July, 2005

Barbie Is The Enemy Now

If you want to know why there has been a six month hiatus in these updates, blame my lovely webmistress. Brig gave birth to the gorgeous Ronan and although women really are easily capable of returning to their work in the fields just a few hours post-natal, she would have probably demanded some kind of maternity leave. She gives me such a hard time, that woman. But we're back, and welcome Ronan to the Great Mystery!

It catapaults me back to when Ella and Joe were born. After I'd recovered from the discovery that babies are sort of purple with pointed heads when they first pop out, and after I'd wiped away my completely oafish tears, we whisked Ella straight back from hospital and laid her down in our bed. To see this tiny, tiny human being in the middle of this infinite bed - this ship of life - just made me laugh uncontr ollably. I'd spent a sleepless night at the hospital and the joy, sleep deprivation and free samples of gas 'n' air were making a circus clown out of me: weeping and laughing: a peasant; a mad person; someone who can't apprehend that what's happening has happened to millions of people before, and doesn't want to.

And now Ella is almost nine. Uh? Surely some mistake? Now she can swim further than I can, executes perfect cartwheels on the lawn and is demanding that I order the latest Harry Potter, which with gritted teeth I suppose I will. In the usual frantic scramble for school the other morning I was helping her find some clean clothes, whereupon I produced a smart pair of jeans and asked her would they do. Cross to a vampire! "Can't you see what's on the pocket?" she hissed at me. There was a scrap of embroidery, nothing else, so what? "Just look at it!" she bellowed. I looked at the embroidery. It read Barbie, and there was some kind of logo there, too. Some kind of hateful logo. Oh, and pink. Nothing Pink Shall Enter Here: it should be inscribed on her door. Pink is a... err... red rag to a... she-bull. Oh, bad writing day.

Then I went on my own shopping expedition for clothes, always a woeful outing. Minatory and depressing. Shopping sucks. Malls make me ill. I'd rather French-kiss a live piranha than go shopping. But eventually the old favoured threads start falling off you, they do. So there I was trying on a jacket. Not yet nine and she actually laughs in my face! "You can't wear that. Don't be ridiculous."

What I'm saying is that last time I blinked she was that tiny thing in that boundless bed and I was, for reasons I've never understood, laughing like a drain at her. How is this happening so fast? Are you listening Brig? Oh, but it gets better and better and better.

Enough of that. Writing things, and some news regarding The Tooth Fairy: The Movie. I'm thrilled to announce that I have contracted with Nick Brandt to adapt the novel. Yes, again. Nick is a fabulously talented director and highly accomplished photographer. He is also well-known for some of his music videos for people like Michael Jackson, Moby, Badly Drawn Boy and others. Nick is passionately committed to the original novel: at the moment I'm the one arguing for necessary changes, not him. In marked contrast to my last experience with this "property" as it's called in movie terms, we both want it to include the eponymous Tooth Fairy. How radical of us! To keep the main character of the story! I know, we're just so avant-garde! Anyway, we also want it set in England. I'm already working on the first draft. More news as things develop.

My young adult novel TWOC had just been published by Faber (with a special collector's edition from PS Publishing). The question is will it cut any ice with teen-readers. We'll see, but in the meantime I'm half way through a second YA novel for Faber and for Viking (who will also be publishing TWOC in the US). I'm hopeful that it will prove to be a cross-over novel, in that it will also appeal to an adult audience. Though it's a lighter, funnier read I certainly didn't tone it down or dumb it down. Anyway, the Guardian gave it a good review last week in its summer round up; and more importantly Ros Hanson, my friends' hip, "attitude" and beautiful teenage daughter (who has just landed an acting part in a big forthcoming movie) has read it and says it's very cool, so that's it then.

I've just completed a duty serving as a judge on the SF Foundation's Essay competition. There were some superb entries. Most of them were academic essays and while the intelligent insight into genre fiction was impressive, some of the language was not. Since the development of Literary Theory in book discourse, the academic literary world has got itself into a dreadful state. Some of the concepts of Theory are necessarily complex and employ the language of sociology, which is inevitable; and this has resulted in some of the most shocking violations of the English language ever perpetrated, all in the name of scholarship. The less confident the writing, the more it retreats into difficult sentence construction. Lucidity and elegance seem to count for nothing. I wish someone send us a saviour! would do something about it, but it's a runaway train. At least I'm pleased to say all three judges settled instantly on the well-written winning essay.

How's the horse riding coming along, Graham? Oh, great. Got bit on the writing hand. Got thrown off on a jump. Traumatised a testicle on a rising trot. Love it. Actually, getting bitten by a horse is interesting. The stable girl was tightening the girth so the thing bit me (I was the one holding its reins). In one way horses are a mysterious and magnificent compression of huge amounts of nerve and muscle, very sensitive; in another way they are plain stupid. Anyway, if a horse bites, you have three seconds to hit back, and you must. After that they don't know what they're being punished for. So, remembering this fact when it bit me, I delivered a swift, hard uppercut to its jaw. Then I eyeballed it to show it who was boss. We had a clear understanding. I got on, rode it round for ten minutes, took a jump and it threw me off. This boss thing: we're still in dispute.

Forthcoming appearances. Lowdham Book festival on July 12. Then I will be at the Worldcon in Glasgow August 5-7. After that Iim Guest Of Honour at World Fantasy Convention in Madison Wisconsin Nov 3-6. Then I'm MC at the British Fantasy Convention Sept 30-Oct 2 in Walsall. Come and say hello at one of those: I'll show you the horsebite on my hand. Right that's it. Me 'n' Ella are off to decapitate some dolls.

Graham Joyce can be contacted by emailing graham@grahamjoyce.net