Although I’ve well and truly got 2011 away with a great plan of attack and some poetry, I have just found time to take a proper look back on what I achieved (and didn’t achieve) during 2010. I’m not going to make excuses for not spending as much time on fiction writing as I usually would – it’s not every year you have a baby, and no matter how much I want to be a published novelist, being a mother is – at least at this stage of his little life – a whole lot more important. Although I’m planning on combining the two a lot more effectively in 2011.
Just the same, I didn’t do all to badly on my 2010 goals, mainly because I was smart enough to realise it was never going to be the year of huge amounts of writing. I had four goals, the first of which I completely achieved (submitting my Bratislava novel to a contest); the second and third (submitting Kanako’s Foreigner to agents and increasing this blog’s readership) got a little attention though not much progress; the fourth, to plot and complete my third novel didn’t really do so well, but at least I have a solid idea and a reasonable plot outline.
Looking back on reading – all important for a fiction writer! … first of all, there’s my 2010 reading list. Basically, I read a huge number of books pre-baby, and nearly none after, but this averaged out to “not too bad” in the book-reading department. Take a look at the list if you like and see if we’ve shared any reads this past year.
And now to my “Book of the Year” for 2010 – Markus Zusak’s The Book Thief. I cannot tell you how many reasons there are to love this book. A bonus is that it’s even by an Australian – you know how I can’t go past Aussie literature! I had planned to make more effort to read outside my preferred modern literary fiction genre during 2010 and I did “okay” – there is some crime/spy stuff on the list, a couple of classics and even a romance and a chick-lit – but I’m still hoping to read a little more widely in the future (I’ve got a gory thriller on the go at the moment so you can see I’m starting 2011 pretty well!).
All in all, 2010 was certainly the year of a new baby and not much of a fiction writing year, but at least I didn’t completely drop the bundle (or the baby!). And I’m on track to get a lot more writing done in 2011. Go me!
PS: Speaking of 2010 reads, I’d love to hear your favourite reads of last year – let me know in the comments.
by Cate Kennedy
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was announced to be the winner of the 2009 Prime Minister’s Literary Award. Then I figured I had to read it.
, was published, but I picked it up a couple of years later at a second-hand sale and recently devoured it. Set in Fremantle, my hometown’s port, and full of interesting characters, it’s a great read – but the next one’s better.
, and I’d have to agree; it’s delightful and devourable, with a great narrator and characters which really inspire me to improve the characters in my own fiction. A coming-of-age story set in a small Australian country town during the time of the Vietnam war, Jasper Jones covers the events of one (pretty eventful) summer in a teenager’s life. It’s so good that I’m not going to say much more about it, because you should read it first; after you have, go and read what