I hope he’s not cursing the storyline too much. It’s about a boy who doesn’t like anchovies and hides them under his bed, then he notices that as they dry out, they twist and stick together into strange shapes, strange animal shapes… so he makes a circus out of them… after that, things really get wacky.

Connah has very kindly lent me a few roughs to show you:

(Removed as book is now published)

If you like his funky style as much as I do, check out www.connahbrecon.com
and you can buy some of his artwork at www.GetDead.Etsy.com.

Go Go Gecko Comes Alive!

The books I signed contracts for a few months ago with Blake Education are having life breathed into them courtesy of some very fine illustrators.

Jan D’Silva is doing wonderful stuff with Go Go Gecko, and is one half of a partnership that runs an animation studio called Moving Ideas Animation.

I know you all want to see the dancing gecko so here is a sneak peak:

(Removed as book is now published)

Thanks Jan, these are gorgeous!

Honourable Mention

I received an online honourable mention from Ellen Datlow as part of her search for her Best of Horror 2009 collection for my short YA story “Being Bella Wang”.

Flash Fiction and New Scientist Magazine

I spend most of my time writing novels that haven’t sold BUT I’m a lover of the short form and most of my short science fiction does find homes. The shortest of the shorts is flash fiction which is usually anywhere from 50 words to 500 words, and perfect for online reading.

Antipodean SF is a downunder online mag that specialises in flash fiction and can be found at antisf.com. Five of my flash publications were with them and are now archived at the National Library of Australia as part of their Pandora project.

Kim Stanley Robinson recently challenged 8 science fiction writers to write some flash set 100 years into the future. Now, while not all the novelists grasped the concept of flash, Geoff Ryman clearly didn’t attempt it and just posted a mini essay (and that is fine, novel writing is a far cry from flash fiction and not everyone is talented in every area), there are still some fun quick reads here, and a contest if you want to have a go yourself. You have less than a month to come up with 350 words: New Scientist.

Success!

Signed two contracts today for children’s educational fiction with Blake Ed. They are part of the ‘Sparklers’ fiction series. I already have three ‘Gigglers’ with Blake Ed. They are a sensational company to work with and the ‘Gigglers’ were top class books. Can’t wait to see the finished product.

Merry Christmas!

Hope you’ve all had a good one. I can only say… TOO… MUCH… FOOD… next year: a crayfish, a beach and a bottle of champers… nothing else.

End of the year upon us and what have I done?  Not the tax return that’s for sure… better get onto that. I did quit two jobs this year… is that progress? It is in terms of time management. Altho, it’s not immediately sensational for the bank balance. Now I’m on contract work I have lulls in which I can build webpages and write.

In terms of writing, I also did a couple of bold things this year. I called up a couple of favours from industry people when I normally wouldn’t be so bold. I got a very good response too. Also I’m getting great reviews for “Being Bella Wang” which appeared in SHiNY mag a couple of months ago:
The Fix
As If
Last Short Story. Tansy already had Being Bella Wang on her list of favs for 2008.
The Elephant Forgets – go down to 9 Dec.
That’s 4 positives from 4 reviews. A new record for me.

Oh, The Elephant Forgets is Rich Horton, who reviews for Locus. I’m a bit late keeping up with the play. Rich said lovely things about “Lost Property” in Locus magazine a couple of years ago. Impeccable taste that man. If only all editors were like Rich.

I was sad that “Being Bella Wang” didn’t get through to the finals in the Aurealis Awards. Sure I was trying some strange stuff, but I was very pleased that I almost got it the way I envisioned. I’d hate to think that my envisioning was completely out of whack.