sallymurphy.com.au

Sally Murphy, Australian author

Poetry Friday and a Celebration

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It’s Poetry Friday and I am running late with my post because life has been soooooo busy these past few weeks.  My day job is chaotic (mostly the good kind of chaotic, but busy none the less) and I have been off doing some real live author things.

Last week I was lucky enough to play a small part in the Between the Lines Literature Festival in Busselton, my neighbouring town. There were some big name authors, including the amazing Bren Macdibble, Will Kostakis, Holden Shepherd and Craig Silvey,  and I got to hang out with them and also speak to some wonderful audiences about Worse Things. I am still waiting for an official photo, but here’s a pic of the pile of books I signed.

Do you like my new signing pen, thematically tied to the book?

This was my first festival since before Covid, so very exciting to talk to real live audiences, and chat to enthusiastic young readers and writers.

Then  this week I was extra lucky to visit Majella Catholic Primary School in Perth, where I was a Role Model invited to a book giving ceremony as part of the wonderful Books In Homes Program, where children are presented with packs of books three times per year to take home and read and keep and love. An excellent program and a lovely, warm-hearted school, with a real sense of community. 

Here I am with some of the lovely, and very excited, recipients of those books.

Also this week some amazing news. Worse Things was announced on the shortlist of the Children’s Book Council of Australia (CBCA) Book of the Year Awards. As you can see, it is on he list with some amazing company:

You can see the full shortlist here.

So much to celebrate, and I was glad there was a bottle of champagne in my fridge.

The biggest joy for me was how happy to so many people are for me and for the book. I spent a whole evening reading and replying to messages on social media and via email, and there were phonecalls and real life congratulations too. So much shared joy.

This joy is for me the biggest pleasure of such a shortlist, though the sticker is wonderful too – doesn’t it look pretty?

Even more exciting that the sticker is the fact that this means the book will be read and discussed for the next five months until Children’s Book Week. I love it when my books end up in the hands (and hopefully hearts) of young readers.

SO, with all this business (and more I haven’t even touched on), I wasn’t sure I had a poem to post this week, but I visited Mary Lee’s blog, because she is hosting today’s round up, and was reminded that sometimes a haiku is more than adequate. So, here’s a haiku for you

You came to my blog

looking for a poem, so

this one is for you.

(Sally Murphy, 2021)

And here’s another, for the happiness I’m feeling

A pop of champagne

bubbles of joy effervesce

Celebrating good news.

(Sally Murphy, 2021)

The Poetry Friday Roundup is, as I said, being hosted by the wonderful Mary Lee. Pop over there to see what other poetry goodness is on offer this week.

 

A New Diary

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Yesterday I bought myself a new, funky diary for the new year which is rapidly approaching.

My next goal is to fill it up with lots of school visits and festivals and lunches and writing workshops and poetry performances. Basically,  I want to spend lots of time in 2017 talking. As you can see from this photo:

I don't dress like this every day - but sometimes dressing up helps me feel authorly.

I don’t dress like this every day – but sometimes dressing up helps me feel authorly.

 

And this one:

Sally Murphy

Without an editor, I might still be throwing my hands in the air!

And even this one:

gesture2

I love getting out and about talking about my books, answering questions, and speaking to audiences big and small, young and not-so young.  So if you’d like me to visit your school, library, writers group, festival, luncheon or anything else you can think of in 2017 (or beyond), now’s the time to get in touch.

 

Pay Up: Why Authors Should be Paid to Speak (Part 2)

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Speaking at Celebrate Reading at the wonderful Lit Centre, which always pays ASA Rates.

Speaking at Celebrate Reading at the wonderful Lit Centre, which always pays ASA Rates.

Yesterday I spoke about the reasons authors should be paid to speak. I spoke about why it was important for the authors to be paid, but I didn’t talk about what was in it for the people paying the authors – the festivals , schools and libraries who I’m saying should be paying authors for their time. So, here we go with why it makes sense to pay authors to speak:

  1. We entertain (and inform) audiences. The very popularity of literary festivals vouches for the fact that people want to meet and see and hear authors speak about their work, about life, about all kinds of things.
  2. When we are paid, we are more likely to go the extra mile. It makes sense, doesn’t it? If authors are being paid for their time, then they are likely to see presenting as a job, and therefor prepare well, and give generously of that time.
  3. Literary festivals, school author visits, library talks, dinner speeches etc etc all promote literacy and reading. In the case of children’s authors, this link is hopefully obvious – hearing from a real live author encourages children to read not just that author’s books, but more (and hopefully more and more). But this works for adults too. Hearing a good speaker read from and talk about a book leads people to read more.
  4. The hour long presentation is the culmination of many hours’ work. Although most festival and school sessions are an hour or less (with the exception of workshops), the fee paid to the speaker takes into account the amount of time that goes into preparing for the session as well as the years spent honing the skills used to write the book and develop speaking skills.
  5. Authors promote the festivals/events they speak at. Most authors use social media (Facebook, Twitter, blogs, websites) to spread the word about their appearances, drawing audience members, and spreading the word for future festivals. They also talk among themselves. A good festival experience will be shared with fellow authors socially. I have a wish list of festivals I’d love to attend based on their treatment of author friends. Payment is one part of this experience.

If you are running an event in Australia arnd are not sure what you should be paying, the Australian Society of Authors (ASA) has a detailed list of rates, which should be a great starting point.  And, if you are an author, I encourage you to charge properly for your time.  Again, thanks Philip Pullman for bringing this issue to the fore.

 

 

Pay Up: Why Authors Need to be Paid to Speak (Part 1)

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PWF12 gesticulating

Speaking at the Perth Writers Festival, which pays ASA Rates. Hooray!

This week author Philip Pullman has been in the news for pulling his support of the Oxford Literary festival because it does not pay authors to appear there. Bravo Mr Pullman! The news that other prominent UK based authors have signed an open letter calling on authors to boycott literary festivals which do not pay has kept the topic in the spotlight. I thought I might devote some blog time to examining this issue from the Australian perspective .

Though in my experience most festivals here in Australia pay, and pay the recommended ASA Rates, I don’t know any author who has not, on numerous occasions, been asked to speak at a school, festival, library or other event for free. It’s happened to me more times than I can count.

There are two main arguments put forward for speaking for free. Firstly: standing up in front of an audience is great for promotion. People will hear you speaking and go and buy your book.

Let’s look at that for a moment. An audience might range from a few people to a few hundred people. Let’s assume I speak to a group of 100 people. And let’s say I am absolutely riveting in my presentation, which inspires all hundred of those people to buy one of my books. Should they each buy a $20 book, sales will come to $2000. A tidy sum for my hour’s work? Maybe, except of that $2000 my royalty cut, at 10%, is $200. That’s if the book is not illustrated (which most of mine are) , in which case my royalties are 5%, so $100. Which I’ll receive up to six months later, because royalties are paid twice yearly. Of course, a bigger audience might mean more sales, but the reality is that it is highly unlikely that every audience member will buy a book, especially at a festival, where there are numerous authors presenting, because attendees will need to make purchasing decisions based on budgets and the strength of their book-carrying backs.

Of course, promotion isn’t all about book sales on the day. Making a name for myself might lead to sales of future books, as well as future sales of my backlist (once they read one book, they’ll want to hunt them all out, right?) In my wildest dreams all 100 of those people might go and buy all 10 of the trade books I have in print – resulting in $20000 sales, and $1000 royalties. Over weeks, months or even years.

The second argument for speaking for free is about budgets. If festivals (or schools, or libraries, or whatever) paid authors to speak, then they couldn’t afford to hold the event. And of course we all want to encourage reading through such events, don’t we? Yes, we do. But this argument doesn’t hold up unless everyone else who works at the festival is also working for free. The program manager. The venue staff. The sound/lighting people. The printer of the programs. The catering staff. If these people – who all do important jobs – are getting paid, why not pay the talent? The people standing up front who are, after all, the ones that the audience is coming for, are entitled to be compensated for their time. Because if there are no speakers, there is no festival.

I said there were two main arguments given for not paying authors but there is a third, unspoken one: the implication that authors don’t need the money. Because we’re all rich. Right – if earning $12, 900 a year makes us rich. That’s right – the average Australian author’s income is less than $13 thousand a year. So that fee for speaking is much-valued income which gives us a little bit more time to write. When we speak for free we not only miss out on that payment, but we are also taken away from either writing, or from a day job which enables us to eat – because authors, just like every all humans , like to eat, and pay bills and so on.

So, thank you again Mr Pullman for standing up for authors. Thanks too to the many festivals and schools and libraries across Australia who pay authors properly. And thank you to the ASA who fight for the rights and conditions which Australian authors enjoy.

This post has focussed on why the authors need to be paid. Tomorrow, I’ll look at what’s in it for the festivals. .

Voices on the Coast

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Last week I was lucky enough to be part of the Voices on the Coast Festival over on the Sunshine Coast. This awesome event is run by Immanuel Lutheran College with the support of the university of the Sunshine Coast, and sees thousands of young people attend dozens of sessions with authors and illustrators from around Australia.  This was my first time there and I’m hoping it won’t be last. Such a wonderful atmosphere. Such wonderful organisation. And such wonderful young audiences.

 

Highlights for me:

1. The kids. My audiences ranged from year 5 through to year 12, and all were attentive, asked thoughtful questions and (perhaps best of all) laughed at my jokes.

2. Running the same writing workshop – titled You CAN Write Poetry – three times in two days and it being different every time.  Each group of students was different, and I found that this lead to us doing different exercises, and to different things being produced. What was consistent was the enthusiasm of the kids. Everyone left each workshop having written something wonderful.

3. Being looked after by the gorgeous Kelly and her ever-enthusiastic team of helpers. Running a festival like that is a massive task, but Kelly does it so that everything  runs really smoothly and, as a presenter, I felt so very appreciated.

4. A shared session with Sue Lawson, a fellow author who I’d never met in real life before. That didn’t stop us becoming instant friends, and chatting with our audience as if we’d known each other for years. (Not only that, but we shared an apartment at the hotel, too, and chatted for hours every night. ) Sharing a session meant that we could really delve into each other’s thought processes and experiences, and the audience got to see how we were both different but similar.

5. The friends old and new among the other presenters. Writing can be a very solitary pursuit, especially when you live in a rural area. So meeting up with a bunch of other creative types and sharing the journey is always a delight. Some I’d met before, and others I hadn’t, but each one soon felt like an old friend. One of the volunteers at the festival asked if we saw each other as competitors, and I laughed (politely). Maybe sometimes our books compete for attention, but I see my peers as just that – peers – and fellow survivors of this mad, crazy, amazing business.  Spending time with them is an absolute delight.

As always seems to be the case I arrived home exhausted, and still seem to be playing catch up, but I loved every moment.

 

 

Shoes

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Nothing to do with writing, but last night I discovered I have a shoe fetish. Not for buying shoes (though that’s fun, too) or wearing shoes (though that’s necessary), but for the smell of good leather shoes.

I went to a shoe party (like a Tupperware party, but with shoes) and, as the shoes were passed around for us all to admire (and they were beautiful, good quality shoes) I found myself holding each one up to my nose and breathing deeply. That rich leathery scent of new shoes is divine! Of course my friends all thought I was crazy – but they already did, anyway.

So I had a scent-full night and came home with a lighter wallet. I fell in love with two pairs of boots, each very different, and decided I could justify getting both.

The brown pair are comfortable and semi-dressy, so I could wear them out or to work.

The red pair (yes, red) are sensible bots with elastic sides, like a pair of work boots. But I got to choose the colour – and I chose red. They’ll be great for school visits and such and will sit proudly in my wardrobe alongside the purple shoes I ordered last year.

Now for the writing-related bit. My number one piece advice to writers attending literary festivals and the like is to wear sensible shoes. They can be purple or red if you so choose, but do remember that you are likely to spend large parts of your day on your feet, and if they start aching, you cease to enjoy yourself.

If you are going to a conference, please do your feet a favour and pack your sensible shoes. You’ll be glad you did.

sallymurphy.com.au