April is the coolest month!

Actually, April's kind of a slog, I have to say. Brilliant autumn days that I mostly can't go out in, except to the dayjob.

Here I am on the third day of my Easter-weekend all-but-final-assault on the novel revisions. Have had one ordinary day, one good day and one very faffy morning. You, dear blog readers, are being faffed at right now. I am boring (yes, that's the operative word) through to the end-of-April deadline, and I think I will make it. I can't imagine what that will feel like; pretty much like not-having-an-albatross-around-my-neck, I expect.

Pre-deadline upcoming wonderfulness includes the Vogel party. We are awarding the 30th Australian/Vogel's literary award to a writer whose name will only be revealed on Wednesday night, but the book will be available right away, having been through the editorial/publication process since we decided on our winner last August. This is going to be a Big Bash, with Fancy Guests from all over to celebrate 30 years of Vogelicious literature.

Post-deadline wonderfulness of course is all about flying away, away, with an absolutely jampacked-with-work three weeks in between the two trips.

So I promise to get interesting soon. But for the moment it's all just scribble-scribble-scribble, sit and think, then scribble some more.

So why don't you go and look at this wiggly dancing by Lil Buck and Yo Yo Ma (via @Gwenda)?

UPDATE: The Australian/Vogel shortlistees are published in the Australian today. They are: Jade Maitre, for A Short Death, Rohan Wilson, for The Roving Party, and Romy Ash for Floundering. *zips lips, waits for Wednesday*

Also,

the zombies won. Less said the better about that, don't you think?

'...the pleasure of storytelling is palpable.'

So says Delia Falconer in the Australian this morning, of Yellowcake.

...the overwhelming strength of Lanagan's writing is its pungent physicality. Like good animation, these stories are feats of magical imagining that live through their precise feel for objects' movement and weight. In 'Night of the Firstlings'...the mephitic wind that kills the unprotected first-born brings death with all its terror and smells, while the Red Sea parts to reveal an uneven and terrifyingly naked ocean floor.

That's nice, eh?

I'm up to my ears re-revising the selkie novel at the moment, so haven't got a lot to say—except, hey, writing is hard, but fun, but maddening, but so satisfying when it's going well (as it sometimes is). I will come up for air in May to go to New Zealand, and preparations are also in train for the Clarion West trip in June and July.

I hope you're all sleeping well, eating lots of fresh food, and finding plenty of good reading, online and elsewhere.