Because I could not stop for Death,
He kindly stopped for me;
The carriage held but just ourselves
And Immortality.

We slowly drove, he knew no haste,
And I had put away
My labor, and my leisure too,
For his civility.

We passed the school, where children strove
At recess, in the ring;
We passed the fields of gazing grain,
We passed the setting sun.

Or rather, he passed us;
The dews grew quivering and chill,
For only gossamer my gown,
My tippet only tulle.

We paused before a house that seemed
A swelling of the ground;
The roof was scarcely visible,
The cornice but a mound.

Since then ’tis centuries, and yet each
Feels shorter than the day
I first surmised the horses’ heads
Were toward eternity.

Emily Dickinson, 1830-1886

—

Emily Dickinson lived a quiet secluded life and her large body of poetic work was not discovered until after her death, but is regarded as amongst the most influential in American poetry.

‘Because I could not stop for Death’ is possibly the most celebrated of all Emily Dickinson’s poems. The version used here follows that used by by Thomas H. Johnson in The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson 1955, and Johnson wrote of Death, as conceived in this poem, as “one of the great characters of literature.”

"The Heir of Night"

My second-to-be-published book, The Heir of Night—my first, Thornspell (Knopf) came out in 2008—will be published by Eos (HarperCollins) in the USA on 1 October. And because this officially makes me a HarperCollins USA writer, I was invited to be part of the Supernatural Underground, a blog site (and related Facebook page) where HarperCollins USA Fantasy, Science Fiction and Paranormal Romance authors post about their writing (and related matters). Those of you who are regulars here may recall that my debut post, on Why I Love Fantasy, appeared on 1 July—and I will be posting again on the first of every month from now on (so watch out for 1 August!)

But being part of the Supernatural Underground isn’t just about posting once a month and supporting other HarperCollins writers when they post, it also means I am now part of a network of writers (around forty, I believe) who are all doing the same thing I do—writing books, promoting books, dealing with the everyday of being a writer. This includes lots of stuff like deadlines, editing, contracts et al, as well as the fun of “what are my characters doing today?” So it’s really good to be able to hear the wisdom of my fellow writers, many of who have been succeeding in the wriitng game for a long time.

But sometimes there are other moments as well, when an email will fly around saying, “my next novel debuted today” and then—it feels like an incredibly short time later—another whizzes round the circuit saying: “And it just made the New York Times bestseller list!” Heady stuff—although I believe New Zealand’s very own Nalini Singh can lay claim to quite a few such moments over recent years.

One fellow HarperCollins USA author whose work I have been following since reading her first novel, Wicked Lovely, is Melissa Marr.  So you can imagine how thrilled I was on Saturday when Melissa’s email flashed around the group to say that, not only has she signed a deal with HarperCollins for a new 3 book YA series (about a “a girl assassin, a demon with a soul, and a world where myth and science meet”, which sounds fairly exciting) but that fans of Wicked Lovely can also expect a forthcoming Wicked Lovely movie. The rights have been bought by Universal Pictures and Caroline Thompson (Edward Scissorhands) has been hired to write the screenplay.

Very, very exciting news and a tremendously well deserved success for Melissa—but exciting, too, for a writer on the far side of the world to be part of this much bigger picture.

* Note, The Heir of Night will also be published in Australia/New Zealand in October, by Little. Brown (Hachette).

I’m still on that big push to finish all the fiction finalists for the Hugo Awards and this week I finished both  Robert Charles Wilson’s Julian Comstock: A Story of 22nd-Century America and Paolo Bacigalupi’s The Windup Girl.

Interestingly, both are future dystopia’s, although Julian Comstock is more “back to the future” with a 22nd century where society has regressed to a 19th century level theocracy, and where technology—what there is of it—is mechanical. The life and adventures of Julian Comstock (“Julian the Agnostic’) are also very closely aligned with the life and activities of the Late-Roman Emperor Julian (“the Apostate”). Well, I found the alignment interesting anyway, being a keen student of history . . .

The Windup Girl on the other hand is what is being called “biopunk” (nods here to William Gibson and Neale Stephenson’s “cyberpunk”)—but this medium-term future is characterised by steampunk style technology and genetic engineering, the latter having in many/most cases gone horribly awry. There’s a lot more to say, including that I really enjoyed the read, but as with Catherynne M Valente’s Palimpsest last week, I am trying not to say too much until I have read all six finalists in the novel category. But it may be worth noting that The Windup Girl has already won the Nebula Award 2009 and Locus Magazine’s 2010 Award for “Best First Novel”, and I’m told it’s the insider’s tip to win the Hugo Award as well.

But having said all that, I have just started the last of the six finalist’s, China Mieville’s The City and The City and I have to say that I am finding that compelling reading—so far, so good—as well, so the jury is very much still out as far as I am concerned. And of course, The City & The City won the Locus Award 2010 for “Best Fantasy Novel, as well the British Science Fiction Association’s Award for “Best Novel”—and fellow Hugo nominee Cherie Priest’s Boneshaker took the Locus award for “Best Science Fiction Novel” so I would say it very much won’t be over until all the votes are counted.

By the way, I also posted on the Hugos on Out of this Eos blog earlier this week—click here to read.

Friday July 30 is New Zealand’s National Poetry Day and to celebrate the lead up to this event I’ve been doing an interview with a NZ poet every Saturday for Women on Air, Plains 96.9 FM. You can check out three of the interviews to date on podcast—just click on the poet’s name below and either press the “play” icon to start the interview, or download the mp3 version:

Sarah Broom: Tigers at Awhitu

Ingrid Horrocks: Mapping the Distance

Joanna Preston: winner of Australia’s prestigious Mary Gilmore Prize for her debut collection The Summer King

Next weekend I will be completing the poetry month series by interviewing Bernadette Hall, one of the 3 poetry finalists in this year’s NZ Post National Book Awards for her 2009 collection, The Lustre Jug (VUP). My colleague Ruth will be interviewing Selina Tusitala Marsh, as well, winner of the NZ Society of Authors’ Jessie Mackay Award for Best First Book of Poetry for her debut collection Fast Talking PI (AUP).

And today I interviewed National Poetry Day Coordinator, Siobhan Harvey, about events happening around the country next Friday–rather a lot as it happens. You can check out events in your area on the website, here.

But just in case you thought that was all that’s happening for National Poetry Day, the Tuesday Poem Blog (of which I am a member) will be featuring a special posting. The hub site will feature poems by all 3 Poetry finalists in the NZ Post Book Awards 2010: Bernadette Hall, Michael Harlow and Brian Turner, all on a theme of “New Zealand”. The contributing Tuesday Poets will also post a poem with “New Zealand” as the theme, although for those Tuesday Poets not from NZ poems may also be about the joys of poetry and the making of it. So be sure to drop by next Friday—as well as Tuesday—to check us out.

Christchurch Writers' Festival Programme

There’s been all sorts of good things arriving in the post this week—yup, that’s the good old “Her Majesty’s Mail”, not the electronic variety. Much more fun, because you get to open the book, and then the envelope or packaging, and discover the mysteries contained therein.

So what did lie therein this week?

On Monday I received my copy of The Press Christchurch Writers’ Festival programme—with my name in it three times: two for the events I’m in (Hot Off the Press and Speed Date A Writer; this last is for High School kids only).

Meet the Authors!

But I think the third time may have been best: my Australia/New Zealand publisher, Hachette, put in a

full page “Meet the Hachette Authors” feature—which I have to say, fully fits my definition of “fun stuff”.

—

But yesterday, I received another package in the post, this time with a copy of debut New Zealand author, Mary Victoria’s brand new, hot-off-the-press SFF novel, Tymon’s Flight (HarperCollins Voyager, Aus.)—which, by the way, has a fabulous cover designed (I believe) by her husband.  There’s a nice connection to WETA here (you know, Peter Jackson & The Lord of the Rings WETA Studios & Digital) as both Mary and her husband work for them. So the launch is—where else?—but you guessed it, at the WETA Cave on August 14. (Not many sleeps left now!) And I’ll be interviewing Mary for Women on Air (Plains 96.9 FM) on Saturday 19 August.

Definitely more fun stuff happening all round!

Matariki (Pleiades)

I’ve mentioned the Pleiades constellation several times in the last month or so because the traditional Maori New Year, Matariki—which is also the Maori name for the constellation—is celebrated when the Pleiades first rise into Southern Hemisphere skies, which happens around the time of the winter solstice. So Matariki, like the solstice, has recently been and gone, hence the whole mentioning thing …

… But as you may have gathered, I’m quite keen on stars and stuff anyway, so I got quite enthused when I popped over to Phil Plait’s Bad Astronomy website yesterday and saw that he had posted on—you’ve guessed it, the Pleiades. And there was this really cool photograph of

WISE_Pleiades Cloud

the constellation moving through a dense cloud of galactic dust and gas, which was taken by NASA’s Wide Field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE). Mr Plait had a whole lot more to say about the constellation and the galactic gas/dust cloud, but rather than my trying to paraphrase him (most likely badly) you should go over there and read it for yourself. I found it fascinating.

And just to let you know that the article I wrote on my reading for the Hugo Awards is currently up on the Out of this Eos blog—please do check it out! 🙂

The Influences on Story (2) blogpost giveaway is now closed and it has been great to get such interesting responses around place and the influence of land, city and planet scapes on our imaginations as writers and readers. So thank you everyone who read—and most particularly everyone who commented!

"The Heir of Night" Cover Flat

In terms of the giveaway of a signed cover flat of the US edition of The Heir of Night, which is out in the States, Australia and New Zealand in October (it’s March 2011 for the UK), the sorting hat has already sorted

The Sorting Hat

and the winner is:  Ripley Patton

Ripley posted about: “ … a 5 week tour of Alaska via the Inland Passage, mostly on various ferries, and it had a huge impact on me … [inlcuding] … two short stories … The Derby (short-listed for an SJV) and Traveling by Petroglyph.”

Congratulations Ripley—I will email you to arrange delivery.

The First Artist on Mars

Well, the first professional artist
There were scientists who, you know
dabbled
but NASA sent us —
me and two photographers —
to build support for the program.

The best day?
That was in Marineris.
Those canyons are huge
each wall a planet
turned on its side.
I did a power of painting there.

You can see all my work
at the opening. Do come.
Hey, they wanted me to paint propaganda —
you know, ‘our brave scientists at work’ —
but I told them
you’ll get nothing but the truth from me

I just paint what I see
and let others worry
what the public think.
Still, the agency can’t be too displeased.
They’re sponsoring my touring show.
That’s coming up next spring.

Would I go back? Don’t know.
It’s a hell of a distance
and my muscles almost got flabby
in the low G. Took me ages
to recover — lots of gym and water time
when I should have been painting.

But Jupiter would be worth the trip!
Those are awesome landscapes
those moons, each one’s so different.
Mars is OK — so old, so red,
so vertical. Quite a place
but limited, you know?

(c) Tim Jones

Tim writes:

“The First Artist On Mars” was first published in Blackmail Press 15 (May 2006) and was included in my second poetry collection, “All Blacks’ Kitchen Gardens”, where it forms part of a sequence about the exploration of Mars called “Red Stone”. That sequence was inspired by Kim Stanley Robinson’s superb Mars Trilogy, but this rather conceited artist is entirely my own invention.”

—

Helen writes:

Voyagers

Tim Jones is a fellow Tuesday Poem poet, as well as an editor and writer of speculative, literary and interstitial fiction.  In addition to The All Black’s Kitchen Garden, his short story collection, Transported, was published by Vintage in 2008 and longlisted for the 2008 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award. He is also the co-editor, with Mark Pirie, of Voyagers: Science Fiction Poetry from New Zealand (Interactive Publications, 2009). I initially encountered “The First Artist on Mars” in Voyagers and felt that the invention of Tim’s “rather conceited artist” was an excellent one—and yet the feeling for Mars as place still came through.

—

This thread to the poem, of course, fits with yesterday’s second instalment of my “Influences on Story” post series, in which the influence I looked at was landscape, in reality and on the imagination. If you check out the post, you’ll see that there’s also an opportunity, as writers, to comment on whether there are landscapes that have strongly influenced your work. Or you can comment as a reader re landscapes in fiction that you have either particularly enjoyed (as I enjoyed Mars in this poem) or felt shaped a work.

By way of extra encouragement, everyone who comments will go in the draw to win a signed cover flat of The Heir of Night. (The commentary and giveaway opportunity will run until 9 am Wednesday morning, NZ time.)

So do feel free, poets and poetry readers, to take a look and participate!

To read more Tuesday Poems go to the main site (or click on the Quill icon in the sidebar).

"The Heir of Night"

I’ve just had my first, public reader response to The Heir of Night—if you don’t count the wonderful cover quote from Robin Hobb—in this case from my fellow Tuesday Poem poet, Joanna Preston.

Joanna has posted her response to Heir on both her A Dark Feathered Art blog and also on Library Thing. Each post is a little different from the other, so you may like to check out both.

Of course, like every writer, I’m always thrilled when a reader likes my work—but in Joanna’s case she’s a pretty tough sell when it comes to the written word, so I’m doubly glad The Heir of Night cleared the bar!

—

Please note: I just had to add this post, but there’s also a commentary and giveway—of an Heir of Night cover flat—around the influence of landscape on creative writing that’s still running, under “Influences on Story (2)” immediately below.  Because tomorrow is Tuesday Poem day (where landscapes of Mars will feature) the commentary and giveaway opportunity will run until 9 am Wednesday morning, NZ time. So do check it out and participate. 🙂