Alison Stuart - Writer

Rediscovering Reading

2012-01-30T12:12:00.000+11:00

This may sound a strange blog title...particularly coming from a writer but the sad truth is that in this busy world, I have lost the art of reading. Reading has been reduced to a self indulgent pleasure or a few snatched chapters before switching off the light at night.

To my shame, I get hopping mad when my husband starts to read because he is utterly single minded. He will sit and read a book from cover to cover in one sitting given half a chance and while I'm flitting around the house being busy and doing "stuff", he is sitting there READING A BOOK. He will then take it to bed and read it into the wee small hours without a thought that the light is driving his companion crazy!

I have just returned from a week in beautiful New Caledonia, most of which I spent by myself in a hotel in Noumea. DH (who was doing a site visit in the north of the island) joined me for the weekend. The 4 days I spent by myself, I DID very little. Normally I have to train for holidays which are spent madly rushing around trying to see and do as much as we can in a short space of time.

WRITER AT WORK

Instead I wrote, I thought, I plotted and I read.

In keeping with my commitment to the Australian Women Writers Challenge I read Australian Women authors and here is the list.

THE FORGOTTEN GARDEN: Kate Morton
A small child is found alone on a dock in Australia 1913 with nothing but a small white suitcase containing a book of fairy tales. This story traces the story of that little girl and the search for her identity. It is told through the eyes of the child as an older woman, her granddaughter and the mysterious "authoress" of the fairy tale book. What unfolds is a complex story of social class and rejection in the late nineteenth century. It is not a pretty tale and the fairy stories themselves give more clues to the true story and hints at a darker story than the one revealed on the surface. As the story moves between not only the three women's point of view, but also a fair smattering of the secondary characters, it is not an easy book to "get into". However once the rhythm is established it is a compelling with a satisfactory ending, at least for the granddaughter, Cassandra, who has her own demons to bear.

INTRODUCING THE HONOURABLE PHRYNE FISHER: The first 3 Phryne Fisher novels: Kerry Greenwood
The wonderful Phyrne Fisher is the subject of seventeen books and is shortly to appear on our screens (ABC) in a series of single episodes based on a number of her books. Phryne is a "modern woman" of the 1920s, totally confident in her abilities and sexuality. Of course it helps to gorgeous and independently wealthy! The first 3 Phyrne books establish Phryne in Melbourne society and her cast of characters that surround her. Kerry's portrait of 1920s Melbourne is not tinged with rose. It was a rough and ugly world if you were poor and even though the root of the book is firmly local, the stories are universal (and just the right length for an easy holiday read).

BOOMERANG BRIDE: Fiona Lowe
Fiona Lowe writes as HMB "medical author" and Boomerang Bride is her first venture outside that sub genre into the wider world of romantic fiction with a "feisty" Australian bride turning up in small town Wisconsin looking for her online fiancee. Instead she meets Marc the viking. This is a wonderful story, written with a deft and light touch. Fiona's deep affection for a part of the USA she know well comes through and the cast of secondary characters are beautifully drawn with the right amount of pathos/humour. Despite knowing this is a romance and it will end HEA, there are enough credible twists and turns along the way to keep the protagonists at a distance while they come to know not only each other but their inner selves.

BRIDE BY MISTAKE: Anne Gracie
I did what my husband normally does...I read this book from cover to cover in one day. Admittedly most of that was spent on a long boat ride to an island, followed by an extended sit on a tropical beach. This is the last of Anne's Devil Rider series and I've loved them all. What I particularly like about Anne's writing is that she doesn't shy away from the reality of the period. Most of Regency England was spent at war and the men who returned from the war were inevitably damaged - physically and emotionally. Anne doesn't hold back in depicting the horror of what they endured and Luke, more than any of the other Devil Riders, is a badly wounded hero (all right I am a complete sucker for wounded heroes!) but so is Bella and together they have to heal the wounds of their horrible war.

I also started: HOUSE OF WOMEN: Ann Whitfield also writing as Anne Brear

All Aussie women writers and all different! The only actual book I took with me was the Anne Gracie, the rest were transported via Kindle (imagine lugging that many books in your suitcase!). I am a total convert to ebooks!

In his few days with me, DH polished off his latest book (Dan Brown...say no more!) and "in desparation" picked up and read the Anne Gracie - in twenty four hours. A great fan of Bernard Cornwell and the wonderful Sharpe series, he chuckled his way through Luke and Bella's adventures and when he finished (with a smile on his face) pronounced it a "lovely story". Consider that a review!

What have you been doing for your holidays (summer or winter!) and what reading has taken your fancy?

A NEW BOOK IS COMING!

2012-01-16T12:17:00.000+11:00

Hot off the press:

I am thrilled to announce that GATHER THE BONES, the book I have been loosely describing as "Downton Abbey with ghosts" (I will come up with a better description!), has been bought by Lyrical Press and will be published as an ebook in the mid year.

Watch this space!

A very excited...

Alison xxx

Australian Women Writers Challenge 2012

2011-12-13T15:14:00.000+11:00

Keen on romance, fantasy, crime, YA, literary, mainstream women's fiction? Contemporary or historical? Memoir, other nonfiction or poetry?

Whatever your preference, whether you're a fan of one genre or a devoted eclectic, the 2012 Australian Women Writers Book Reading & Reviewing Challenge invites you to celebrate a year encountering the best of Australian women's writing.

Challenge period: 1 January 2012 - 31 December 2012

Goal: Read and review books written by Australian women writers – hard copies, ebooks and audiobooks, new, borrowed or stumbled upon by book-crossing.

Genre challenges:
Purist: one genre only
Dabbler: more than one genre
Devoted eclectic: as many genres as you can find

Challenge levels:
Stella (read 3 and review at least 2 books)
Miles (read 6 and review at least 3*
Franklin-fantastic (read 10 and review at least 4 books)*
* The higher levels should include at least one substantial length review

I will be joining the challenge and it is my GOAL to be a "Stella" reader (I'm a painfully slow reader these days!) in a genre other than my own (OK...choosing CRIME!).

If you would like to join me GO TO the Goodreads Australian Women Writers Challenge and sign up!

And if anyone would like to choose one of my books (yes, I am an Australian writer!) to read and/or review, please email me at alison@alisonstuart.com and I will give away a free copy of the chosen book in the e-format of your choosing.

Happy reading in 2012.

Alison

CHANCE ENCOUNTERS

2011-11-25T12:05:00.001+11:00

Donne wrote “No man is an island” but for many writersstarting on their writing journey, they can feel that they are not only anisland but a very remote island stranded in a wild sea. When I first started towrite it felt like some sort of guilty pleasure that I would be embarrassedabout if anyone caught me at it! I felt completely and utterly alone.

Gradually, as that first novel began to take shape I started to believe that this wassomething I could do, that a childhood dream of being a writer was achievablebut like any spring growth, that dream felt new and vulnerable to criticism. Acouple of wrong words and I would have crawled into a corner and tried toforget all about it. It took a couple of chance encounters to realise that itwas all right to keep writing and to keep dreaming.

The firstencounter was with a woman in our church choir who I’ll call “Ann”. To me shewas an idol…a successful career woman who had managed to reach the pinnacle ofher profession and yet also be a wife and mother at a time when women werestill expected to be the little housewife. I can’t recall how the conversationstarted, during which she “confessed” that in her spare time (what spare time,I wondered?) she liked to write romance novels. I never knew if Ann was apublished author or not – in hindsight she seemed rather cagey about thataspect of her secret life. That short, snatched conversation in the choirvestry had a deep impact on me and it felt as if she had given me permission topursue my dream. If this amazing woman wrote romance novels then it was OK forme to do so too.

I typed“The End” and that first manuscript (begun when I dislocated a shoulder on askiing holiday) had become a fully formed book. A BOOK! I'd done it! But publication seemedan unachievable aspiration as the rejection letters began to flow in. In themeantime my legal career limped on and led me to my second chance encounter inthe crowded foyer of a local magistrate’s court, among the speeding drivers andpetty criminals. There I met an upcoming crime writer, and lawyer, by the nameof Kerry Greenwood. I had read several of her wonderful Phryne Fisher novelsand she was enough of a local identity for me to recognise her. In the courseof the conversation I blurted out my hopes and dreams of leaving law behind andbecoming a writer. Kerry listened patiently and told me that of course I coulddo it. I just had to keep at it.

The rest ishistory. I found a writing family with Romance Writers of Australia and nolonger felt alone. I kept writing and eventually my stories were published butI never forgot Ann and Kerry’s encouragement to a young, vulnerable, fledglingwriter with a dream.

Recently Imet Kerry Greenwood again. No longer up and coming but arrived, Kerry’sfabulous stories are being transformed into film with a Phryne Fisher seriesdue for release on the ABC next year. Like any nervous fan I sidled up to herat the end of the panel and began “You won’t remember me, but…”. “Of course Iremember you,” she said. “How is the writing?” I felt myself flushing withpleasure that a chance encounter so many years ago had stayed with her. If sheonly knew what it had meant to me at the time.

Musing about the Muse

2011-09-27T10:39:00.002+10:00

"Those who work only when the Muse strikes them make little progress." (William V. Dunning)

Thank you William, your words are so true! Any writer, poet or artist will tell you that if they waited for the muse to appear at their shoulder then there would be little in this world of great literature, poetry or art. The creative life is, I am afraid to say, 10% inspiration and 90% hard graft!

Since becoming "differently employed" in November last year, I have learned that my previous excuses of work pressures no longer excused me from writing. I have spent many mornings sitting at a blank computer screen (well not completely blank, generally it was occupied by Facebook or some other distraction). In order to write I have had to chain my muse by the ankle to the desk and she has howled and sulked and occasionally come up with the goods, but writing, like my previous employment is hard work. Some days the words flow and other days they have to be drawn out like fingernails.

So, who are these muses that so torment us? According to Greek mythology there were nine of the lovely ladies:

Calliope: Epic Poetry (symbolised by a writing tablet)
Clio: History (a scroll)
Erato: Love poetry (a cythara - harp)
Euterpe: Song and Elegaic Poetry (an aulos - flute)
Melpomene: Tragedy (tragic mask)
Polyhymnia: Hymns (veil)
Terpsichore: Dance (lyre)
Thalia: Comedy (comic mask)
Urania: Astronomy (globe and compass)

The word "muse" comes from the Greek "mousa" meaning to excel in arts and in the ancient Greek culture, this covered all learning. Modern words such as "music" owe their derivation to the mousa.

I have decided my own personal muse thrives on stress. With an imminent overseas trip, a bathroom renovation and general domestic upheaval, I signed off on a draft of one of my WIPs last week with the decision that I would take a break from writing to get everything sorted out.

That is when my muse came out to play. Without warning I felt compelled to shake the dust off my novella. I have decided this particular story is born of stressful occasions, as I started writing it during my father's last illness. Suddenly I found I could pass the computer and out would come another few hundred words, without conscious thought and recourse to Facebook or Spider Solitaire.

Perhaps I am not meant to be a "full time writer", maybe I need some added dimension to my life to kick start my muse into life, or maybe it is just about self discipline and taming my muse into submission?

What kick starts your muse?

PS You may notice that my blog has changed "look" - that's just me procrastinating again. Then again I am still in spring cleaning mode so a fresh new look for the spring?

Guest Blog: How does Feng Shui Work?

2011-09-04T15:19:00.000+10:00

I have done several blogs on Feng Shui and its accidental role in my life. This week I am delighted to have a practitioner in the subject as my guest, Michael Shnippering, who is far better qualified than I am to tell you how Feng Shui works!

In order to understand how Feng Shui works, it is crucial to understand chi. Chi is energy; chi is life force. There exists both positive and negative chi, or energy. Feng Shui is used to promote positive chi and subdue or remove negative chi.

However, there are also other, crucial concepts that form the foundations of Feng Shui. One of these is harmony. Harmony, balance, and symmetry are very important in Feng Shui as well. By improving chi flow, creating openings for chi to enter, and formulating spaces where harmony, beauty, and balance are abundant, Feng Shui works to make a home and the people who live there healthy, happy, and prosperous.

Because energy affects us on every level – physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual, by working with the energy and creating positive situations, Feng Shui helps us improve our lives. With Feng Shui, if you change the energy, you change your life.

Feng Shui is referred to as a science and an art. Some even call it magic. It is all three. For those who don’t believe in magic, simply open your understanding to define magic as a science we don’t yet understand. Because in the Western world, the study of energy is often considered to be “New Age”, there is a great deal of ignorance about it and people tend to negate what they do not understand.

In many other places and civilizations in the world, the study of energy has existed for thousands of years. Scientific experiments have proven that we have energy. Whether you call it chi, prana, or energy, it not only exists but plays an important role in our lives.

A doctor named Masuro Emoto did a study where he froze ice crystals. On some of the crystals he wrote the word “love”. On another set he wrote “Hate”. The ones marked “love” produced beautiful, symmetrical crystals. The others, marked “hate”, yielded deformed, lopsided, sickly-looking crystals. You can think of Feng Shui working for similar reasons.

Feng Shui works because like attracts like. When we attract positive energy into our homes, we attract positive energy to our bodies and the events that surrounds us. Certain elements in our homes may promote negative energy. This is often because they are disharmonious. For example, things that are dirty, broken, or ugly make us feel bad – we are picking up on the energy they emit and cause.

The ancient Chinese studied chi in great detail. They were able to discover how things in our physical world carry a certain kind of energy or cause a particular type of energy. They then translated this into a template for making a home harmonious,. In addition, they also used astrology and astronomy, for the positions of the planets, seasons, elements, and other aspect of nature also guide and shape their own energies.

The bottom line is – Feng Shui works. People have noticed the changes to their homes and lives.

BIO: Michael Schnippering is the founder of of Feng Shui at Work. He is committed to the true art and science of Feng Shui. Over the years his Feng Shui practice has taken him to various parts of the United States, Germany, France, Spain, Colombia and Argentina.

Visit Michael and his team at Feng Shui at Work http://www.fengshuiatwork.com

Twitter: @fengshuiatwork

On Spring Cleaning and Blogs

2011-08-23T13:13:00.001+10:00

Spring is in the air and I am spring cleaning! So far I today I have cleaned the oven, launched a new book and revamped my website.

In September I will be part of an exciting new grop blog -- Historical Hearts -- which launches on September 14 and in the interests of maintaining my sanity and the best use of my time, I am moving my personal blog over to my website. Past posts will still be able to accessed here but all future blogging will be done from http://www.alisonstuart.com/alison-stuart-blog.html.

Oh... and the new book I have launched today is a collection of my short stories: TOWER OF TALES available at Smashwords and Kindle. From now until the end of August you can download it for free from Smashwords. Just quote coupon #CZ59R!

Fit to Write - A Personal Journey

2011-08-19T08:53:00.002+10:00

This time last year I was a mess.

My dream job had begun to unravel as the organisation I worked for as a senior executive went through an organisational restructure. I was working long hours, dealing with some difficult issues, what little exercise I did was getting pushed to the back burner and my diet seemed to largely consist of Board room sandwiches and take away. My weight climbed up over the 80kg mark for the first time ever which on a 162cm frame was not a good look! I was going to bed exhausted, sleeping badly and waking up just as exhausted. In short I was stressed, overweight and miserable.

My father had died earlier in the year and in retrospect I was still dealing with his loss - I simply hadn't acknowledged my need to grieve. I was also frustrated because that five minutes I grabbed on a Saturday afternoon to write was just not enough time to produce anything of any worth. So add 'creatively stifled' to the mixing pot and I was going nowhere fast.

You know things aren't going right when you feel nauseous just driving into the car park in the morning and you tear up just looking at a white board!

Something had to be done or I was heading for the ubiquitous "burnout". Early in September I attended a conference at which the motivational speaker was Matt Church. Every conference has a motivational speaker these days but Matt Church brought a different perspective. He talked about the chemistry of the body and how it affects your working life. He described "Adrenalin Junkies" and as he spoke I could hear the voice in my head..."He's talking about you". To paraphrase him, our bodies give us effectively 3 hours of adrenalin a day and if you are an adrenalin junkie (and I ticked all the boxes), you've burnt it off by 11am. After that cortisol kicks in which, while giving you the same energy level, has the physical effect of thickening the blood. When you stop, "it's like being hit by a Mack truck"...it affects your sleep, causes weight gain...etc.

How to deal with the problem? Seratonin - it takes at least 3 weeks to begin to replace your seratonin levels. I couldn't change the work situation but I could change me - diet and exercise needed serious re-evaluation. So I signed up to Michelle Bridges 12WBT program. This is not a quick fix weight loss program; it is careful eating and a minimum of 6 days of exercise. I began to use the gym at work in a quiet hour in the afternoon if I could grab one, I changed into my exercise gear before I left work thus ensuring I made it to my Step Into Life classes or simply worked on Michelle's "Learning to Run" Program.

Then in November my employer and I parted ways. It was one of those unpleasant Friday afternoon discussions that come from left field. Yes, I was devastated but at the same time exhilarated. I felt as if I had been set free. As a measure of how stressed I had been, it took at least two months to begin to feel as if I had achieved some sort of equilibrium again. In that time I had lost 8kg and I was exercising every day. In May this year I ran my first 5km "Fun Run" (not two words I have ever put together!) in 37 minutes.

I now write full time. I sit at a desk from 9 to 5 talking to imaginary people, which after my recent work experience, certainly beats talking to real ones! But you have to be fit to write. It is an occupation that demands as much attention to your physical well being as any other job. I'm at an age where bits of me are starting to wear out but that is all the more reason to exercise.

Exercise is now a vital part of my life, if I miss a day then I know it. I still need to lose more weight but at least that is not down to Board room sandwiches any more! The fact is I like a glass of wine in the evening and good food and I'm at an age where the metabolism doesn't function quite the way it used to but at least I don't FEEL overweight any more.

So where am I going with this? Some advice for being "Fit to Write"

Make exercise part of your day - whether it is going for a walk, yoga or anything. Start setting yourself goals. You do it with your writing...do it with exercise. "Today I will walk one street further" or (as happened to me) "In May I will participate in a Fun Run". It is easy for me to say this and I can hear the excuses (I know them all...believe me) but you can do it. Not exercising is a habit. It takes 21 days to make a new habit. If I could do it, you can too.
Watch your diet. I know chocolate is a compulsory part of any writer's life, but make it a treat, not a part of the daily food group.
Get up out of that chair at least once ever hour and do something different for 5 minutes.

I know many of you are not just writing, but also balancing employment and families. Nothing changes what I've said above. I did it...you can too! When I started running, I could barely make one minute before feeling as I was about to have a coronary, now I can run 3kms without stopping (OK...I will never be a marathon runner but this is about you...not what others can do!).

In summary: Listen to your body, cultivate a "whole of body awareness" and set yourself goals, even if they are "baby steps". Striving to achieve a goal is better than just sitting back and letting life happen to you.

Any more tips to allow us to be "Fit to Write"?

Alison after the Run for Kids - still smiling!

(PS Another great reference that resonated with me is the "Strong Women Stay Young" concept. See the website at http://www.strongwomen.com/ )

The Soundtrack to my Writing Life

2011-06-29T08:58:00.000+10:00

Being a creature of habit (in other words a typical Capricorn) from an early age I developed a routine around the way I worked, of which music played a significant part. Back in the days of LPs (remember those large shiney black things?) I would never start a study session without Tchaikovsky’s 1812 overture or Handel’s Water music. It would have been as unthinkable as not playing a couple of rounds of solitaire (with REAL cards) while I ate my lunch.

More recently when I needed to concentrate at work drafting agreements or finalising complex meeting minutes, I would put my iPod on and listen to an eclectic selection of music in a playlist called “Music to Work To”. This included Celtic and Opera.

You may be rolling your eyes and thinking “OCD” here, which I am not at all but when I have a goal to achieve I find music and routine helps to soothe the savage beast. Putting the music on (and occasionally lighting the oil burner) seems to provide a clue to my scatty brain that we are here to WORK.

As I was thinking about this, it occurred to me that my published novels were both written to music. THE KING’S MAN with its dark undertones had behind it the music of Purcell. The music of Loreena McKennit features strongly in my writing world, and her eastern influence is providing background to one of my current “WIPS” (work in progress) which is partially set in the Arab world of North Africa in the seventeenth century.

At the moment I am deep into rewrites of my post World War One novel and you would think that maybe something 1920s or a selection of the war poetry of Wilfred Owen might be the kick start, but oddly it is a simple little ballad by a young singer called Christina Perri. Her song “Arms” seems to perfectly capture the fear on the part of both my hero and heroine to allow themselves to fall in love. I am probably singlehandedly responsible for the number of You Tube hits Christina’s video is experiencing as neither the CD nor the digital download seems to be available in Australia yet, but here it is. I hope you enjoy it.

Do you have a musical soundtrack to your writing, reading or working life?

The next best seller is coming along nicely...

2011-05-24T16:21:00.000+10:00

I have had a few readers ask me lately when my next book will be coming out. The truth is I don't know!

For the last eight years I have been occupied with the thing called "career" as I rose to being a senior executive. While I liked to think it didn't interfere with my writing, the truth is it did. I will be the first to admit I am not superwoman. After a day at the executive grindstone, I would crawl home from work too tired to do much more than throw some food on the table, watch an hour of mindless TV and go to bed. Weekends were then spent catching up on cooking, shopping, cleaning and life. So those spare five minutes on a Saturday afternoon were not terribly productive. I could feel all my creativity just disappearing. I couldn't write and I couldn't sew - my two creative outlets. All I had was work.

In November last year I quite suddenly found myself "differently employed". The circumstances don't matter...it is one of the realities of corporate life and the higher up the ladder you are, the shakier it becomes. If anyone has ever found themselves in the same position you will know that it is a horrible experience and despite all the silver linings (and there are plenty!), it shatters your sense of self.

I suppose I am more fortunate than most. I didn't feel defined by my career. I realised that I had one solid rock to cling to and that was my writing. While I don't think my "career" is completely over, I have consciously taken the time out to consider where it was going and, more importantly what it was doing to me (I think that is the subject for another blog). In the meantime I have thrown myself into my alternate career - writing.

The reality is that By the Sword and The King's Man were mostly written during my time in Singapore where once again I had found myself "differently employed" (as an expat wife). What this means is that I have a cyber sock drawer stuffed with ideas and half started novels but nothing close to submission quality so I have set myself this year to finish some of those "UFOs" (Unfinished Objects).

I believe the best tool of writing is "time" and by that I mean setting your work aside to "set" for a while (months is good) and then coming back to it with fresh eyes. My writing style is to complete a rough draft (and I mean ROUGH) - the plot may change from the beginning to the end, it will have missing chunks with "put more stuff here" annotated into the manuscript but what it will be is the skeleton of the story. I will then put it away and pull out the ugly object some months later and begin my favourite part, the rewrite. This is like putting flesh on the bones, or for an artist starting to apply the paint to a rough sketch. This process will need to be repeated several times as you deepen the layers of paint, add complexity to the characters and depth to the plot. It is like any craft, it needs to be done with care and love and above all, time.

Time is not a commodity that many professional writers enjoy. There are nasty things called "deadlines" so the honing of their work needs to be tailored to meet that deadline. I suspect this is why so many writers first couple of books are infinitely better than their subsequent books (until they get into a rhythm of writing).

So where am I at? I currently have four pieces of work on the various burners of my literary stove.

A ghost story set in 1922 encompassing a Regency mystery and the shadows of the first world war. A big departure from my usual period of history and quite a complex story.
The long awaited sequel to By the Sword and The King's Man. Set in 1680 it brings the strands of both stories together with the "next generation" plus Barbary Pirates.
A Regency-set romance. I am venturing into very well covered territory here so I am not hopeful this will get much of a run but it has been interesting playing in another period of history.
A time travel novella...English Civil War to modern times. It's been fun to write!

There we are...that is what is simmering at the moment, in various stages of production. I am shuffling them around and my hope is by the end of this year, they will all be to submission standard. It is one thing to write them, the next thing will be to find a publisher and in this rapidly changing world of books, I have no idea how hard that is going to be!

So thank you for asking, I would love to say my next best seller will be coming out soon, but I would be lying!

However what I am doing is putting together a collection of my short stories which I will self publish so watch this space.

Alison

The Colours of Lake Eyre

2011-05-19T16:03:00.000+10:00

The early settlers in Australia clung to the fragile coast line of this great country and could only dream of what lay beyond there own existence. They watched the sea birds flying inland and explorers began to venture into the interior in search of the great inland sea that drew the birds. Charles Sturt carried a whaling boat with him into the dry interior in the hope of finding this mythical sea. Other explorers found the great sea but it was an illusion...a great salty sink in the centre of Australia, named Lake Eyre.

We have watched in horror as massive floods raged through Queensland earlier this year. Some of the water went out to sea but a great deal of it filled the inland waterways of the Cooper Creek and Diamantina River systems and after 10 years of drought the rivers flowed at last, spilling out into Lake Eyre. The filling of Lake Eyre is said to occur only once a lifetime but it seems that this phenomena may become more common as the climate adjusts. As it fills, life comes back to it, filling it with fish and water birds. It is no coincidence that the pelicans have gone from my own waterfront in Melbourne. Some primeval urge draws them to the waterways of Lake Eyre.

Just as it draws the birds, so too it draws people and my husband and I headed off on a 4000 km round trip to see Lake Eyre for ourselves. Our own explorations have already taken us to Innaminkca, Longreach and Birdsville and we have seen the "channel country" as it is called in drought and flood. Lake Eyre was the final pilgrimage.

The human ability to settle in what seems utterly inhospitable country never ceases to amaze me and on those dry, barren desert plains of northern South Australia, you come across the ruins of old homesteads and railway settlements from the days of the great Ghan rail link between Adelaide and the north. Lake Eyre itself is very hard to approach from land as the country around it is privately owned - the great Anna Creek Station, the size of Belgium, being one such landholding.

From William Creek, a one pub town that once used to be a siding for the Ghan, we took a flight in a small pain over the great Lake which is the only way to get a real appreciation of the size of this inland sea. Pictures speak volumes so here are some of the colours of Lake Eyre

On Books and Printing

2011-03-25T12:10:00.000+11:00

The original 17th century print machines

To choose a good book, look in an inquisitor’s prohibited list. ~John Aikin

On a recent trip to Belgium, I came across a small gem - an intact insight into the world of books and printing in the seventeenth century. The Plantin-Moretus Museum in Antwerp.

This little treasure is a museum of books and printing (ah yes I can see a few eyes rolling) but far from being a dry museum of glass boxes, it is a world heritage site because the museum is in fact the actual home and printing works of the Plantin-Moretus family and is exactly as it was in the late sixteenth/seventeenth century.

The printing house was founded in 1555 by a Frenchman, Christoffel Plantin, who by 1575 was running a thriving business employee 70 people and 15 printing presses (two of the oldest printing presses in the world are still extant in the museum). The business was inherited by his son-in-law Jan Moretus and the business continued in the family for the next three centuries. The house printed not only in Latin but also in Greek, Hebrew and other languages, producing itself a bible in three languages (Greek, Hebrew and Latin).

As a home, it is a fine example of a seventeenth century wealthy businessman’s home. Many of the rooms are lined with leather, with the design gilded – a sort of seventeenth century wall paper, only affordable by the most wealthy. By far the most impressive part was the library – particularly for the seventeenth century, it is a phenomenal collection.

But the real interest is in the process (the craft) of producing a book. The original letter dies (and the business actually made its own dies) still in their wooden racks are to be seen. The wide range of letters and fonts (many still used today such as Garamond) in languages such as Ancient Greek and Arabic – in sizes from almost microscopic to full size makes you realise the skill of the typesetters who had to set the forms for the printing press. The illustrations were generally done by copper plating (a process very well demonstrated at another museum we visited – the Rembrandt Museum in Amsterdam). Many of the illustrations were done by Balthasar Moretus’ great friend and fellow resident of Antwerp – John Paul Rubens (whose paintings hang on the walls of the house).

To print a page, the form had to be individually inked and then put in the press, one sheet at a time. In another part of the house at two huge desks, the editors sat, red pens in hand. These men were not just editing. To do their job well they were language scholars and academics. The editing marks are the same as those used today by modern editors. Once the pages had been edited, the book could be printed, page after individual page. These were then wrapped and taken down to the shop to be sold in loose leaf form. If you wanted your book bound then you went to a book binder, a different trade all together.

When seen as an entire process, I came to realise why even after the invention of printing, books were so expensive and so valued. To possess a library even approaching the size of the one owned by the Moretus family, required enormous wealth.

And the reason for the quote at the beginning of this piece? In a corner of the museum there is the Inquisitors list of banned books which included several printed by the Plantin-Moretus press. They nearly came undone, had it not been for some very quick work by Jan Moretus in securing the Catholic Church’s contracts!

If you find yourself in Antwerp with nothing to do in the afternoon, don’t miss this wonderful museum and tribute to the art of creating a book!

Read an E-book Week

2011-03-07T19:29:00.001+11:00

Did you know that far from being a modern phenomena the concept of the electronic or ("e-book") goes back at least 40 years?

In 1971, MIchael Hart was given $100,000 worth of computer time with a Xerox Sigma V mainframe computer. He decided that the greatest value created by computers would not be computing, but would be the storage, retrieval, and searching of what was stored in our libraries. The first "e-book" was born—a copy of the Declaration of Independence. Those humble beginnings would become Project Gutenberg. Today Project Gutenberg houses 20,000 free texts and over 100,000 books are available through their partners. Today over 3,000,000 books are downloaded each month.

It has been a difficult journey for the e-book which I once saw described as a "solution in search of a problem" but with the advent of e-ink and affordable e-readers, not to mention the iPad phenomena, the e-book may finally have arrived as a real alternative to print books. For a comprehensive history of the e-book revolution go to http://www.ebookweek.com/history.html

To celebrate "Read an E-Book Week" my e-books are available at a 50% reduced price. Go to http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/alisonstuart and select the book of your choice. At the checkout quote coupon # RAE50 to receive your discount.

The Tiger Painting

2011-02-13T16:04:00.000+11:00

The Tiger Painting

In 2002 we were living in Singapore on an expat posting with DH's (Dearest Husband) company. DH was always travelling so was rarely at home, Number One son was doing HSC at the Australian School, Number Two son was in Year 9 and a lump of teenage misery and I was trying to hold the whole ship together. Don't get me wrong, I was having a perfectly wonderful time but it did have its moments...the ones they never tell you about in the "Expat life is wonderful" articles.

In May of that year I bought DH a beautiful painting of a tiger that I found in an obscure little Art Gallery in Holland Village. DH was suitably pleased with the purchase and we hung it in the dining room of our apartment. Our apartment was one of the older style apartments, spacious, airy and multi level. The dining area was at the top of the highest level and we placed the painting on the wall facing down the stairs, effectively in the most dominant place in the apartment. This is IMPORTANT!

The Dining area of our apartment - Tiger looked straight down the stairs!

We started to experience a period of "general domestic unrest". DH was told that he may be posted elsewhere...could be back home, could be somewhere else or we could be remaining in Singapore. We began to quarrel in a way we had never done before - or since (one famous quarrel resulted in me offloading DH on the side of a road). #1 son was going through the "HSC blues" and #2 son as well as being a general lump of misery, seemed to be continually unwell. It felt like our little ship was beginning to founder.

"Feng Shui" tours of Singapore are very popular and a group of us embarked on one of these tours. As the bus circumnavigated the popular haunts of the island, the Feng Shui master who was hosting us, went to great pains to explain the power of "tigers" and "dragons". Tigers he said were the most powerful images and if you had one in your house you had to be very careful where it was placed or the power of the tiger could overwhelm the household. I stared at him! The tiger painting...I had placed it in the MOST DOMINANT place in the whole apartment. I had upset the balance of our home and we were being overwhelmed by the tiger.

On the way home I gloomily considered whether art galleries in Singapore would take returns on the basis of bad feng shui. Stopping for coffee in one of the malls we were joined by a newcomer to the school mothers' group who, she told us, just happened to be a geomancer (from Sydney). I related the sad story of my beautiful tiger painting and she laughed (well who wouldn't!). The problem was easily fixed, she said. Just move the painting to a left hand wall (relative to your front door) and make sure it is facing a blank wall and then balance it with a dragon image on the other side of the room.

The $5 resin dragon

My first stop was one of the cheap touristy curio shops where I purchased a small, resin dragon for the huge sum of $5 , I then hurried home and moved the painting just as the geomancer had instructed to a benign wall in our living room, carefully placing the dragon opposite.

An hour later #1 son slumped in from school. In answer to my tentative "How was school?", he replied with a quizzical look on his face. "Good. Half way through the afternoon, it suddenly felt OK again.". I gave the tiger a wink.

Next morning, I received a phone call from DH. "Just had a meeting with the boss. Sorry, Al, but I am being posted back to Melbourne." Job uncertainty resolved, I gave the tiger a thorough dusting.

The following day, #2 son's grumbling appendix threatened to burst and he was whipped into hospital. OK, not a great outcome for him but at least it explained the ongoing ill health! At this point I felt I should be lighting joss sticks in front of the tiger.

Over lunch with some friends a few days later, I related the story of the Tiger Painting and one of my friends went pale. She had just purchased a large Tibetan chest, painted with the faces of six tigers. She promptly went out and bought a multi branched dragon candelabra (figuring so many tigers needed something more substantial than a $5 resin dragon) and had her sceptical teenager moving the chest into less dominant positions. Too late - the next day her husband's appendix burst and he was whipped into hospital with peritonitis - a week before they were due to be posted back to Melbourne. (I have often wondered if there was such a thing as contagious appendicitis as we had hosted a BBQ only a week earlier and 3 people from that day came down with appendicitis!).

So you can see, I am a staunch believer in the power of the elements and the principles of Feng Shui. The wealth corner of our property is the far left hand corner of DH's garage which is so cluttered and disorganised you can't even get to it. Knowing this was likely to happen if you dig through the junk, you will find a frog with a coin in its mouth. I can't change DH but I can do what little I can to influence the qi!

Tiger still lives with us, I couldn't find a non-dominant left wall for him, but he has his back to the front door and across the room is his little friend the dragon. Peace and harmony rules.

Tiger and the Dragon - in harmony

(If you find yourself in Singapore and you have exhausted the joys of Orchard Road, why not take a Feng Shui tour? You never know what you will discover!)

Dust and a Dose of Feng Shui

2011-01-10T11:56:00.000+11:00

My grandmother used to say, "Darling, we all have our own standards of slovenliness and are faintly appalled by everyone else's.". My grandmother, I hasten to add, was not the best of housekeepers. When she died, my mother and I spent days painstakingly washing her incredible collection of valuable antique china all of which had a thick yellow patina from years of being confined in the same room as a smoker. And as the true colours of the beautiful pieces came through the smoke haze I felt an incredible sense of wonder and satisfaction (and moral superiority over my darling but distracted grandmother) .

Just before Christmas I became "differently employed" - the choice was not entirely mine but finding myself at home (and now devoted to a full time writing career), I began to NOTICE that my own standard of slovenliness had definitely declined in the years I had been working. I have a wonderful cleaning lady who comes once a fortnight and manages in her 3 short hours to at least keep the house sanitary but the dust had accumulated on my collection of antique china (inherited from my grandmother) and under the furniture I did not have so much dust bunnies as dust elephants. I had simply stopped noticing.

In a pre-Christmas frenzy I spring-cleaned the living room (apparently a must before erecting the Christmas tree) and discussed the "need for clean" with friends on Facebook and why it particularly afflicts some of us (I will happily concede there are people out there to whom this will mean nothing) around the New Year. My Scottish friend claims "means you'll never be able to keep your house clean for the next year" and it got me thinking back to my time in Singapore.

The same frenetic "need to clean" afflicted my Chinese friends as Chinese New Year approached. A dirty house before New Year meant that the negative qi would stay around and make your life a misery for the rest of the year and I am sure if you were to scratch the surface of any culture you will find the urge to "spring clean" occurs at some point in the year.

Of course in the northern European culture, spring cleaning was a necessity. One can only imagine what state ye olde castle was in after a winter. Those nice fresh summer rushes laid down in autumn would be rank - man and beast were indiscriminate about where they relieved themselves, throw in rotting food among the rotting rushes and it makes my dust elephants look positively benign.

But I do think the Chinese are on to something - they call it 'feng shui' (the ancient Chinese laws of aesthetics). For a very good reason (a long story to do with a painting of a tiger) which I should make the subject of another blog, I am a FIRM BELIEVER in the principles of feng shui and among them is the belief in the negative energies generated by clutter (and dust). So whether you are Scottish or Chinese, the principle is the same, at some point in the year (whether it is the start of a new year or spring) the negative energies that have accumulated in the corners of your home need to be expelled in order for you to have a prosperous year. (For some handy home hints on on dealing with your troublesome negative qi click here)

Well I'm not sure this year will be too prosperous (owing to a lack of a job) but I know I am feeling better for the slow (room by room) cleansing my poor neglected home is getting. Then there are the cupboards and book shelves... and quite frankly, when did I ever have time to work? Is this what they mean by a "woman's work is never done"?

What are your thoughts...?

(PS...When I typed "medieval househeeping" into Google, I got a gazillion sites on medieval torture!)

A trip back to childhood with an old friend...

2010-11-14T15:53:00.000+11:00

I recently had cause to buy a young niece a birthday present and lacking both time and imagination, I gave in and decided to buy some "clothes" for her large collection of Barbies. I had fond memories of my own childhood companion, Sindy and thought the many Barbies could probably do with a change of outfit or two. I was horrified to find the choice on sale was extremely limited and basically came down to "sexy nurse Barbie" or "hooker Barbie". I opted for the latter - very short glittery skirts and tops and high heels - and had a delighted niece.

Sindy in her "country walk" outfit"

It gave me a moment of nostalgia for my own beloved Sindy, her boyfriend Paul and little sister Patch, who still reside in a box at the top of my cupboard. My Sindy had endless outfits of great respectability - including a tweed skirt and suede jacket and sensible lace up shoes - for "country walks", a proper nurses outfit (yes Sindy was the nurse, Paul was the doctor - this was the 1960s), riding jodphurs with a hacking jacket (alas despite many hints Santa never provided the horse!), a puffy ski jacket with down trim...and so on. Her party outfit, a pink mini dress with kitten heel shoes was the sexiest poor Sindy got.

In an endeavour to procrastinate while studying for an exam on Corporate Finance, I found myself trawling the web in search of Sindy. (All I can say is I am grateful the internet did not exist when I had to do exams seriously! My diversion in those days were endless games of patience - played with ACTUAL cards. Yes Virginia...that's what we used to in the old days.)

I discovered a world of Sindy collectors out there in internet land and from their comprehensive web pages, I learned that my beloved auburn haired Sindy with her striped "matelot" jumper and jeans and red "Alice" band must have been one of the early models - certainly between 1963 and 1968 (when she grew her hair). Poor Sindy wasn't terribly robust and did not survive all the clothes she was routinely changed in and out of and her head broke off. Mum dutifully elastoplasted it back on again and the repair still survives - just as well as it would now cost over $250 to find the same model in mint condition. Patch also lost her head. Paul managed to keep his but I suspect he was not played with quite as much.

It got me thinking what a microsom of history my Sindy was with her tweed skirt and her pink party dress. Mum (God bless her!) added to her wardrobe with delicate hand made outfits - all so wonderfully 1960s! My grandmother had a lovely wax doll from her childhood called "Priscilla" with whom I was allowed to play on very special occasions. She had beautiful hand stitched clothes and sheets for her turned wooden bed. I wonder if I ever a grand daughter I will produce Sindy or if the new generation will turn up their noses at such silly, dated toys.

Just a couple of the Sindy sites:
http://www.oursindymuseum.com/1963sindy.htm
http://sindyourpedigreegirlofthe60s.piczo.com/?g=1&cr=6

Do you have a special toy from your childhood that still lives with you? Any other Sindy girls out there?

Back in Print!

2010-06-20T16:38:00.004+10:00

"We have the technology..." Do you remember those famous words from the 1970s "Bionic Man"?

In 40 years even the makers of that series could not have envisaged the technology available to us today. Publishing is one of those industries that is still coming to terms with technological advances and for years e-publishing has been struggling to make its mark on the world. Now we have KINDLE and IPAD (I am irrationally hankering after one of those machines - so shiny...so many apps...) and it looks like the e-book may finally have come home.

At least I hope so! My two books, BY THE SWORD and THE KING'S MAN went out of print early last year, ironically just as they were starting to make a bit of a market for themselves and for eighteen months I have been making apologetic noises about the unavailability of my books, particularly following the recent "showcasing" of THE KING'S MAN on the ABC. Attempts to find new publishers for them have been unsuccessful, even with the promise of a previously unpublished sequel so I made a decision to go it alone. I figure I own the electronic and print rights to both books, they've both been published so it's not as if it is a "vanity" publishing. Publishing as we know it is changing!

Originally I thought I would just make up a couple of .pdf files and make them available through my website then a friend put me on to Smashwords, a site run by Mark Coker.
"Smashwords is an ebook publishing and distribution platform for ebook authors, publishers and readers. We offer multi-format, DRM-free ebooks, ready for immediate sampling and purchase, and readable on any e-reading device.

At Smashwords, our authors and publishers have complete control over the sampling, pricing and marketing of their written works.It's free to publish and distribute with Smashwords.

For readers, Smashwords provides an opportunity to discover new voices in all categories and genres of the written word. Once you register, the site offers useful tools for search, discovery and personal library-building, and each week we add new features based on feedback from members."

Why not! The process of re-editing the books myself (the original publisher did a shocking job), getting spiffy new covers designed and getting the books up has been time consuming but I'm really pleased with the result and I hope the readers are too.Thank you to everyone who helped me along the way.

For those of you familiar with THE KING'S MAN, I have taken a liberty. THE KING'S MAN was originally intended to have a sequel close on its heels but with the termination of my contract the sequel never happened. As a result the book ends on a cliff hanger - unforgiveable as every book should be complete in itself. So call it "Director's cut" but I have tied off the loose end I left at the end of the book and will be happy to share the new last chapter with anyone who has been teetering on the edge of that cliff!

I have also been working with one of Smashwords affiliates, WordClay, to get a print (POD) edition of BY THE SWORD available at a reasonable cost. It should be available in a couple of weeks.

All in all, an educational experience and I certainly don't expect to be giving up full time work just yet. I am just happy that my books are "back in print".

TO BUY:

BY THE SWORD click HERE

THE KING'S MAN click HERE

My Secret Arts Life

2010-05-02T16:36:00.001+10:00

Andy Warhol once said we are all entitled to our 15 minutes of fame but I don't think I quite understood what I had let myself in for when I was approached by the producer of "My Secret Arts Life", a segment of ABC Arts Nation, to see if I would be interested in appearing. He explained that the segment was looking at people with busy full time jobs who had secret passions for artistic pursuits. For example an eye surgeon who did ballet...and, yes, a senior executive (in a fire service) who wrote romantic fiction would be perfect!

It could have been awful. Writers of romantic fiction are used to being held up to ridicule as latter day Barbara Cartlands or bored housewifes in fluffy slippers. It is one thing to bear that burden in your writerly guise but quite another to carry it over into the real world where, yes I am, a senior executive in a very male industry! I should have had more confidence in my work mates, after all the first question I was asked when I went for my interview was where my books were available. Still...

I tried very hard not to think about it and put off the dread date till as late as I could possibly make it, only to have it brought forward on me. They would need at least a couple of hours at my workplace and would then film me at home. As luck would have it, the date and time we chose for the filming at work coincided with a rally by our friendly neighbourhood union which would culminate in a noisy gathering outside my window. The last thing we needed was a film crew pushing its way through ranks of annoyed workers! It was agreed to delay the filming session to the afternoon.

I had envisaged a discreet hand held camera and maybe one other person, not a film crew consisting of the producer, the camera man and the sound man, all hoisting huge amounts of gear! All very disruptive to a work place. So under the bright lights, I held imaginary conversations with my PA (who was choking with laughter in the outer office), checked files and stared intently into the computer screen (OK - my job really isn't that interesting!). Bemused work colleagues got dragged into my office for instanteous meetings, one of my fellow Directors had to quickly don a uniform for a one on one interview (which sadly wasn't used) and the afternoon receptionist had to bid me good morning (no less than 3 takes). It all culminated in a visit to the Fire Station (downstairs - I work above the shop!). Two charming, but amused young firefighters were commissioned to show me over the Mk5 pumper truck (I do love those big red trucks).

It was with some relief we adjourned to home (thankfully the cleaning lady had been!), for the interview, the book reading and more filming of me typing on my computer. My dear friend, Anne Gracie, came along for moral support and DH arrived home in the middle of it all. Having declared he wanted no part of it, he found himself dragged into the filming and acquitted himself with all the aplomb of a true hero. Admittedly he did announce on national television that while I am a romantic person who loves flowers, he himself would never buy me flowers because he'd hate to think he was manipulating my emotions. Any wonder I write romance???

I was told the piece would go to air on May 9 and would include a re-enactment of part of the first chapter of THE KING'S MAN. While we all long to see our work on film, I cringed inwardly at that prospect.

Last weekend we went camping with friends and just by sheer chance I checked my telephone to see a SMS from the producer telling me it would be going to air that afternoon at 5.30pm! Stupidly we had forgotten to pack a TV but our friends came to the rescue. Their new car, they told me, had TV reception so at 5.30pm 8 of us crowded into the car to watch ARTS NATION. The five hours of filming had been reduced to 5 minutes and the result was respectful of both myself as a writer but also of romantic fiction. Even the re-enactment worked (and can I please have the actor for Kit in the full screen version???).

Unfortunately while it is available on the internet, for copyright reasons (apparently) it is not viewable outside Australia, so my vain hope of the snippet being picked up by some bored Hollywood producer anxiously searching for new ideas, has been scotched and I have had my few minutes of Andy Warhol fame!

Watching Arts Nation on a 6" TV screen while camping!

BREAKING NEWS: Both THE KING'S MAN and BY THE SWORD will be re-released shortly as electronic books only. Watch this space....

WHAT A COINCIDENCE!

2010-03-07T14:01:00.001+11:00

How often have you read a book or watched a film where the plot has turned on a coincidence? I bet your lip curled at the use of such a trite plot device and the credibility of the author sunk to an all time low?

Any writer worth their salt will do ANYTHING to avoid the use of coincidence in their writing and yet coincidence occurs in real life all the time.

This was brought home to me over the last weekend.

Sometime before Christmas, DH and I had booked what is now quaintly referred to as a "mini break" to our nation's capital to take in a travelling exhibition of Impressionists from the Musee D'Orsay. As the year sprinted through January and hurled itself into February our weekend away was upon us.

COINCIDENCE NUMBER 1
On the Thursday before we left, DH rang his brother in Sydney to discuss some family matters. At the conclusion of the conversation the talk turned to the weekend plans.
"We're flying up to Canberra for the weekend," DH imparted.
Pause. ""Oh, so are we! We're driving down Saturday morning with some friends."
DH: "Great! We must catch up for dinner on Saturday night. Where are you staying?"
His brother named the same hotel where we were booked. They had only made the decision to go to Canberra the week before!

COINCIDENCE NUMBER 2
(A tip for visitors to our National Gallery, it is worth every cent to pay for "preview" tickets - no queue and we were in the front door at 9.00 am).
As we left the exhibition, the queue now stretched the full length of the hall, out the front door and down into the car park. We heard our names called out and scanned the waiting line of people to see right before us, some old friends from our Singapore days who, although they live in Melbourne, we probably only see once a year. Like us they had flown up for the weekend with some friends.

COINCIDENCE NUMBER 3
That evening, we gathered for dinner with DH's brother, wife and their Sydney friends. We chose a random restaurant (among the many) in Manuka and settled in for a pleasant evening. Just as our meals were served, DH leaned across and said "Look at the table behind you." I turned around to see an old colleague from my Army days with his wife and their Melbourne friends (I'm not sure if the whole of Melbourne had decamped to Canberrra for the weekend but it was beginning to feel like it!). We had not seen each other for well over 10 years and enjoyed a wonderful catch up over lunch the next day.

So - coincidence? Once maybe, twice but three times in two days? Imagine if those encounters had occurred in the book you are reading? You would probably have hurled it at the wall!

Strange coincidences in your life? Fact being stranger than fiction, I would love to share your stories with you.

A Seventeenth Century Christmas tale (and recipe)

2009-12-13T15:21:00.001+11:00

Christmas is coming and the goose etc, etc...I should be downstairs up to my elbows in Christmas cake, marzipan and mince pies but instead I am footling away on my computer, doing a very unseventeenth century Christmas blog for the Hoydens and Firebrands so I thought I would share a Christmas blog and one of my favourite Christmas recipes!

Of all the heinous offences laid at the feet of the puritans, the banning of Christmas raises the most interest. Oliver Cromwell is generally credited with this crime but the fact is that the abolition of Christmas (or “Christ’s Mass”) as a feast day and holiday predated Cromwell’s rise to power and was the outcome of the puritan domination of Parliament in the 1640s.

Christmas had always been celebrated in England with traditions predating Christianity itself eg the “holly and the ivy” goes well back into pagan times. The traditions of wassailing, carols, feasting, mummers, plays and general drunkenness, general frivolity and idleness were not looked on favourably by the puritans who believed that not only was it pagan but also resounded with Roman Catholic undertones. The puritans believed in a pure (hence the name) form of worship and devotion, based on the scriptures and felt that even the reformation had not gone far enough. ( I am sure we will hear more about the puritans as this blog grows!)

In 1645, a “Directory of Public Worship” was produced in Westminster to replace the prayer book (for more information see http://www.covenanter.org/Westminster/directoryforpublicworship.htm ) and in 1647 the parliament passed an ordinance abolishing the feasts of Christmas, Whitsun and Easter and in the 1650s this was taken further with a specific ordinance ordering shops and businesses to remain open on 25th December .

Despite the ordinances and the threat of penalties (that included fining and being placed in the stocks, many people continued to covertly celebrate Christmas behind closed doors. For an account of one family’s perilous decision to continue the practice of Christmas, see the diaries of William Winstanley. Winstanley was an Essex farmer who “believed it was the duty of all Christians to celebrate the birth of their Saviour, with joyous festivity and open-handed generosity towards friends, relations and more especially the poor." (Alison Barnes author of William Winstanley: The Man Who Saved Christmas available here http://www.poppyland.co.uk/products.php?s=latest ).

In 1660 the monarchy was restored and the Christmas ban was lifted, although, not surprisingly, after 18 years it took some time for it to return to its familiar time of carousing and good cheer.

As we contemplate the “stress” of Christmas, is there, perhaps a pause for consideration that perhaps the puritans were not all that wrong and that a purer form of worship and remembrance of Christ’s nativity should have a place in modern society? I would love to hear your thoughts…and in the meantime I would like to share a genuine seventeenth century recipe wit h you.

“LIBBY’S” CHRISTMAS PUDDING

250g flour, 1 tsp nutmeg, 250g suet 1 tsp cinnamon, 250g dark (Barbados) sugar, 250g each of sultanas, raisins, currants and mixed peel
250g grated new carrot, 100 slivered blanched almonds, 250g grated raw potato, 1 large wineglass of brandy or sherry, 3 or 4 tsp mixed spice

1. Mix all ingredients thoroughly and put in greased basins, covered with greaseproof paper and a cloth.
2. Steam for 8 hours.
3. Cool and change cloth.
4. Re-steam for 3 hours and serve with brandy butter, custard etc.
Notes: can be made not too long in advance and it can be frozen. It makes one large and one small wonderful, dark, very rich pudding!

(This blog was originally posted to the Hoydens and Firebrands blog in December 2008)

A very happy Christmas.

The Welcome at the end of the World

2009-09-21T11:52:00.010+10:00

As I straightened from tying my boot laces, I glanced out of the window and caught a spray of foam on the still ocean. Not quite believing what I had seen, I looked out in time to see a juvenile Southern Right Whale rising from the ocean and then crashing, back arched into the water. I pressed my hands to the glass of the window, trying to bring myself closer to this amazing animal, conscious of the privilege he afforded me in sharing this moment of utter joy in being young and alive.

Hastily picking up my pack, my husband fumbling for the binoculars, we ran outside in time to see the young whale disappear around the point of the lighthouse rock. We caught up with him again. Like a synchronised swimmer he poised nose down in the water, that beautiful white tail slapping at the water with the joy of a child banging on a saucepan, before he slid away under the water and out of sight.

A walk of 19kms had brought us to the old lighthouse at Wilsons Promontory, the most southern point of the Australian mainland. Although the "Prom" itself has been a National Park for many years, the lighthouse remained Commonwealth property, shut off from the hundreds of bushwalkers until very recently when it was reopened to offer accommodation in the old light house keepers cottages to the not-so-intrepid bushwalkers who like a little comfort at the end of a long day's hike, a sort of remote bed and breakfast (providing you bring your own bed and breakfast).

Built as one of a string constructed in the 1850s to protect the passage from Europe to Sydney through Bass Strait. It is hard to even begin to imagine the lives of those early lighthouse keepers and their families. Even today the lighthouse on the Prom is an isolated place, only accessible by foot - a walk of some 19kms from Tidal River which in turn is some 50kms from the nearest town. One such family, the Musgraves lived at the light in the late nineteenth century. There Mrs. Musgrave bore 7 children and buried 2. Their 12 year old son would take the only horse and ride the 100 miles to the old Yanakie homestead for mail and mutton. Supplies came in by boat once every 3 months. And yet, despite the isolation, the children's memories of their lives in these isolated light houses (and Wilson's Promonotory was not the most isolated!), is one of happy times and it was a life that continued right up until the lights became automated in the early 1980s.

We were met by Ailsa Richter who, with her husband, Chris, still 'man' the lighthouse as they did for years before autmoation. They raised their children in this isolated place and so deeply ingrained did their love of the sea and the Prom become that they returned as Rangers and together have built up a history of the Prom, its families and the life they led. Chris took us on a tour of the lighthouse and as he spoke of the old building and the work he did to keep the light blazing shone from him like the beacon that kept the shipping safe for all those years.

From the balcony on the lighthouse, we watched as a rain squall blew in from the west and retreated to the warmth of the old house as the wind shook the foundations. We now understand the meaning of those weather forecasts that promise "gales east of the Prom". We marvelled at man's ability to tame the wilderness, snuggling down in our sleeping bags, completely exhausted and at peace with the world.

Our return loop took us to Waterloo Bay where we stopped for lunch, alone on this completely by ourselves, on the beach at Waterlooo bay to once more see this spirited youngster rejoicing in the freedom of his world. All our wordly worries and cares vanished like the foam his frolicking created. A precious moment in time, impressed on us both.

What is it about Heyer?

2009-07-13T14:19:00.005+10:00

I have only recently started to read Georgette Heyers wonderful Regency romances and it is quite a stable to work my way through!

So far I have read THE TALISMAN RING and A CIVIL CONTRACT (a book that is no doubt historically accurate but somewhat bleak!). However on the strong recommendations of Heyer fans I launched myself into the 18th century Alastair family trilogy THESE OLD SHADES (the book cover pictured here is clearly historically inaccurate as it must be set in the 1750s/60s not the regency), THE DEVIL’S CUB and THE INFAMOUS ARMY. I confess to reading the last one first, more out of my own interest in the Battle of Waterloo (did you know that until recently Sandhurst used this book as a textbook of the most definitive description of the battle?). So having encountered the Lady Barbara Childe, I turned to her family story beginning with her great grandfather Justin (THESE OLD SHADES) and her grandfather (THE DEVIL’S CUB).
Coming to both these books with 21st century eyes, I have to confess I really wondered what on earth I was getting into with them. When we first meet Justin Alastair he is mincing down a street in Paris wearing high heels and a purple coat. He then proceeds to buy a young boy to use as his page. Hmmm….? As for Dominic, by the end of the first few chapters we have met an immature homicidal maniac with a mother fixation. One of my reading rules is I have to fall in love with my hero… and there is nothing immediately lovable about either Justin or Dominic. So why did I read on? Why couldn’t I put these books down?
I think Heyer’s strength is in her writing. She has a wry , witty style that gives humanity to her characters, particularly her heroines and somehow these truly despicable heroes, who put the BAD into 'mad, bad and dangerous to know', are redeemed. (An example of the wonderful repartee that had me in stitches is found in the scene in THE DEVILS CUB where the truly awful Mrs. Challoner visits Lady Fanny and Lady Fanny gets it into her head that Mary Challoner is some by blow of the Duke of Avon).

I know many of you are Heyerites of much greater devotion than me, so I would love to know what is it about Heyer that not only makes me want to read to the end but makes these heroes worthy of my devotion?

Vale Marysville

2009-02-16T09:12:00.006+11:00

The world has watched in shocked horror, the devestation wrought by the terrible bushfires that have burnt through some of the lovliest parts of Victoria over the last week. At times like this it makes us realise that Melbourne is a small town and the rules of six degrees of separation dictate that no one remains completely untouched. Although I know two people who lost their lives defending their home and others who escaped, only to lose everything, in some ways it is the loss of the little town of Marysville that has become emblamatic of the fires. Five hundred people lived in the town - barely a dozen buildings are left standing and it is estimated the death toll may rise to one hundred - a fifth of the town's population.

I am not alone when I say Marysville always held a very special place in my heart. We arrived in Melbourne in 1968 and in July 1969 we took our first holiday - to Marysville. Mum booked us in to a slightly ramshackle old guest house called, at that time, Mt. Kitchener Lodge. We shared a large room with three beds with saggy matresses and chenille bedspreads that had seen better days. Meals were taken in the communal dining room and in the evenings, the hosts organised different sorts of entertainment. I can still recall a game that involved a blindfolded tour of 'Lord Nelson's life' - where a chewed up minty passed for his eye and the child had to insert a finger into an orange for his eye socket. Gruesome but great fun!

It was in Marysville that I met my first Aussie BBQ. On a day of pouring rain (yes, it used to rain in those days, Virginia!) all the guests tramped down to the football ground and we huddled under the shelter, watching the rain, the smell of cooking sausages and onions mingling with the scent of the wet gum trees, eating sausages wrapped in white bread with onions and tomato sauce. I thought I had never tasted anything so wonderful in my life.

We went back every year for the next 4 years. Sometimes in winter (my favourite time of year) and sometimes in summer. The ownership changed and the lodge was rechristened "Mountain Lodge". A swimming pool was built (luxury!), we played croquet, I learned the rules of "21" (played with matches) and I read my way through the entire works of Agatha Christie (the local store had an unending supply!). I rode horses, hired from the hacking stables in those happy days before insurance and compulsory head gear (see photo age 11 - the horse was called 'Cisco'). We walked the ferny gullys and climbed to Keppels lookout and stuffed ourselves on Devonshire teas (another new taste sensation for me) at the Fruit Salad Farm.

Our last holiday to Marysville was in September 1973 when I was fourteen. Who would be 14 again? Gawky, socially inept and terminally embarrassed by my parents. The photo says it all really - the compulsory Saturday evening entertainment - a bunch of equally miserable teenagers entertaining the guests with "Rocky Racoon" (that's me on on the far left). It all belongs to a far off, more innocent time.

I have been back to Marysville many, many times and more recently twice in the last six months. I had forgotten how pretty it was and in a moment of impulse, I grabbed the brochure for the local real estate agent. I had it pinned to my fridge until last week. Ironically my husband and I had walked the firebreak to the north of the town and talked about how this resilient little town had survived Black Friday of 1939 and the Ash Wednesday Fires of 1983. It seems third time unlucky.

I know the strength of the community will rebuild it again but the old guest houses are gone now and it will never be quite the same again.

HEROES - Pt 2

2009-01-18T17:46:00.001+11:00

Alison Stuart Interviews – Kit Lovell, hero of THE KING’S MAN

AS: It’s 1654, England has been under the rule of Oliver Cromwell for the last three years, and things are looking pretty grim for the supporters of the late Charles Stuart and his son, currently in exile in France. I have with me one of the King’s most loyal supporters, Christopher Lovell.
KL: Please call me Kit, everyone does.
AS: I believe things have been tough for your family since the defeat of the royalist cause, Kit?
KL: They certainly have, Alison. My father and I took the royalist side in the wars of 1642-1648. Father died in the defence of our home and I went into exile. Most of the estate has been sold off and my step mother and my sister live in the ruins of the family home. I send them what money I can make off gambling and …other means, whenever I can but I’m afraid I’ve not been very much help to my family.
AS: I thought you had a brother?
KL: I don’t wish to talk about Daniel. He was lost at the battle of Worcester in September 1651. Stupid young fool thought he would follow in my footsteps. Not particularly worthy footsteps to follow in! My step mother blames me of course…
AS: So what have you been up to since the battle of Worcester?
KL: Oh, I spent an uncomfortable few months as a prisoner but managed to escape. Since then I’ve drifted between Paris and London, trying to make whatever money I can to keep body and soul together and a decent pair of boots on my feet.
AS: I hear you have something of a reputation with the ladies?
KL: Now don’t believe everything you hear, Alison. It’s true I have managed to land a wealthy widow as a mistress who keeps me in the manner to which I am accustomed and obligingly gives me the time I need for my other occupation.
AS: Which is?
KL: Cards and, oh yes, planning the overthrow of Cromwell’s regime and the restoration of the King.
AS: Any success?
KL: Well, I’m very good at cards but every plot to overthrow Cromwell is foiled by that master of spies, John Thurloe. Cromwell picked a wily man as his Secretary of State. Trouble is it’s hard to know who’s in Thurloe’s pay and who can be trusted these days! Even the most loyal of the King’s men may have good cause to turn coat. Let’s talk about women…that’s my favourite subject…
AS: You told us about your mistress, do you have any other women in your life?
KL: I take it you are referring to that infuriating music teacher, Thamsine Granville? I rue the day I ever saved her life!
AS: What happened?
KL: The stupid girl had just lobbed a piece of rock at the Cromwell’s coach. If she’d been caught…well I shudder to think what would have become of her.
AS: Why would she have done such a thing?
KL: Thamsine is like me, the flotsam of war. Her family also paid a price for supporting the King. In her case she found herself thrown out of her home and living off the streets of London. If I hadn’t saved her that day she would have been forced into prostitution just to keep herself alive. Now I’m stuck with her.
AS: What do you mean?
KL: Look, my life is… complicated. I’ve got a job to do and she’s a distraction I don’t need distractions. I’ve got the girl a job at an inn, what more does she want?
AS: You, perhaps?
KL: I don’t want romantic attachments, Alison. Anyone who gets involved with me is just going to get hurt. I use people for my own ends and she may find she’s no different.
AS: What do you mean you “use people”?
KL: Is that the time? I really must get going. The plotters are meeting at the Ship Inn and I’m expected. Perhaps I will see you there?
Read Kit and Thamsine’s story in THE KING’S MAN by Alison Stuart
For more information on the period, how the story came to be written and to read an excerpt go to http://www.alisonstuart.com

HEROES - Pt 1

2009-01-18T17:36:00.003+11:00

The Australian Romance Readers Convention (ARRC09) is coming up next month and I will be appearing on a panel with Stephanie Laurens, Anna Campbell, Sara Bennett and Kinley Macgregor...wow...that's pretty august company! I will be the quiet one on the end!

The topic of the Panel is "What's so great about rakes and assorted historical heroes?" It should be a lot of fun.

I don't write about rakes... not sure I could if I tried. My heroes are men with pasts, dark secrets that make them the way they are.

So in honour of ARRC and the panel, I am repeating an early blog I did which is a "Character Interview" with the hero of BY THE SWORD, Jonathan Thornton. I will post an interview with the hero of THE KING'S MAN in the next day or so.

I hope you enjoy them! (They were a lot of fun to write)

Interview with Sir Jonathan Thornton Bt. at Seven Ways Hall, Worcestershire.
JT: Are we on?
AS: Let me adjust that microphone…going live…
AS: Sir Jonathan Thornton, welcome. It’s 1660 and London is buzzing with the news that the King is to be restored to the throne. As a loyal supporter of the royalist cause how do you feel about that?
JT : Well, delighted, of course. It’s been a hard time for those of us who remained loyal to the King.
AS: In what way?
JT: Our estates have been subject to heavy fines and the continual threat of sequestration. As an outlaw, had I inherited Seven Ways on my grandfather’s death, the entire estate would have been forfeit.
AS: But didn’t your grandfather find a solution to that problem?
JT: He did. The old fox left it to my young cousin, Tom Ashley, but even the Ashley family’s parliamentary connections couldn’t entirely prevent the privations of the last few years. Of course, my marriage to his mother didn’t help much either.
AS: There were those of us who were surprised at your decision to settle down with Kate. You had, how can I put it, a wild youth?
JT: I can’t deny that I was the cause of my parent’s despair on more than one occasion. My mother , god rest her, never recovered from that troop of Parliamentary horse trampling her garden and ruining her orchard. Of course I look back now and regret that I never really made peace with my parents before they died.
AS: Any other regrets?
JT: Of course I have regrets. I’ve always had a tendency to act with my heart rather than my head and people I care about have got hurt in the process, badly hurt. Thank heavens for the wisdom of age and the love of a good woman to knock some sense into me.
AS: I presume you are talking about Kate?
JT: Of course.
AS: And how did you meet Kate?
JT: She was working in the garden at Seven Ways. I’ll never forget it. She wore an old, shabby gown and a battered straw hat. I thought I’d never seen a woman look quite so lovely. At the time I had a price on my head and no intention of falling in love. That’s what I mean about my heart ruling the head. Talk about a doomed relationship.
AS: But you managed to overcome the problems?
JT: We did, but our happiness came at a price. If you have a little time to spare, let me tell you the story….
Read Jonathan and Kate’s story in BY THE SWORD by Alison Stuart
For more information on the period, how the story came to be written and to read an excerpt go to http://www.alisonstuart.com

Australia - The Movie (A review)

2009-01-01T14:10:00.008+11:00

I wanted so much to like Australia - The Movie. Not just because I am a huge fan of Hugh Jackman but there is also so much to love about Australia - the Place!

I was so disappointed. After three long, long hours, I was left feeling like someone who has been given a large box of chocolates, has scoffed the lot and feels both slightly ill and unsatisfied.

Firstly how can you define this movie? Is it epic, is it romance, is it drama, is it a western, a war movie, is it fantasy? It is all of those things and none of them. You are left with a mish mash of all the genres with a heavy handed overview of political correctness. The treatment of the politics of the Stolen Generation is dealt with so much better in THE RABBIT PROOF FENCE.

The characters, with the exception of the Aboriginal actors (particularly young Brandon Walters who plays Nulla) were completely two dimensional. The baddies were bad and wore black hats just so you knew who they were and the goodies were good. The acting was stilted and wooden and the dialogue...oh my god! I stopped counting the number of times poor Hugh Jackman said "Crikey" and when he had to say "Shut your damper hole", I nearly fell under the seat! Who says that...ever???

The plot divided into two completely separate stories - lacking a clear story arc for either. One hour into the movie and they have arrived in Darwin, then follows filler during which everyone lives happily ever after and then on to the war and the bombing of Darwin. Now, if the story commenced in 1939 then three years have passed since the drive to Darwin and yet Nulla has remained exactly the same age! Continuity problem? Just one of many and I won't even go into the historical inaccuracies.

The winner is the wonderful Australian outback which is beautifully filmed. I think it was mostly filmed near Bowen in far north Queensland. I love the Australian outback and I hope that this film inspires people to come and visit but don't expect to find this Wild West frontier. 90% of Australians are urbanised and are unlikely to say "Crikey" even when provoked!

Welcome to the Seventeenth Century

2008-11-14T17:07:00.006+11:00

What is it about the seventeenth century that makes it so unapproachable for readers and publishers?

This was the century that had it all, the century that marked the turning point between the medieval world and the modern world. In England it was a century torn by a civil war, a revolution from which the whole basis of modern concepts of democracy arose; a king was executed by his own people; another king spent years in exile, yet another was deposed. It saw wars, spies, warming pan babies, dispossed royal bastards, the battle for religious freedoms, London burned down and rebuilt, plague...and on the list goes.

As a writer of historicals with a romantic bent, what could be a better source of inspiration than the English Civil War, where the cavaliers "were wrong but wromantic" and the roundheads were "right but repulsive" (to quote Sellers and Yeatman from 1066 and All That)? Yet I have been told by publishers that as a setting for a historical novel it is "unsaleable" and "unmarketable".

I am a reader too! Sitting on my bookshelf is a small selection of my favourite writers of the period beginning as a youngster with Rosemary Sutcliff ("Simon" and my all time favourite "Rider of the White Horse"), Barbara Softly ("Plain Jane", "A Stone in A Pool" and several others now out of print and hard to find), Ronald Welch ("For the King"). My desert island book and the book that began my passion for the ECW "The King's General" by Daphne Du Maurier, the Wintercombe and Heron series by Pamela Belle - all read until they are falling to pieces.

Please add your own favourites to my list...

In the meantime, watch out for a new space for writers and readers to get together - coming soon!

Du Maurier Revisited

2008-04-18T10:55:00.003+10:00

(Warning: may be spoilers)

I have just finished reading Daphne Du Maurier's JAMAICA INN. I last read it as a teenager (prescribed school text) and I loved it! Mind you I was already a Du Maurier fan, having adopted THE KING'S GENERAL quite early in my life. I also think "gothic romance" novels appealed to me - JANE EYRE being my "desert island" book of choice.

So it was interesting to go back to it with an adult's eye and realise what a highly inappropriate book it was for a 13 year old - being black with the overwhelming threat of violation and the murderous deeds of the wreckers. No one can write like Du Maurier. She has the power of words to bring the Bodmin Moor to life as a character in its own right, as black and dangerous as the landlord.

But it has left me with a question. Is it a romance?

I had to give a lecture at a school on this subject. The girls were studying REBECCA specifically as a romance and the teacher thought it would be diversionary to get a romance writer in to talk about the subject. I'm not sure if she was best pleased with my conclusion - that REBECCA is NOT a romance and neither is JAMAICA INN...yes the hero and heroine end up together but there is no promise of a 'happy ever after' and the reason for this, I think, lies in Du Maurier's heroes. They are, to a man, flawed almost beyond redemption, incapable of love. Maximillian in REBECCA never really appears at all and while Jem Merlyn displays some heroic qualities, you are left with the query in the back of your mind as to whether blood will out and Mary, is in fact, going to end up just like her Aunt Patience. As for Sir Richard Grenville in THE KING'S GENERAL, there was never going to be a HEA there. The heroes of Du Maurier's books are "mad, bad and dangerous to know" and the heroines love them without reserve, but it is an animal attraction. Mary Yellan even accepts this...she says at one point in JAMAICA INN that her attraction to Jem Merlyn is not a romantic attraction, but an attraction as old as men and women. An irresistable attraction she describes as love but not romantic love.

I would love to know what you think...Would you describe Du Maurier's books as "romances"?

Alison

Secret Lives

2008-03-12T17:48:00.002+11:00

You can see from my profile that I have a number of "lives", of which writer is only one! I have been pondering this strangely schizophrenic life. In my 'real' life (the one that pays the bills!), I am a senior executive with a large not-for profit organisation. For three days a week (in real time, more in emotional time!) I balance the demands of board meetings, board reports papers and ongoing requests for legal advice. For two days a week I try (not terribly successfully) to be Alison Stuart, writer...and in between I fit wife, mother etc. into the equation.

The people you meet and interact with in your day to day life form a certain image of you in their own mind. For many years, when I first started writing, I would no more have admitted to my secret life than stood up in front of a Melbourne Cricket Ground crowd and declared myself a born again Christian! It was even something a little shameful , a secret vice like eating too much chocolate ... or buying really expensive Italian shoes...

I had to really trust a person before I confessed my secret life, generally prefaced by something like: "Just for fun! Just stories, not great works of literature..." I was so afraid that if my colleagues knew I wrote historical fiction (with romance) my professional credibility would be undermined in some way. This is one of the reasons I chose to write under a pen name. It freed me up to be another person, the Jekkyl to my Hyde!

As I've gone on, I have gained a little more confidence in my work colleagues and most of them now know that beneath the senior executive in the tailored suits (that is a look I am definitely trying to shed!), there is a whole other side to my life. This has, in its turn, invited similar confidences about the secret lives of my work colleagues - martial arts champions, crime writers, poetry writers...

I would love to know how you balance your secret lives? Do you have work colleagues with secret lives? How does knowing a person's secret life affect the way you interact with them?

The Book of My Heart!

2008-03-12T17:36:00.004+11:00

If you have read my earlier blogs and visited my website, you will know that BY THE SWORD is the book of my heart. A little story that began when I visited Harvington Hall at the age of 11 and has been with me through thick and thin - endured rejection and rewrite, consignment to sock drawers and resurrection is now an Eppie Award winner.
The awards were announced in Portland on Saturday night but, of course, being in Melbourne Australia I did not see the results until Monday morning. My husband, hearing the shriek, came bounding up the stairs two at a time, convinced I was being savaged by a monster spider....
Thank you so much to those out there who have sent me so many good wishes that I am sloshing in cyber champagne and to Fiona Lowe and Mel Scott for "blogging me"...and most of all to those of you who have read and enjoyed the story. THAT is why I write :-)

A Room of One's Own

2008-01-27T13:04:00.000+11:00

I have no pretensions to be the next Virginia Woolf but that superlative writer wrote an essay on this subject which you can read in full at http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0200791.txt . In short she said to write fiction, a woman needed money and a room of her own.

I have always had, in one sense or another, a room of my own or should I say, a place of my own where I worked and I could make identifiably MY space. My sons had their bedrooms, my husband his shed and I claimed the room in the house loosely termed "the study". Two and a half years ago I lost that space when my husband's employer unilaterally decided my husband should work from home. I don't propose to go into the fine details of that (still ongoing arrangement) that left my desk stranded on a (large) landing.

I attempted to claim that space on the landing as my own, but nothing I could do altered the fact that it was still a thoroughfare. I mourned for my space and my writing effectively dried up, except, oddly, on those few days when I was home alone and the whole house once more became my space, but crammed into a corner and subject to the continual interruptions of sons and husband was not a good place for a writer.

There are probably those of you who say, a good writer can write anywhere, and certainly when the muse is with me, I could write in a train station in the middle of peak hour, but I need a sense of order around me to get that muse kick started and working on the landing, I never seemed to achieve that sense of physical or mental order.

When I lived in Asia, I learned quite a bit about Feng Shui - certainly enough to know that the basic precepts of not cluttering and freeing up energy lines have some considerable credence. Certainly they do for me!

My eldest son has upped stakes and is travelling overseas for the next year so I, after some basic consultation with him, claimed his room. Over the Christmas/New Year period I painted the room and moved all my "stuff" into it, hung my pictures on the wall and made the space mine. I am not just a writer, I also sew (quilting/ embroidery) and with all my sewing materials pushed into available spaces around the house, I have even felt myself unable to pursue that side of my creativity. Now it is all with me again and I feel the space in my head opening up again.

Along with the space, I have also embarked on some new year's resolutions which I fully intend to keep (and by declaring them publicly - I can keep myself honest!). The first was to undertake one of Margie Lawson's on-line courses on "Beating Self-Defeating Behaviours". Through the course, I have hooked up with a wonderful fellow-writer in Canada, Alice Valdal , to be my change coach. We share a lot in common - including the same self-defeating behaviours.

The second was that old chestnut - exercise! I have given up on the unused gym membership and taken up a programme called "Step Into Life" - group exercise in the great outdoors. With a stressful job and the general pressures of daily life, physical fitness is the most worthwhile investment I can give myself. So keep me honest! Exercising outside is wonderful at the moment because the days are long and the weather is warm - roll on winter and it may be a different story.

Two questions:

1. Do you need a "room of your own"? Or If you have a "room of your own" tell me about it.

2. What new year's resolutions are you absolutely committed to keeping this year?

I look forward to hearing from you.

Alison

BY THE SWORD - 2008 Eppie Finalist

2007-12-15T10:56:00.001+11:00

Welcome to my new blog page. I'm not sure if that is the correct term for it! My earlier blogs can be found at http://alisonstuart.bigblog.com.au/blog.do

Breaking news! By the Sword is a finalist in the 2008 Eppie Awards. "The Eppies" are the major awards for electronically published books. The winner won't be announced until March at the "Epicon" convention. Unfortunately, as I live in Australia and the convention is in Portland, Oregon it is unlikely I will be there, but it is such a thrill to be nominated.

By the Sword was actually my very first novel, although it bears little resemblance to the early "iteration" and chronologically comes before The King's Man. It is "the book of my heart" and I find it enormously satisfying that, after years of trying to find a publisher, of my two novels, it is the one that the readers (and judges!) seemed to favour.

If you would like to read an excerpt go to http://www.alisonstuart.com/excerpts.html#by%20the%20sword%20excerpt