Consumption Diary May (incl. 2/3 of a mini-residency)

MUSIC

She's a long one this month...

PRODUCTIVITY INTERLUDE

On May 20th I flew up to Auckland (eventually my bag made it too) and took up temporary residence at the Michael King Writers Centre in Devonport.

I leave on 10 June.

When I arrived I had a 33,573 word "first draft" of a novel that I worked on in 2022. I shelved it because:

    a) I was writing it about events in 2022 such as the anti-mandate protest at Parliament and wrote ahead of those events knowing I'd need to come back to it "later", once the present of the novel that was the future at time of writing became the past for the reader.

    b) I got COVID for the first time right at the end of the first draft and:

        i) being sick meant there was a natural break between 1st draft and my next concerted efforts with the manuscript

        ii) having COVID and being slightly feverish while writing the final chaps meant I was highly skeptical that it would would be any good when reviewed with some perspective.

    c) Once you stop, it's really hard to pick something back up again with the fear of it actually being shit and no longer relevant, but also (moreso) the fact I have a full-time job and a full-time family and JUST LIFE.

At the time I finished the first draft I knew it needed to be longer, but it would probably only top out around 50-55,000 words. There's a missing persons element to the plot, and I knew that the "resolution" in the first draft was a bit dumb, and should really be more of a red herring, and that there was a bit part character in the 1st draft that wanted/needed more page-time, and maybe making them part of the real "answer" would "fix" things? 

So I really needed a solid block of time to unfuck the novel, writing new chapters and overhauling/ditching existing ones.

Which is why this 3-week residence was and is such a boon.

Over the first two weeks I:

• did a full read-through and mark-up in hard copy
• writing a prologue (though it's not actually labelled as such)
• expanded the first half of the novel (1st draft consisted of 10 chapters from the same character's p.o.v.; 2nd draft has two main characters alternating p.o.v. chapters)
• re-ordering the 2nd half (told through v. many p.o.v. characters), adding some new ones, rejigging some others
• doing a full read-through of this 2nd draft (using Microsoft Word's Read Through function - it's really good for picking up dumb typos and times when you've used too many words) and making necessary corrections and additions.

So the manuscript jumped up to 56,837 words (a net increase of 23,364), but any original words from the first draft really had to earn their keep.

I wasn't sure if I could achieve all of this in three weeks, but I knocked it off in two.

Which is great. Because now I am sick of that manuscript and can let it marinate again (and let some others read it) and it shouldn't be too far off.

And because that means I can also work on my second short story collection. Which is what I started doing today.

Well, I've written and published (and written and not published) many short stories since my first collection came out in 2010, and have had various word documents with my favourite selections combined since 2018 (with another flare up of activity in 2021). So the task isn't writing a shit ton more stories, it's re-assessing which ones should go in this collection and where the two or three gaps are that could/should be plugged by new stories.

Today I used the "Read Through" function to go through all the stories in my 2021 assemblage, plus a bunch I didn't think should make the cut back then (most of which I thought were good enough today, so I don't know, maybe I just love myself rn).

The biggest challenge is the majority of these stories were written closer to 2010 than 2024, so there really does need to be some new stuff. There's a story I have half-written that needs to be finished (it pairs directly with another story in the collection), and then there are two more stories I've written lots of notes for over the last 3-5 years, and just need to smash out.

So by the end of this next week, if I can add these three stories into the manuscript, that one might also be ready for other people to read.

After which, I may need a rest!

PS - all this writing means lots of listening to music, hence the longer than usual monthly playlist!

PPS - I've also done some exploring of the North Shore (and started an Instagram to share some of that stuff) and caught up with friends and family, so I have been going outside!!

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BOOKS

Parade by Rachel Cusk (physical, novel, UK, 2024)

Second Place by Rachel Cusk (physical, novel, UK, 2021)

Kudos by Rachel Cusk (physical, novel, UK, 2018)

Transit by Rachel Cusk (e-book, novel, UK, 2016)

I had to review Parade, so I read/re-read a lot of Cusk in preparation. 

Doppelganer: A trip into the Mirror World by Naomi Klein (non-fiction, audiobook, US, 2023)

This proved to be very useful when working on the second draft of my novel, so I let a character name drop Klein.

It's way more personal (and scattershot - in a good way) that her earlier works. It could be a case of right book, right time, but I really liked it!!

Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Hwang Bo-reum (audiobook, novel, Korea, 2023)

Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi (audiobook, novel, Japan, 2019)

I've read too many bookshop/library-themed works this year. Sorry pals.

Palace of Shadows by Ray Celestin (audiobook, novel, UK, 2023)

I didn't think I'd like it. It seemed to be laying the gothic on really thick, but it did it really well.

Big Swiss by Jen Beagin (audiobook, novel, US, 2023)

Yeah! This was excellent. Funny, dark-at-times, possibly even profound. And it has dogs in it!

I really liked that the protagonist/narrator was late 40s (I think) but language and ideas still seemed to be alive to them. It felt true(ish) to my inner dialogue as a early 40s person. 

Totally unrelated negative-impulse: I don't want to Google how old Elizabeth Bennett's parents are in Pride and Prejudice...

Skippy Dies by Paul Murray (audiobook, novel, Ireland, 2011)

Another book I was on the fence about reading (having already committed many hours to listening to the very good, but very Irish Franzen-y The Bee Sting already this year).

Another book I ended up really enjoying. I think I preferred this to The Bee Sting because it's a bit less Franzen-y and because I myself have been grappling with a plot point not dissimilar to (not a spoiler, guys) Skippy dying!!!

(Maybe some months I my inner hater takes a holiday)

The Golden Spoon by Jessa Maxwell (audiobook, novel, UK, 2023)

A mash-up of cosy crime and reality baking shows. Does the baking stuff well enough, but the characters were pretty meh and structurally felt like the first death came way too late.

A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers (audiobook, novel, US, 2021)

Fantasy continues to be the steepest genre hill from my affections to climb.

Just Then by Harry Ricketts (physical book, poetry, NZ, 2012)

Along Blueskin Road by James Norcliffe (physical book, poetry, NZ, 2005)

FILM & TV

• Hacks Season 3 - *makes a love heart symbol with his hands, then feels self-conscious*
• Welcome to Wrexham Season 3 - good, but makes me hate the bandwagon Wrexham fans... I need to get an MK Dons jersey or something
• Curb Your Enthusiasm - finished the final few eps of the final season, and also watched the Seinfield series finale (which I clearly hadn't seen before (yeeeeesh))
• Prisoners
• Dream Scenario
• Blackberry
• Atlas - No ma'am, unfinishable.
• Unfrosted - Shouldn'thavefinishedbutIdidforsomereason

January 2021 Consumption Diary

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

So we live in Dunedin again. The Burns Effect is real.

I start my new job (Net Carbon Zero Programme Manager at the University of Otago) after the long weekend (9 Feb). It's gonna be great.

MUSIC

BOOKS

Turns out moving to a different island is great for your reading/audiobook listening. Lots of cleaning, lots of gardening, lots of books churned through.

Autumn by Ali Smith (novel, 2016, UK, audiobook)

Promised I’d re-read this after finishing the other three books in the seasonal quartet in 2020… Still great. My altar to Ali Smith is progressing well.

New Waves by Kevin Nguyen (novel, 2020, US, audiobook) 

Strong debut novel that deals with gender, race and privilege through a fairly straight-forward narrative set in New York’s start-up scene.

Breasts and Eggs by Mieko Kawakami (novel, 2020 [translation], Japan, audiobook) 

Never warmed to this one. These things happen.

Earthlings by Sayaka Murata (novel, 2020 [translation], Japan, audiobook)

A gem. I loved it from the first sentence. I worried for a bit that it was going to swerve too much into the territory of Convenience Store Woman, but it remained enough of it’s own thing to be a triumph!

Sisters by Daisy Johnson (novel, 2020, UK, audiobook) 

A short novel that trades almost completely on an atmosphere of dread. Felt like I’ve been told this story before.

The Office of Historical Corrections by Danielle Evans (short stories, 2020, US, audiobook)

I’d never heard of Danielle Evans but the title intrigued me and I was really impressed with these short stories (one of which is billed as a novella, but it’s just a long story IMO).

Whatever It Takes by Paul Cleave (novel, 2019, NZ, audiobook) 

I enjoyed this. Starts off at a rollicking pace and pays off in the right places.

Rules of Prey by John Sandford (novel, 1989, US, audiobook) 

Ugh, it’s official: I never want to read/watch/listen to anything that includes extended sections from the perspective of the killer ever again. That shit can fuck right off.

A Neon Darkness by Lauren Shippen (novel, 2020, US, audiobook) 

The second Bright Sessions novel. This one is set well before the time period covered in the podcast (which I haven’t listened to), but ironically I think it needed that prior investment in the Damien character to fully hit its straps.

The First Bad Man by Miranda July (novel, 201X, US, audiobook) 

Did it go on too long, or maybe just take a little long getting there? Maybe the endorphins from the drastic brain re-wiring enacted by the first couple of chapters wore off by the two-thirds mark? Still v. good.

Bluffworld by Patrick Evans (novel, 2021, NZ, physical book)

I’ve reviewed this for The Listener... should hit shelves in early March. Here's the cover, which didn't fit in the collage...

FILM & TV

Turns out moving to a different island significantly reduces your screentime. Hurrah! The only thing I can recall is: I May Destroy You - Season 1.

Return to Fire Island: Fortnight 26 of the Burns

I'll have you know, this is NOT the end of my Burns year. I'm still on the university's payroll for another three days. As such, I must refrain from doing any number crunching, graph making or sweeping generalisation until at least 1 February.

Biggest new first...

My book got reviewed in the New York Times yesterday!

New Zealand art has always been shaped by distance and the isolation it breeds. A new novel finds surprising ways to cover this territory. https://t.co/SKVcgnF0Jt

— New York Times Books (@nytimesbooks) January 27, 2018

Pull-quote:

In his debut novel, the New Zealand writer Craig Cliff adds to the canon, but with such ambition, creativity and sheer energy that he shows there’s still something new to say about a national narrative that can seem, at times, to hold no surprises.

I tend to agree with everything in the review (apart from the bit about Marumaru being in the North Island, and maybe the way it makes it sound as if The Mannequin Makers follows on from The Luminaries, when TMM was launched in New Zealand a handful of days before Catton's book in 2013). It is "almost Shakespearean in scope" (emphasis on almost) and ambitious (see first point) and the final part probably is the weakest (oddly, some American reviewers have struggled with the third part, which is clearly the greatest extended epistolary subantarctic castaway yarn by a mute Scottish woodcarver in the history of the printed word).

So, yeah, I was happy to be reviewed in the fricken' New York Times, and doubly so that it was strongly favourable (I've spent too much time on review aggregator sites!), but I think it would feel different (more immediate?) if this was happening in 2013 or 2014. Right now, I can't help thinking about my location scout/levitation saint novel (how I need to finish it; how a good review in the NYT might help it find a publisher and a readership).

My US Publisher (Milkweed Editions, an indie press based in Minnesota) - who've been fantastic the whole way - have been extra excited the past 36-hours. When you see your editor's mum congratulate her on Facebook for a review of your book, it reminds you how many other people it takes to get your book out there, and how each of them stake their reputations on you. 

At some point this year I'll be putting my next novel out there with agents and publishers and I'll try remember all this when the rejections come. 

Better to be loved late than strung-along early.

Fortnight 26 wordcounts

Total words: 6,620 (40% on this blog, 60% on other non-fiction - book reviews and judges comments)

1st week: 0 (travelling)

2nd week: 6,620

My 100-words-a-day story hit a snag somewhere around Christchurch. It was boring me, and it was turning into something that would need around 5,000 words to complete it, which meant more than another month doing something I wasn't feeling in tiny chunks. So I took a breather to reconsider. I'll hit restart again for February with a different story.

Roadtrip continued...

Mapua

Following on from the end of Fortnight 25... after two nights in Christchurch we drove to Nelson for three nights, then Picton for one night, before catching the ferry back home (?) to Wellington.

We rented our house out while we were down south. I inspected the place back in August and it was looking good, but it was depressing to return for real this time and find they hadn't cleaned inside very well (like, trail mix on the carpet in one of the bedrooms), the fabric softener part of the washing machine was full of washing powder (so they'd been washing their clothes with plain water all year) and the outside (not the renter's responsibility) was going to take A LOT of work to wrestle back to respectability.

Every time I went out my front door to bring in another box, I was greeted with this young flax growing from the garage gutter.

Oh, and that room I built in my garage to store the stuff we wouldn't need in Dunedin (beds, books, toys, suits) and save the cost of a storage unit? Half the stuff was moldy. Not incredibly moldy - the room stayed dry, it's just whatever moisture or spores were present when the stuff got shut away last January had been trapped there for a year. So there have been many loads through the washing machine (putting the washing liquid in the drum!) and kitchen stuff through the dishwasher and everything else wiped down by hand and left in the sun's life-zapping rays.

After four days of this (and weeding and keeping the kids from killing each other), I was well and truly missing Dunedin.

So I flew back to Dunedin...

...for this guy's birthday. 

Fittingly, January 25th is when the prizegiving is held for the annual Robert Burns Poetry competition, for which I was one of the two judges for this year.

You can read about the winners in the ODT article.

I landed mid-morning and had time to kill before the ceremony at 5pm, so I went back to my bare-looking office at the university, procrastinated, got a haircut and spent a bit more time with the Gordon Walters exhibition at the Art Gallery.

Gordon Walters: it's not all about the koru.

The ceremony itself was a treat - getting to hear the poets read their work aloud, especially the ones written in Scots, really brought them to life.

And afterwards, judges and winners were given free tickets to the Burns Night Dinner at Toitu.

Those brackets on the "(and woman)" part were a bit weird. Especially if you've already clicked on the ODT link and read Jill O'Brien's winning poem from the published category ('Reply from the Lassies') or read about the current debate in Scotland about whether the bard was a "sex pest". 

Whether it was the impact of #MeToo or simply a coincidence, the night became a kind of conversation about the role of women and what should and should not be celebrated about Burns.

For the first time in the 157 year history of the Dunedin Burns Club, a woman, Ayrshire-born Donna Young, delivered the 'Address to the Haggis' (and did so splendidly). 

#abouttime

Peter Sutton reading his winning poem from the unpublished category

Jill O'Brien, winner of the published category

Donna also sang Jill's poem (which was written to be performed), and local writer Lisa Scott excoriated Burns and resuscitated his reputation over the course of an hilarious (and at times hilariously uncomfortable) ten minutes, before the toast to the lassies.

Everything was taken in good spirit and I felt proud to be there as the Burns Fellow (and that I whakapapa back to Scotland - Clan Ross represent!), but also to be knocking around in 2018 when dumb reverence or pregnant silence is so passé.

The next day it was my farewell morning tea at the Department of English and Linguistics. After that, I knocked around in my office for a few more hours, graffittied the desk, then caught the shuttle one last time to the frustratingly distant airport, and back to Wellington.

But but but

As I said, I'm still technically the Burns fellow for another three days!

Maybe I can finish my novel in that time?!?

Um. Alright.

But, my daughter starts school and my son goes back to daycare on Wednesday. I don't go back to the Ministry officially until 12 Feb (though I will be popping in and out before then) and even then I'll only be 0.6 of an FTE, which means I'll still be a writer two days (and whichever early mornings I can scrounge) a week.

This last week, it's been frustrating to be home and not working but not have the time to touch my novel, after travelling for a fortnight and not touching the novel (after cleaning and packing and not touching the novel).

I had four books to review when I first got back to Wellington (I'd read them but hadn't written the reviews, having run out of time in Dunedin), which soaked up a good many evenings. (And the review I did of three books for NZ Books will probably close more doors than it opens... oh well.)

Former Burns Fellows inform me there's a thing called the Post-Burns Blues... But hopefully I'll be too busy to notice. 

Like, I've got three more blog posts to write (best books of 2017; January consumption diary; graphing my Burns Year productivity). How could I possible have time to get depressed!

And I'll be back in Dunedin in September for the 60th anniversary of the fellowship.

And I have something to aim for fitness-wise: being the spritely elder statesman at the  100th anniversary of the Fellowship in 2058.

Pass me my running shoes!

Smouldering: Fortnight 23 of The Burns

Today is my daughter's fifth birthday. Thanks to Christmas, she doesn't start school till the end of January, so I'll be whacked again by that Tempus Fugit feeling soon enough.

Speaking of time flying, we're already 20% of the way through fortnight 24, so time for some numbers...


Fortnight 23 wordcounts
Total words: 14,563 (56% on the novel, 37% on this blog, 7% on other non-fiction like rejigging the Q&A on my blog)
1st week: 6,533
2nd week: 8,030

A 111% increase on Fortnight 22, though some of that is inflated by work on my (long-but-not-that-artful) end-of-year music posts. I'm going to hold off a similar review of books until the year is properly done.

The first week of Fortnight 23 I really got back in the flow with the novel by NOT starting where I left off before all my speaking engagements and sick kids. Instead, I found myself writing a historical section (San Giuseppe in Naples) that I'd skipped when pushing ahead with the contemporary action a couple of months ago.

And I knocked out that chapter (three or four pages) in a day.

The next day I wrote the next historical section (San Giuseppe getting kicked out of the Capuchins in Martina Franca) which will slot in after the contemporary chapters I've left hanging.

The third day, drunk on all this completion and achievement, I put off returning to the contemporary mire and worked on the final section of the novel, which jumps ahead two years. I wrote half of that (the other half involves a perspective shift which I'm not sure about). But what I did complete has helped me go back to the 2017 chapters and ask questions of it like:

Should I move you from May/June 2017 (when I did my research roadtrip) to Oct/Nov 2017, when the Harvey Weinstein/#MeToo stuff started blowing up? Because how can you write anything about Hollywood in 2017 that doesn't address the pre- and post-Weinstein world (I don't like those terms but others have started using them and I can't think of a different shorthand right now)? But you don't have to depict the exact moment when the pricks started to fall in order to deal with the subject of sexual harassment and unfairly retarded careers in Hollywood (and other walks of life). In fact, I'd already built all of this into my story - the way male characters tend to have female counterpoints who operate under a different set of rules and expectations. By jumping from June 2017 to sometime in 2019, as has been my intention since before October, I'm able to allude to the fate of both male and female characters, and let them rise or fall based on what they did in 2017 (and the years preceding it)...

/internal monologue

There were other knotty questions too. And for each I've come up with answers, or at least diagnosed which bits need to change and will figure out how when I reach them.

So I started going back through from page one again, and I'm about 90% of the way through the manuscript as it stands.

Maybe tomorrow I'll get back to the next blank page in the 2017 section...

Judge... 

Fortnight 23 also saw me don my judging hat for the 2017 Robert Burns poetry competition. Together with my fellow judge, Elena Poletti, we've reached our verdicts.

There's a prizegiving on 25 January, which, funnily enough, is Burns Night. Looking forward to some haggis in one of my last acts as the Burns Fellow...


... and be judged.

U.S. reviews 3 and 4 of The Mannequin Makers have appeared. The one from The Arkansas International was enthusiastic. The other, from Minnesota daily, The Star Tribune, was not. It was a bad review in at least two meanings of the word (a poor use of 550 words - too much plot, factual errors...; and unfavourable).

I'm more frustrated by the quality of that review than its conclusion.

Maybe it's the fact I'm in the process of reviewing four other novels.

Maybe it's the fact my novel is ancient history to me (I wrote it before my daughter was born!) and I'd do some things differently now.

Maybe I'm deluding myself.

But it's useful to be reminded how varied the responses to a book can be while in the midst of writing another. I can sometimes fall into the trap of trying to write for everyone / not offend or 'lose' anyone.

That way pallid mush lies.

Better to work until the novel is wholly what I intend it to be (or as close as I can manage with my capabilities at this time).


Speaking of reviews

I came across this tweet late last week and it got me very worked up:

It's sad to see such attention spent trying to sever delight from the world. Perhaps the review genre should be preserved as a space for gratitude?

— no(ah) (@noahbaldino) December 15, 2017

If you don't have something nice to say, don't say anything at all? 

Fuck that!

Reviewers must be bold enough to be honest and smart enough to back it up with evidence.

Some context: The tweet was in response to a less-than-favourable review of Kaveh Akbar's poetry collection:

John Ebersole @waveofpanic on Kaveh Akbar's Calling a Wolf a Wolf https://t.co/AymvCL3Yd0

— Tourniquet Review (@tourniquetrview) December 14, 2017

A lot of people felt it was mean-spirited and ad hominen. But some of the griping felt like people who didn't know how to take criticism, even when it isn't directed at them.

And then came that tweet about the review genre being preserved as a space for gratitude... Way to kill of any serious discussion about books and the thoughts the are able to squirrel away. Way to misunderstand everything about.

To @noahbaldino's credit, they clarified this statement the following day:

& to frame celebration as something that doesn’t exlude generous critique. when we bring rigor-via-attention to our readings, & when like Ross gay says the critique emerges from love, it’s going to beget more attention, more rigor, honest love, better community, etc.

— no(ah) (@noahbaldino) December 16, 2017

Hmm. That's better... but it still presupposes that every book is worthy of our love. I can think of plenty of examples, either the ranting of evil men or the blather of bland one, that do not.


What use Fiction?

While I'm discussing random tweets, here's one from Ben Goldacre:

Wasted a 45 minute reading window trying to cope with fiction. It's all people people, boring people, the facts and ideas are buried like they're embarrassing or so wildly uncontainable they can only be communicated implicitly. Bloody story books.

— ben goldacre (@bengoldacre) December 16, 2017

That cut pretty close to the bone, as someone trying to talk about skepticism and the limits of the rational materialist world view, but doing so with what amounts to a bunch of sock puppets.

But when I read non-fiction books on the subject (I just finished Sam Harris' Waking Up after getting it out of the library twice and not making it more than a few pages), I realise why it can only be done the way I'm doing it.

Because I don't have answers, only questions.

Better to read Steppenwolf, with all its narrative frames and ropey elements, than Alain de Botton or David Mills.

At least, that's how I am built.

Objects in a book review may appear smaller than they really are

Some notes I made myself before writing another book review

• Do re-read John Updike's rules for reviewing books before starting the process afresh.
• Don’t veil your put-downs. A young author, a first book, an ambitious premise, a long book, a short book – none of these things in themselves is a negative. If attitudes appear naive, the book is poorly structured, confusing or long-winded – just say so.
• Do think deeply about the book and the author’s possible intentions, before setting fingers to keyboard.
• Don’t mention aspects of book design unless there’s evidence that the author drove these decisions and discussion of them further illuminates the text.
• Don't talk about "writing", talk about "language" - the means by which reader receives the story- and provide examples. If you must talk about "voice", again, back it up with quotation.
• Do provide a plot summary that corresponds to the length of the review.
• Don’t jump around. Keeps things ordered and orderly. Don't talk about the book’s opening after discussing the middle.
• Don't use the first person if it can be avoided. It's the best way to dodge the pitfalls of space-wasting and humblebragging, and it forces you to consider other readers/readings.
• Do refer to other books, other writers, literary theory or popular culture if it serves to illuminate the reading of the text at hand (and the reference will be comprehensible to the readers of the review).

*

Maybe it’s because I egged the universe on with my digression on the art of reviewing in my last post. Or maybe it really is that the book world hibernates between November and late Feb. Whatever the reason, I opened the door and more reviews of The Mannequin Makers came marching in.

First, some oldies I missed from the Oamaru Mail and Gisborne Herald in August and M2Woman in October (basically an abbreviation of the blurb and a rating of 3.5 stars - informative, huh?).

(I once flicked through M2Woman's brother publication, M2Man (naturally),  in my dentist’s waiting room, specifically looking to see if they do book reviews (they did that particular edition, but they were both non-fiction; they also reviewed DVDs and video games). It’d be nice to one day be reviewed in M2Man, even if it's a glorified thumbnail ad... but I can see why a book that revolves around two department stores -- despite it’s long, briny excursion into sailing and shipwrecks -- doesn't scream out manliness.)

Then two new-new reviews happened.

The first was in New Zealand Books new issue (Autumn 2014). It’s a triple-billed review, with my novel sandwiched between Duncan Sarkies’ The Demolition of the Century and Summer Wigmore's The Wind City. It’s a good review, I think. Both favourable to the book and well-written.

One complaint: "Cliff suffers perhaps from first-time novelist's compulsion to cram every possible image, experience and idea into a too-small space."

I’d rather a reviewer said, ‘The book crams a lot in and I found it too much at points A B C, because X Y Z’. 

Or, dream scenario, when an author has another book (even if it’s not a novel) the reviewer investigates to see if this maximalist impulse is present elsewhere and comes to a conclusion about what this means for the novel’s shape, themes and overall effect.

But like I said, it’s a good review all told. Especially when held against the other new review, which appears in Landfall Review Online. 

The review is long. Nearly 2,000 words. And while it’s nice that the reviewer spends so long on my novel, the bigger compliment would have been to spend longer and write a shorter review.

Again, it's largely favourable, but, well... I'm probably the most interested reader this review could hope for and, despite multiple attempts, I've never managed to read it the entire way through.

Try and read this sentence while retaining the will to live: "Occasionally, despite genuine mastery overall, the prose packs in over-much explaining, but not often."

And the reviewer mentions the cover and the engravings of birds at the start of each of the four parts of the novel and internal design. (I’ve blogged about how little say I had over my cover.) Wasting breath on this stuff represents a totally superficial way of appraising fiction, as if they really are reviewing a book – a physical object, a commodity to be bought and shelved – rather than effect the words create. Perhaps if the reviewer asked the question, ‘What do these different birds at the start of each part signify?’ the thought process might result in a worthwhile and enlightening paragraph.

Anywho. Enough shit talking. Any coverage is good coverage. I'm off to drink free wine... 

February influx / Young Turks etc / February flatline

Last week the book world came back from their summer break. At least, it seemed that way after things had been awful quiet (for me) since November. But then, BLAM: a translation deal for The Mannequin Makers, an invitation to an Aussie writers festival in August and a request to review a novel all arrived in my inbox in the space of 48 hours.

The translation thing is the coolest (being my first book-length translation deal) and the oddest, since the language is Romanian. Not to be sniffed at (24 million speakers), but not the first language you think of when someone says, ‘Hey, a foreign publisher asked for a copy of your book...’

Romanian mannequins, via Reddit

According to Google Translate (!) the novel's title could be rendered: ‘Factorii de decizie manechin’ and (because I can’t help myself on Google Translate) my name becomes Craig Stâncă in Romanian. Stâncă! Makes me think of a bi-polar (sad-mouth “a”, happy-mouth “a”) narcoleptic.

Last week I also came across a new review of The Mannequin Makers, though it was published earlier (8 February) in The Southland Times. It’s only 228 words, and there’s not a lot anyone can do in that space without resorting to sweeping comments / sounding dangerously like a press release.

But I found the final paragraph odd:

I guess we see the age-old themes of love, loss and redemption. The cover and blurb of this novel did not appeal to me but I was hooked in the first chapter and found it extremely difficult to put down. Cliff lives in Wellington but is in Iowa on a writing residency working on a second short-story collection. His writing reminded me of the likes of Jack Lazenby or Doris Lessing. May he be as prolific.

“I guess”? I can’t read further without picturing the reviewer’s elbow on the table, her head weighing heavily on her hand. 

Question: have Jack Lazenby and Doris Lessing ever been mentioned in the same sentence before? Not on the internet they haven’t.

And this talk about covers and blurbs in limited space is a disturbing trend. This review a couple of days ago on the Booksellers NZ website, for example, devotes 23% of its space (63 of 276 words) to the cover.

I know writers are supposed to be grateful for every outlet talking about books, but when a review (I feel tempted to put that word in scare quotes for anything with a wordcount under 500) piffles about things almost entirely out of the author’s control... well, it seems a lost opportunity.

One reason I agreed to review this other book is that I get 1,250 words to do it.

I know reviewing is poorly remunerated and largely thankless. If you get the space to demonstrate critical and/or original thought, you’re doing so for pennies in the dollar. The only people the system currently works for seems to be academics, who’re expected to publish (*another temptation to use scare quotes narrowly defeated*) and have a salary to fall back on.

I’m going to talk more about reviewing in a few days, so I'll stop. Take it away Rod!

*

*

There is no February reading summary because The Recognitions is really long and I’m still listening it. The Luminaries is really long and I finished re-reading it but it deserves a separate post. The Flamethrowers isn’t that long, but it defeated my enthusiasm for it after a while and Rachel Kushner isn’t coming to Wellington next month anymore so it all seemed less urgent.

Conclusion: I was a slack reader in February 2014, but an obsessive cricket fan, a present and willing father, an amazing chief policy analyst / shaky acting policy manager, an inexperienced IHC volunteer, a threadbare columnist, a deliberate cyclist and a ready sleeper.

This ends the New Zealand portion of our programme

...almost.

I'm off to the States tomorrow. WLG - AKL - LAX. We're having a 2-night layover in Los Angeles (wise, methinks, given the 7.5 month-old in our party) before getting to Iowa City (via Dallas and Cedar Rapids).

The travel trauma should rule a nice thick line under the first few weeks of The Mannequin Makers' life in the big bad world. I'm looking forward to fully immersing myself in the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa and writing some butt-kicking stories.

But for now it's probably worthwhile just noting down how The Mannequin Makers has fared thus far.


Sales

Well, it was #4 on the bestseller list in its first week. Okay, so the New Zealand Fiction list is quite a specific category, but A Man Melting never made it to the top 10... The Mannequin Makers also made #5 on the list of all books sold at independent books stores in New Zealand for the week.

The eagle-eyed among you may have noticed how a certain book is #1 and #2 of both lists (paperback and hardback). Feel free to bump me up a spot if you think that's cheating (I don't - in the great wash-up it's pretty cool to be fighting for airtime with a favourite for the Booker Prize).

One last musing on sales... It'll be interesting to see how things go in the coming weeks. Whitcoulls is selling The Mannequin Makers for $30, $8 off the R.R.P. They'd even moved it up from the "What's New" table near the back of the Lambton Quay store to the "What's Hot" table near the entrance. Which is all good (especially since Whitcoulls never bothered to stock my last book except for in airports), but Whitcoulls is no longer signed up to Nielsen Bookscan, which is used to compile the bestseller lists.

I'm just gonna forget about all that sales stuff until my next royalties statement comes through in March-ish next year.


Reviews

I've seen seven reviews so far, and apparently there's one in the new North & South which came out today, but they didn't have it at Countdown yet.

(All I know is what RHNZ tweeted: 'In THE MANNEQUIN MAKERS, @Craig_Cliff “has crafted a brilliantly structured and evocative story.”' Sounds promising, but you can never trust those publishing types and their money quotes.)

The other reviews have been:

The Listener, 1 August 2013
Highly favourable. Money quote: "it’s tremendous, darkly entertaining and original from start to finish."

The Press, 3 August 2013 (not online)

Highly unfavourable. Money quote is an indignant text from my father-in-law in Christchurch: "Who the hell is Phillip Matthews?"

Radio New Zealand (Nine to Noon), 7 August 2013

Mostly favourable (didn't like the fourth part as much as the others). Money quote: [the bit where she gives away why the Carpenter is mute, and about six other meaty plot points].

The Hoopla, 9 August 2013

Highly favourable. My first Australian review (for any book), that I'm aware of. Money quote: "This is a superb novel of parental obsession, the lure of the unattainable and the tragedy inherent within human nature." ALso, the bit where she compares TMM to Peter Carey's Oscar and Lucinda and Tim Winton's Cloud Street. Nice company, I reckon.

SwampThing, 9 August 2013

Highly favourable. Money quote: "Much like his craftsmen, Kemp and the Carpenter, Cliff has crafted a lovely bit o' story – well built and polished."

The Australian, 10 August 2013

Highly mixed (if that's a thing). Money quote: This twitter exchange, where bookseller Martin Shaw managed to draw both the reviewer and me into a conversation about the review... Ha!

Also of note: the fact I was compared to Peter Carey again (though this time it was meant to be disparaging). If that's the mud people wanna sling, I've no fear sticking my head above the parapet!

Aside: until this week, I'd only been compared to Peter Carey once before. It was in Sydney and I blogged about it:

When I said it was an honour to meet him [Tom Keneally], he said, “I am reminded of another young short story writer who approached me with reverence many years ago... who turned out to be Peter Carey. If I can offer one piece of advice: One booker is an honour; two is just an indulgence.”

Otago Daily Times, 10 August 2013
Mostly favourable (found Part Three a bit long: "just another shipwreck story", but liked the other parts). Money quote: "With The Mannequin Makers [readers are] being treated to a tale that has characters and a plotline even Dickens would have been proud of."

Also, right at the end: "Let's hope it sells a few copies and stirs the interest of TV drama and film-makers." To this I would add, "Just a few?" and "TV drama and film-makers, my people are waiting by the phone."

If you've seen any other reviews, lemme know and I'll hunt them down (though that might be hard in the States).


Other publicity

I wrote about my uneasy relationship with historical fiction for the New Zealand Book Council.

I did this interview with Lynn Freeman, which ran on the Arts on Sunday (4 August) on Radio National.

I did an event at the Palmerston North City Library (a place that used to be a department store, and I've previously described as my spiritual home as a writer) on Sunday 11 August.

There's an interview with Joan Fleming/The Lumiere Reader that should be online in the next day or so.

There'll also be a write-up about me in the Herald on Saturday 24 August (I think). And something in APN's regional newspapers one day soon (if I haven't already missed it).


And now...

To read through the 30 or so stories for the BNZ Literary Awards (Novice Category) that have made my longlist. There were 607 entries in total, and I'm hoping to trim down to 12 or 15 that I'll take with me to the states and mull over for a few days before I make my final decision.

And then pack... 16 hours to my first flight leaves. Better hop to it.

Twitter flail / Anniversaries / Spotify

Why I suck at Twitter

It’s a combination of lack of nerve and a lack of anything interesting to say.

To illustrate, here are some tweets that I drafted and crafted into the requisite sub-140 characters but thought better of actually publishing:

Just described a dead boy's penis, from the perspective of a skua gull, as a "bonanza grub" then thought better of it. #amwriting

There’s nothing like walking smack into a ranch slider to suggest you’re a little distracted.

On the thinness of rejection letters. #essaysleftunwritten

I just bought a pair of grey trackpants from the warehouse. I look like a PE teacher and I feel like a slob. A comfy, comfy slob.

(I actually turned this into a 500-word column, which means I’m more worried about sounding dumb to 269 twitter followers than c.50,000 subscribers to the Saturday Dom Post).

Sometimes I just have a word or phrase stuck in my head and I want to tweet it but chicken out.

Katabatic winds. 

Messerschmidt 

Sometimes it’s more of a note to self or what might be the title of a short story

Reindeers eat their own antlers

Invitation to Meddle

Operation easy sandwich

Tusk to tusk 

This is why we can't have nice things 

So what do I actually tweet? Not a lot.

'A to Z' by Kumi Yamashita
(heaps of cool stuff on her website)

Momento Mori

It’s two years and four days since my first and only book was published, which means its two years and five days since my book launch and two years and six days since I proposed (and that proposal was accepted). I’m working on an epitaph along the lines of: Highlights cluster once the work is done.

Perhaps that’s A Man Melting’s epitaph. Perhaps it’s every book’s.

In one last gasp at relevance, shortly before its second birthday, A Man Melting got a mention on some Canadian’s blog under the headline ‘A MAN MELTING: I REALLY LIKED THIS ONE, BUT I STILL DON’T LIKE SHORT STORIES’

Money-quote: “I suppose my complaint is one I hold for most (if not all) short story collections and that is that I wish it was a novel.”

Please explain.

“... these characters were so swiftly introduced and then denied me.”


Okay. Any advice?

“So hear this, Mr. Cliff, write me a novel, okay? Because you’re one bang up writer with heaps of talent.”

Cool. Well, I’m almost in a position to do an Alison Holst (‘Here’s one I prepared earlier’). Maybe this time next year.

Spotify - an update


I raved about Spotify back on 30 May. Since then, I signed up for the free 30 day trial and neglected to read the fine print (or any print). If I had, I would have read that after 30 days you automatically get rolled over for another month and your credit card or paypal account will get charged $12.99.

Fair enough. So I have another month of Premium Spotify left. It'll come in handy next Friday when I host my work's mid-winter party. It's Friday 13th themed and I don't own 'Monster Mash' or 'The Devil Went Down to Georgia' and whatever music the youngins will want to hear at 11.30pm when all the managers have gone home.

Thanks to Spotify I've been listening to a lot of new (to me) bands. Said The Whale, Django Django, Hey Rosetta!, Margot & the Nuclear So and So's, Immaculate Machine... It kind of ruins you when making a party playlist coz chances are no one else has heard any of these bands and you'll get that 4 mins and 24 seconds lull when everyone looks at you and their eyes say, 'Why'd you have to go and do that?' and my eyes say, 'But it's Django Django!'