Thanks Paul for the reading of Me and Magic on 101.7 Capital Radio on Saturday. It felt good to me.

I’ve now finished the author’s revamp of Turn on a Light.  Over the past few months, with some nagging and guidance, I’ve taken it from 441 pp to 302 pp and now the dreaded final editor has carte blanche.

The nagging and guidance can be summarised in what I was told. It was: “Re-read every line carefully, and if you make changes, re-read it again. And as you do, ask yourself two questions. One is whether what you written has been said in other ways earlier and you’re just repeating things. The other is how what you’ve just read enhances the story you’ve written, and if it doesn’t, get rid of it. And focus on the word ENHANCES!!”

That sort of work has taken me from a creative writer to a writer who wants to provide polished work. Tonight at a few drinks saying farewell to friends, I was told by a couple of people who have read both published novels that The WILUNA Solution had moved my writing to the new level. And part of the new level was the succinct nature of the story-telling.

I appreciate the comments because they told me that the hours and hours of work polishing the text weren’t wasted. I’ve come to believe that writing the novels is the easy part. Getting them ready for publication is the hard work. But then, I guess it’s why editors exist. Anyway, if you’re going to write and want to publish, find and editor or friend who will cheerfully tell you that part of what you’ve written are crap, and will just as cheerfully tell you how to fix it. Never reject it. It may not be what you decide to do, but suck it in, think about it deeply and then decide.

As we said late last year, we have been negotiating with Visability (formerly Guide Dogs for the Blind) to have Hiding Place and The WILUNA Solution published in audio-format. We should have more details before the end of this month.

In addition, however, Tony Howes who is with 101.7 Capital Radio and who co-hosts the Capital Events show on Saturday mornings is very interested in using the short stories that are on this website. That includes a new one I added today called On Working with Bureaucrats.

Our son Paul, who is a voice-over artist, has already produced two of these for Tony, and I understand the first reading will go to air on Saturday 23rd January (next Saturday). We are delighted with Paul’s work on the two he’s done to date and look forward to hearing more. If you get a chance to listen in next Saturday, let us and Capital Radio know your thoughts. We’d be delighted to hear from you on this web page and Capital Radio can be reached via http://capitalcommunityradio.com/contact.html (to either ring or email).

In addition to these story going on radio, we will also be adding them to this website after they’ve been aired, and eventually have all of them in audio-format.

It’s all very exciting, and the cover for Turn on a Light is almost complete. We think it’s a marvellous piece of work by Ross McLennan from Book Covers Australia. We told him when he’d finished the front and back covers separately that his work was succinct, graphic summary of the story. When you see it and read the story, hopefully in April, we are sure you will agree.

I mentioned the other day that I would be appearing for the second time on Capital Radio (101.7) in Perth WA. Tony Howes who, with Dale James, hosts a program called Capital Events. It happens each Saturday and I’m on the program around 11.30 am. Tony was interested in finding out how my excursions into producing my third novel, Turn on a Light, have gone and to get some idea of what it is about. In addition, however, Tony liked some of the Short Stories that appear on this website and was interested in getting some to play. Our son Paul, who makes his living from voice-overs as well as acting nationally, volunteered to assist and has had the tick of approval for his first recording from Tony. As I understand it, Tony will play the first Short Story to be read by Paul on Saturday 23rd January and then plans to use the others at regular intervals over the early months of this year. He and I will undoubtedly chat again when Turn on a Light appears. We are aiming for April at the latest.

I received the cover from Ross McLennan (Book Covers Australia) today and I love it. The nature of the story (a remote Aboriginal community, a young teacher sent to the community for his first appointment, discovering the unexplained deaths of eleven children over four years, dealing with a conservative people large town in a gold-mining region and struggling with an inward-looking bureaucracy and political environment) is one that will get people hooked. I got the idea for a story from the Northern Territory and transposed it to the WA Goldfields Region and Kalgoorlie, a fictional  Aboriginal community north west of Kalgoorlie, and set it in the mid 1970s.

I am indebted to Capital Radio for their interest and support. Most of my experiences in dealing with commercial radio in Perth have disappointing to say the least. But 101.7 has been engaging, flexible and a pleasure to deal with.

I am heartened by many responses to this page, and thank people for taking the time to respond. Several have commented on grammar and spelling and are saying some of the stories have many mistakes.

While I don’t claim perfection in terms of presentation, I have been back through most pages and find little in the way of mispelling,  words omitted, or poor phrasing. So I am wondering if some of those comments don’t stem from not understanding the tone of the novels and short stories and my constant use of pidgin English.

So let’s see if this explanation helps. I use pidgin English as much as I do in my stories because the great majority of the stories involve Aboriginal people. In remote sites in Australia, those people generally still speak their own languages. For example, in East Arnhem Land, it is called Yolgnu Matha (Yolgnu is the name of the people and Matha means ‘speak’). In Alice Springs, the people and the language are called Arrernte. But almost everywhere, Aboriginal people also speak a form of Aboriginal English or pidgin. Note, however, that there’s no standard form of pidgin. Each language group may have variations from every other group.

A linguist may say this differently or more eruditely, but for me, there are two differences between standard English and pidgin English:

• syntax which is the arrangement of words and phrases
• some substitution of sounds

An example of syntax is in the way of meeting Aboriginal people. I was taught to ask, Who your mob? Where you bin prom? (Which is your language group and where is your country?) And there is the general use of the word been which sounds like bin. For example, dat pella, ‘im bin your brudda, ay? Is that man your brother?)

In Hiding Place, the following conversation takes place between Garrick Edwards, a cattle-station owner and Mick Wilson who is going to work for Garrick on one of his cattle stations, 200 kilometres north-west of Alice Springs. Garrick is explaining pidgin to Mick.

“Don’t the Aborigines around here speak English?” Mick asked with a confused expression.

Garrick looked at him strangely. “Most speak kriol or pidgin. Kriol mixes English and their language, while pidgin is a form of Aboriginal English: like shorthand English. But all of them still speak their own language fluently.”

Mick scratched his head as Garrick’s expression became one of amusement.

“Here’s some pidgin, Mick,” and Garrick spoke rapidly. “‘Who been dat pella? Where him been prom? You subby him? Him been talk punny way, ay? Him been kardiya bloke’.”

“What?” Mick shook his head quickly.

“I said, ‘Who is that man? Where is he from? Do you know him? Doesn’t he talk in a strange way? He’s a stranger in this place’.”

The other difference is sound substitution. As a general rule, there are three main substitutions:

• the sound ‘f’ is replaced by the sound ‘p’, so football becomes pootball (Ay, we play pootball?), from becomes prom, (where you bin prom?)
• the sound ‘v’ is therefore replaced by the sound ‘b’, so volleyball becomes bolleyball, (Ay, we play bolleyball dis day?) or very becomes berry (Dat bin berry good one)
• the sound ‘th’ usually is said as ‘d’ or a ‘t’ (dat womans she know everyting)

I have also noticed two other things. As in the previous sentence, there is a tendency is some groups to use the plural for some singular words. There are also two words which seem to be common in every language group I have visited. One of them is ask which is always pronounced arks and the other is the word goona which, politely, can be translated as faeces, (Ay, dat pella go for goona.)

It’s a long-winded way of explaining, but I think some of the feedback regarding spelling, syntax and grammar in the Short Stories may be due to my use of pidgin. If not, feel free to write and tell me more precisely the things that seem incorrect.

I have updated the section in the Aussie Yarns website on Short Stories. They are now individual stories and a number of them contain photos. Every endeavour has been made to contact photographers where they can be identified and traced. If someone sees a photo that they have taken, please contact me at dave@aussieyarns.com and we can discuss what you would like to happen. I also warn that one photo contain images of persons who are probably deceased (the story entitled “Assimilation”) so if that causes concern, please avoid the story.

I am pleased to be able to have updated in this way, however. The photos seem to help illustrate the themes I am trying to convey in the short stories. I trust you enjoy them.

I received this question this morning and thought the answer might be useful to other people, too.

First off I want to say excellent blog! I had a quick question which I’d like to ask if you don’t mind. I was interested to find out how you center yourself and clear your mind before writing. I have had a difficult time clearing my thoughts in getting my thoughts out. I do enjoy writing but it just seems like the first 10 to 15 minutes are wasted just trying to figure out how to begin. Any recommendations or hints? Many thanks!

Your question is a good one. I’ll answer by starting from a different part of my life. While being a novelist, I am also a consultant in change management. That involves formal research work for which I am well-qualified. (I will talk more about that on my next blog, because the formal research background was actually a barrier to writing fiction, which I am still dealing with. But back to the question.) When I was studying at university doing a Ph.D, I complained to my supervisor that I seemed to spend more time walking in the backyard of my house thinking than I did writing my thesis. He told me, “walking and thinking is part of your process of writing your thesis. It helps clarify and identify themes and ideas. Some people do it differently. I always did it by sitting in front of my computer and writing random thoughts about a topic as they came into my head. I wrote a lot of rubbish but I also wrote a few valuable gems. You are grounding (centering) yourself by walking and thinking.”

Perhaps you could think about a “difficult time clearing my thoughts in getting my thoughts out” in the same way: that it’s part of the process and not a waste of time. You could see it as centering yourself and perhaps try what my supervisor said as well: sit and write random thoughts until you feel focussed, save them, and get on with writing. Another analogy is with sport. All athletes warm up before undertaking a sprint or a high jump or a triple jump. Perhaps try to see your activity in the same way. Hope that helps.

It’s been a fascinating experience working to come up with the cover for the third novel. I sent Ross MacLennan a sketch of themes from the novel as a montage. I loved his first effort, and his advice that I had too many themes cluttering the cover. He selected four themes which I think blend well and part of is a photo of Aboriginal children at play which he found on a website belonging to a person involved on movie-making. It is a joyously uplifting photo but we felt there were several problems in using it. One was being able to get permission from the photographer, who wasn’t the owner of the website, a second was that the last entry on the website was in 2009, and a third was to find out the community where it was taken and seek their permission too. Talk about detective work!!!

Anyway, after several abortive attempts to find the website owner, I decided instead to try to identify the photographer. After several searches I eventually came up with the name Brett Monaghan. That led me to Facebook and Linked In and a couple days of contacting various people under that name. I’d just about given up when I got an email from Brett saying “yes, I’m the photographer, get in touch and we can talk.” I rang him, explained what I wanted to do, and while he is no longer in the photography business, he still owns the rights to that photo. He said he happy for me to use it, but we agreed that we should contact the community where the photo was taken – Ernabella, which is in the Pitjantjatjara Lands, a couple of hundred kilometres south of the NT/South Australian Border. I’ve been there working but not since 2004. Brett, bless his heart, was willing to make contact if I sent him a copy of the draft cover, which I did.

Getting to that point took the best part of four days work and we still have no answer from Ernabella. On the one hand, it’s very frustrating trying to follow the legal and ethical requirements of different cultures. On the other hand, however, it has put me in touch with some lovely people whose comprehension of the legal and ethical dimensions across cultures is warming. And I know if I fail in this effort, Stephen DuPont, a photographer whom I met in Mildura, is willing to assist, too.

We presented at the York CRC with assistance from Karina, whose efforts were genuinely appreciated. Dave had played a couple of seasons of Australian Rules football with York back in the 1970s, when people like Jim Finnerty, Macca and the Marwicks were on the field. So it was great to see a few of those names and to meet others at the CRC. We also introduced those present to the cover design for Dave’s new novel, “Turn on a Light”. We used a sample of Ross MacLennan’s design and asked the question, “Would this cover make you turn to the back and check out the synopsis?” The answer, generally, was yes, so Ross has done well. We need permission, however, to use one of the images on the cover and Dave is currently pursuing that. We’ll see what happens.

But yes, it was a top time in York, staying at recently re-opened Settlers, and dining at the Castle on Monday night. Our next endeavour will be in the south-west, probably after Christmas. We’re looking forward it.

I spent time at VisAbility in East Victoria Park chatting about Audio Books. The idea emerged on our promotional trip to the south, and libraries at Albany, Denmark, Walpole and Bridgetown all had large sections of Audio Books. In chatting with librarians, they spoke of different groups of people who used Audio Books, including not only the sight-impaired but long-haul truckies, farmers on tractors, and people driving to or from Perth or between country towns for work. That led me to speak with Dinesh and the staff at VisAbility about the possibility of producing Audio Books. One of the staff members, by the way, is Susie Punch, whose father Keith was the chief supervisor for my Ph.D.

Their offer is certainly well worth considering and part of the reason is the possibility of partnership between myself and Karen as authors and publishers of the novels, and VisAbility asa marketing and production entity with the capacity to extend the reach of our novels. At the same time, I am exploring the private sector through our son Paul, whose contacts in the realm of voice-overs has given him ideas about how to record and produce Audio Books.

But whether I choose to go with VisAbility or not, I was hugely impressed by the production team, their facilities, and the enormous number of volunteers who assist in the production of Audio Books. To be part of that production set-up is certainly a motivating factor. Good on you people and well done.

Travelling through rural towns promoting the Aussie Yarns concept, we came to the realisation that we were neglecting a possible avenue to reach people: the Audio Book category. The more we travelled, the more the idea of developing these grew. At first, I was thinking only of people with limited vision, but speaking people at presentations, a range of different categories entered the thinking. Categories such as farmers ploughing or harvesting, driving to Perth, long-haul truckdrivers, people driving on mine sites, people flying, people with afflictions that make reading difficult … The list has continued to grow.

So, a couple of weeks ago, we approached two potential sources to produce Audio Books. Having a son who is in the “voice-over” game, we asked him to investigate and he has come back with an idea and a contact in Melbourne. And, as much as it is incestuous, we think he has just the voice that we’re looking for. People in Western Australia would know him from Bowra and O’Dea and Freeview ads, not to mention Jeep (Are we there yet) and the voice of Brain on the Bond Advertisements on the web. At the same time, we approached an entity in Western Australia whom we are meeting on Thursday to begin discussions on production. Exactly where it will take us isn’t yet known, but it’s exciting to consider.

And I am now in the process of preparing a third novel for publication. As I indicated a couple of weeks ago, I have gone back to the idea of publishing “Turn on a Light”, set in the Eastern Goldfields of Western Australia in the mid-1970s. I have already held discussions for the cover concept, have had the product shaped into the most effective size (A5 – the same as for The WILUNA Solution) and it will shortly undergo a final proofing. The final proofing, by the way, is one thing I try not to   participate in, mainly because years of experience have taught me that I read what I think I wrote, rather that what is actually on the page.

The Government Office complex on Hannan Street – the Wardens Court, Court of Justice, Mines Department and Post and Telegraph Office – all built between 1896-1899.

If you’d like to see the synopsis of “Turn on a Light” you can find it under novels, along with  a few more enticing photos. The one to the right plays a crucial role in the story.

So, it’s an exciting time all round, together with more rural visits either planned or being planned.