My major accomplishment today has been to write a quarterly planner for writing projects. It might not sound like much but it has made me feel better directed and more motivated already. I don’t really go in for those inspirational sayings: Fail to plan, and you plan to fail, and all that gumpf. But the … More Quarterly planner templates for writers
Ann Patchett is the kind of novelist we’d all like to be – successful, award-winning, a nice person by all accounts, and she writes a bloody good book. I read Commonwealth last year with no expectations, and found myself engrossed in a family saga. Well here’s another one – The Dutch House, every bit as … More The Dutch House by Ann Patchett – book review
If your short stories consistently fail to hit the mark in competitions, it may be that the writing is falling into the common traps. This is what I found when I was a judge in the Tasmanian Short Story competition, which attracts entries from all over Australia. In a recent post we looked at how … More Four Tips on Writing a Short Story
Unbelievably, it’s fifteen years since we took the plunge and moved to Tasmania. We loved it from the moment we got here and haven’t looked back. Here are eight things we’ve loved the best. Gained a Sense of Space We’ve got five acres. That sounded huge when we first got here, but now we realise … More Eight things we’ve done since moving to Tasmania
Do your short stories consistently fail to hit the mark in competitions? When judging the Tasmanian Short Story competition, I found that many entries fell into the same classic traps, falling short of the mark and sending them to the bottom of the slush pile immediately. Here are my two top tips on how to … More How to begin a short story
Years ago, I saw a picture of Richard Burton sitting on a sunlit step at his house in Switzerland, reading. There was none of the posing of Insta-friendly celeb photos. He wore a warm, soft, creamy cardigan and his attitude was one of complete absorption in the book held loosely in one hand. Alongside that … More How Richard Burton made me want a library of my own
I wanted to do something a little different. We were asked to write a short piece introducing ourselves, for the second unit in my Masters of Creative Writing with Deakin University. So I ‘rang Martin Amis’ and had him interview me as we stood on the rooftops, he in Paris in the 1970s, and myself … More Martin Amis helps you get to know me
There are two points of the year when authors sink into a funk, and that’s March and October when we’re paid. Did you know that writers receive approximately ten percent of the Recommended Retail Price of their book? After publishers take off the costs of production, printing, distribution and marketing and a bit of cream … More The Constant Hustle of Publishing
It’s hard writing a book and even harder marketing one. If you’ve got paperbacks or hard copies out there in bookshops or online, well done. You’ve probably been on a long slog to get to that point. It’s hard work selling books as well and you have to feel for bricks and mortar booksellers. They’re … More On the Shelf
We’re at home today with one child, two from tomorrow. Obviously English is one subject I feel a bit qualified to help mine with. So here’s the first assignment I’m setting my year eleven daughter. It’s based on the film Love Actually, which we’ve watched a few times recently in an effort to keep cheerful. … More Home schooling questions on the film 'Love Actually'
I’ve been on Instagram for a couple of years and posted all sorts of stuff: pics from my farm, food I’ve eaten, and ‘Author Shots’ – a series in which I recreate shots of great writers using myself as… err… the model. But lately I’ve focused my account more on what I love – books … More How to do Instagram if you’re an author or writer
The seventh best chef in the world is in need of a smoke. Alex Atala’s restaurant DOM in Sao Paolo has occupied a doughty spot in the World’s Best list for fifteen years. Now he’s come to Tasmania as the last guest in the 2018 Great Chefs Series, which sees international names working with students … More Shooting Star: Alex Atala does Tasmania
Just before she appeared in The Times and the Daily Mail, I asked best selling self-published author Nicola May if she’d do a Q&A for my blog – on what makes a best seller – both in the writing and the marketing of a book. Nicola is a lovely lady who can be found sharing … More Q&A with Nicola May – what makes a best seller
Bill Bryson doesn’t need reviews, but I write in the same genre, travel memoir, and sometimes my book has nestled thrillingly alongside his in the online booksellers categories (a very comfortable spot, thank you). Reading him again has been a reinvigorating experience, which I daresay he’d be quietly pleased to know. Bryson’s cleverness lies in … More Little Dribbling review
Books are the best gift. Always welcome, often surprising, long-lasting and enriching. I love to give books as gifts, so I’ve gone through my book shelves and chosen a few that would make great gifts for Father’s Day. There’s something for everyone here – whether the man you’re giving to is into health, travel, business, … More Father’s Day Gift Books
This post is mostly for authors – a look at that great and ongoing mystery, how the bloody hell you market a book. You’ve written it, you’ve had it published, held it in your hands and it’s real. Congratulations! But that was the easy bit. Now comes the real challenge – getting the bloody thing … More Marketing Your Book
There are great places to eat and drink in the Tamar Valley – if you know where to look. In a recent feature article in a national newspaper, a prominent chef shared his pick of the Tamar – including places on the central north coast. Bizarre. Below are the places we like to go, and … More Where to eat in the Tamar Valley, Tasmania
Last year when my book was in the final stages of edit, three men in my writers’ group told me they would not buy it because it had the word ‘wife’ in the title. To put their remarks in context, we were having a discussion about the title, and whether I should change it. An old … More Do women and men choose books differently?
Chosen with care and a canny feel for what a person enjoys reading, a book is a great gift for Mother’s Day – or any other day and any of the special peeps in your life. I lean towards British writers rather than Australian and I hadn’t really considered how many Australian female writers I … More Books to gift for Mother’s Day Australia
Are you writing a memoir? Who do you think you are anyway! If you’re not a football player, a celebrity blogger, an ex-politician, comedian or actor, why would people be interested? Plenty of reasons. Memoir and autobiography are a perpetually popular genre. People love getting an insight into other people’s lives, whether they’re famous, unusual, … More How to write memoir
I’ve read a lot of literary fiction and commercial fiction in my reading life, and there’s a constant narrative in my head about the relative merits of the two, and whether there should even be a distinction. I’ve just read Marian Keyes’ latest novel The Break and wrote a review of it for Goodreads, and … More Marian Keyes versus Colm Toibin
If I have one goal in life it’s to appear on the legendary BBC Radio 4 program Desert Island Discs. For fifty years, the Beeb has been casting celebs and other notables away to a hypothetical desert island, on a weekly basis. As aids to survival, they must choose the eight music tracks they will … More The Hot Seat on City Park Launceston
It’s been a turbulent week. Oliver, my Other Half, always says you have to take the rough with the smooth, or as he puts it, the “ultra-smoove”. Once an Essex boy, always an Essex boy. On the upside, Apple Island Wife, the book, the birth, the long-awaited tome, is designed, blurbed, raising its head above … More Launch day for Apple Island Wife!
Describing a restaurant as a safe pair of hands is a damp squib of a compliment if ever there was one. So much better to liken it to the kind of friend it would be, or better still, what kind of lover. If The Gorge Restaurant in Launceston were a swain, it would be worth swooning … More The Gorge Restaurant Launceston: review
Early this year I had one of those ‘oh shit’ moments which I’ve since learned is commonplace in a freelance writer’s life, when you realise that you haven’t actually got any work. Writing a book is quite an undertaking and since late last year I had been working with my publisher on the structural edit … More Writing life and the side hustle
During the long silence, I have not been kicking back on an eastern shore with a plate of oysters (only for a week in the summer). No, I’ve been channelling Dalton Trumbo and hard at work, as pictured, on the structural edit of my book, Apple Island Wife. Just before Christmas, the manuscript went off to … More Apple Island Wife goes to edit
Imagine having a member of staff within your household dedicated to keeping the wine cellar stocked, the laundry fresh, vehicles fuelled and faux pas in etiquette and appearance to a minimum. One could breeze through life with considerably more ease. Not many are in a position to avail themselve of such an individual these days. … More What the Butler Saw
To mark the occasion of being fully funded for publication, author Fiona Stocker met with Martin Amis, literary genius and tennis player of some note, who joined her from a rooftop in Paris in 1980. Here’s what he had to say. FS: “Thanks for joining us, Martin. What are your thoughts on the status of … More Celebratory interview with Martin Amis
So next year, I’m publishing a travel writing memoir with independent UK publisher Unbound, the world’s first crowdfunding publisher. Here’s the latest update from my campaign page on the Unbound website, about how the crowdfunding is going. In a nutshell, almost there!! The book is 90% funded. I have a couple more conversations and … More Crowdfunding with Unbound
I’m a creature of habit, when I’m writing and when I’m not. Every day I have the same breakfast, the same snacks, and morning coffee at the same time. No thinking is required, it’s fuel. My new snack of choice is Vegan Bliss Balls. They’re nutty and sugar free, as required by my doctor. Sometimes … More What food in fiction
Something unexpected has happened – my husband has turned out to be right. This may sound like a trifling event, and it’s only about smoking sausages, but for Oliver to be wholly right and me wholly wrong is unprecedented and has never happened in the course of our marriage. We agreed many years ago that I … More My Smoking Hot Husband
As a writer, it’s lovely to get onto the radio and be able to talk about your book. It helps bring it alive – not just for readers and listeners, but for the author as well! Time passes between writing a book and getting it published, and very often you forget what you’ve written! So much so that … More Interview on Launceston’s City Park Radio
Author Fiona Stocker today won the approval of her livestock for her tales of rural living. ‘She knows great literature when she hears it, that pig,’ said Stocker, pictured on her ranch with Bettina, the Berkshire sow. ‘I don’t know what she’s on about,’ Bettina was quoted as saying later. ‘I only came out of … More Crowdfunding Apple Island Wife
Mr Cumberbatch and I have many things in common. We like a drink at four o’clock. We support our local newspapers and admire good journalism (although I probably wouldn’t choose either of the examples pictured here as my top choice). And we support the arts. He’s got better legs than me, I’ll give him that, … More Learning how to do crowdfunding
There’s a tradition where I live in rural Tasmania of swapping foodstuffs. It’s an edible black market, dealing in things from the river, the land and the larder. Over the years we’ve dealt in eggs, pork, salmon, venison, wallaby patties, Riesling and sausages. We once gained half a lamb when our retired sheepdog help round … More How to Cook a Pheasant.
To ready myself for best seller status, I’ve taken inspiration from Jilly Cooper, whose success and property portfolio in the Cotswolds I aspire to. I had that tooth removed specially. Turns out crowdfunding a book is every bit as much of a ride as one of Jilly’s polo novels! Elation one minute, doldrums the next … More The crowdfunding roller coaster
River Cottage Australia keeps popping up on my TV. Every time, I marvel that it’s yet another bloke on our screens wondering in the delight of putting his hand underneath a hen and drawing out a warm egg. Where are all the women, I wonder? Do program makers really think it’s just blokes moving to … More The Wife’s Tale
It was freezing in Tasmania last week. Determined to be warm not cold, I channelled Roadl Dahl and took to my bed with the electric blanket set on ‘toast’ and my work balanced on a tray before me. Ah, the writing life. The rest of the house is normally warm but this was a … More In Bed With Roald Dahl
Tuesday was quite a big day for me. I signed a contract with Unbound, a crowdfunding and publishing phenomenon who have changed the face of publishing in the UK. As long as I meet my crowdfunding target they will publish Apple Island Wife – one woman’s adventures on five acres in Tasmania, in digital and … More Apple Island Wife to publish with Unbound
Somebody asked me last night whether I’d be better off stacking shelves at Coles than I am running a small farm and food business with my husband and writing on the side. Luckily he was a charming person so I didn’t mind being asked. I have no idea what you’d make stacking shelves at Coles. … More Sprout Tasmania Dinner at Stillwater Restaurant
I’m definitely going off a bit early here, but I’ve done two things today which promise excitement. Then again, they could be complete fizzers. This morning I booked a trip to Sydney for my family. And this afternoon I submitted the manuscript of Apple Island Wife to Unbound, with the plan for a crowdfunding campaign. … More Exciting news comes in twos
Blow me down if I wasn’t asked to be one of the judges for this year’s Tasmanian Writers’ Competition for short stories. The competition is run by the lovely people at Tasmania Forty South, with an ‘island’ theme. An anthology of the best entries is launched at the Hobart Writers’ Festival in the years when … More Tasmanian Short Story Writers’ Competition 2017
Warning: long blog post with the prospect of middle aged people getting a bit frisky towards the end. Use caution. It’s not often that my Other Half and I find ourselves sans enfant for the evening . So when visiting relatives kindly took our two away overnight during the school holidays, we wanted to mark … More Geronimo Aperitivo Bar & Restaurant for dinner
Butter’s not what it used to be, many people would agree. Olivia Morrison wanted to bring back the true taste of butter that people used to enjoy, when families made their own butter at home. They’d collect the cream from the milk over the course of a few days and as it sat, natural cultures … More Tasmanian Butter Co – the real deal
Not many in rural Tasmania dine in 3-star Michelin style very often, but we had the chance to do so last week, when legendary chef Alain Passard visited our island and created three spectacular dining events, at Josef Chromy Winery, Peacock and Jones Hobart, and Drysdale, the restaurant of TasTAFE in Launceston. In these celebrity … More Michelin starred chef Alain Passard cooks at Peacock and Jones
My only source of knowledge about polo, prior to visiting The Creech in Tasmania, is the Jilly Cooper novels I’ve read. The impression I have from those is that people who play polo are usually Argentinian, born into landed gentry, or live in the English Cotswolds. I’m not qualified in any sense, then. But I’m still … More Day Trip with Tasmanian Farming Women
“How do you turn this thing on?” Dan Hong asks as he swings the handle of a wok burner to and fro in TasTAFE’s impressive catering kitchens. We’re here to talk about the Great Chefs Series, the initiative which, well, does what it says on the tin – it brings great chefs to Launceston’s Drysdale campus … More Sydney Chef Dan Hong visits Launceston for the Great Chefs Series
Being a woman and a winemaker can be a useful point of difference, says Fran Austin, owner and winemaker at Delamere Vineyards in partnership with husband Shane Holloway. While some people are cynical about it, she and many other women in the industry accept that it can generate marketing. The Fabulous Women in Wine Society … More Women in Wine
