more france

I'd been hoping to get back to France for years and years now and so when my friend Becky said, hey, I've got to go to Montpellier for work – want to come stay? I said ... OKAY!

Cathedreal in Angers, early(ish) in the morning.

Beautiful, spooky art to commemorate the prisoners held inside the Chateau d'Angers.

I was unable to capture the Sagrada Familia properly with camera or phone but I was able to stand and stare for most of the afternoon.

Old folks in Sergovia out for a Sunday stroll.

Madrid turned it all on for me.

Maybe I'll move there.

Montpellier alleyways are made for flâneuses like moi.

Street art, Montpellier.

La poste (le chien).

Crèpes equal delicious, with wintery sun and blue skies.

La Seine, Paris, on my birthday.

Have any writers ever died for Australia?

Would we build a crypt for them if they did?

Paris street art.

View from my fenêtre, Montmartre.

Wee baby Basile!

Coming up the metro steps to go home for the night.

the halfway mark

Happy June.

For some reason, this year has set out to be a bumper year for change. Most remarkably, the crick-crack-rock-chick best friend made a (small) human. My writer's group is exploding with talent and releasing books willy-nilly, getting amazing opportunities and generally being wonderful people ... as well as making small humans in their spare time or threatening to abscond to Malaysia and/or Spain. I'm writing a bit, and had a birthday. Work's exciting. There's great coffee, and even better books.

Just a few scenes from my world lately:

Bespoke birthday card. Literaryily funny.

Morning coffee.

EllaPants.

Celebrating Anna Cowan's UNTAMED. Out now!

First glimpse of Nelika's THE VALE GIRL,
out in September! The real cover is lovely.

A wee honorary nephew; here, just twelve hours old.

Friends who work in bread are good friends indeed.

The Sun Bookshop peeps always bring the wine.

The Merri Creek putting on its autumn frock.

Feeling quite pleased with this year. Keep it up, 2013.

the museum of australian children's literature

This is a good place, with weekend bread* all week long, it's a writers' retreat where I don't have to pay, where there are fresh eggs, sixteen puppies and four dogs.

There's Where the Forest Meets the Sea, Wilfred Gordon McDonald Partridge and Barbro Lindgren's The Wild Baby**.

There's all those Paul Jennings Un- books and The Wayne Manifesto and Penny Pollard's Diary.

There's Killer McKenzie, a whole mess of well-thumbed Margaret Clark books, about fifteen copies of Bridge to Wiseman's Cove, advance reader copies of late-90s Australian YA, there's Margo Lanagan's perfect Touching Earth Lightly.

I haven't lived at "home" since I was seventeen, but that just makes going to visit even better. And it's not just the puppies and the homemade sourdough and the lovely things to read...

*at my house we only buy special sourdough (like Irrewarra or Phillippa's or Zeally Bay) on the weekends, for a treat.
**not Australian. but still the best.

shelfspy #1

The girl formerly known as The Intern - the real actual Hilary - posted a picture of her bookshelf today. She stopped herself from editing the shelf for her audience, showed it in its real state. It's a funny thing to be intrigued by, in some ways, but it's really fascinating to have a peek at someone's books, how they're arranged, which books look familiar, which ones don't. She said she would like to see other people's bookshelves...

So here, my little nosey parkers, are mine. I photographed them exactly as they were when I got home this evening, I swear. There are many embarrassing books in here, as well as some ace ones. I haven't read them all.

let the wild rumpus start!

once i won trophies for being good at sport. har har.

includes a 'to do' list. and a 'saving-up-for-paris' tin.

the shelves a 21st present from the grandwrinklies,
made from floorboards of a gold rush era pub.

Compared to Hilary's spartan shelves I feel like a mad crazy subject from the tv show Hoarders. I've been living in my current house for five and a half years, which is the longest I've lived anywhere since I left my childhood home in 2001. For five of those years I worked in a bookshop. This is my excuse.

Also, I am something of a hoarder...

Show us your shelves!

marlo

beachcombing

watsonia, d'affinois, pickled green tomatoes

the calm before large, noisy dinner

silhouetted by the sunset

in pictures

cute puppies are cute 

the primary school village green preservation society is out in force on green st, richmond 

a guinness cake for a departing frenchman

the rag and bone man literary salon gets its kate bush interpretive dance on

a weekend adventure southside

Anchors away!
Granted one last summer's day
We watched the sunset silhouette
The western suburbs across the bay
And when the sky was monochrome
We drained our drinks and headed home
Past bright-eyed boys in business suits
Tourists, where once were prostitutes

And you proposed a promenade
Neither of us knows
Follow the yellow brick apartment blocks
The Californian bungalows

But remember when you're wandering alongside
The river has a right side and a wrong side
Remember when you're wandering alongside
The river has a right side and a wrong side

I confess it's been a year, or little less
Since last I sallied forth
From the friendly confines of the north
But a single seagull's cry hangs in the quiet suburban sky
And for a moment I'm amazed
I ever claimed to hate this place

But remember when you're wandering alongside
The river has a right side and a wrong side
Just remember when you're wandering alongside
The river has a right side and a wrong side

~ Transpontine, The Lucksmiths