Words From A Glass Bubble

SHORT CIRCUIT VISITS THE SHORT REVIEW BLOG

2010-01-07T15:23:00.000-08:00

See - it gets everywhere. My batty writer says...

The next stop on my bloggy tour is with The Short Review blog. Editor Tania Hershman has a great essay in the book - actually, an essay that had one writer (an editor as well) messaging me this week to say it had completely changed her view of flash fiction, and above all, the flash writing process.)
Tania asked me a very good question - would readers, as opposed to writers, find Short Circuit an interesting book? Would it make them read more short stories??? Get thee over there to find out what I said.

And visit The Short Review too! I reviewed a book called The Town of Fiction, by The Atlantis Collective. And there are some terrific collections up this month - so much to read, so little time!

I HATE that book...

2010-01-05T12:57:00.000-08:00

I HATE Short Circuit. It is a snooty, horrible piece of work if you ask me. Well, OK, no one did ask me but I'm saying it anyway.

Its only been around for six weeks, and today, O dreadful day - my batty writer looked at the Amazon statistics for Salt Publishing, and Short Circuit is at NUMBER TWO!!! Out of hundreds of books.

Well. Someone must be mad, that's all I can say. BUY ME!!! I am MUCH better than him!

(I was at Number Three, which isnt baaaaad. But still. Id like to ovetrtake him. Must be a bloke, dont you think?)

Its not fair...I have a rival!

2009-12-29T02:55:00.000-08:00

Well, I dont know. A girl goes to sleep for a few weeks on her shelf and wakes up to find she's got a rival. Huh. My batty writer seems to have another book out there.
I dont like the title - its called Short Circuit. What sort of title is that? And whats more there is just a brain on the cover, a lightbulb and a plant. I ask you. Not a whiff of a pink jumper.
And what's worse, people seem to be buying this monstrosity. Look! It got higher than moi in the Salt bestsellers list before christmas and that is sheer poo.
I'd love to be a fly on the wall when they open the thing though! There isnt a decent story in the whole book. It's all boring old essays by people I've never heard of. About how to write. Codswallop. I can write. I've got a crayon. I didnt need a book with a brain on the cover to show me how.

Salt Publishing bestsellers of all time

2009-08-10T13:43:00.001-07:00

Well, I can't tell you how many books Salt Publishing has been midwife to, over the years. A lot.
And it is extraordinary, extraordinary...to see that there are a few familiar books in their All-Time Bestseller list, posted this week on their website.

Who Says?

2009-08-10T10:27:00.000-07:00

People have been talking about moi and I didn't even know. It's all that batty writer's fault, she never bothered to teach me to READ did she, silly woman. Mind you, I cant say I am surprised. It's all on a silly place that calls itself Amazon, apparently, well who wants to be called after a smelly old river anyway, that's what I want to know. And I wouldn't read it anyway even if I could.
So I dont know what they are saying, but my batty writer seems pleased. Doesn't take much, that's all I can say.
And do you know WHAT?? Not ONE has the decency to remark on my pink jumper. I call that rank ignorance. (Did I spell that right?)

Brave New Writing
The characters in Vanessa Gebbie's stories are perfectively idiosyncratic and developed with sensitivity, bravery and a robust sense of wit. It is no coincidence that Gebbie's craft is at the forefront of a new-wave of literary storytellers. Her work is fine-tuned and Words.. comes as a remarkable debut for a versatile and extraordinarily talented writer.
Melissa Lee Houghton

Exquisite, disturbing, compassionate
This is an exceptional collection of short stories. I am not usually a great short story reader, preferring the immersion one gets with the world of a novel, but there have been a few short story collections recently that have created as much impact as a novel in just one story. This is one of them. 'I Can Squash the King, Tommo' is my favourite - understated yet emotionally devastating. Almost every story made me put the book down to savour the writing and think about the layers that are so skilfully floated under the surface of the story. On second reading I enjoyed them just as much in a different way and suspect I could read them again and again and find new meaning. This is an exceptional achievement. The two other collections I'd recommend are Junot Diaz's 'Drown' and Christopher Coake's 'We're in Trouble.'
Umi Sinha

Brilliant
Loved this collection of short stories, some funny, some tragic, some downright dangerous and all written expertly.
Nik Perring

We read this collection in our book club and found it fascinating - and not all of us are fans of short stories. There was a majority verdict, too: the style and narrative of each story sat perfectly within the format, and the format provided a compulsion to read on. We look forward to Ms Gebbie's next book of short stories!
The content is often centred around loss, providing a springboard for acute observations of human behaviour. Ms Gebbie has created page-turner stories by looking at the minutiae of life from vivid angles, and by dealing deftly with the challenge of beginning, developing and ending a critical episode in the life of each of her protagonists.
V. Down

One of the finest collections available
I have admired Vanessa Gebbie's short stories since she first started to write fiction seriously, and it was no surprise to me when prestigious prizes and awards began to come her way. Many of the stories that won those accolades are included in this collection, and I urge anyone who enjoys good literary fiction to buy this book.
Gebbie has a gift for creating memorable, often quirky characters, and conjuring up the appropriate situation that will bring them out in a multi-layered, memorable story that conveys much more than the words on the page. Her stories can be poignant, funny, all things between but above all they are alive, as only character-based stories can be.
DJM King

Absorbing and thought provoking,
I'm not usually a short story reader but I was lucky enough to meet Vanessa on a recent holiday and so decided to 'take the plunge' and I am so glad I did. As soon as I started to read 'Bones' I could visualise the Jewish cemetery in Prague and have found out that it was indeed that cemetery that was Vanessa's inspiration. I don't know if I have a real favourite among the collection but I thought 'I can squash the King, Tommo' utterly brilliant. I'm looking forward to Vanessa's next collection.
Linda Witts

A Brilliant Storyteller
Intriguing, gripping and poetic stories whose characters live in your mind long after you've finished the book.
Fia Mackenzie

Superb
Beautiful, lyrical writing, by turns thoughtful, passionate and funny. I loved it.
My favourite stories would have to be 'Dodie's Gift' and 'Harry's Catch' - they are masterpieces of understanding and compassion, without ever seeming mawkish or overly sentimental.
All of the stories are great, though. I just can't recommend this highly enough.
Lee Williams

Highly recommended
It's just a brilliant collection, from start to finish. It has a number of different moods that intertwine through the course of the book to create a marvellous smorgasbord of stories There are colourful epic tales, steady, mellow meditations, and shorter piquant and mordant interludes.
Ogden Gnash

Magical reading
These are wonderful, insightful stories, the sort that make you want to tread more carefully through life after reading them; stories which enrich and deepen the reading experience. And such range! Humour, history, anger, love and pathos. Everything you could ask for from a short story collection. All beautifully packaged in a slim hardback volume that feels just right in your hands. Writing - and reading - at its very best. Brava, Vanessa!
Franky

For lovers of great writing
This book is exactly what a short story collection should be: vivid, varied, moving, lyrical, disturbing, entertaining, thought-provoking, original. Ms Gebbie is award-winning, and reading her stories it is clear why they stood out for the judges. A wonderful read.
Tania Hershman

Bubbling Over With the Good Stuff
Words from a Glass Bubble" by Vanessa Gebbie is a collection of nineteen of her short stories, compiled in a handsome hardback from Salt Publishing. There's no overarching narrative, but although the stories are very different, some themes and images crop up more than once.
Gebbie's talent is to shine a light onto her characters, giving us brief insights into their lives, their hopes, their disappointments, and--most of all--their mistakes, before moving on, leaving us with the hope that the characters too will carry on, make better decisions, have better luck, once the spotlight is removed.
Each story has its own voice, from "Words in a Glass Bubble" itself, where a family tries to come to terms with the loss of their son, to "Smoking Down There", where a child naively recounts her friend's story of how she almost inadvertently saved her baby brother from being disposed of at birth. The fragmentary, butterfly narrative convinces as that of a child. 'But then, if you smoked down there why didn't the hairs catch fire? That's what I wanted to know. But the bucket. Why wash out of a bucket when there were perfectly nice china things?'
Gebbie doesn't shy away from the darker side of life. One story, "Irrigation", goes into great detail--too great detail for this reader--about an enema. In "Dodie's Gift", the central character is left lost and wondering, "...if someone takes something you were going to give them anyway, is that stealing?' Reading this story, it's hard to decide whether to give her a hug or a good shake. Either, you think, might damage her beyond repair.
This story contains an image that recurs--'But there, at the bottom of the hollow, a gull has had a meal, and the sand holds white bone, red bone, skin....' The predator devours, leaves what it doesn't want, and moves on. What's been devoured, abandoned, somehow has to move on, too. Its life now may not be what it envisaged, but it still holds significance.
None of the stories is too long, although it's easy to feel some are too short. The characters live on in our minds and we can't help wondering what will happen next. If they'll come out all right.
This collection is definitely one to savour. Read a story, put it down, think about it, come back--the whole can't be devoured in an afternoon.
D R Moorhouse

Powerful work by Gebbie!
Gebbie is a huge talent. Get in early on this author as this is a name that is soon going to be very well known indeed. People are already starting to talk and the tipping point for success and fame these days is far shorter than it used to be. Her gentle, lyrical voice is a sponge filled with emotional power. With each story I found myself with a knot in my throat and tears seeping down my face. Brilliant work!
Dr Gail Louw

A must for anyone who loves great writing
Vanessa's writing really paints pictures in your imagination, but what raises this above the rest is that they are so (un)usual and arresting. These stories will stay with you long after you've put them down.
Andrew Marshall

Sharp, smart and sad
Vanessa Gebbie has won more prizes for her short stories than you can shake an HB pencil at, and this debut collection shows off the best of them. She tackles tough themes with originality, subtlety and shows a humungous tenderness towards humanity's most vulnerable. Her language is often poetic, calling to mind Dylan Thomas or John Banville.
Really, really worth investigating if you're a fan of original literature.
Mrs Gene Hunt

My batty writer would like them all to know how much she appreciates their lovely words. But secretly, I KNOW they arent as lovely as MINE. So there.

I am utterly invisible.

2009-06-30T06:46:00.000-07:00

This is fun! No one can find me at all, and I am invisible. It's a good game.

It's too late to be sent to Ireland now, well goodie. I didn't want to go anyway. I LIKE Eastbourne. I think I shall go and play on the beach.

Yah boo sucks. It just serves them all right for taking me out of my nice hard covers and putting me in a paper one.

Batty as ever....

2009-06-29T14:48:00.001-07:00

My batty writer was very naughty, and telephoned the distributors today. Oooo er. They were OK, and said they didn't know where I was. The lovely Salt Publishing have sent tlots of me and I have got lost. I have arrived, but no one seems to know where I am. They even sent a second lot cos there were some orders stacking.

I have absconded.

That is all very well, but my batty writer has got a lot of stuff lined up, and if I am not there, she will get all upset.

Well poo. I am hiding.

heard of hide n seek?

MUMMEEEE!

2009-06-28T13:18:00.000-07:00

I have gone and got lost! I don't know where I am! help! I am in a big box and it is veeeery dark.
I am in a place called Eastbourne. I know this cos I heard them talking.
"What a dump," they said before driving off and leaving moi in my boxes on a floor somewhere.
Thing is, I am only wearing my paper coat. It is hot at the moment, but if I am not found until the winter, I may die!

(I am in Eastbourne, in a load of boxes, at the distributors. I have been here for ages, and I need the loo. Please will someone put moi on a shelf? I need to be bought, and read, and I need people to tell me I am beautiful again. or I shall cry.....)_

Where's my covers gone???

2009-06-11T06:55:00.001-07:00

Well. Huh. They took my nice hard covers off, they did. They put me in a paper cover. Well, I tell you something, it's COLD. I don't like being paper. I need a thicker covering, me. Oh yes.
I know this jumper looks nice and warm, well it isn't its a FASHION item.
Anyway. My batty writer seems to think it's OK putting me in paperback. She is leaping about the place talking about new words on the cover... new reviews or something.
Now look here. You'll see LESS of me of there are more words... so why the joy, I ask?

No consideration for my feelings, that's what.
Huh.

I Went to University..

2009-04-03T14:10:00.000-07:00

I dont know what all the fiuss is about. Anyone can go to University.

Yes they can. I did. Look. I went to a University called Oxford. It is not true at all that you have to have exams to go there. I have not even started school yet and I am there, on a table, in something called a Literary Festival.

My batty writer was there, on a panel for another book. Not moi. So I wont mention it but you can go and read it on her other blog. If you must.

But I was there, too. Lots of me, and she signed me lots of times, and seemed pleased. I am on a special table for signed books, right in the middle of a huge tent caklled a marquis. Or a duke. or something. They go to Universities like Oxford, you see.

Mind you, I reckon they must be a bit hard up. Their buildings are so OLD. You'd think they could afford to build something more up to date, wouldnt you?
Look, there I am, sitting up. next to the other book, which I wont mention but its called One World.

My Batty Writer

2009-03-19T15:27:00.000-07:00

Is lazy and boring. She says she is working on another book, and I say there IS no other book.

Especially today, when my batty writer has been invited to attend a reading group who are reading MOI (and she doesnt know any of them) and a second invitation, to attend a U3A group. Which is venerable people, she says, and I will be going to a PUB!!!

I am a bit young for that, though. I will have lemonade.

However. She did reasd out of MOI a week or so back, at Waterstones, with the lovely Alison MacLeod, who read out of another book that didnt look like MOI at all.

I GOT BANNED!!!

2009-02-12T02:12:00.000-08:00

Well I think I got censored, anyway, which is brilliant news. They'll put me in prison next and I'll yell until the News of the World hears and make a mint.

e-bay did it!. They wouldn't print GLASS (because ASS is naughty... huh?)

so I was Words from a GL*s* Bubble!!! And so no one of the thousands who were looking for me could find me. Isn't that a hoot as my batty writer would say?

I think they might have changed it back now, which is boring.

PARTY AT A LIBRARY!

2008-12-17T00:36:00.000-08:00

Last night my batty writer went to a party at a Library (a big place full of books like moi!). All these nice people had read bits of moi and wanted to meet HER. Not moi. HER. That stinks.

However what made it OK was that there were crisps and a drink called mulled wine that made my toes warm, and biccies with icing on.

And my bartty writer talked a lot. And then she read a story NOT out of moi (whats going on?) but the people laughed so that must be OK.

CHARLES LAMBERT: SOMETHING RICH AND STRANGE

2008-12-09T01:27:00.000-08:00

My batty writer has put this on her blog. So I'm having it too.

It is a real privilege to host the Cylone stop of Something Rich and Strange, the blog tour for Charles Lambert's super collection, The Scent of Cinnamon. Charles and I had a quick natter, and decided to concentrate on two stories, Air and Moving the Needle Towards the Thread.

Hi Charles. I am interested but not surprised to see that you had chosen to set both these wonderful stories on islands. That works on so many levels. There is a deep and resonant sense of loneliness, of 'something fracturing, separating', of displacement arising from the setting, and from the characters,. In Air, an important layer of the theme being explored here seems to be voiced by the man met in the bar. Am I right? Can you talk about this? The choice of island for setting for example... was it a deliberate thing? Did it appear as a 'surprise' to you, the writer, from some part of the creative spirit that allows preoccupations to surface in this way... see what I mean?

Well, the two stories came from different places, creatively speaking. Moving the Needle towards the Thread was triggered by one of those what if? things I spoke about with Elizabeth: in this case, the idea of the compromising photograph and the circumstances in which it was taken and found. After which I had to do some work on who and where. I’d just come back from a holiday on Cephalonia, where I’d come across the wonderful, and awful, concept of the pharmacos, essentially a scapegoat but with the idea of healing so firmly implanted in the word, and I know that fed into my choice of setting. This is one of those stories that I wrote and re-wrote (my patient Zoetrope reviewers may remember this!) and I only got it right when I realized it was her story, not theirs, and turned it round to first person. But the fact that it’s set on an island obviously isn’t casual. The story deals with isolation, of the individual and of the couple, and how this both protects us and renders us vulnerable.
Islands, like holidays, are experimental conditions in a way; there’s no escape. I’m sure we’ve all experienced the holiday sensation - I hope short-lived - of being trapped within a relationship and of having nothing else to fall back on because you’re stuck in some place that isn’t yours, with the one person who should be everything and suddenly, disastrously, isn’t. Moving the Needle towards the Thread carries this to extremes. The island I drew on for some of the details, by the way, isn’t Greek, but Italian. It’s Ponza, just off the coast from where I live.

The second story, Air, is also the result of an island holiday, this time on Rhodes, and most of the details in the story are drawn from our experiences. We really did go to the island with the half-baked idea of buying a bar and settling, and so on, and anyone who’s entertained similar thoughts may be able to corroborate the whole Greek business of buying the ‘air’ in order to take a place over. The bar we went to may still exist, and I’m sure the aquarium is just as depressing now as it was then.
So I had a bundle of scenes that felt like material for a story. What I didn’t have was a dynamic, until the final scene came back to me, much distorted, from another incident on another holiday some time before. Once again, the story focuses on a relationship and what happens to it under stress, but here the island becomes a metaphor not only for laboratory conditions, but also for escape. The contrast between the two characters – home-loving, stick-in-the-mud Julian and restless, ever-seeking David – is also, as you say, a contrast between normality and a sense of being special, and this is made explicit when David talks to Brian, the man they meet at the bar, who says: ‘Special? We’re two a bloody penny, we are. You want to know what’s special about us? I’ll tell you what’s special about us. We don’t belong here or there or anywhere else.” The story isn’t sure about this, about who’s right, about whether belonging and exile might be the same thing, and its uncertainty is what drives the narrative on.
Charles, reading at his launch party, in Borders, Oxford Street, London.
Thanks. Now... let's continue exploring your work from this perspective... "We don’t belong here or anywhere else." In the wonderful modern fairy story you read at your Borders launch, The Growing, a child and a parent who live miles away from the city wear masks to make a visit there. Seems to me this explores a similar thing... our need to fit in, to be part of the team. The dissonance that plagues us if we do not, or 'think' we don't. Do we as writers wear masks, in that we explore the world and our places in it through our fiction, our characters, who are invented things, but who still retain the essence of 'us', the writers?

Well, to misquote Frank O’Hara, I am the least introspective of men, so I’m not quite sure what to do with this question, which actually seems to me to be two questions, one about wanting to belong and one about what we’re up to when we write. As far as the first question goes, I’d certainly agree that one of the themes that occupies me is what it means to fit in, what fitting in involves and asks of us. What’s interesting about the girl in The Growing, though, is that she isn’t so much driven by a desire to belong as by a dissatisfaction with the world she’s being offered, and by the fact she’s expected to hide her true self - which she finds beautiful - in order to conform to it, as though fitting in weren’t really a need at all, but a failure of the will. David and Julian are also dissatisfied, in their different ways, by Brian’s analysis in the tavern, and I think they’re right.
Wanting to belong is often a way of saying that we’re prepared to settle for less, and neither of them is willing to do that, which is also, of course, why their relationship is bound to end. The story sides with Julian but I’d be inclined to stick up for David and his claim to be special, primarily because I also regard myself as special (which, I hasten to add, doesn’t mean ‘better’).

And this leads me, indirectly, to the second half of the question. My twin sense of myself as gay and as someone who identifies himself as a writer emerged at the age of eleven or twelve, under the benign influence of Kenneth Allott’s Penguin anthology of contemporary verse, from which I somehow learned that Auden was homosexual. My reading/writing and my sexual self-discovery went hand-in-hand from that point on. Later on, and I’m back to O’Hara, I came across the line, ‘It is the law of my own voice I shall investigate,’ and I think that what I try to do with my writing is not so much wear the various masks of fiction as use the various voices at my disposal to investigate what matters to me, and to make something unique from it. Which is, I’m now aware, pretty much what you’re saying, Vanessa, albeit in slightly different terms.
I think what I want to say is that I don’t see the writing of fiction as the wearing of a mask in the sense that I hide behind what I write; I’ve always seen writing as an opportunity to offer to others the open book of myself, in a cavalier rather than a confessional sense. I particularly like your framing of the question as ‘exploring the world and our places in it’, rather than ourselves, which has always struck me as a rather solipsistic and doomed enterprise, except as an inevitable collateral effect – of course what I write reveals something about me. How could it fail to? What good writing does, though, surely, is engage - through the writer - with what’s outside the writer. And that’s what’s interesting, finally. One of my favourite quotes comes from Ruskin, and I’ll use it to round this off: “A man wrapped up in himself makes a very small parcel”.

Charles, you've given us a fantastic insight into your work. May I wish The Scent of Cinnamon every success... not that it will need it. The collection is superb. Many congratulations indeed.

Best Reads of 2008

2008-12-08T15:40:00.000-08:00

Wheee! I am a reader's choice by the lovely, clever and amazing lady I met in Cork, Nuala ni Chonchuir. On her blog. HERE

She says I am poignant. I dont know what that is, but I bet it has something to do with having a pink jumper.

SCHOOL? Yerk.

2008-11-10T02:18:00.000-08:00

I have got to go to school. Not only that I have got to go to something called Universisisisty.

Now look. I am not old enough, and I know I an a PEN but that's enough.

My batty writer (who is getting battier by the minute) says I am going to be used at a University to teach from.

I am in a few school libraries too. Which is not a good idea if you ask me.

I AM A PEN!!!

2008-10-07T10:12:00.001-07:00

I am loads of pens!

I can now do my own writing stories (when I've learned to spell and stuff) and I don't have to rely on that batty woman any more.

Wheeeeeeeee!

I went to Ireland again

2008-09-25T07:28:00.000-07:00

I did. I went to a place called Cork (I thought those were what stops wine coming out of wine bottles?) because there was a festival called FRank O Connor.

Remember? He's the nice man who said I could go and gave my batty writer a few days there as an early Christmas present. Actually, I met his daughter, who was a really lovely lady. I wish SHE had written me. She's much nicer than my batty writer. I wish she hadn't come to Cork, really. I am a real party animal, and she only spoils it.

Still.

There were lots of me on a table every day, and we moved about. One day I was next to Jhumpa Lahiri's book, (Unaccustomed Earth, the one that won the big prize) and the next I was with An Instruction manual for Swallowing, by Adam Marek. He's great. Looks like a film star. I must grow up fast. He bought moi, actually...so there.

There were loads of readings, and they were really good. My batty writer talked to a lot of the writers, and drank far too much Corona which is not pop, like it used to be when she was a girl, but is beer.

One day, my batty writer went for a walk with Mrs Salt (a lady called Jen Hamilton Emery). They went all round Cork, and into this park where there was a Peace Festival. oooo-er. It was full of tents, and music, and clothes and dogs and children and drums and hats and the air was full of sort of blue smoke. My batty writer was dancing, and I was sooooooo embarrassed.

When we came out, my batty writer said 'I feel a bit light headed'. Mrs Salt said she did too.

I doont think it had anything at all to do with the blue smoke.

But anyway. I had lunch with Jhumpa Lahiri who is dead famous. Only even though she is called Jhumpa, mine is better.

My writer takes loads of photos. Only they are all of walls. I SAID she was mad....

LOVELY MESSAGE FROM A READER

2008-09-02T12:14:00.000-07:00

My batty writer got this letter today:

Dear Vanessa,

Hello, hope you're all keeping very well.

I just wanted to send you a note to say how much I liked your book. Thank you.

I think that your writing is very intense and compassionate and also very brave in that it deals with painful subjects. I found the stories gripping.

I hope you go from strength to strength and book to book.

Nice innit?

BUBBLES DOWN UNDER!

2008-08-18T11:58:00.000-07:00

I am now big in Australia.

Well, sort of. There is one copy of moi in a library in a place called Perth.

So if you want to see me, yuu can call by but I'm not on loan, you can only sit and read moi. Upside down.

"DOING WELL..."

2008-08-09T04:23:00.000-07:00

I dunno. My batty writer decided to ask how I was doing. So instead of asking moi, she asked my publishers, Salt.

Well, I suppose it is six months coming up since I was borned. So, like you take other babies to get weighed and have things stuck in their ears and things, and injections... yerk... I can have an MOT via how many peoples are buying moi, and things like that.

(I am very pleased that I don't have to have injections. My batty writer hates them, and it's genetic. I hate them too even though Ive never had one. I have been glued together though - a painful procedure - and I have been folded in half and sliced in a guillotine. YOU try it. It's not nice.)

Anyway. There is a widget on Amazon, and my batty writer can see where I am relative to sales of other stuff on there, and so far so good... but it doesn't tell you how many of me are whizzing around out there in identical pink jumpers.

Anyway, Mrs Salt-person who is called Jen, was packing to go on holiday and she works hard and needs one, I think. So she couldnt do all the calculations, but sent an email to say:

"Your book's doing well."

I suppose that is what writers of things like moi want to hear.

SPOTTED AT CHICAGO AIRPORT

2008-08-03T07:01:00.000-07:00

It's true! I have been seen at Chicago Airport (which is not here, but a long way away, I'm told), being read by a woman.

And a friend of my batty writer's saw me, and went up to the woman reading me, and said something like Hey, are you a friend of Vanessa's, I know her...

and the woman looked like she was being accosted by a lunatic, so my batty w's friend said I mean Vanessa G, the writer of your book... that one...

and the woman didn't reply at all, just closed moi and wandered off...

coo.

SHORT FUSE READING

2008-07-26T23:30:00.000-07:00

I had a great time at Short Fuse in Brighton, on 17th July, but my batty writer forgot to post, and I can't spell yet.

There were four reads, me being one, and my writer's friend called Jo Horsman (who is skinny and wears sparkly tights) being another one. It was a fun party.

My batty writer had been asked to read Dodie's Gift out of moi, because it fitted the theme of the party.

ECLECTICA INTERVIEW

2008-07-17T04:18:00.000-07:00

My batty writer is interviewed all about Moi on a place called Eclectica. By a nice lady called Tania Hershman, whose birthday it is today, and I hope she is having a cake with lots of candles.

But my writer also managed to get in a few bits about herself and her other writing, which I think is just NOT ON.

She is such a hogger of MY limelight.

If you must, her INTERVIEW is HERE.

WEST CORK LITERARY FESTIVAL

2008-07-13T10:32:00.001-07:00

I am famous. I am Big in Bantry. I was in a bookshop window for nearly a whole five days, until I got all sold. All twenty copies, or something, which my batty writer says is lovely, and I say there's a long way to go before she's Dan Brown.

He sells squillions of copies of his books, and is very rich.

But.

I have something he doesn't. I have a pink jumper.

(Oh. And the week was great, and the bookshop was full for my batty writer to read out of moi, and I saw three ladies crying afterwards. I hope that wasn't cos I am bad...and I got a second bit read on Friday night at the bedtime reading. Only that was the one about swapping skin with a drug addict. I don't like that one, myself. )

On this coooool blog...

2008-06-30T23:08:00.000-07:00

Hey, I'm on this cooool blog today, called

LITERARY REJECTIONS ON DISPLAY

and my batty writer is nattering about how I got out there. Moi.

Ich bin ein BOOK!

However. For once she's saying stuff about learning to write before you call yourself an undiscovered genius. Pah and thrice pah!

I can write like a dream. In red crayon... I got a GOLD STAR from Miss Atkins last week. For writing my NAME with only one spelling mistake. So YA BOO SUCKS.

One day, far from BEING a book, I shall write one myself. And show you all how eeeeeeeeeeeeeasy peeeeeeeeasy it is.

And I shall do it in my News Book, in joined up writing. You wait. AND I bet I'll get another gold star.

Mr Francis O'Connor

2008-06-29T14:08:00.000-07:00

Well, I dunno. She hasn't even met the man, my batty writer, and she refers to him as Frank. I said it was rude, and she didn't reply.

Anyway. It seems that moi was considered for a prize in the name of Francis (see, I'm far more polite...) and I never made it...

But

and of course, this is all about moi, and my jumper, and my stories, and nothing about her at all...

But

we've been asked to go all the way over to the Frank O'Connor Festival, in September, and my batty writer will be reading out of moi! We're going for three whole days, and staying in a real hotel with rooms, and going on a plane, and things. And Frank is paying.

he must be a really nice man, thats all I can say, whether he is Francis or Frank. Who cares?

Oh, I am so pleased, cos I feel far more at home in Ireland than over here. So does she, actually... it will be our third visit this year.

if I can keep her off the Murphy's...

NEEDLEMAKERS' LEWES READING PARTY!

2008-06-15T01:01:00.000-07:00

My batty writer has written all about the party last Thursday on her other blog.
Anyone'd think it was SHE did all the work when it comes to reading out of moi. I tell you, she should give me some credit.

She said this:

What a brilliant occasion. Yesterday evening's readings in The Needlemakers' Cafe, Lewes (Janet Sutherland, Catherine Smith and me) performed to a sell out audience.

The cafe is a wonderful space, high brick ceiling, heavy wooden pillars. A massive curved back wall that we stood against to read.

Janet went first, reading her work with quiet authority. She read many poems from her recent collection Burning The Heartwood, and others from magazines previously published. There was gentleness, humour, poignancy, all woven into words I wanted to catch hold of and read myself. So I will!

Catherine came next. Her collection, Lip was the source of her readings - funny, witty and thought-provoking in equal measure. Another one to read later as well!

We then had a break, with drinks and tapas served by the cafe. And I read after the break, choosing the title story from Words From A Glass Bubble. It seemed to go down fine, people were very generous with their commments and natter afterwards. Lovely to see so many writers in the audience, and lovely to talk to writers before and after. Like the cafe was feeding us on all different levels!

Thanks to Matt at Skylark for organising this, for compering so well.

SHORT FUSE, JULY

2008-06-07T23:06:00.000-07:00

I am going to another party... my batty writer is reading Dodie's Gift at Short Fuse in Brighton on 17 July!

That will be a busy week...home from Ireland on 13th, reading at Stoke Newington Bookshop 14th, Short Fuse Brighton 17th.

Can a girl stand it, I ask?

Party, 11 June

2008-05-22T04:21:00.000-07:00

I'm being allowed out again, to a party at The Needlemakers' Cenre, in Lewes. In the Cafe, 7.15. Ooo, I will be up late.

Its where needles were made in WWI... I hope there aren't any there now. I don't like injections.

However. My batty writer and two lovely poets are going to be reading, and there'll be music, and a bar, and food.

The poets are Janet Sutherland and Catherine Smith

CATHERINE SMITH HERE JANET SUTHERLAND HERE

I hope they do strawberry jam sarnies this time.

Anyway. I'm washing my jumper specially.

I've been put away...

2008-05-13T23:08:00.000-07:00

It's dark in here.

I'm in a place called the attic, with the suitcases.

I can see a bit when the landing light is on, otherwise it's all dark.

My batty writer has got a box of me and she's put me up here, not in the study. There are a few of me on a shelf downstairs, lucky things.

She says she has to move on, get on with writing something else.

It has been fun though.

And another is how my batty writer's found out that lots of other writers don't like people with books out. They get jealous and don't even like other writers doing their marketing how they want to.

Well, as my batty writer says... tuff.

So if you write yourself, best get ready, huh?

Good moods again. Nice review from Pulp.net

2008-05-11T09:10:00.000-07:00

Who'd be grown up? There's a nice review of Moi again, up at a place called Pulp.net. (whats that then? Pulp is stewed apple mashed with custard...)

Nice Pulp HERE

Grown Ups are Silly...

2008-05-09T14:03:00.000-07:00

Well I think grown-ups are silly.

There was my batty writer ge tting all depressed over something nasty someone didn't say.

I said to her... you can't get on with all the other kids in the playground, so get over it.

go and play with a friend.

A NICE MAN CALLED FRANK

2008-05-06T04:15:00.000-07:00

I am very fond of a man called Frank O'Connor. He seems very nice, and I am on something called a longlist called after him, with loads of new friends. Roddy Doyle sounds nice too, and so does Jhumpa Lahiri. I already know Ann Enright.

Wonder what sort of jumpers they wear? You've got to look the part, apparently.

Still. Here are my new friends, from all over the place. It's fun. My batty writer says I haven't got a cat's chance in hell. And she's right! Or would be, except for my new flameproof pink jumper...

THE LONGLIST FOR THE 2008 FRANK O'CONNOR SHORT STORY PRIZE

IRELAND (5 authors)

Mary Rochford (IRELAND)
Gilded Shadows
Tia Publishing, Birmingham, UK
Mary O’Donnell (IRELAND)
Storm over Belfast
New Island, Dublin, Ireland
Gerard Donovan (IRELAND)
Country of the Grand
Faber & Faber Ltd, London, UK
Anne Enright (IRELAND)
Taking Pictures
Jonathan Cape – The Random House Group, London, UK
Roddy Doyle (IRELAND)
The Deportees and other stories
Jonathan Cape – The Random House Group, London, UK

BRITAIN (14 authors including 8 authors from Salt Publishing)

James Waddington (BRITAIN)
Torc
Ogo Press, Honley, Holmfirth, UK
Clare Wigfall (BRITAIN)
The Loudest Sound and Nothing
Faber & Faber Ltd, London, UK
Niki Aguirre (BRITAIN)
29 Ways to Drown
Flipped Eye Publishing, Manchester, UK
Wendy Perriam (BRITAIN)
Little Marvel and Other Stories
Robert Hale Limited, London, UK
David Gaffney (BRITAIN)
Aroma Bingo
Salt Publishing Ltd, Cambridge, Uk
Carys Davies (BRITAIN)
Some New Ambush
Salt Publishing Ltd, Cambridge, Uk
Elizabeth Baines (BRITAIN)
Balancing on the Edge of the World
Salt Publishing Ltd, Cambridge, Uk
Padrika Tarrant (BRITAIN)
Broken Things
Salt Publishing Ltd, Cambridge, Uk
Linda Cracknell (BRITAIN)
The Searching Glance
Salt Publishing Ltd, Cambridge, Uk
William Guy (BRITAIN)
The I Love You Book
Salt Publishing Ltd, Cambridge, Uk
Vanessa Gebbie (BRITAIN)
Words From a Glass Bubble
Salt Publishing Ltd, Cambridge, Uk
Richard Bardsley (BRITAIN)
Body Parts – The Anatomy of Love
Salt Publishing Ltd, Cambridge, Uk
Robert Shearman (BRITAIN)
(Writer of the Dr Who series and a contemporary of David Walliams at Reigate Grammar School, has worked with Alan Ayckbourn and had a play produced by Francis Ford Coppola)
Tiny Deaths
Comma Press, Manchester, Uk
Adam Marek (BRITAIN)
Instruction Manual for Swallowing
Comma Press, Manchester, Uk

AUSTRALIA (4 authors)

John Clancy (AUSTRALIA)
Her Father’s Daughter
University of Queensland Press, St. Lucia Queensland, Australia
Susan Midalia (AUSTRALIA)
A History of the Beanbag
Uwa Press, Crawley, Australia
Kathryn Lomer (AUSTRALIA)
Camera Obscura
University of Queensland Press, St. Lucia Queensland, Australia
Nam Le (VIETNAM-AUSTRALIA)
The Boat
Canongate Books Limited, Edinburgh, UK

NEW ZEALAND (4 authors)

Tim Jones (NEW ZEALAND)
Transported
Random House New Zealand Ltd, Auckland, New Zealand
Sue Orr (NEW ZEALAND)
Etiquette for a Dinner Party
Random House New Zealand Ltd, Auckland, New Zealand
Elizabeth Smither (NEW ZEALAND)
The Girl Who Proposed
Cape Catley Ltd, Auckland, New Zealand
Witi Ihimaera (NEW ZEALAND)
Often regarded as the most prominent Māori writer alive today, his novel, The Whale Rider, was made into the very successful film of the same name.
Ask The Posts Of The House
Raupo Publishing Ltd, Auckland, New Zealand

USA (8 authors)

Jhumpa Lahiri (USA)
Unaccustomed Earth
Alfred A. Knopf Inc., Random House Inc., New York, Usa
Wanda Coleman (USA)
Jazz and Twelve O’Clock Tales
Black Sparrow Books, Boston, Massachusetts, Usa
Benjamin Percy (USA)
Refresh, Refresh
Jonathan Cape – The Random House Group, London, Uk
Janet Kauffman (USA)
Trespassing – Dirt Stories and Field Notes
Wayne State University Press, Detroit, Usa
Jim Shepard (USA)
Like you’d understand, anyway
Alfred A. Knopf Inc., Random House Inc., New York, Usa
Marianne Herrmann (USA)
Signaling For Rescue
New Rivers Press, Moorhead, MN, Usa
Don Waters (USA)
Desert Gothic
University of Iowa Press, Iowa City, Usa
Donald Ray Pollock (USA)
Knockemstiff
Harvill Secker Editorial – The Random House Group Ltd, London, UK

CANADA

Alison MacLeod (CANADA)
Fifteen Modern Tales of Attraction
Hamish Hamilton, London, UK

SINGAPORE

Wena Poon (SINGAPORE)
Lions in Winter: stories
MPH Group Publishing, Petaling Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia

TAIWAN

Egoyan Zheng (Qian-Ci Zheng) (TAIWAN)
Urn’s Bottom Village Stories
Press Store Publishing Co., Taichung City, Taiwan

NIGERIA

Tubal R. Cain (NIGERIA)
Dandaula and Other African Tales
Precious Styles Nigeria Limited, Jebba, Kwara State, Nigeria

Frequently asked Questions

What is the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award?

Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award is an annual award of 35,000 euros, as such it is currently the world's richest prize for the short story form. The award is in memory of the late Frank O'Connor, one of the world's most renowned short story writers. The award is presented in O'Connor's hometown of Cork, Ireland. It is organised by the Munster Literature Centre and funded by Cork City Council. The award goes to the author of the book judged to be the best collection of stories published in English for the first time anywhere in the world in the twelve months between September of one year and August of the next. If a translated book wins, the purse is shared equally between the author and translator.

How are books considered for the award?

Publishers, authors or agents may enter eligible works of short fiction. Self-publications are considered but entries from vanity presses are not. Books must be submitted by March 31st in seven bound copies to the Munster Literature Centre

What sort of books are entered in error?

Vanity press publications, books first published outside the year of consideration, books which collect or select stories published from the author's previous short story collections and collections of novellas.

How is the winner decided?

All eligible titles constitute the long-list which is read by the jury. A short-list of four or six is chosen. The winner is selected after further deliberations from the short-list.

Who will serve as judges?

The judges are selected by the director of the Munster Literature Centre from published short-story writers, academics with a track-record of involvement with the short story and from time to time any other special category person.

When will the shortlist be announced?

the short-list will be announced mid-July in 2008

How will the winner be announced?

The winner will be declared at the closing event of the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Festival in Cork, Ireland on Sunday September 21st

ULLAPOOL BOOKSHOP

2008-05-05T10:28:00.001-07:00

Ullapool is a great place! We stayed there for a few days after the book groups, so my batty writer could do some writing. I have to say she didn't do much.

(She kept saying, "I've cracked it!!"... that's not writing is it? I mean. You can't crack writing.)

But we went to visit The Ullapool Bookshop and there I was. Moi! All the way up there.

A READING GROUP!

2008-05-05T10:16:00.000-07:00

See I thought you could read a book all on your own.

I mean, I do. Red Book 3 is dead good. Much better than Red Book 2. AND I CAN READ IT ALL ON MY OWN.

So why do big grown up people have to read in groups? Something really fishy going on here. I don't think they CAN read on their own, and that's why they need to be in sixes. Or sevens.

Anyway, my batty writer went up to Scotland to talk to two reading groups. TWO! All together. So see... I was right... they can't read on their own at all. Not even in one book group. They need TWO.

Anyway. They had read Moi, and asked loads of questions. And one lady was going to go off and order Moi from a library. And another was going to go to a school to ask if they could read Moi at the school.

And one said I was 'dark'. What, Moi? Dark?

I said, 'Why d'you think I've got my back to you on the cover?' but no one listened. Not even my batty writer.

It was good fun, though. And it was really nice that they'd read Moi. Even if they had to do it in a group.

Back to Red Book 3.

2008-04-15T23:15:00.000-07:00

Oh for goodness sake. My batty writer is all of a tither. Will someone go and fetch the pink pills?

Moi has pparently been selected for the pick of the short story reviews, on Mslexia's website. CLICK HERE FOR MSLEXIA'S WEBSITE

the feature is headed:

In each issue of the magazine reviewers assess books across selected genres. These are the ones they liked best.

Well OF COURSE they liked Moi the best!! Why are we surprised? I put on my best jumper for this picture, and I am gorgeous.

This is what my batty writer is pleased about, again. I wish she'd just shut up and get on with writing a sister book for Moi...

Full review:

SHORT STORIES
reviewed by Francis Clarke
Words From a Glass Bubble by Vanessa Gebbie (Salt, £12.99)

There is a wide range and variety in the 19 stories in Gebbie’s Glass Bubble. In the poetic ‘The Kettle on the Boat,’ we see events from the viewpoint of an Inuit child and a fragile world is brought to life; a poignant finality is deftly captured in the image of a kettle sinking in the sea. ‘I can Squash The King, Tommo,’ with its Dylan Thomas echoes, has a blithe and energetic narrative drive, and the emotional weight of it is carefully kept in balance with the thread of each character’s revelations so that the climax is genuinely moving. Characters teem throughout the collection, and Vanessa Gebbie boldly takes on different voices, from a teenage boy in care to a boy with a junkie mate. The stories themselves are riveting, but phrases like ‘Billy…always looked wise but hurting like Jesus being nailed to the cross…’ occasionally keep characters at arms length rather than bringing them to life. All of these stories bar one have won or been placed in major competitions and the humour in some of them is especially enjoyable. In the title story, for example, a plastic Virgin Mary is taken out for a drive, ‘...her face like a small boy’s pet mouse in a blue hood,’ and Serbian Vera is a character in the otherwise sad ‘Irrigation’ who is simultaneously tragic and hilarious to great effect.

I WAS ON RADIO!!

2008-04-12T12:02:00.000-07:00

I'm famous! I was on the radio! My batty writer was the guest on Coastway Radio in Brighton.

There was loads of natter about Moi, naturally, then lots of boring stuff about writing, teaching, competitions... but my batty writer also talked about going loopy!!

She did. She talked about looping the loop. See. I SAID she was batty. She also talked about seeing a polar bear in Spitzbergen and writing in the garden shed.

THIS was her music. (Cover your ears. I did!)

1) Tom Lehrer, The Elements
2) Tom Lehrer, She's My Girl
3) The Beatles, Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da
4) Andreas Scholl (Countertenor) Blow The Wind Southerly (beautiful!!)
5) Carl Maria von Weber, Clarinet Concerto no 1 in F. minor op.73, Rondo
6)Donovan, Jennifer Juniper

THEN it was dead funny... we were meant to have Dusty Springfield and, I Only Want To be With You...only Rosemary pressed the wrong button, and instead we had Ken Dodd singing Happiness...

I nearly died. Is there NO style?

A brilliant hour, great publicity and a good laugh!

Signed Books

2008-04-11T11:02:00.000-07:00

My batty writer went to Brighton today with a pen.

Then she called into Borders Bookshop and scribbled her name in Moi, then a nice man stuck a purple sticker on Moi saying 'Signed by the Author'.

But it's the wrong colour! It doesn't go with my jumper!

But my batty writer was very delighted to see Moi on a table propped up under a sign saying 'Brighton choices'... So I am hopping about when people hover nearby....

Then she went into Waterstones Bookshop and a nice lady found her a table to write her name in a few more of Moi.

In that shop I am propped up so People can see my jumper, too...but I'm next to a funny looking man called John Updike. Don't like the look of him much.

Readings!!!

2008-04-08T11:50:00.000-07:00

My batty writer is going to read.

Well big deal really, we all know she can do that. Just showing off again, I expect.

But she is reading out of Moi... of course, where else? Silly question.

May 14th Border's Bookshop Brighton, evening do.

May 29th (probably) Skylark Bookshop Lewes (watch this space...)

July 6-13th all over Bantry in Ireland (wheee. I haven't been to Ireland. I want to try Murphy's...)

July 14th Stoke Newington Bookshop

What I want to know is what's wrong with June?

Huh?

Reviewed in Mslexia

2008-04-05T01:45:00.000-07:00

It is amazing to watch my batty writer opening the post then sitting down with a cup of tea to read a review in a magazine called Mslexia.

Then I see it's a review of me!!! Oh I'm famous. Must be!

And I'm with that Taking Pictures by Ann Enright again... only she, of course IS A GENIUS IN CAPITAL LETTERS, and my batty writer isn't. No way! She's got that Taking Pictures book. I've seen it. I don't think she likes it though cos she keeps saying Oh God and shaking her head when she reads it. I said she was batty.

And another book is reviewed called Far North and other Dark Tales by Sara Maitland... I expect my batty writer will buy that one now.

But the reviewer did say some nice things about me, and I'm dead pleased. And they used a picture of MOI to illustrate the reviews... but I'm not surprised. I AM rather lovely.

They said this:

'wide range and variety' (of all of Moi)

'poetic...fragile world brought to life...poignant finality deftly captured' (of Kettle on the Boat)

'Dylan Thomas echoes...blithe and energetic narrative drive... emotional weight carefully kept in balance...' (of I Can Squash the King, Tommo)

'Characters teem throughout the collection... boldly takes on different voices'

'The stories...are riveting'

"The humour is especially enjoyable..'

"Serbian Vera is a character in the otherwise sad Irrigation who is simultaneously tragic and hilarious to great effect.'

phew.

Short Story Website and moi...

2008-04-03T14:34:00.000-07:00

Me and my batty writer are given a mention on The Short Story Website! I'm sandwiched between two very illustrious writers... Ann Enright and Sophie Hannah... wow

SHORT STORY BOOK NEWS HERE

mind you I'm not surprised. I've always liked sandwiches. Jammy ones are good. Raspberry. And peanut butter, yum.

And another nice 'review' thing

2008-04-01T01:58:00.000-07:00

I've been over to my batty writer's blog, and she's wittering about being in the local Waterstone's Newsletter.

I dunno what all the fuss is about. They only said this... (well, and interviewed her as well. It'll all go to her head... just you wait...)

"... contains some of the most beautifully crafted and engrossing stories that one can read,...a rare talent...characters becoming real as she relates their tales with wit, compassion and an unflinching eye."

Yes but, no but. Look! This is moi they are talking about. Not my batty writer. Look! 'CONTAINS' they said. SHE doesn't contain all that stuff, I do....

give a girl her due...

huh.

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Another party!! Wheee...

2008-04-01T01:54:00.000-07:00

The Nightingale Theatre, Brighton..LINK HERE

A huge thank you to New Writing South (link HERE) for organising a lovely party last night to launch Words From a Glass Bubble in my ‘home city’.

The venue was perfect: The Nightingale Theatre, above Grand Central Bar in Brighton. It’s a great space, and for the audience of about 30, there was bubbly flowing, nibbles, and a terrific atmosphere… everything candle-lit.

It was so professionally done. I was introduced very generously by Andrew Marshall (link HERE), with whom I work in a face to face writing group… he’s an extraordinary talent… writes best-seller self-help books, musicals, plays, fiction, and he’s a journalist on several broadsheet newspapers.

I read Dodie’s Gift and dedicated the reading to Zadie Smith, who took such a battering in the press in recent months for sticking up for standards. I think it went down well… although my dear Dad (who is fairly deaf) said afterwards that he thought it ‘went on a bit…”!

I was really delighted to meet up again with Carol Hayman, another extraordinary talent. She is very involved with New Writing South, but was also writer-in-residence for a BBC writing competition in 2006… we met in a one-to one workshop, and she was so positive and encouraging about my writing. I look back now and realise how very important that was… it would have been so easy to lose heart back then.

Read about Carol Hayman HERE… and watch out for her TV adaptation of the sparkling Ladies of Letters radio series she co-wrote… I wonder if it will be Prunella Scales and Patricia Routledge again… fingers crossed.

Sales seemed to go well, lots of signings, and a great couple of hours afterwards in Grand Central bar, with impromptu juggling lessons from the expert Rob Horsman, and rather a lot of crisps. The chef had gone home.

---------------

However, (and this is me talking now, not that batty writer...) I prefer crisps. They had yummy salt n vinegar ones that make your tongue frizzle,and even more yummy sweet chili ones that make your eyes frizzle.

I can juggle anyway so didn't need that Mr Horsman teaching me. Actually, that's what I'm doing in the cover photo, but the photographer just cut out the juggling balls. Clever what they can do. I was successfully keeping 46 red ping pong balls in the air whilst skipping along this road.

Don't believe me?

Huh.

Revewed at 'Stuck in a Book'...

2008-03-30T23:34:00.000-07:00

Another review, this time by Simon Thomas at Stuck in a Book.

He says:

Words from a Glass Bubble by Vanessa Gebbie has a … varied group of scenarios, narrators and themes - but her voice is rather harsher, more concerned with the gritty and the earthy. Occasionally a quieter voice creeps through, which leaves one staring at the page at the sheer pathos Gebbie can create. 'The Kettle on the Boat', for instance, where parents quietly take their Inuit daughter away on a boat; she narrates the journey, and leave her for adoption: "If I am not there to help, how will Mama know when the fish are ready?"

The one I wanted to point to, though, is 'Cactus Man'. 'The Kettle on the Boat' was my favourite, but 'Cactus Man' is perhaps more representative. 'Spike', an enthusiast and collector of cacti, wants to discover his real name because he is getting married. He visits a social worker who can look through his files and tell him.

'I was saying how unusual your case is.'
'Can't be doing with too much usual.'
'Sorry?'
'We feed off being unusual, us lot.'
'Oh, I see'.

The story is one of muted disappointment, understated grief and an eventual path of hope for Spike. Gebbie is at her most subtle here, and manages to evoke the lives of her central characters completely, visualised through the stilted attempts of Spike to gain a firmer grasp on his identity. There is nothing so saccharine as a 'love conquers all' message here …but a sense that hope can be found amongst fragility and discouragement.

I'm glad he picked that one to represent the book. It's my favourite story.

Glass Bubble was reviewed alongside Balancing on the Edge of the World, by Elizabeth Baines... he loved her book, as did I.

The whole review can be found HERE
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Conversations with Amazon

2008-03-22T23:48:00.000-07:00

What do you do when Amazon litter your book page with errors?

Here's the product description as lifted from the Words from a Glass Bubble page:

This passionate new book gathers together for the first time many of Vanessa Gebbiea??s award-winning stories. Described by Maggie Gee as a??a prodigiously gifted new writera??, she is a natural storyteller; her narratives unfold with a deceptively light touch, exploring with compassion what it is to be human and flawed. a??Words From a Glass Bubblea?? is about coming to terms with the cards we are dealt.

Good, innit?

There is, thankfully, as system whereby the author and the publisher can change their product pages. I followed the guidelines exactly, taking careful note of the exhortation to take care, as what I typed into the online form would override the existing content.

Good! That's why I was doing it!

But no. The incorrect paragraph is still there, incorporated into the product description, looking ever so, but ever so slightly amateurish...

The conversation continues.

Sigh. It is wonderful to have a resource like Amazon, but...

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Fame...is Page 5 of the Sussex paper...

2008-03-22T10:09:00.000-07:00

So they know about me in Lewes, and in Rye, apparently. I'm in two different papers and two different blogs, but they look scarily similar.

LEWES, SUSSEX EXPRESS

RYE AND BATTLE OBSERVER

BOOK LAUNCH...THE SEQUEL

2008-03-19T23:25:00.000-07:00

Lots of piccies of me, here, and far too many of my batty writer. But you get a good idea of my beautiful jumper and skirt.. my favourites. Goes with my hair don't you think?

These were all taken by photographer Cora Malinak at the launch party for Words From A Glass Bubble, March 11th. Friends, family, place, people, books, pictures, and a lot of smiles.

Put your speakers on: the music is the Allegro from Handel's Cuckoo and Nightingale Organ Concerto

Handel makes an appearance in the slide show...in terracotta.

But mostly the best pictures are of moi, the book.

The photographer is whizzo. Ace, and all sorts of clever. Not like my batty writer who has just worked out which way up to hold a camera. Huh.

CLICK HERE FOR CORA MALINAK PHOTOGRAPHY

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REPRINTS, BOOKSHOPS and MORE PARTIES

2008-03-19T15:10:00.001-07:00

LOts of news!!
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A lovely shop called Skylark, in the Needlemaker's Centre in Lewes, is selling me. I am delighted!
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I am alive and kicking in Waterstones in Brighton and lots of others. And on lots of web shops, like Amazon, and Blackwells and ..and..and..
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I am having another party, in The Garden Room, in Lewes, with readings...

There's a launch party being put on by New Writing South, at The Nightingale Theatre in Brighton, just for moi!
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Monday 31st March, 6.30 to 8.30 pm, free ... and a free glass of bubbles to go with my glass bubbles. Lovely Jubbly!
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(I expect my batty writer will have to be there. One of these day's I'll be allowed out on my own...)

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and

I'm being printed all over again cos they've nearly run out.
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PICCIES!!

2008-03-19T15:00:00.001-07:00

My batty writer signing a book...
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My batty writer with Jen Hamilton Emery from Salt Publishing (and half a Big Salt Bag for Salt Books...)
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Mr Kieron Fenton reading moi...
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My batty writer signing moi for Maggie Gee who says nice things on my cover...
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Molara Wood and Elaine Chiew
.

More on the party...

2008-03-12T11:19:00.001-07:00

Last night, at London's Foundling Museum, Words From A Glass Bubble was launched.

It was the best possible event. I was surrounded by 130 friends - writers and non-writers. The champers flowed, the noise level was high, there were three readings and a constant opportunity to explore this wonderful place with the help of experienced guides.

I will post pictures when they come through... but HERE IS A LINK to Elizabeth Baines' blog, with her piccies, a lovely account of the party, and the book...

And Sarah Hilary, a super crime writer (and winner of one of the Fish prizes this year) has written it up on her blog HERE

Can't ask for nicer words from either of them. Thank you both. It was lovely of you to make the journey to London, one from Manchester, one from the Cotswolds.

I HAD A PARTY!

2008-03-12T00:35:00.000-07:00

I did! I had my first party! I must be a party animal, I think. At least that's what people were saying to my batty writer.

There were some brilliant people there. Really brilliant. 130 of them. I counted.

My batty writer read my first story, in three episodes. There was loads of champers and wine, and I wanted a jelly but there weren't any.

SALT WINS AWARD

2008-03-10T08:44:00.000-07:00

Brilliant news! Salt Publishing have won an award!!

The Independent Publishers Guild is proud to announce the eleven winners of the 2008 Independent Publishing Awards.

This from their blog:

Salt Publishing received the Nielsen Innovation of the Year Award for its imaginative efforts to increase sales of collections of poetry and short stories despite very challenging market conditions. It impressed with its range of web-based marketing initiatives and partnerships and energetic development of its brand. “Salt is bucking the trend in poetry by growing its sales,” said the judges. “Its innovation in lots of small ways adds up to a major achievement."

CONGRATULATIONS JEN AND CHRIS!

BRIGHTON BUBBLY LAUNCH THANKS TO NEW WRITING SOUTH

2008-03-08T02:00:00.005-08:00

Lovely news. New Writing South, my writing association, are putting on a launch party for Glass Bubble. With a free glass of bubbly for everyone!

BUBBLY LAUNCH PARTY... sounds rather appropriate!

It will be in Brighton at a fab venue, on Monday 31st March, 6.30 pm

Fantastic!

Watch this space for venue.

REVIEWED ON NORMBLOG

2008-03-06T11:25:00.000-08:00

Words from a Glass Bubble has been reviewed by Adele Geras today on her husband (Norman Geras)'s blog, Normblog.

(I love Normblog. There is always something to provoke, to challenge, to make me think...)

Adele Geras reviews two Salt Collections: Balancing on the Edge of the World, by Elizabeth Baines, and Glass Bubble.

She writes a very good introduction in which she champions the short story.Here is her article in its entirety:

Two short story collections (by Adèle Geras)

Salt is an independent publisher based in Cambridge and it specializes in short stories. I've read two collections by Salt authors recently: Elizabeth Baines's Balancing on the Edge of the World when it came out a couple of months ago, and - the other day - Vanessa Gebbie's Words from a Glass Bubble, to be launched next week.

Some people simply don't like reading short stories and I find this so inexplicable that every so often I'll try my powers of persuasion to win the form a few more readers. Publishers (though not Salt, obviously) think that collections are not a paying proposition and efforts to bind them up individually as tiny little booklets and sell them at railway stations and the like don't seem to have flourished. They crop up less and less frequently in magazines. The broadsheets will carry a story by a superstar writer at Christmas, and occasionally at Halloween, because ghost stories, at least, are perennial favourites. Val McDermid tried her hardest a couple of years ago to get short stories noticed with a superb website and perhaps the internet is part of the future of this genre. But collections like these two show that the form is still alive and well in its printed version.

Those who don't like short stories are disappointed, perhaps, because they expect them to be small novels and they're not. It's like wishing a truly delicious canapé, or an exquisite strawberry tart, were a three-course meal. That isn't going to happen. With a few exceptions, short stories are short - over in a few pages for the most part - and therefore you'd think ideal for journeys, waiting rooms, the time before you fall asleep and any small time slot when getting stuck into a novel means you won't get further than the next few pages and have to leave it hanging till a later time.

Stories, when they work (and in the hands of these two writers they do work), offer us a chance to look into someone else's life. They can throw a stone into our mind that keeps rippling out to the edges of our thoughts all day long. That, I think, is what the blurbese 'haunting' means: you are literally pursued by the story you've just read, as if by a particularly vivid dream. They can terrify you (M.R. James, Franz Kafka), make you laugh (Damon Runyon), and even bring to life, however briefly, a whole distinct world (Katherine Mansfield, Anton Chekhov). They can be extended jokes, or delicious bits of scandal, or an overheard conversation. There are stories to suit every taste.

Elizabeth Baines's speciality is unpacking relationships. She catches perfectly the embarrassment, rivalry, squabbling, envy and love that exist between parents and children and between siblings. 'The Way to Behave' has a wronged wife going to speak to her husband's mistress. Baines is wincingly funny about the creative process and 'The Shooting Script' ought to be required reading for anyone who fancies themselves writing for television. She's both lyrical and clear-sighted when she looks at the world through a child's eyes. Try the stories 'Power' and 'Daniel Smith disappears off the face of the earth'. She moves between the city and the countryside and her internal monologues sound genuine, which isn't a surprise as Baines is a prize-winning playwright. Many of these tales would make good short dramas and perhaps that's one way of approaching them. The difference between drama and stories, though, is this: you have to provide the setting, costume and props in words and Baines does this with enormous aplomb.

The cover image on Vanessa Gebbie's book (which shows the back view of a beautiful red-haired girl going along a road and which reminds me of the Clark's shoe advertisements from the 50s) is an ironic comment on the contents of the book. The stories here are often heart-breaking. The death of children is a recurring theme and tales like 'I can squash the king, Tommo' (with its deliberate echoes of 'Under Milk Wood') are hard to read with dry eyes. Gebbie is never sentimental and the grief felt by her protagonists is brilliantly described. The ordinariness of pain: the way you settle into it, the way you face what's dished out to you, the way you cope, are examined in language that's plain and even brutal when it needs to be, and tender and poetic when that's appropriate. Some of the stories are set in Wales; the seaside is the background for some others. There's a story about an Inuit child which is desperately sad, but still uplifting. Harry in 'Harry's Catch' - which dwells in some detail on the technicalities of fishing - faces the truth about his marriage for the first time. A lowly employee at a hotel works out who wears the shoes he polishes, and in my favourite story, 'Dodie's Gift', you get an entire thriller plot played out in ten pages. It's terrific stuff: wide-ranging, interesting and, like the Baines, very well-written.

I do urge anyone who loves short stories to read these two collections and help me spread the word. (Adèle Geras)

Bubble goes international!

2008-03-05T12:02:00.000-08:00

Funny place I've ended up in, I have to say. I thought I was going to be read in United Kingdom places.

(You see, that's nice... I LIKE Kings, always have. I feel a sense of affinity. Must be a throwback to royalty myself. I mean. Look at my hair? Some king was a redhead, wasn't he? QED. Who IS the King?)

But my batty writer has been writing nice things on my title page, wrapping me up in padded envelopes, and sticking stamps on me.

So my sisters and I have gone to England, Wales, France, Finland, and America. Thats just from her box, too. I dont know about the people at Salt.

From this tiny post office in a grocery store in a village in the middle of nowhere much, in UK.

The lady there is nice.

My batty writer and this post office lady had the following conversation:

"Put it on the scales please. Is it inland?"

"No, Finland."

"Yes, inland?"

"No, Finland."

"That's what I said."

"No, Finland. With an EFF"

"Is that inland Finland?"

(I made that last line up. She reckons she's the only one who can make things up round here... pah!)

More on marketing

2008-03-02T03:03:00.000-08:00

INTERVIEW

I was interviewed this week by Kelly Spitzer on her 'Writers' Profile' Project.

INTERVIEW HERE

The first day the interview was up Kelly tells me she had 500 hits.

COMPETITION WIN AND PUBLICATION

I won the 2nd Per Contra Prize, announced on Saturday (the same day the book was officially published)

Publication and of course mention of the book in the bio, alongside work by none other than John Updike. Can't get better than that.

ANOTHER ACCEPTANCE

Wei Ch'i, piece of flash fiction, accpeted by the lovely Smokelong Quarterly, for publication this month. Mention in bio, and another interview.

TIM LOVE'S REVIEW

2008-02-27T23:38:00.000-08:00

I must be careful how I get out of bed. Last night my writer was very over-excited, because she had something called a review. Whatever that is, she was pleased.

There's this place called Tim Love's Literary References. He does something with computers, or er (I don't know) at Cambridge University.

Cambridge University is a few old buildings and a few old professors. I am still in Infants myself, and am just starting Red Book 3. We have new buildings and I like that. Less spiders.

However. This person has this great website that's chocca with information and links and this and that all to do with his love of literature.

That's why he is called Love. I don't know why he's called Tim.

But HE says I'm OK.

So that's good.

He even says I've got enough good stories in me that I could be used to teach how short stories ought to be written... Wow.

That means I am nearly better than Red Book 3.

TIM LOVE'S REVIEW HERE

Finalising Launch Party Arrangements

2008-02-26T00:09:00.000-08:00

So today, I got stuffed in a bag and taken to London. I was left under a table while my owner (the batty writer) had lunch, then taken in a taxi... (I like those. The engines make a good noise. Better than her car).

Then we were in this amazing place full of pictures, and exhibits about a foundling hospital, and something to do with G F Handel...

My writer gave me to a lady who said I was beautiful. (I like that!!)

Then there was a lot of talk about a party with 110 people so far and some haven't replied yet...that seems a lot to me. I'd tell a few not to come, myself. Parties should be nice and intimate...

But then we went into this room where it's being held. I have to say it is great. Beautiful, and huge, with these extraordinary paintings. The nice lady held me the right way up too.

(You see, books like me hate being held upside down. It makes the words rush to our heads...)

Anyway. We had a private tour round. Just like the guests will on the night. It IS amazing.

The writer can take up the wine and the books well before the party. Which is good, apparently.

And they might be selling me in their shop. I have to behave though, or they won't.

The 'Is one of those for me' issue

2008-02-24T02:01:00.000-08:00

It is fascinating. Seems people assume that the books in the box are freebies.

NO they aren't.

They cost me to write. Time and tears. Why should they be freebies?

My Second Outing

2008-02-22T06:37:00.001-08:00

I reckon there is something odd about this person who takes me out of my box.

This morning we went to a church, at Berwick.

"Not to worry, "she says "I'm not a churchy sort..." then she sticks me down on a pew and starts doing stuff with spray polish, dusters and a bright red Henry hoover.

Haven't been in one of these places before, although they are mentioned in one of my stories.

And I was wondering if they are all covered in paintings like this one is. Just covered. Not old paintings. Newish ones.

Anyway, when she'd done with the hoover, this batty woman I've been landed with propped me up on the chancel steps (she said) and took my picture a couple of times.

Seems like the paintings are by something called The Bloomsbury Group. People called Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant and their mates. Quentin Bell too. What sort of name is that, then?

Apparently, this Vanessa had a sister who wrote a bit, but committed suicide just before the paintings were done. I wouldn't know anything about that.

I would like to ask this person I've been landed with why she cleans the place. I expect it's because she's fond of it.

MY FIRST OUTING!

2008-02-22T01:39:00.000-08:00

Well. I was let out last night, taken out of my box, and driven all the way into Brighton! Oooh it's a scary place.

My writer was one of the judges at a short story slam event at the Komedia, put on by Short Fuse.

She had to kick start the event with a reading, and she chose something out of my pages! I was so proud, I can tell you! She read two flashes from a story called Closed Doors.

And people clapped! It was lovely. Then she put me on a table while she listened to twelve stories read out and I think I had some Budweiser dripped on me at one point.

What DOES she think she's doing? Think's she owns me, I expect... huh.

Actually, I quite liked the Budweiser. And the stories, some of them. The winner was really great... she won the Small Wonder Festival Slam too, last autumn. Gosh I was tired when we got home.

Its all very well being born, but all this activity is a bit much so soon.

The Strange Case of the Boxes in the Hallway...

2008-02-21T16:21:00.000-08:00

"Watson?"

"Yes, Holmes?"

"Watson, did we find the drinks cabinet?"

"I'm afraid not. That will remain a total..."

"...mystery. Thank you Watson. I have the good lines."

"May I ask what that is on your head, Holmes?"

"It is a bandage, Watson."

"Ah."

"Precisely. Some confounded idiot left a load of boxes in the vestibule."

"Ah"

"And I fell over them. However..."

"...however?"

"I am assured that I will recover fairly quickly and will only require calf's foot jelly in the afternoons for a week. No more."

......

"Watson?"

"Yes?"

"Where are you going?"

"To catch a calf, Holmes."

"A what?"

"A calf. So I can remove it's feet, to make ..."

"...calf's foot jelly. Right. get to it. But before you leave..."

"Yes?"

"Pass me something to read, will you?"

"One of these? I found them on the floor of the vestibule...they seem to have come out of those boxes you fell over."

"Have to do, I suppose. Fetch my monocle, Watson. What is the title? Who's written the thing?"

"Words from a Glass Bubble. By someone calling herself Vanessa Gebbie."

"A bloody woman? Forget it, Watson, bring me The Times.... and Watson?"

"Holmes?"

Hurry up with that calf..."

.

The Strange Case of the Disappearing Books...

2008-02-21T00:42:00.000-08:00

"Watson," said Holmes, "bring me my violin. I feel a need for melancholia. And a small glass of claret."

"Ah."

"Ah? A simple request, I believe, Watson. My violin. Nothing to shake Baker Street's foundation, my friend."

"The claret, Holmes. Why not concentrate on the claret?"

"That will not do at all, Watson. Prior to claret, I must have melancholia. I need high, mournful notes, minor keys, the distant wail of a child in distress..."

"No can do, Holmes."

"What sort of futuristic language is that? And do I sense a mystery? has my violin gone missing? Never fear. We shall examine every square inch of the house, leave no corner unsearched..."

"No, not your violin, Holmes. Your books. The entire library... and the drinks cabinet..."

"Not the claret?"

I'm afraid so, and you recall I have no doubt that your pipe rack was on the cabinet..."

"What! Gone, my pipes? Call a bloody detective!"

---------------------

Which is, in a roundabout way, saying that yesterday, my books were delivered to Jen In Great Wilbraham, and somewhere between Great Wilbraham and Ringmer, there is a lorry parked up with the driver deep in a book.

It's THAT good folks!

Numbers creeping up...

2008-02-19T10:57:00.000-08:00

We are now at 85 for the launch party...still waiting for lots of replies... and are struggling with the logistics of carting me, husband, wine, books, friends, up to London in a small Golf.

Between the covers!!

2008-02-15T00:41:00.000-08:00

Hilarious things happen...

I've had some lovely people pre-ordering the book, giving me a cheque.

One was popped though the door yesterday from a squash partner of the husband. The accompanying note said: 'I am very much looking forward to climbing between your covers...'

hmmm.

A week today?

2008-02-13T06:37:00.000-08:00

It's possible that a week today I will have boxes delivered full of my book.

I can't quite... you know... (she said with the ultimate in her articulate toolkit...)

Launch list going well. Son's godmother Jane coming from deepest Wales (my oldest friend, who has never met her godson. Well that will be interesting. He's coming up 30...)

Sue Booth Forbes from Anam Cara Writers' and Artist's Retreat coming on her way back to Ireland from the USA. ( work that out for me someone)

Tania is coming from Israel (yes, I know... not only for this, she is reading at several UK events...)

Fictionbitch and bloke!

Some party. ...

Conversations, conversations

2008-02-12T06:04:00.000-08:00

I spoke to an organiser at Cancer Research yesterday, inviting him to the launch party. All royalties from this book are going to them, (I lost my mother 17 years back to cancer, and my friend Jan to whom the book is dedicated died just over a year back, and since then three good friends have gone, all in their early sixties....)

I can't do much, but this I CAN!

Besides which it was Jan who said "Writing is your gift. Use it," or words to that effect. And I am, as much as I can. I often wonder if I'd have given up during the down patches over the last few years if it wasn't for her positive take on things even when she was seriously ill.

So.

Launch part admin going well so far. Fifty three coming... still waiting for lots and lots of RSVPs.

Endorsement by Zadie Smith...

2008-02-12T03:11:00.000-08:00

It's been a roller coaster over the last week, reading the Willesden Herald Blog, and Zadie Smith's wake-up call to writers of short fiction to do do better. Her refusal to award the prize this year has caused ripples, and they are still spreading:

The Sunday Times carried almost a whole page: HERE

Yesterday's Daily Telegraph followed suit: HERE

But hey:

If people want to know what she does like, there are two in this book... In Words from a Glass Bubble.

One joint first prizewinner from 2006 (Dodie's Gift), and one runner up from 2007 - the title story that went on to take second at Fish.

Making writing work...

2008-02-04T23:11:00.000-08:00

What better way to get the message about the book 'out there' than to get a few acceptances, and put a mention in the bio?

Acceptances this year so far:

Beat the Dust ezine (Neo Punk)
Right Hand Pointing ezine (nice, small lit zine)
Innisfree Poetry Journal (poetry)

Current: GUD print journal (cult cutting edge literary/fantasy/genre)
Birmingham Arts Journal print (nice little print magazine linked to Birmingham Arts organisation, USA)

Forthcoming: Night Train ezine (strong literary outlet)
See You Next Tuesday Anthology of Sex Stories...Better Non Sequitur Press.. (er...sex stories?)

THE COVER SAGA

2008-02-03T03:34:00.001-08:00

Although the painting is beautiful, Chris at Salt had worked on something quietly, and he surprised me with this...

and I LOVE it. So here you go. This is the new cover:

COVER STORY CONTINUES

2008-02-02T01:16:00.000-08:00

I know the most fabulous artist,Cecil Rice. And I have several of his paintings. And his book.

It suddenly struck me that one of his paintings would make a very strong cover...

watch this space.

He had agreed, and the image is gong through to Salt for them to have a look, to see if it's suitable. Fingers crossed...

Cover issues and invites...

2008-01-31T03:07:00.001-08:00

It is looking less and less like this will be the cover.

The agency can't track down the photographer, but a person there who knows him well says he is unlikely to approve it because of the colourwash and text over the image.

It's one of his favourites.

I understand that. I wouldn't want someone editing my work without my permission, and I wouldn't want them to turn a piece into something other then itself, if itself was already as I loved it. (grammar, woman!)

So. Yes, I just went and cried. And yes, it's awful, as all the promotion's been done with that cover, and its built up recognition already. And yes, it won't be the same without it.

But hey.

Worse things have happened.

and I'm handwriting invites to the launch today... so lets hope the Foundling Museum doesn't fall down.

.

GOOD COMPANY, ANTIDOTE TO THE BLUES...

2008-01-29T02:48:00.000-08:00

Hey, no point in being depressed about the cover problems. I can do nothing about it, and I know that Salt will do all they can, both to sort the problem, and if it all falls flat, they'll come up with something brilliant instead!

So look at what's coming out later this week, from Salt Modern Fiction.

Richard Bardsley's BODY PARTS

Now THAT has to be on my list of 'must reads'...
.
.
.

My lovely cover....

2008-01-28T11:42:00.000-08:00

Might not be my lovely cover. I have to face that. I heard today that the photographer has not given his approval for the use of his photo in this way, and is being chased to do so.

So, I am sad, to say the least. He's away travelling, apparently, and unless we can get his agreement in the next day or two, ....

PROOFREADING

2008-01-28T05:54:00.001-08:00

Oh I am such a bad proofreader. My brain works creatively, and I don't SEE any little glitches. I read the words as they were born.

It's bad enough proofing a story for publication submission, or for a competition.

I won't let anyone else do it, because it's MY responsibility.

So. This is how this writer does it:

1) Make coffee or tea. Feel inspired to get going on proofreading.

2) Drink coffee or tea, and make a phone call or two. Feel a bit guilty that I haven't started reading my own work yet.

3) Wander up to the computer and write a flash. Feel even more guilty.

4) Go downstairs, put fre on, and sit down with my proofs. Read half a story.

5) Realise I am READING the story, NOT PROOF-READING.

6) Make more tea.

7) Find that the cat is curled up on my proofs, by the fire.

8) Start reading the story again.

9) Tell self 'Cor, this is good. Did you write it? When was that then?'

10) Smack own wrist. Get ruler, and tray.

11) Follow each line separately holding ruler underneath.

12) 150 pages, 31 lines, .... 4,750 lines.

13) Find it extraordinary that I only found eight tiny twiddles this pass.

Final Proofs...

2008-01-23T02:33:00.000-08:00

The final proofs arrived yesterday afternoon. One hundred and fifty something pages. Now all I have to do is find that chicken...

(For new visitors... Charlotte Chicken is my editorial assistant, seen below at work on the first proofs...)

The Difficult Question of Reviews

2008-01-20T23:58:00.000-08:00

It's vital that a book is reviewed independently. But how on earth do you achieve that?

I have to say I am impressed with the numbers of Salt titles that end up with a review in the broadsheets, and of course, that would be a real dream. Every review is valuable. Its out there for people to read... giving the book a stronger profile every time. (Of course, you can do nothing to influence the content... you just have to hope... but the exposure is GOOD.)

And like everything else, I can't sit back and assume it's just going to happen. I need to do my bit.

So, anywhere I see books reviewed seriously, I email to ask whether it might be possible... and it is lovely to report that several have said 'yes, send me a copy'.

------------------------------

Aside: I am a reviewer myself, for The Short Review LINK HERE

If you want to find insights into short story collections, new and classic, take a look.

LONDON LAUNCH AT THE FOUNDLING MUSEUM

2008-01-16T04:21:00.000-08:00

The Foundling Museum; the perfect place to launch this book.

The room shown above, the gallery, will be where we hold the launch. This is a family 'do'. I have older son organising the wine, younger son desperate to get off school for the evening, husband helping with guest lists.

Why is this place perfect? For many reasons. I am drawn to the place personally, and have been ever since I was introduced to it by the friend to whose memory the book is dedicated, Jan Newton. She was a patron. We shared the often difficult experience of being adopted kids, as do many of my closest friends. And The Foundling Museum gave all of us a strong sense of validation.

I'm taking the whole place over for an evening, so guests have the place to themselves. They can wander at will round the collections, ask questions, enjoy, and be moved. This is an extraordinary place.

The Museum is a tribute to the collaboration and vision of three men, a sea-captain named Thomas Coram, a musician called George Frederic Handel, and a painter called Hogarth. It is a beautiful, outstanding place. It will be a privilege to bring friends here.

Foundling Museum Website HERE

I quote from the website:

The Foundling Museum not only showcases the Foundling Hospital art collection and the Gerald Coke Handel Collection but most importantly tells the story of the 27,000 children who passed through the Hospital between 1739 and 1954.

Readings; getting 'out there'

2008-01-07T04:16:00.000-08:00

Well it's lovely to have a book on the chocks, but you can't sit back and relax! It's not going to market itself.
Quite rightly, Salt Publishing expect their writers to put in a lot of effort to complement the effort Salt put in themselves.

So, so far, the organised events, readings and so forth are as follows:

Feb: workshop with group of would-be writers, wanting to write and wanting to talk about Glass Bubble.

March: 2 private launch parties, 1 London, 1 Sussex.
1 workshop with book, Sussex

April: 2 reading groups Scotland,

May: 1 maybe 2 reading groups Sussex.

July: Reading slot at West Cork Literary Festival, Ireland.

September: Reading Group Sussex

I am delighted to come and read, do a workshop. 1 hr from home, is perfect, further might need talking about.

Quotations, ellipses...

2008-01-05T05:24:00.000-08:00

We're off into The New Year, with a request for a story file from Jen at Salt, advice on dropping an ellipses from a story title, and a deep think about a quotation.

The quotation is

"You make a living from what you get. You make a life from what you give."

And it was said by Sir Winston Churchill.

Now I'm no rampant anything, politically, other than definitely left of centre, and I couldn't care less who said it. I found the quote, it perfectly sums up the friend to whose memory the book is dedicated.

But mention of Sir W C will not go down well in all quarters, it seems.

So, out it comes.

Sorry Winston.

More endorsements, more postcards, my webpage

2008-01-03T04:40:00.000-08:00

The postcards in Christmas cards was a good idea. Now, whenever I see friends, it is they who start the conversations...

"Thanks for the card... the book looks great... love the cover... what's this, a book!...tell me about it... etc etc

and in the jeans pocket are a few more cards. So if there's someone in on the chat who wasn't on my Christmas card list, I can hand them one legitimately!

I had some more endorsements, and they are lovely. One says I have 'the heart and soul of a writer'...

Salt have put my webpage up, detailing the stories in the collection (needs a bit of revision) and my bio.

But most important, for this writer at least, my endorsements.

CLICK HERE FOR MY WEBPAGE AT SALT PUBLISHING

POSTCARDS

2007-12-20T08:18:00.000-08:00

The next step has been to send postcards out.

Salt Publishing supplied the cards, on one side of which is the cover of Glass Bubble, complete with endorsement.

On the back, their address and other contact details, and a pre-order form. Also a link to my webpage in the Salt site.

How many cards to send?

Who to?

Well, the time of year makes that easy. Why not put one in each Christmas card, with a note, apologising for blatant self-publicity...hoping that my friends know me well enough to know that I dont actually like blowing trumpets, but needs must.

So. 200 have gone.

Jen has had another 100 printed, and at this rate they will go too, over Christmas and the New Year. I am becoming absolutely shameless!

The nice thing is that yesterday I had two calls from people who had just opened their cards, congratulating, and saying they were ordering...and another today...

so thats three down, nine hundred and ninety seven to go.

(I am aiming at 1000.)

reasons to follow.

ENDORSEMENTS

2007-12-19T05:39:00.000-08:00

First stage.

It has been an extraordinarily moving thing to muster the courage to ask some excellent well-known writers if they will endorse Words From A Glass Bubble, and to find that they will.

Endorsements start the process of differentiating the work. Calling attention to it in a good way. Underlining that these writers have weighed it and found it not wanting, if you like. Giving it a stamp of approval that says 'if you like literary short fiction you will not be disappointed...'

MAGGIE GEE, Chair of The Royal Society of Literature:

Original, compassionate and illuminated by humour, these stories by a prodigally gifted new writer dare to mine the fault-line between rage and love.

JACOB ROSS, FRSLit

Vanessa Gebbie explores with extraordinary lyricism and beauty the human lives that connect, interweave and turn around often tragic incidents.
These narratives unfold before us with the deftness and assurance of the truly gifted writer. A remarkable book.

PETER JAMES

A srikingly fresh voice, sharp, shocking and original, a natural, gifted writer.

JOCK HOWSON, FISH PUBLISHING

There is a tide in the affairs of men,
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
Julius Caesar

There is a tide in the affairs of men, and therefore postmen, and therefore, in our not so modern world, postwomen too. Words From a Glass Bubble is about a non-post-modern postwoman, a talking Virgin Mary in a snow-globe, and an illiterate bachelor farmer who’s party piece is imitating bird calls. It is light and airy, funny and quirky. But Vanessa Gebbie’s short story is also about severe psychological trauma, and the disruption of normal relationships with family, society, religion and self, in the face of insurmountable grief, which yet, must every day be surmounted. And it is about, perhaps, a turn in the tide; an opportunity, a chance to leave behind the Shallows and Miseries of regret and remorse, a chance to take on the flood of life’s ebb and flow and to move-on, renewed. Not forgetting, but, at last, forgiving and accepting and cherishing.

Words from a Glass Bubble is very finely crafted. The story was placed second in the Fish Short Story Prize 2007, and is without a doubt, one of the subtlest and strongest pieces in the Fish Anthology, with a depth of meaning and symbolism, and a richness of language and word-craft which one only slowly appreciates as the airyness and humour of the story becomes ever more poignantly over-written by the depths of a mother’s despair. The character of Finn ‘Birdman’ Piper, his bird calls - “the thin cry of the buzzard rising from the old chimneys into the night sky.”- only slowly becomes the centre point of the reader’s understanding of how our postwoman might come to a new understanding and a new acceptance, And how her husband might too. And how time and life can eventually heal any wound, even an amputation, though that which is severed can never be replaced.

As Michael Collins says in his foreword to the 2007 Fish Anthology, “Words From a Glass Bubble “is very, very Irish”: and it is, but is it not also very, very universal?

Jock Howson
Editor – The Fish Anthology 2007

Starting the Marketing Process

2007-12-19T05:34:00.000-08:00

It is hard to think of Glass Bubble as a commodity, but that is what it is, and it has to be marketed like any other.

It is actually hard, this bit. Certainly, I do not find it easy to blow my own trumpet, and that is what is necessary now. And perhaps it might be useful to others to see what I am doing. Who knows the process mght result in half a dozen books being read and sold. But I hope it might have better results than that.

So... the next few posts will be dedicated to things I am doing to market the book.

I Have A Cover!

2007-12-05T11:15:00.000-08:00

Now that I exist, I deserve my own blog.

I am due to be born on 1st March 2008, the product of a fruitful partnership between writer Vanessa Gebbie and Salt Publishing, Cambridge, UK.

My writer also has a page on the Salt website HERE

I will post news here. meanwhile, I have three more months to go before my birthday! Wish me luck.

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