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Of radio shows, and reference to sheep sphincters

Has been a fiendish few days, and I've finally worked out why. Let's put it this way: I've been shouting at my kids more than usual and craving chocolate. Ladies, you know what I'm getting at. So I've been unwinding by You Tube-ing daggy old music clips. For those of you in the US, who may be not au fait with the term 'daggy', it's an Australian colloquialism referring to things that are uncool, or perhaps cheesy. The noun is 'dag'. A 'dag' is also the dried excrement adhering to the wool around a sheep's sphincter. It's sheep's sphincters that often get Aussie farmers into trouble.

I had some good news the other day. Nothing's definite, but a radio show is going to be broadcasting in my area soon, and one of the people involved asked could he give the producer/presenters my email because I'm involved in a theatre project, and launching a new novel soon. I said go to for it; I need every bit of publicity I can scrounge up. And referring to the aforementioned term, I've been acting like a bit of a 'dag' by imagining what sort of questions she will ask me on air. I said to my husband today that I don't want to be artificial and arty-farty because people have a better built in bullshit detector than the general populace will give credit for. So I probably won't say I thought it important to tackle the issue of high school bullying, and feelings of disenfranchisement. I could just say, 'I want to sell millions of copies of my book to pay my mortgage and feed my children.' Admittedly, I did want to explore writing in the genre of Young Adult as opposed to my usual adult fiction. I also thought having a talking beagle would be an interesting twist. The titular character 'Abernethy' is a beagle with the power of speech in relation to special people, like my protagonist. Yeah, I think I'd rather some honesty, if I was listening. That's not to say bullying and loneliness are frivolous issues, of course.

I think there's often an element if not laziness, then the Easy Way Out, when it comes to your scenarios as a writer. In 'Abernethy', my protagonist Billy's father is in prison for a white collar crime, awaiting his appeal to the Court of Criminal Appeal. I did not choose this because I am the daughter of a lag. God, no. I just happen to have a strong legal background, so I knew what I was looking at. Also, Billy goes in his school play. I happen to be a bit of a ham myself. It's the old thing, isn't it? Write what you know.

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