Why you shouldn’t get upset by a review

Posted on by March 13, 2021
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Every now and then some idiot makes a scene about a bad review of their book. It doesn’t happen very often, but someone last week took it to a new high by voicing her complaint via some not very nice tweets, and siccing her fans onto the reviewer and publishing his phone number. Big fuss, public apology had to be made, and so on. The surprising thing was that this was a well established author, not a novice.

So for anyone out there who is already – or hopes to be one day – published and reviewed, let me tell you one very good reason why you should NEVER take too much notice of any particular review, good or bad:

It really doesn’t mean much because you will never be able to please everyone.

And here is the proof:

I once had a single star review from a reader on the Barnes & Noble USA online site. The book was The Aware, and the heading was “An Unpleasant Read”.

It was ages ago and I can’t access that particular review any longer, but from memory the reviewer went on to say something along the lines of her “idea of an entertaining story was not one where the plot seemed to consist of people getting caught and escaping ad infinitum”.

There might have been more, but I can’t recall. Definitely an unhappy reviewer. The review was about as bad as you can get, and I’ve remembered it particularly because she never did say why she used the word “unpleasant” and I have been curious ever since.

And then there is this review, also on the Barnes & Noble site. Same book, different reviewer, four years later.

“…this series has to much to offer. It had wonderful satire, selfless decisions, curious characters, original plot, and completely valid for teaching in schools. The themes of this book series were amazing, and her writing style is smooth and fresh. Blaze Halfbreed is a strong and cunning character whose past is heart-breaking yet it’s amazing to see her still alive and thriving. This book will be one I re-read, and there aren’t a lot I actually do re-read. I highly recommend this for anyone who wants something with substance and something that is original and actually does not have much in the way of cliches. The way it goes, one may think one thing, but a completely opposite event happens. The twists and turns and ties all bring this series to be my absolute favorite of every book I’ve read.”

In fact, you can’t get a better reader review than that.

Same book.

‘Nuff said.

No, mate, it’s Australian!

Posted on by March 13, 2021
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I was in the flower market in Amsterdam once, with my sister. As we were admiring the bunches of picked flowers in buckets, one of us exclaimed, Look! Morrison!’

We turned to say to the flowerseller,
“This is a flower native to the place where we grew up!”

And she said, “Oh, you’re from Israel?”

Sheesh.

I have walked in Italy and the south of France, in Greece and Turkey, in Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco, and in each one of those places I have had the locals point out their lovely native trees — Eucalyptus every one.

I have heard Californians wax lyrical over their lovely Californian trees. Yep, Eucalypts.

Last night we had dinner with an old friend, a Brazilian nuclear scientist. We were talking of trees and native fruits, and he said he looked forward to showing me the wonderful Eucalyptus groves of Brazil. “They are our native trees,” says he. “Very beautiful…”

Listen folk. Let’s get this straight for once and for all.

Eucalyptus trees are native to Australia (which has over 700 species)
and a few islands of South-East Asia
(which have 15 species, 8 of which are also found in Australia).
AND NOWHERE ELSE. Ok?

You may grow them, but you pinched them from downunder first!

And Morrison (Verticordia) is also Australian. In fact I seem to remember reading somewhere that Western Australia had more wildflower species than the rest of the world put together. I have no idea if that extravagant claim is true or what their definition of wildflower was anyway, but I do know that when we were feral kids scampering around the range at the back of our place in spring, the morrison was just one in masses and masses of gloriously absurd and wonderful flowering plants.

If you haven’t seem the West Australian woodlands in spring, you have missed one of the world’s great experiences.

See here for a tiny taste. And note that Verticordia. The top lefthand pix on this page is also Verticordia. The trees are all species of Eucalyptus. The topmost are called blackbutt…three guesses why. All photos were taken in my home state, Western Australia.

Yet another aargh. (Those of male gender need not read this.)

Posted on by March 13, 2021
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Yesterday I telephoned to get results of pap smear and mammogram. Latter fine, pap smear not. Yuk. This is a first time for me, and means a colposcopy is scheduled for treatment and biopsy. Nothing urgent and I am doing it when I get back from the States.

But all you women out there with a cervix – please don’t neglect this. The reason this is not urgent for me is because I have a smear done regularly and therefore the abnormality is caught early before it becomes a cancer. And this applies to you youngsters too – my daughter was in exactly the same boat just a month ago and she is in her early 30s.

Another thing to think about: the doc doing the breast ultrasound (which should be done as a matter of course together with the mammogram) said it is even more important to do a monthly self-breast examination than to have the mammogram/ultrasound – simply because it is monthly.

Don’t neglect yourself because you are “too busy”. You are never too busy to die.

Oops….

Posted on by March 13, 2021
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Yesterday was the 1st of July.
And I said I was going to start writing book 3 on July 1st, 1,500 words at least every day.
But – that’s me on the left, the squashed rabbit with a load of work on his back.

Instead of the new book, I have to continue to deal with a whole lot of niggly little things in the last one, mending a few holes, dealing with a character flaw (not mine, someone in the book), etc. None of it is major, but almost all of it is time-consuming nonetheless because everything after the smallest of alterations has to be checked to make sure it still makes sense.

I bless my editors who notice these niggly little things and help make the story better, but it has thrown my schedule out.

This week and next week are full of irritating stuff too – have been doing all the chores that I have been putting off – some for a year or more – dentist, mammogram, pap smear, haircut, shopping for essentials like new business cards, repairs around the house, dealing with workmen, and so on. And sometimes things you think will be routine turn out not to be.

So the book did not start being written yesterday.

And I am flying off to USA on Friday next week to babysit 5-year-old grandson.

I have decided I am too old to pull all-nighters. Come to think of it, I think I am too old to have deadlines. Are there really people who retire at 60? What do they do?

Pix from here: one of Henry Rountree’s Alice in Wonderland illustrations

Playing in someone else’s sandpit

Posted on by March 13, 2021
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Jo asked yesterday what I think of fanfic, or people who write stories set in another writer’s world usually without permission. It’s actually a complex question when you get into it.

My knee jerk reaction to such people is: Don’t you dare!
But then, this is followed by a second knee jerk which is: Wow, am I that popular? Great!

On one level, I think it is a good exercise for a beginning writer who can practice in someone else’s creation, with characters already extant, so they can just concentrate on telling a good story. Nothing wrong with that. If a writer doesn’t then move on to their own creation, well…hmm.

Books set in some worlds, of course, are created by more than one writer. Star Wars books, for example, have many different authors, each commissioned and paid to write a book by those who hold the rights to the world and characters. That’s a commercial agreement, absolutely legal and very successful. Nothing wrong with that.

Sometimes the estate of a deceased writer, or an aging writer her/himself, will agree to have their stories continued by another. Once again, a commercial agreement, absolutely legal and possibly successful. Nothing wrong with that, either.

So when would it start to upset me, assuming that someone some day will use one of my worlds and my characters?

Fanfic writers swop their stories. Sometimes they take your characters down roads they were not intended to travel – some write porn, or change the sexuality of people in your books, or who sleeps with whom, or make other major changes. That’s where I would be upset if these tales were open to anyone who happened that way. If they stayed on egroups, newsgroups and mailing lists and such, I wouldn’t worry too much.

I doubt that I would actually do anything about it, but I wouldn’t like it. Why not? Because I love my characters and my worlds. I expended a great deal of effort to make them what they are, and it would hurt to see them used this way.

Why then would I not do something? Not worth the trouble. Every creative person has to shrug and accept that their creation – when it be music or an artwork, or a play, or a designer dress or whatever – may end up being treated in a way they don’t like. Comes with the territory. Live with it. At least they presumably bought your books and read you avidly enough to mess around in your world!

When would I take action? Well, my publishers and I would be most unhappy if someone took my creation, used it as background to their own work, and flogged it to make money for themselves. Now that would make me really, really mad.

I am no lawyer. This post is purely about my personal reaction, and why. If anyone wants to know just what is legal and what is not, try this site.

Yay! Now this is what I call a good day for a writer…

Posted on by March 13, 2021
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Well, it started maybe not so well – with a traffic jam followed by a long overdue mammogram (squash) and ultrasound (squish). Perked up a lot at lunch with several friends who work for the Malaysian Nature Society, then was dampened down by their reports on the Various Strange Ways Authority Try to Wriggle Out of Taking Care of Our Mutual Environment, because Immediate Money is More Important than Longterm Economic Benefits and Health.

More traffic jams, then spent the afternoon with a very dear friend from University days who is recuperating from knee surgery.

Then, home again:
Editor emails me with the finished cover of the Oz version of Book One of The Watergivers trilogy, The Last Stormlord. (And here’s a tiny tantalising bit for you to look at on this post. Artwork by the very talented winner of the Best Fantasy Artist for two years in a row, 2007 and 2008, Vincent Chong. Aren’t I the lucky one!).
Then:
Agent tells me she thinks Book 2, Stormlord Rising, is the best book I have ever written. Wow. Double wow, in fact, especially as it is the middle book of a trilogy, usually a tough one to get right. Triple wow, because she has high standards.
Then:
She adds that I have an offer for translation rights for The Isles of Glory in yet another language (so far it is out in English, Russian and French). Fingers crossed that goes through. Yay. And I wrote the first book of this trilogy back in 1990, so it is really nice to know that it is still relevant and has not dated!

So there you are, apart from the squash and the squish, this was a pretty good day!

Working

Posted on by March 13, 2021
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Yeah, I might be dreaming of Tioman, but I am working. On a Sunday. Reading. Can reading a novel be work? Yep, when you’ve already read it umpteen times over the past few months. Hell, when you wrote the danged thing!

I am reading both book 1 and 2 again, before book 2 goes to copy edit, because editors have suggested a few brilliant improvements to make to the latter.

The trouble is this: when you add a line on page 22, it has this horrible habit of making nonsense of something on p44. So you alter that, only to find that now something on p65 seems repetitive. So you alter that. But then, that gives the plot a hiccup, if not real indigestion…and so it goes on. Which of course is why you sometimes scratch your head over something in the books you read, thinking to yourself, how the heck could the writer have written that twice and not noticed? Or whatever.

So I am reading book 1 (which is not to be altered as it is going or has gone to the printers already) to make sure that something I do in book 2’s tweaking doesn’t make nonsense of something in book 1. Got it?

Now all non-writers are still scratching their heads, still wondering why I have to re-read. How can an author possibly forget something they wrote if it is a part important enough to affect the plot? Believe me, they can. And do.

The cartography is to tantalize…the talented Perdy Phillips has produced a humdinger of a map, a tiny portion seen above, and it has gone to the design team at Harper Collins. Wow. I feel publication is really getting close.

Maid, lackey or serf? What some Malaysians think of their hired help.

Posted on by March 13, 2021
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There has been a lot of talk here over a proposal to legislate to ensure that maids (usually foreigners) have one day off a week. That’s right. Apparently domestic workers don’t come under normal labour laws because they work in the house. (Ok, as a housewife I don’t get an automatic day off either…)

But my first reaction when I heard this was…wtf? You mean there are people out there who don’t give their maids a day off???

For those of you who don’t know how things work here: almost all urban women work full-time. It is very hard to make ends meet on a one-salary family, even on a fairly modest scale, especially at the beginning of their careers, and yes, that applies even if you have a university degree. The solution used to be that you got the kids’ grandmother to look after your kids. Nowadays though, grandma is probably working too. So you look for a maid. Most full-time domestic help is from overseas, usually Indonesia or the Philippines.

Back in the days when my kids were little in the 70s and early 80s, we had a maid too. She was local and every 3 months she took a week off to go visit her family in another state. And if she wanted to go out at other times, she asked for time off. Usually she went out several times a week, sometimes sleeping over with friends. I never refused unless we had a function to go to and needed a babysitter, which was pretty rare. When the first maid left to get married, we hired her sister. I taught her English and we helped her get a place in a college to do hotel housekeeping and she left. Her younger sister came in her place, and she stayed until she got married. After that, my kids were big enough to pull their weight, and I have not had a maid since. Whenever I am down in western Johor, I drop in to see those 3 sisters…

The government has now dropped the idea of the legislation, saying it is not necessary. Really? Hmm.

Here is one letter to the newspaper (The Star, Monday 22nd June).

It starts like this: ‘I am appalled to read a recent headline in our local press suggesting the need to legislate…’

Good, I thought. Here’s someone as appalled as I am.
And then I read on.

‘…house helpers are employed on a full-time basis for specific purposes…the contract is on a full-time basis for a specific period, and maids have been explained their rights, income and working conditions by their responsible agencies…If they want to be paid less vis a vis weekend off, we can always curtail their present two-year contract to, say, 18 months or so…‘

The writer even signed the letter with his name. Their maid is apparently expected to work for two years, seven days a week, living in. I wonder if they are allowed out of the house compound?

I thought that was bad enough. And then I heard of a maid (not in Malaysia but a neighbouring country) whose husband died back in her own country. And she was refused leave to go home for the funeral.

After that depressing thought, here’s a photo to calm you down. Sunset outside our chalet on Tioman. Taken while sipping a glass of cab-sav in a chair on the lawn…Enjoy vicariously.