I’ll be chatting to the lovely Jorja Kelly at Syn (90.7 FM) tomorrow afternoon. Jorja hosts “In Other Words“, a Syn show about all things language. It airs from 3 – 3.30pm on Tuesdays.
And it’s LIVE! Terrifying, no?
Tune in to discover a new must-listen show, and hear me put my foot in my mouth on live radio!
In Other Words:
Tuesdays at 3-3.30pm
LIVE on Syn 90.7 FM
This morning, I read my star sign for the first time in over a year.
Vague, vague, vague…Then:
“An impending tempest”.
DEAD RIGHT!
Week four reading: Shakespeare’s “The Tempest”… An impending tempest, indeed!
Having much respect for what Megan from Literary Life has to say, I took this book recommendation. Grudgingly, mind you. I shuffled off to the library in search of Mama Mia by Mia Freedman, the ex-editor of Cosmopolitan and editor-in-chief of a jumble of other ACP magazines. She has also worked in television and written columns for newspapers, and now blogs.
I’m not particularly fond of women’s magazines like Cosmo and Cleo. I’m sure they’re great for some people, but for me, they just make me feel like being a woman is a game that I’m playing but I don’t know the rules for. Which is a pretty lousy way to feel. Once I got past needing Dolly and Girlfriend to guide me through puberty, I got those things out of my life. However, Mia Freedman’s Mama Mia was recommended to me as a book with countless insights to the publishing industry, so I thought I’d better give it a whirl.
It wasn’t exactly a revelation in terms of publishing tips and tricks – I’m not interested in going into women’s magazines, but in terms of dishing the dirt on big Australian names, Mia Freedman has done pretty well.
That’s not to reduce the book to a gossip-fest: far from it. Mama Mia is equal parts about Mia’s career, and her life outside of her career, as a mother and wife. It made me laugh out loud, multiple times. It made me cry. Like real, tears-down-the-cheeks crying. I didn’t expect that.
The book is brutally honest, from Mia going into labour screaming to everyone around her “I need to POOOOOOOOO!” (that was a laughing moment), to wondering over her ‘failure’ at keeping her baby alive (tears here), followed by years and years of IVF.
The ‘mothering’ part of the memoir talked to me a lot more than the ‘magazines’ – however, the ‘magazines’ parts weren’t uninteresting to me, and I was surprised to find that there was only one part of the book that I was shaking my head at. “No, no I just can’t relate to that” – Mia talked about how all women bond over clothes shopping. *spew*
The tone of the memoir is conversational, and perhaps this is why there was only this one point that I felt I wasn’t a part of.
Mia Freedman has lived a life very memoir-worthy, and she’s written a book which speaks to readers as if they’re her friends. It’s honest, it’s funny, it’s heartbreaking, it’s accessible.
Overall, it’s pretty great.
This week, Mercedes M Yardley is our very welcome guest.
Mercedes is from Vegas, and she juggles two kids, a husband and a writing career. A writing career which is shooting pretty rapidly upwards at the moment, too. She writes pretty much everything – fiction, non-fiction, short-stories, a novel. Her blog, “A Broken Laptop” is updated regularly with updates about her writing practice and her thoughts on the world.
I came across Mercedes when I first joined WordPress, and have been reading ever since. I’ve even taken up some of her methods for working. My favourite? Her commitment to always have a certain amount of pieces out with publishers. I now have a running note in my journal: “Pieces out: X. Goal: Y.” It keeps me honest. And it’s paid off for Mercedes: her name has appeared in a huge number of publications, she’s won a bunch of competitions, and has just been picked up by an agent.
I admire Mercedes for her absolute commitment to making her writing work, despite all the crap life throws at her. Between caring for one child with Williams Syndrome and another who suffers from seizures, and being a good wife (she bakes!), Mercedes makes time in her day not only for writing, but for joy. Hats off to that!
She also takes FANTASTIC bio shots – check it out! :
How long have you been writing?
I’ve been writing forever, but I’ve only been submitting to markets for about three years. I’m still bright and shiny and new.
Your fictional work is about horror – what attracts you to the genre?
I like the darkness. I think a little bit of fear is sexy. That said, I tend to write “whimsical horror” instead of straight-up horror. I don’t enjoy gore and I don’t enjoy scenes where the characters are being abused for the sake of abusing them. I like my darkness to be twisty and fun. Think Tim Burton. Think Neil Gaiman. That’s what I get a rush out of. So my character stabs a boy in the heart with a sharp stick. She did it out of love. She did it to save him. There’s always a lightness even in my darkest dark. That is very much by choice.
What does a typical day in the life of Mercedes M Yardley look like?
My typical day is full of glamour and butterfly wings. I wish! I’m a stay-at-home mom with two small kids. My days are spent rushing about madly. I try to keep up with my reading (Shock Totem slush, books for review, stories to critique for others, and, oh yes, fun) and fit exercising and writing into every day. It’s a struggle sometimes. But I try to keep the whimsy with me. Every day I try to do something creative. Writing, certainly, or I sit down at the piano and play. The kids and I dance a lot. I’ll jump on the trampoline and swing on the swings pretty much every day. I’ll bake. If I don’t keep things interesting, I get bored and become An Adult. And we all know that Adults never have any fun.
Describe your writing process.
I’m very free-spirited when it comes to writing. I don’t plan things out; I just type as fast as I can and see what happens. I think that one of my strengths is that I’m hungry. I get an idea and I want to see it, I want to know how it turns out, I want to fall in love with the villain (I love villains) and I want this to happen as quickly as possible. I’ll think about my characters and their traits, but I don’t really plot in my head or have an outline. It’s like a lovely rollercoaster ride. It’s thrilling.
You have an incredibly busy life, what tricks do you use to make the time and keep yourself writing?
I never sleep. That’s pretty much true. It’s always been this way.
I have also learned to budget my time and make sacrifices. It’s impossible to write when both kids are home, so I know that I can only write when my son is at school or when they’re both in bed. When that time comes, I’m not dawdling. I’m writing RIGHT THEN because it’s the only time that I have. It is very precious. I have to sacrifice some of the other things that I’d rather be doing in order to write. I have to look at the long term. In another ten years, will I be pleased that I spent an hour tonight looking at HappyChairIsHappy.com, or will I be pleased that I wrote that new scene for my book? It’s horribly pragmatic, but it helps keep my priorities in order. (Maybe just ten minutes of HappyChair.) 😉
Here’s another trick: Twitter. I get on there, stomp around, make writing friends who support and encourage me, and then I challenge them to some sort of a contest. A “I can write more than you!” or “I can publish a star story first!” or “Whoever makes it into this anthology wins” contest. With consequences. It’s a lot of fun, it’s extremely motivating, and it’s an excuse to play with friends and call it “working”.
And last but certainly not least, I have The Best. Writing Group. In The World. I am not kidding you. We read, we write, we nearly come to blows over our critiques, we hang out together and we have fun. That’s dedication. We have these amazing meetings every Tuesday night, and if you don’t have a piece to present, you can’t come. That rule alone forces me to churn out something every week. My Interdimensional Wombats are gold, I tell you.
What kind of a role does your blogging play in your writing?
A blog is extremely valuable to me because I’ve met a lot of people that way. Twitter is fun for conversation but blogs are better for content. My favourite bloggy thing right now is a series that I’m doing called “Be Mysterious: Writers in Masks” where authors send in a picture of themselves with their faces obscured in some way, and a blurb. I dig it. I love seeing these fabulous people portraying themselves in a mysterious light. I look forward to every piece that comes in.
And right now my friend and fellow author Simon C. Larter and I are doing a kind of noir-ish serial blog project. We each write a section a week and post it to our respective blogs. Sometimes I forget how much fun writing is, but this project has reminded me. It’s wickedly delicious.
One of your latest projects is “Shock Totem”, a journal with the subtitle “Curious Tales of the Macabre & Twisted”, which I have to say is a pretty gripping title! Tell us a little about that, and how it’s all going.
It’s going quite well! My piece “Murder for Beginners” appeared in the first issue, and about six months later they asked me to join as staff. It’s a great experience for me. I get to hang out with very cool people who care a lot about literature. It takes an insane amount of time to choose stories and cover art and that sort of thing. I never realized how much time, so my respect for magazines has skyrocketed. I also write nonfiction for them, and it’s cool to write about real life horror. We just released Issue #2, and I have a very personal, very soul-baring piece in there. I’m a bit terrified to have it out there, quite honestly, but you never grow if you don’t do scary things. In fact, my New Year’s resolution for the past few years has been “Do Things That Scare Me”.
Congratulations are in order, Mercedes – a piece of yours has just been accepted for “Werewolves and Shape Shifters: Encounters With the Beasts Within”. Your work appears alongside names like Chuck Palahniuk, H.P Lovecraft, Charlaine Harris and Neil Gaiman – you must be absolutely stoked! What’s that been like?
Oh my goodness, it’s been a dream! I feel very honoured. I also feel deliciously devious, like, “Yes, I crept into this anthology and it’s too late to kick me out! Bwa ha ha!” Working with John Skipp has been a pleasure. He’s a delightful man, very encouraging and friendly. He makes me feel like it’s perfectly natural to be included with such high profile authors. He acts like it isn’t strange, no, it isn’t strange at all.
You work on a really wide variety of writing – poetry, short stories, non-fiction, novels. Do you choose to work this way because you’re unable to pin yourself to any one genre, or is it more that you’ve just seen opportunities arise and made your writing fit those opportunities?
I like variety. I like to see what I can do, and I like to stretch my wings. I’ve always written stories and I’ve always written essays. I’ve never seen them as mutually exclusive. I enjoy it all, and the versatility is nice. I see no reason to confine myself to one genre. Why do that when there are so many different things to explore?
What’s on the cards next for you, what can we look forward to?
Well, Werewolves and Shape Shifters: Encounters with the Beast Within comes out in October. I’m in the Hint Fiction anthology with some other astounding authors (Joyce Carol Oates, Ha Jin, and F. Paul Wilson, for example. I die!) and that comes out in November. I’m delighted to announce that I’m now represented by the very cool Jason Yarn at Paradigm (Yay! Yay, hooray!) so perhaps we’ll hear something on the novel front. Right now I’m working on a memoir about my son’s rare genetic syndrome and also a book of short stories. So I’m busy, and maybe these pieces will see the light of day. Who knows? Life is such a gamble.
Thank you so much for having me, Sam! It’s been fun.
Thanks to Mercedes for joining us today for A/I Thursday – check out her blog and keep an eye open for this woman, she’s on the way UP!
I was introduced to Sage Francis’ music about four years ago. I didn’t listen to a lot of hip hop then, but I loved poetry and my boyfriend knew that. As soon as I heard his music, it was the start of something that felt really special. You know that feeling when you find an artist who just captures it all perfectly? That was Sage Francis for me then, and still is now. His finger is spot on the pulse.
I admire his work because it breaks from the norm – at least, the norm as I know it in Australia. Sage Francis is not only a white guy producing really good hip hop, but he’s putting poetry to music. And that poetry shines, it really does. His subject matter oscillates between confessional and social commentary.
It’s easy for confessional work to become self-indulgent… Sage’s doesn’t. It speaks to the darker side of me. His comments on society aren’t just a rant – they’re intellectual, they’re insightful observations of where we’re at. They’re important and accessible.
Sage Francis – he’s smart, and not sorry about it. He’s honest. He’s funny (my favourite line: “if you ain’t dead, you ain’t a suicide girl!”). Lyrics aside – it’s plain good music.
He was kind enough to answer some questions for LGWABP.
Q: -Your beard’s a bit epic. Tells us about that.
A: My beard grows wildly. I must be part viking. I would braid my beard if it didn’t hurt so much.
Q: -Come to think of it, B. Dolan’s beard’s a bit epic too. Is it some crazy Rhode Island thing?
A: We have different breeds of beard. His grows sideways while mine grows downward. We’re both part Irish so maybe the beard gene stems from Ireland but probably not. Because they are different species of beard.
Q: -Before hip hop you were a slam poet – what you do now is a beautiful mashing-together of the two. How did this happen?
A: Common misperception. I was not a slam poet before hiphop. I found out about spoken word poetry (which then introduced me to slam) many years after I had already been rapping. Since I was already writing by the time I stumbled into performance poetry I figured it was a good medium to present my material to an audience. I was right. What I’m most thankful for, in regard to my involvement with the spoken word scene, is that it opened me up to different subject matter which then was infused into my rap songs. The slam thing was inspirational in the beginning but it quickly wore thin and uninteresting to me. Much like the battle scene in hiphop. Competitive based art, when graded and judged by people you are performing in front of, almost always results in bad art. Those are not creative scenes, nor are they supportive scenes. At first they are, but they quickly fall to the way side once people figure out the “tricks.”
Q: -Your latest album ‘Li(f)e’ is very diverse sounding – it’s much less beats-based and uses a lot of really different instrumentation, and you’ve worked with a lot of great musicians on this one. Each song certainly has its own distinct feel. Tell us about that.
A: You said all that I think needs to be said about that. I mean, those are the basics right there. I deviated from a beat-based soundscape and delivered my raps on top of live instrumentation. This has annoyed some of the more hard-lined hiphop fans and opened up some of the non-hiphop fans. I wanted to create an album with a whole new sound and doggone it…we did. I believe that rap is much more flexible than people give it credit for, and I always have these impulses to explore the territories that other rappers or musicians are hesitant to go. As long as my ideas and words have room to breathe I am happy.
Q: -When listening to your music, I often discover a new line after I’ve heard the song fifty times. Do you intentionally make your lyrics that way, or do you just have so much to say that you try to fit it all in?
A: That’s what makes writing so fun. Setting up the traps, pitfalls, escape routes and alternate meanings. The power of poetry, as far as I’m concerned, is being able to stuff as much meaning into as few words as possible. That’s the fun part of what I do.
Q: -For “Little Houdini”, the first track off your latest album, the inspiration came from a news article you found. Do you do this a lot? And where else does your inspiration come from?
A: I don’t often derive my subject matter from news stories. In fact, Little Houdini is the only time I did that. It was a story I found so inspirational that I held onto it for a few years and then decided I wanted to tell the story. The only other song that followed a similar pattern is Makeshift Patriot, but in that instance it was the events that occured after 9/11 that inspired the song. Although my lyrics consisted of actual phrases from news reports, it really wasn’t the same kind of thing. My inspiration for songs usually just comes from whatever subject matter is plaguing my mind. That typically comes from personal experience or information that I come across in one way or another through regular day-to-day stuff.
Q: -Your lyrics often hold a mirror up to society – do you see social commentary as a big part of hip hop’s role?
A: Well…yeah. It used to be like that anyway. That’s a big part of what drew me into hiphop in the first place.
Q: -Your songs seem to be equal parts confessional and social commentary. Is that intentional?
A: Sometimes you have to turn the mirror on yourself. I don’t really like looking at myself in the mirror anymore, but I need to be fair.
Q: -The slam scene in America is quite different to what it is here in Australia – over there you can pack out stadiums with poetry… Here we hold tournaments in warehouses and pubs, but it’s a push to pack it out. It’s a small but very enthusiastic scene. Do you have any advice for those of us trying to get this thing to take off?
A: It belongs in pubs. Not stadiums. Let the small pack of people stay enthusiastic and creative. Don’t bastardize the shit like we tend to do with everything in the states.
Q: -A lot of what you tackle with your work is really heavy, but there’s also this video floating around on Youtube, of you battling the Strange Famous Records intern in your parking lot. Care to comment?
A: Well…that battle took place in the Epitaph parking lot. It was totally random and off-the-cuff. While I was in Los Angeles I dropped by their office to have some face time with the Epitaph folks. While I was making my rounds I came across this intern who would dance on command. He was told to dance for me…and he did. The office burst into laughter and I got mad. I was like, “That ain’t shit. It’s time to battle.” And the whole office was like, “Ooooooohhhh.” So they immediately set up an event to take place in their parking lot so the intern and I could do a dance off. The rest is history.
Q: -Tell us a bit about how you create.
A: When all goes well I fall into a trance-like state and let my mind run wild. That’s just when I’m feeling metaphysical though. It takes a fair amount of peyote to get me there. A lot of the time I just imagine something that I want to bring to fruition…and that’s that. Nothing too complicated there. Once I put my pen to the page I do my best to avoid typicality. A lot of ideas are bad ideas so it’s important to be a good editor. Editing can turn shit into gold if you know what you’re doing. And vice verse if you don’t know what you’re doing. I probably do both.
Q: -You’ve recently announced that you won’t be touring anymore, and you’re taking an
indefinite break – what bought this on?
A: I’ve found this to be very difficult to explain to people which I didn’t expect but I understand why there may be confusion. I’ve been a road dog for over 10 years now. I’ve traveled this world many times over. I’ve seen many clubs. I’ve had the same small talk conversation with thousands of people. I’ve wrecked my throat and body, risked life and limb, ruined my relationships with people back home and have a career to show for it. Yay. It worked. I don’t want to do it anymore. I’m a pseudo-recluse. I can function while in the company of others but it’s not comfortable at all. That’s not me. I don’t know what I’m going to do, or if things will change for me, but for right now I have to be fair and honest with myself as well as with my fans. I won’t be able to do long strings of shows anymore. It’s doing some serious damage to my life. That doesn’t mean it wasn’t worth it.
Q: -And what will you be doing instead?
A: I’ll try to live a life of stability and creativity. If that doesn’t work then I’ll be back on the road telling myself “It’s the journey, not the destination.” Repeatedly. Over and over. Oh, journey…you fuckfaced mistress…gimme a death kiss already.
Thanks to Sage Francis for supporting a blog like mine, and answering my questions. He will be in Melbourne on the 15th of October for the Melbourne International Arts Festival – you can buy tickets here. Check out the rest of MIAF’s program too, there’s some exciting stuff on.
This is a messy post – I’m just putting that out there now, so that you know what you’re getting yourself into. Mess. Which proceeds thus…
I’m back at uni. We started back on Monday, and it’s been really good…Until today. I have a terrible tutor for a course that has the potential to be fantastic, and this upsets me. In an earlier draft of this post, I ranted about what was flawed about this tutor’s teaching style, but I re-thought that, as it probably has no place here. I’ll simply carry on with my passive/aggressive cheek toward said tutor for the remainder of the semester… Good luck to her.
I was going to post another “Comment July Challenge” post today, with highlights from the last week. But having done a lot of thinking in the last few days, I’ve realised I’m over-committed and things are suffering for it. So in an effort to de-frag my life, I’m culling those commitments which I don’t absolutely need. Unfortunately, the Comment July Challenge is one of them – I’ll still be commenting on as many blogs as is possible, contributing to discussions where I can, but without the pressure to do five per day. It’s an admirable project, and I wish Megan and the others involved the absolute best with it.
And now for the “A/I Excitement!” part of my title – tomorrow I’ll be posting the interview I was referring to the other day. The admirably haired and wonderfully talented Sage Francis (yes, that Sage Francis!) was kind enough to answer some of my questions, so that will be up tomorrow – get excited with me!
Teaser Tuesday is hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading.
(Something’s up with my photos today, so sorry, no cover shot!)
“A cheer went up and I took a breath, which I possibly should have saved. ‘As much as I would love to put you on a Cosmo cover – or, say, myself – it’s likely that the only people who would buy those issues are our friends.'”
-From “Mama Mia” by Mia Freedman.
Sam van Zweden 