If you happen to have been following my 2010 reading list, you’ll have found it a bit boring recently. After ploughing through a book at least every two days during most of the year, in April my reading came to a bit of a standstill. Which is hardly surprising considering what happened on 2 April. But anyway: my April reading totalled this -
- The World Beneath
by Cate Kennedy
However, I’m still going to announce The World Beneath as my book of the month, because it really was excellent. If it hadn’t been, I would never have found the time to read it this month! I’ve seen Cate Kennedy speak at writers’ festivals and she impresses me so much because she’s absolutely down-to-earth, and makes me feel like I, too, could actually publish a novel too – though probably not as good as hers.
While I’m at it, since April is over (oops – by more than a week!), let me give you an update on my writing for the month. You might be able to guess it was a bit of a slow month. However, one big improvement is that post-pregnancy, my poor carpal tunnel-affected wrists and fingers have improved considerably and I can stay back at the keyboard a lot longer. I did manage a significant piece of writing during April, but it was just for me – a summary, I guess, of the whole process of conceiving and giving birth my son, so that I don’t forget details of the experience. It was really refreshing firstly, to be able to sit at the keyboard and type for that long (interrupted by a crying baby rather than by pain), and it’s also been a long time since I wrote something “beautiful” that was for my eyes only – and it was a lot of fun.
Noticing that we are well into May is a bit scary, though – the Allen & Unwin/Australian/Vogel award closes on 31 May, and this year is the last year I’ll be eligible to submit a novel for the prize. After that I’ll (eek) be too old! This means that I really need to find some time to finalise the edits I want to make to my Bratislava novel. Soon. I’m not quite sure how I’ll do it, but they say the first six weeks with a newborn are the craziest and they’re nearly over, so I’m hoping I’ll find a few spare hours somewhere, somehow. And I’m also hoping that come the end of May, I’ll be able to report back with a bit more reading and writing progress than I had in April.
Tags: Cate Kennedy, Vogel award
Amazon didn’t have a description for The World Beneath, but I found one here: http://www.scribepublications.com.au/book/theworldbeneath
Sounds fascinating! WIll definitely put it on my list!
.-= India Drummond´s last blog ..Shower Writing =-.
Good luck finishing in time! And yay for less carpal pain!
.-= Kristan´s last blog ..It doesn’t have to be what it is =-.
[...] that I failed to give you a May update on my reading or writing achievements for the month. Yes, April was already a little meager and things just got worse in May, but if you stay tuned for the end of June, I’m hoping to [...]