… where I tell you I’ve been busy.

And where I use the cunning technique of splitting the first sentence in order to form a pointlessly catchy title for the post. A title that tells you nothing much at all. A title that if it tells you anything, tells you that this is going to be one of those shapeless, formless catch-up posts that people who are fond of articles with titles like “Ten Top Tips For Terrific Blogging” are so appalled by.

So I’ve been busy – busy being hard on myself for not having finished the novel I began so-called ‘fast-drafting’ at the beginning of the year. Apparently for me, fast drafting means an average of about 12.6 words a day. Which are then thrown out the next day, to be replaced by 12.6 possibly better ones.

But then I’ve been busy remembering that I have three books coming out in the US this year (No Bears, Duck for a Day, and Surface Tension, now known as Below, about which I shall write a vastly more terrific post at a later date), and two in Australia (Ten Tiny Things, Wreck the Halls, about which, terrific-ness, also later). And that I have in fact been occupied rewriting and copy-editing and proofreading and visiting schools and libraries and conferences and answering interview questions and doing promotional stuff here and there and everywhere and the many, many other bits and pieces associated with what it means to have five books coming out in the same year.

So there’s that. And also all the other things. There is news, and quite a bit of it, but perhaps I will drip feed that to you over a series of posts, rather than cramming it all in here. I am not sure if the “Top Tips” folk would be happy or appalled by that sentence.

For now, some quick links, before I retire to my cave to eke (I love when people misspell this as ‘eek’) out today’s 12.6 words:
12 Curly Questions: in which I try and fail to sound not at all like a curmudgeon

The Ten Tiny Things Blog: a place for secret somethings and hidden happenings. We’ve been getting some gorgeous submissions from small (and not-so-small) people. Why not send us yours?

Ten Tiny Things on Vimeo: a video made by illustrator extraordinaire, Kyle Hughes-Odgers

Tony Bones’ Stage Adaptation of No Bears: These guys did an amazing job of Duck for a Day last year and early reports are that No Bears is following suit. If you’re a school or library on the east coast of Australia, this is well worth checking out.

Notes From the SCBWI 2012 Conference: an event I attended recently, at which I may have been heard to utter the phrases, “I don’t even like people that much”, “I will be over here in the corner”, and “I think I need some air.” I also managed to avoid getting into too many photos, though there is one of me here, apparently saying something like Stellaaaaa!

There were many highlights from this conference, but as a collector of odd fragments, I think my favourites were: