Reading Matters 2013 - The Reception

This weekend it was my absolute delight to attend the 10th biennial Reading Matters, hosted by the State Library’s Centre for Youth Literature. For those who don’t know, Reading Matters is Australia’s leading youth literature event – where local and overseas authors mix with their young readers in school’s day events, followed by a two day conference with teachers, librarians, teacher-librarians and other industry professionals. It’s epic. 

This was my first ever Reading Matters and I honestly didn’t know quite what to expect . . .  I knew that I loved the author line-up and the topics to be covered (everything from gate keeping to gender identity) piqued my interest. But I went along to the reception on Thursday night a little bit nervous and timid, afraid people would think that, as a blogger, I was encroaching on a professional space (then I felt a bit pretentious, having ‘Alpha Reader’ on my name-badge, like I was throwing a gauntlet down amongst all these fellow bookish types. I’m surprised nobody challenged me to a read-off). 

But, actually, quite a few people chastised me when I introduced myself as “just a blogger.” And then any nerves I had dissipated when I started talking to the authors. 

I got to meet Ambelin Kwaymullina, who I've long admired since reading (and loving) ‘The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf’ and interviewing her for Kill Your Darlings. I got the low-down on ‘Ashala Wolf’ #2 (due out in November) – and have been promised big revelations and a wee bit of romance. 

And then there were my other favourite Aussie authors – Gabrielle Williams, Vikki Wakefield, Fiona Wood and Myke Bartlett. All four are currently working on new books and spoke a bit about them– everybody, watch this space because there are some amazing stories coming our way! 

It was also my great pleasure to meet Jess, of Tales Compendium fame and a fellow blogger who became my conference bestie (bloggers, unite!). If you haven’t already, do check out her blog for some thoughtful and killer reviews (and because I think she might have a few giveaways up her sleeve following Reading Matters. . . ) 

I also got to meet Libba Bray and Gayle Forman at the reception (after spending a good hour quasi-stalking them around the room, then eventually getting the nerve to ask someone to introduce us). You guys. You GUYS! – these two are like rock stars. I’m not kidding. They’re cool like rockers, and they swear like sailors (I do believe Tim Sinclair even taught Gayle Forman some special Aussie profanity – like she needed more?). And they are horrendously hilarious – I thought they were funny individually, but get them together and it’s awesome-sauce. They are like the Tina Fey and Amy Poehler of the young adult scene . . . .don’t even get me started on what they said after we introduced them to the word ‘spunk’ (in reference to an attractive individual). I'm such a huge fan of both Libba and Gayle - and it was just the best thing to meet them and become even bigger fans of them as people, not just authors. 

 

And it was pretty cool when Centre For Youth Literature Program Coordinator, Adele Walsh (also known as Persnickety Snark) offered Gayle Forman an ‘If I Stay’ casting idea – Australian heart-throb, Brenton Thwaites . . . and the very next day Gayle actually mentioned him in a movie-news tumblr post! Argh! It’s like we were present to hear (possible) movie magic happening!

So, that was the Reading Matters reception; swilling wine, hanging out with some formidable authors and feeling an electric buzz in the air for what tomorrow would bring . . . 

. . . Notes on the 2-day conference will be posted soon!

Reading Matters 2013

Christmas has most definitely come early for Australian fans of young adult literature.

Reading Matters is an event held by the State Library of Victoria’s wonderful Centre for Youth Literature (CYL) whose sole purpose is to promote reading for all young people. And in 2013, the CYL team have concocted quite a treat with Reading Matters – in which they bring beloved young adult authors to Melbourne for an event that celebrates all things YA.

 “Reading Matters is a Melbourne-based celebration of everything that’s unique and exciting in the world of youth literature: From storytelling impresarios to graphic novelists, insights into the narratives of games to debating the politics of YA fiction, this program is as diverse as the teen readers themselves.”   

So, have I piqued your interest? Well, hold on to your spectacles fellow bibliophiles – because yesterday the CYL team made the first of three announcements, revealing the author line-up for Reading Matters next year, and it’s a wee bit fantastic.

From the CYL website:

 

Gayle Forman is a Brooklyn based, award winning author and journalist whose articles have appeared in Seventeen, Cosmopolitan and Elle. She burst onto the scene with the bestselling, contemporary titles If I Stay and Where She Went, books that are infused with passion, music and memorable characters.  

Libba Bray is the New York Times bestselling author of The Gemma Doyle trilogy; the Printz Award-winning Going Bovine; Beauty Queens; and The Diviners series. She is originally from Texas but makes her home in Brooklyn, NY, with her husband, son, and two sociopathic cats.  

Andrew McGahan debuted on the literary scene with The AustralianVogel Literary Award-winning Praise. In 2004 he won the Miles Franklin Literary Award for The White Earth. The Coming of the Whirlpool was the first title in his move into youth literature –the beginning of a swashbuckling series full of action and adventure.

Alison Croggon has published award-winning poetry, plays and an opera or two. She started writing fantasy in the late 90s, was nominated for two Aurealis awards in 2002, and reimagined the spooky moors of Brontë in her 2012 YA release Black Spring.  

Myke Bartlett was born in Perth, and spent his first twenty years trying to escape. A trained journalist, Bartlett writes on politics, movies, pop culture and rock music for Australia’s best known cultural publications. His debut young adult novel Fire in the Sea won the 2011 Text Prize.

I am so, so, so excited by each and every one of these authors (and I'm crossing my fingers that Libba Bray attends at least one event in her infamous cow suit!). They represent some of the best that young adult has to offer – from the Miles Franklin-nominated to Printz-winners – covering a range of genres; from contemporary, fantasy, historic and everything in between.

These are some of the current Rock Stars of young adult literature – and if you don’t believe me, check out this post, in which Persnickety Snark recounts her American trip to the YA Lit Symposium & YALLFest last month, and includes a ridonkulously cool photo of the signing queues Gayle Forman attracts!

I am so excited for Reading Matters. Nothing compares to meeting your favourite authors face-to-face, waiting in line with a mixture of thrilling anticipation and crippling nerves for the chance to present a well-worn and beloved copy of their book for signing. To get a couple of seconds with them just to say; “Hey, you write like you’re in my head and while that’s sometimes unsettling it’s also unparalleled in its awesomeness. So, thank you.” And to also hear our favourite authors speak, at length, about what makes them and their characters tick, how they hone their craft and what else they have in store for us. 

Reading Matters is to young adult readers what Woodstock was to hippies and music-lovers, if you will. It's going to be an extraordinary opportunity to congregate with fellow fans and YA-worshippers, meet your literary idols and take your reading to the next level.

I. Can’t. Wait!

This is the current schedule for Reading Matters:

Tickets are on sale now, so hurry up and book your place for the young adult Rock-Fest of the year!

Interview with Myke Bartlett, author of 'Fire in the Sea'

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A very happy release day to Myke Bartlett, whose Text Prize winning novel, 'Fire in the Sea' is available as of today! I strongly suggest you rush out and buy a copy!

The book is another incredible and welcome addition to the Aussie YA scene - set in Perth and delving into all things mythological and mysterious. And I was so happy when Myke Bartlett let me pick his brain about the novel ... not least of all because he let slip that a sequel is in the works! 

Without further ado, I give you - Myke Bartlett!

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Q: How long did it take you to write ‘Fire in the Sea’, from first idea to final manuscript?

The central idea arrived way back in 2008, I think, on the short walk from work to the tram stop. I probably scrawled a few notes on the back of some old paper and stuck it to my noticeboard, where most ideas go to fester. I didn’t actually start writing it until 2010. It actually came together remarkably quickly. Certainly, it helped that I was writing the book with the full intention of winning the Text Prize. I knew it had to be finished by May 2011, which it was. Just.
 

 Q: Are you a ‘plotter’ or a ‘pantser’ - that is, do you meticulously plot your novel before writing, or do you ‘fly by the seat of your pants’ and let the story evolve naturally?

Both. I start off with a ten or twelve point outline. From there it becomes about joining the dots. I’ll write more elaborate outlines, usually in notebooks or across scrap paper, working out details and jotting down dialogue. I actually thought I’d planned out ‘Fire in the Sea’ very meticulously, until I found my outline a few days ago and realised it bears almost no resemblance to the final story. Once a book gets underway, it takes on a life of its own and becomes something you hadn’t quite planned. As it should. I never stop having new ideas about things to change. Even now, with it in print.

Q: Did you start writing with a conscious decision to make ‘Fire in the Sea’ young adult, or did that evolve naturally? Do you write with an audience in mind?

I’d had a US agent suggest I try writing Young Adult fiction, but I hadn’t really read much at the time. It wasn’t until I read Phillip Pullman’s Sally Lockhart series that I became excited about it as a genre or category or whatever we’re calling it. Those books showed me how intelligent, how sophisticated and how exciting YA could be. Around the same time, someone gave me a flyer for the Text Prize, which was what made me start writing. So I definitely had a clear idea of the audience I was writing for, which was really helpful. But, at the same time, I was writing a book I wanted to read. Specifically, I was writing a book that I would have wanted to read as a teenager, growing up in Perth.
 

 Q: Something I loved about ‘Fire in the Sea’ was the Perth setting. In your Text bio, it says:“Myke Bartlett was born in Perth, and spent his first twenty years trying to escape.” – which I suspected, from Sadie’s very authentic & claustrophobic feelings about the city. I’m curious to know when your own feelings towards Perth turned – to the point that you decided to base ‘Fire in the Sea’ there?

My feelings about Perth probably turned as soon as I left it. It’s obviously a place I feel very passionate about, but one with which I have a somewhat conflicted relationship. I grew up in Cottesloe, which is still one of my favourite places on the planet. Most of the best times of my life have been spent there. I’m so grateful for having grown up there. But I think it’s natural to get restless in paradise. You start longing for a bit of dirt and grime. You start longing for adventure. Now that I’ve settled elsewhere, I long for the place. I’ll be back there in September and I can’t wait.

Q: I really loved the many and varied supernatural creatures in this novel, not to mention the mentions of myth interspersed with history. There’s certainly a lot going on here. How did you pick and choose your paranormal inspirations? And were you personally interested in all these paranormal aspects before writing ‘Fire in the Sea’, or did you start researching when you decided on the large fantastical plot?

I did minimal research. I read a couple of books I thought Sadie might have read, including Herodotus’s Histories, which is incredible stuff. But all that mythological stuff came from childhood obsessions. I’ve always been into spooky things. I probably looked a few things up but I was wary about that, because I wanted to use things as I remembered them, rather than getting tied down to the facts. Myths are someone else’s take on particular stories and I really wanted to do my own.
 

Q: I loved your protagonist, Sadie Miller. She’s a really ballsy heroine, and the sort of girl that I’m glad for young adults to read. Did you read YA books before you wrote ‘Fire in the Sea’? And did you build Sadie’s characteristics from what you did/didn’t like in YA books, particularly concerning female heroines?

I hadn’t read a great deal of YA fiction, actually. It’s pretty much all I read now! That said, I absolutely wrote Sadie as a response to the protagonist in Twilight, who I saw as being far too passive and flimsy. I want to read stories about real people, even if the circumstances are fantastical. The girls and women I grew up with were — and are — strong, capable and independent human beings. Sadie is longing for adventure, but she isn’t sitting around waiting to be rescued.
 

Q: Really tough question now – if ‘Fire in the Sea’ was to be adapted into a movie or TV show, which actors would you cast?

When I’m working on something, I always have a number of picture references for characters. For Sadie, I was thinking of Emma Stone, Emily Blunt and Emma Booth. Basically anyone called Em. But all of them are probably too old to play her. I quite like the idea of an up-and-coming Perth actor taking the role. Oh, what the hell, let’s go with Emma Stone. As for Jake… I really have no idea. His points of reference were James Dean, Marlon Brando and Paul Newman. Sadly, I don’t think any of them will be available.

Q: You’re also a journalist – writing about politics, movies, pop culture and rock music. You also write quite a few film and music reviews. I’m interested to know what it’s like to now have the shoe on the other foot – with your work being under review?

It’s absolutely terrifying. When I first held a copy of Fire In The Sea I felt briefly elated, and then fell into a mild panic. Obviously, reviewing is intensely subjective. As a reviewer myself, I like to think that I can take a more objective approach — judging a work on its own merits, rather than my own preferences. But I know the power of a glib remark and how hard it is to resist one. I also know how a reviewer’s whims can briskly toss aside something an artist has spent years working on. That said, I love reading reviews. Particularly the good ones. I know there will be bad ones and, yes, they’ll probably stick at the front of my brain for longer than the good ones, but I’m really happy with the book. The right people will like it. Everyone else is just missing out.

Q: Favourite author(s) of all time?

I honestly can’t do lists. I was asked to appear on a film review podcast at the end of last year and made a mess of their end-of-year wrap by refusing to do a top five. They were very patient, but I won’t be asked back. Some authors that I love: Raymond Chandler, Phillip Pullman, David Mitchell, Haruki Murakami. Other writers who have left their mark on me are TV writers Jimmy McGovern and Russell T Davies.

 

Q: Favourite book(s)?

Aargh, same again! I’ve read dozens and dozens of YA books over the last year, but the best of the bunch has been Patrick Ness’ Chaos Walking series. I also loved Leanne Hall’s This Is Shyness. Although I did resent the fact that I hadn’t written it.

Q: What advice do you have for budding young writers?

Write. Read. Read and write. Actually, the one question I hear most at author talks is ‘where do you find the time?’ You don’t find the time, you make it. If you really want to be a writer, then you’re probably already making the time. And you’re probably feeling guilty you’re not spending more time outside, or with your friends, or with your family. I still get excited when I’ve got a few hours alone with my work. Who needs a social life? Oh, but you should definitely get a dog. Because your best ideas will probably arrive as soon as you leave the keyboard for a few minutes and a dog won’t want to distract you with conversation.

Q: What are you working on now, and when can we get our hands on it?

I have a couple of things underway. One is, predictably, the sequel to Fire in the Sea. I’d love for that to be out next year, but these things take time. I’ve also been working on a time-travel adventure story for boys, but that’s having to take a back seat for now.

'Fire in the Sea' by Myke Bartlett

Received from the Publisher

From the BLURB:

Sadie is sixteen and bored with life in Perth. It’s summer, and lazing on the beach in the stifling heat with her cousins and Tom is a drag. Then something comes out of the sea.

Dark menacing forms attack an old man, leaving him for dead and Sadie wracking her brains to understand what she saw. Then there’s a mysterious inheritance, a strange young man called Jake and a horned beast trampling the back yard.

Sadie finds herself caught in the middle of an ancient conflict that is nearing its final battle, a showdown that threatens to engulf Perth and all those she loves in a furious tsunami.

Fire in the Sea is a fast-paced thrilling adventure with a feisty heroine who is not afraid to fight for what she knows is right.

Sadie Miller needs to get out of Perth. This town is too small to hold her, and has too many bad memories that keep a hold of her. Like the memory of her parents’ death, and every one of her sixteen years that should have been shared with them. Instead, Sadie lives with her grandparents and keeps to her close-knit bubble of friends, including her two cousins Heather and Kimberley, and her best friend (who wants to be more), Tom.

But just as Sadie starts fiercely wishing for anything to change, everything does . . .

At Cottesloe beach one night, Sadie and Tom watch an old man be set-upon by two masked thugs, and Sadie steps in to help. The attackers disappear into the water, and the beaten man tells Sadie to beware of “men with wet shoes.”

But the strangeness is only just beginning. It seems that the old man, a one Mr. Freeman, signed the entirety of his will and estate over to Sadie while on his deathbed – she now owns an old Gothic house and everything in it, and is tasked with taking care of the premises, including a vicious guard-dog called Kingsley.

One night, in the process of guarding Mr. Freeman’s house (now hers) Sadie finds herself pinned by a shirtless, posh, sword-wielding boy demanding to know the whereabouts of the ‘relic’. Even stranger than finding this shirtless, posh, sword-wielding boy in Freeman’s abandoned house, is discovering that the same boy claims to be Mr. Freeman – Jacob ‘Jake’ Freeman. One in the same. Reincarnated. Like the Dalai Lama.

Sadie wouldn’t believe all this rubbish, normally . . . but stranger things keep happening. Like Tom having a close-encounter with a horned man. Or a siren song that keeps calling from the sea, or the appearance of those men with wet feet that Mr. Freeman warned Sadie about.

This really is just the beginning. And if Sadie doesn’t help the reincarnated Jake Freeman find his ‘relic’, an old wooden box worse than Pandora’s, then all hell will break loose . . . literally.

Only one thing is certain – Perth just got a whole lot more interesting for Sadie Miller.

Myke Bartlett’s debut novel, ‘Fire in the Sea’, was the 2011 winner of the Text Prize for Young Adult and Children’s Writing.

I love an Australian young adult paranormal novel that relishes being an Australian young adult paranormal novel. Case and point – Myke Bartlett’s incredibly compelling ‘Fire in the Sea’. This novel marks the first Aussie paranormal I've read that is set in Western Australia, and makes a focal point of the City of Light, Perth. A good portion of the drama and supernatural shenanigans take place at the iconic Cottesloe Beach, with the grandiose Surf Life Saving Club in the background standing watch. It’s clear from the moment that Sadie Miller laments her Perth surroundings (dreaming of a move to Oxford or Melbourne) that Bartlett is himself well-acquainted with the teenage pastime of wishing to be ‘anywhere but here’. Sadie knocks around the beach with her friends, and rides her bike through suburban neighbourhoods, but is thoroughly sick of it all. Not only does this small town hold vastly painful memories of her dead parents, but the fact of the matter is: nothing happens . . . until a beaten old man leaves Sadie with everything, almost more than she can handle.

Bartlett’s particular brand of supernatural is more like a patchwork of monsters, myths and imagination. I don’t think I’ll be spoiling anything if I say that he covers a broad spectrum of paranormal from the Minotaur to sea sirens, while providing a harrowing explanation for Pompeii’s eruption and an even more chilling mystery surrounding a famous long-lost city. It’s a most peculiar mix of myth and mayhem that works brilliantly when woven by Bartlett. But what really saves ‘Fire in the Sea’ from just being a hodge-podge of fantasy is its young protagonist, Sadie Miller.

We are with Sadie every step of the way – from Mr. Freeman’s attack to his seeming reincarnation to a particularly handsome young man. She is as cast adrift in the supernatural sea as readers, but her particular brand of brittle, sarcastic loyalty makes navigating Bartlett’s mythical waters so very easy (and downright enjoyable);

Jake lifted the talisman from the front of his shirt. ‘This marks me as a servant of the Gods. As long as I wear it, I’ll always come back.’
‘Good for you. So you don’t die. You don’t get old.’ Sadie looked down at the dog by his feet, the dog with the same name as countless dogs before him. She saw herself, staring at a dog, standing on grass she’d played on as a child. ‘No. Seriously, what is wrong with me? Demons, Gods. A magic box. I mean, I've never ever read Lord of the Rings. I hate all that stuff.’

I loved Sadie. She’s just the sort of young heroine I love to read – she spends a good portion of the novel being scared witless, but never lets her fear get in the way of saving her friends or doing what’s right. She's quick-thinking and fierce, and just the sort of friend I'd like to have in my corner (should a Minotaur ever attack). But she’s also thoroughly relatable – combating Perth-fatigue, a best friend who wants to be more and trying not to succumb to the grief that constantly pulls at her.

I really shouldn’t be so surprised that another Text Prize novel is incredible, but I am. ‘Fire in the Sea’ is a fantastic new addition to the Aussie young adult paranormal scene – set in the beautiful (if lamentably dull) city of Perth, and featuring everything from sea sirens to crazy reincarnated boys. Myke Bartlett has written a parade of paranormal creatures and a thrilling sea-depths mystery . . . I, for one, hope that this is just the first of many more novels from an interesting new Aussie YA voice.

5/5