Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Even irony can rust


I had a ‘life imitates art’ moment a couple of weeks ago. I was kicking back on the deck of my friend’s house in Melbourne, sharing a bottle of chardy. About to take a swig of wine I discovered a fly swimming for its little life. I flashed back to 1995, a time when Canadian chanteuse Alanis Morisette was peddling her own brand of angst-ridden pop, in particular her song Ironic.

It’s always annoyed me that she tries to link a fly drowning in a glass of wine to irony, so I decided to go through line by line and correct it.

But before I do let me just consult my trusty dictionary and define irony: 'a combination of circumstances that creates the opposite of what is expected.' So here goes...



Sunday, February 19, 2012

Australian Women Writers 2012 Reading and Reviewing Challenge


I once moved house because there wasn’t room for all my books. When I came home from living overseas a few years ago, a good friend took charge of unpacking my books from storage, knowing that if left to me, all my worldly possessions would languish for weeks, while I sat on the floor surrounded by piles of books, re-discovering old favourites.

I usually have two or three books on the go at any one time, and if you visit me you’ll find books stacked on my coffee table and bedside tables waiting to be read. There are fewer pleasures greater than finding a book that grips you so much you have to keep reading, even though it’s two in the morning and you have to be up for work in a few hours.

So although I hardly need another reason to stick my nose in a book, I’ve signed up for a challenge that gives me the perfect excuse to sequester myself away with the written word.

I’ve signed on to take part in the Australian Women Writers 2012 Reading and Reviewing Challenge, and just as it says in the title, for the rest of the year I’ll be reading and reviewing works for Australian Woman Writers.



The challenge is the vision of Elizabeth Lhuede, in response to concerns that newspaper and social media literary reviews are disproportionately of male authors. The challenge is a chance for anyone, female and male, to read and then write about what they’ve read.

It’s pretty straightforward, you sign up for the challenge by registering on  Australian Women Writers 2012 Reading and Reviewing Challenge, (I’m Reviewer Number 273), and after that you can read as many books in as many or as few genres as you like. So whether you’re a devoted fan of comedy, drama, sci-fi, memoir, non-fiction, fantasy, romance or poetry or you prefer to mix and match, you can take part. All you need is an ability to read (or listen to audio books) and an opinion to share.