I’ve been too busy with my current project to blog lately. I have to complete the first draft of my novel before Christmas so I’m working on a chapter a day which averages to about 1100 words, and it seems to be going well.

I would never show anyone my first draft. I have written it without going back over a single sentence. But the ideas are all there. At second draft stage I will go back through it and add voice and nuance and rhythm and all the little details that hopefully raises it above the ordinary story.

Re-writing is what I enjoy most of all. But there’s a long way to go before I get to that stage.

In the meantime, I was so pleased to learn that A Ghost in My Suitcase is a finalist in the 2009 Aurealis Awards. This is an award for speculative fiction. The Garden of Empress Cassia won the Aurealis Awards Best Children’s Long Fiction in 2002 and The Pearl of Tiger Bay was shortlisted in 2004 so I’m absolutely thrilled to be in the running again.