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Book Review.
June 12, 2013The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight
Jennifer E. Smith
Headline Publishing Group (London: 2012)
3 out of 5 stars
Recommended for girls aged 13-20
The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight follows seventeen-year-old Hadley Sullivan over twenty-four hours, beginning with Hadley missing her flight to London by literally four minutes. Although this means she’ll be getting to her father’s second wedding with only a few minutes to spare, her lateness allows her to meet Oliver, a nineteen-year-old British boy who – surprise! – ends up in the seat next to her on her rescheduled flight. What follows is a ‘whirlwind romance’ between Oliver and Hadley; or, at least, what’s meant to be. Despite being marketed as a ‘sweet’ romance that will make you ‘believe that true love finds you when you’re least expecting it,’ most of the book is devoted to Hadley’s broken relationship with her father. Unfortunately, with only twenty-four hours (which bizarrely equates to eighteen – not twenty-four – short chapters), Smith unsuccessfully juggles Hadley’s rocky familial relationships, her blossoming relationship with Oliver, and Oliver’s own personal struggles. Consequently, no single scene has any particular significance, and everything gets resolved all too neatly.
I was first attracted to this book by its design; the title is quirky and original, and the cover is very appealing. However, there is a discrepancy between how Hadley appears on the cover and how she is in the actual novel. As there is no thorough description of Hadley (apart from a mention of her generic ‘blond hair and big eyes’) the reader imagines her as she appears on the cover, which is fine … until Smith writes about Oliver putting his hand on Hadley’s ‘bare leg.’ Having Hadley wear a miniskirt rather than the boyish jeans seen on the cover completely changes the reader’s perception of her, so it would’ve helped to have had a proper description from the very beginning.
The writing is generally clear and straightforward, which makes it easy to breeze through the chapters. But it’s nothing special. At times there is tense confusion and an awkward transition between third-person objective and third-person subjective. There are few errors, except for an unforunate one in what is mean to be a touching reconciliation between Hadley and her mother. When Hadley is trying to convince her mother that she should marry Harrison, her boyfriend, and be happy, she says, ‘He love you.’ The majority of readers would probably be able to ignore this glaring typo, but personally I felt it ruined the moment, which was already failing to be as poignant as it wanted to be.
Nonetheless, The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight is a light, enjoyable read that will entertain you for a few hours. But I highly doubt it will ‘stay with you forever.’
– Ariel Skippen
The Great Novella Search.
June 7, 2013What do George Orwell’s Animal Farm, John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, Ernest Hemmingway’s The Old Man and the Sea, Albert Camus’s The Stranger, and Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis all have in common?
Give up?
They’re all novellas. In fact, they head the top five novellas on GoodReads’ World’s Greatest Novellas. It’s a list that contains books such as (just to name a few) Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange. Even if you haven’t read any (or all) of these books, in all likelihood you would’ve heard of their titles. With some, I bet you didn’t even realise that they were novellas.
Consider these word counts:
Animal Farm – 29,966 words
Of Mice and Men – 29,160 words
The Old Man and the Sea – 26,601 words
The Stranger – 36,014 words
The Metamorphosis – 21,810 words
A book doesn’t have to be obese to be good or meaningful, although given the way publishing has evolved over the years, you’d be forgiven for thinking otherwise. In fact, the novella almost became a forgotten form, which is amazing given the quality of books in GoodReads’ list.
Lately, novellas have started making a comeback. This is probably for a number of reasons.
One would be epublishing. As e-readers tentatively found their way into the market, many couldn’t stomach the possibility of reading a fat book on an electronic screen. Shorter stuff was the go, (at least as a means of introducing people to e-readers).
Another is simply we live in an ever quickening society. Abbreviation seems the norm. Look at television shows. It was only several years ago that a television season was about twenty-two episodes. That’s almost gone. Now, about ten–twelve episodes is the go. It’s a part of a continuing trend. We have to compete with so many other forms of entertainment – Hollywood’s franchise-movie-making machine, the aforementioned TV, games that are almost movies themselves, snippets on YouTube (and on the list goes) – that something big and fat and which seems a long-term prospect can be overwhelming. You really just have to think of the way kids will baulk at a bigger book over a thinner book. That’s us today. Many of us have become kids in our appreciation and investment towards entertainment.
That doesn’t mean that the storytelling itself suffers. Far from it. Again, consult GoodReads‘ list. Size doesn’t guarantee quality, and a lesser length is by no means short-changing. People are falling in love – or back in love – with the shorter form. There’s a beauty and art-form to it which is unique.
Well, it’s long been the intent of our publisher, Blaise van Hecke, to introduce novellas to the Busybird library. Now we’re finally underway.
Busybird will be opening The Great Novella Search, a competition designed to find Busybird’s first novella. Submission details are simple.
Entry Fee: $25.00
Prize: $1,000.
Outcome: Your book will be published both in hardcopy and digital formats.
Submission Guidelines:
Word count: 20,000 – 40,000
Opens: 1st August Closes: 29th November
Genre: No genre specification.
Format: 1.5 line spacing, 12 point font, and remove your name from the document.
And don’t forget … to please number every page!
Also provide … a short bio of yourself and a synopsis of your novella.
Submissions will be accepted and paid for via Submittable. (The link will be available when the competition opens).
Alternately, hardcopies (containing novella, bio, and synopsis) can be mailed to:
Busybird Publishing
PO Box 855
Eltham 3095
Makes cheques payable to Busybird Publishing or PayPal fees to busybird.at.bigpond.net.au. If you pay via PayPal, please also provide the receipt number of the transaction.
Feel free to email us if you have any queries.
And our official page for it can be found here.
We look forward to your novellas!
Reading the Right Things.
May 29, 2013Maybe you read to distract yourself and escape into a reality that is not your own; possibly you are motivated by the prospect of learning new things and accumulating new knowledge; most likely you read because you get some semblance of enjoyment from it. In any case, reading is important. Evidently, as you are reading this, you think so too.
However, many people feel embarrassed or ashamed because they are not reading the ‘right’ thing. These people hide the cover of their books in public (if they ever take them out of their house) because they’re reading a paranormal romance like Twilight rather than an acclaimed classic, such as The Great Gatsby. They lie about or skirt over what they’re reading because they feel anxious that their reading habits will be found out and ridiculed. Even worse, they think that they themselves will be ridiculed.
This is not the atmosphere we want to create. We want our audience to be excited about reading, not apprehensive. When 46% of Australians aged between 15 and 74 have literacy levels below what is considered necessary to get by in everyday life, it would be wrong to discourage reading merely because we find the writing bland or the plot convoluted. That someone wants to read at all should be celebrated.
There is undeniably a sizable gap in the quality of writing between Stephanie Meyer and F. Scott Fitzgerald: Stephen King stated that Meyer ‘can’t write worth a darn.’ However, it is impossible to dismiss the Twilight saga, and other inexplicably best-selling novels (i.e. Fifty Shades of Grey), as poorly written stories that don’t deserve the success they have achieved. It is these books that have reignited public interest in reading and greatly supported the publishing world, which in today’s world can’t be anything but a good thing.
There is nothing wrong with someone reading popular novels or romances or even online fan fiction; to say otherwise is to suggest that there is something wrong with reading. If you don’t like reading those types of fiction, don’t stop someone else who does.
So far I have read an eclectic and varied group of books this year, from Great Expectations (Charles Dickens) to Company (Max Barry) to The City of Bones (Cassandra Clare). Some I’ve liked more than others, and some I would recommend. The point is, though, that I haven’t regretted reading any of them. If it encourages you to read and to continue reading, if you get some enjoyment from it, then it is the right thing to read.
Ariel Skippen.
Readings.
May 23, 2013When I was enrolling to study (writing and editing) years ago, one of the teachers told me a prerequisite of the course was monthly readings, and that there was an obligation that students read at least twice yearly.
Readings! What the hell …? Not an attractive proposition for somebody as naturally insular as myself. The thought terrified me. I also didn’t really understand the relevance behind needing to do it.
Come the first readings I attended, I began understanding some of the merit behind the idea. I watched the audience. Studied how they engaged with the reader. Gauged what worked with them and what didn’t. Just basically examined the relationship between reader and audience to attempt to determine how and when it functioned well, and how and when it didn’t.
Usually, students were meant to read writing from various assignments they might’ve just completed. This might’ve been something as ambitious as a novel or short story, or as simple as a sense of character or place piece.
When it came my time to read, I decided none of those would do. Who wanted to hear about my office? And my fiction didn’t have self-contained scenes I felt comfortable reading, or which I thought might connect. I needed to write something specifically for the audience – or at least something that would immerse them and make them attentive to me for the time that I read.
That’s when I truly began to comprehend the importance of readings. Writing is only a small part of the writing game. Putting words on the page and revising the hell out of it is a great place to start, but you need to consider how your work will fare with its intended audiences. Giving it to friends/colleagues for feedback is one thing. Seeing how it succeeds or fails when every set of eyes is devoted to you is another matter altogether.
Does that idea work? Could that phrase be better? Did that joke you thought a riot get the laughs you thought it would? Did the audience await with baited breath during the tense passages? When you’re writing, you can only hope you’re positively answering these questions – at least in your own mind. Readings give you concrete proof, particularly with the people who matter most: your audience (and people you hope may one day buy your book). You’ll see what works, what doesn’t, what’s fine, and what needs improvement.
Readings are a pivotal facet of development in any writer’s writing life. On the pragmatic side of things, if writing is something you’re pursuing, then readings are something you’ll probably have to do as a means of marketing yourself, whether you’re a best-selling author or not.
We had our first readings last night and had a great turnout, with some fantastic readings and even a couple of songs. Our next reading is on the 26th June, 7.30–9.00pm. Come down, try your stuff out, or listen to others, and see how things work. Whatever the case, it’s great fun.
LZ.
Launch.
May 14, 2013
Whilst Busybird has been around for over fifteen years, for the bulk of that time we were a business focused on design and photography. Our evolution into publishing has been recent – since late 2008, when we decided to begin our own fiction anthology, which everybody would know as [untitled].
Since then, we’ve produced five issues of [untitled], two issues of page seventeen, as well as the nonfiction anthology Journey: Experiences with Breast Cancer (a portion of proceeds going to BreaCan and WHOW) and the children’s book Who’s a Cheeky Monkey? (with all proceeds going to Destiny Rescue). 
We’re now working on a sixth issue of [untitled], a companion book to Journey about prostate cancer (for which we’re still trying to find a perfect title – please email us if you have a idea), and have a host of other great projects in the pipeline.
We’ve also helped a number of authors self-publish their own books, providing services ranging from editing to layout to design. If there’s one thing we love, it’s stories, and helping people get out their own stories.
The next step in our evolution is the opening of our studio. We moved in several weeks ago, and have been working hard on making it home. Here you’ll find the Busybird team, as well as the books we’ve worked on. Feel free to drop in to chat about our projects or the services we can provide. We’re also going to be hosting a whole assortment of great workshops.
Otherwise, please join us for the Grand Opening of our studio this Thursday, 16th May, from 7.00pm. We also have on display the exhibition, In the Suburbs of the Heart, by linvanhek, which will be launched by poet/musician Joe Dolce. The exhibition will run from 16th May–6th June.
Details:
Busybird Studio:
2/118 Para Road
Montmorency 3094
(Melway reference 21 B5)
For catering purposes, please RVSP Blaise by email us or call 0416 157 281.