The Other Scarlett

For The Lumière Reader, originally published May 2013.

An interview with English novelist and Auckland Writers & Readers Festival guest Scarlett Thomas.

“A DELIGHT, not least for the quality of Scarlett Thomas’s writing,” Philip Pullman described Scarlett Thomas’s Our Tragic Universe, “Full of life and energy.” In 2011 Thomas was on the Independent on Sunday’s list of the UK’s 20 best young authors. At Unity Books on Tuesday, Thomas seemed to live and breathe her books, reading from upcoming The Seed Collectors. Kimaya McIntosh snares answers about Katherine Mansfield, Ethnobotany, and road signs.

*   *   *

KIMAYA MCINTOSH: Are there other Scarletts from the creative realms you like?

SCARLETT THOMAS: Do you mean do I like Scarlett Johansson? Yes. I think she’s hot.

KM: A common theme that pops up alongside your name is the devotion followers of your work show. What do you think is the secret to this following?

ST: This is impossible to answer! I don’t know. Perhaps they think I’m Scarlett Johansson.

KM: Tell me about a favourite author from New Zealand?

ST: My favourite New Zealand writer is Katherine Mansfield. Every time I re-read her stories I find something new. I particularly like ‘Bliss’, ‘Marriage a la Mode’, and ‘Je ne parle pas Francais’. I very much enjoyed the novel Electric by Chad Taylor a few years back. I really like Emily Perkins and am just getting into Eleanor Catton’s work, which is fantastic so far.

KM: What is your creative philosophy?

ST: My whole creative philosophy is explained in Monkeys With Typewriters, but in a nutshell: be authentic; be beautiful; be compassionate.

KM: Influences as a writer?

ST: Recent influences are the great writers of free indirect style, particularly Katherine Mansfield. Tolstoy and Chekhov are also big favourites.

KM: Between your novels and your short stories, is there a character you’ve created that you truly dislike?

ST: If I had, it would mean I’d made a huge mistake, and that the work was a failure. I’ve created some very flawed characters for my new novel, but I love each one of them with all my heart. I always ask my students if they love their characters—even the minor ones. Disliking a character is a sign that you have not worked hard enough on your characterisation. Of course I have created types and flat characters over the years—but I’m not proud of them.

KM: When you look at the defining features of your leading characters, they are drawn from you and your life, but which character would you want to be and why?

ST: Maybe Apollo Smintheus. I mean, who wouldn’t want to be a mouse god? I wouldn’t say my characters are aspirational exactly, but I’d quite like to be Fleur from my new novel. She’s very beautiful and a bit weird.

KM: Do you have any words of wisdom for any budding creative writers out there?

ST: Remember that fiction is always about suffering, but that suffering can be funny as well as painful. Tell your truth in your own way and you won’t go wrong.

KM: You’re studying towards an MSc in Ethnobotany while working on your ninth novel, The Seed Collectors. Is this more than research for the new novel? What attracts you to Ethnobotany?

ST: I did begin an MSc in Ethnobotany as research for The Seed Collectors. I completed all my essays, but in the end decided not to do the dissertation—I needed the time to work on the novel. I guess in a way the novel will be the dissertation! I learned some really cool stuff, particularly from the botany classes. There was a lot to learn, too, considering that I began from such an embarrassingly low level that I didn’t even know that flowers turned to fruit. Being a student again—while at the same time being a senior member of staff in another department—was a real eye-opener, and I’m sure it has made me a better novelist. Basically, I got to see myself at my worst: competitive, shy, arrogant, unfriendly, fussy. As the teacher you are in control and that can hide a lot of flaws in your personality (as well as exposing a lot of others, probably). Being a student put me back in touch with the really horrible person I am inside. I was the one who didn’t want to get mud on my shoes, or eat the weird leaf we’d just picked. I cheated at the Fishing Game (designed to show how communities will naturally co-operate without legal restrictions), refused to drink from a cup everyone else had used when someone was demonstrating a ritual, and publicly berated an environmentalist for still eating dairy products. But examining one’s ego is what being a novelist is all about. The worst stuff makes the best (and funniest) characters.

KM: What’s exciting about coming to the Auckland Writers & Readers Festival, your first trip to New Zealand?

ST: It’s my first time in New Zealand, but I’m absolutely loving it. My partner is from here, so I’ve heard a lot about the place over the years. Obvious attractions are the beautiful fairytale landscape and the wonderful climate (I have not yet strayed from the North Island). I’m also enjoying your road signs. They’re much more philosophical than ours. Ours say things like ‘Keep Your Distance!’ Yours say ‘Think about what’s behind you’ without telling you exactly what to think or what to do about it.

Book Review: Children of the Jacaranda Tree, by Sahar Delijani

I have awaken. Just filling in my backlog of reviews, will have an update here today or tomorrow.

This review was originally posted on the Booksellers New Zealand blog.

Book Review: Children of the Jacaranda Tree, by Sahar Delijani

This book is available from bookstores now.

Based on the childhood experiences of the author, Sahar Delijani’s debut follows Neda, Omid and Sheida – the Children of the Jacaranda Tree. Delijani creates an intricate story, spanning years and set mostly in the city of Tehran during and after the revolutionary war, but also in Iran’s Evin Prison, and Turin, Italy.

While a work of fiction, the novel is based on the experiences of Delijani and her parents, who were imprisoned in Evin during the ‘80s. The Q&A on her website gives some great insight in to her life and the story behind her writing Children of the Jacaranda Tree. As one character says in the novel, “It is all one big prison, Sheida. We are all in one big prison.”

Generally I’ll pick non-fiction over a novel, however the ‘based on real events’ element of Delijani’s novel gave me hope that I’d find something to really enjoy. Delijani creates characters that are easy to empathise with, although I’m never great with names and having many characters with similar names meant I had trouble keeping them all straight.

To its credit, Children of the Jacaranda Tree is easy to read and (based on the large font and borders) not very long. The novel is divided in to sections, each following the children at some point in time during the novel’s 1983 to 2011 span. Each section felt like a short-story in itself, rather than a complete novel, leaving the story disjointed, and I found it hard to get back in to the story if I’d put it down during a section. While Delijani has a talent for writing, to me there felt to be a lack of depth to each sentence. Throwing long words in to sentences that are already full of too many adjectives made for awkward and over-written paragraphs. There are poignant quotes that come from the novel, which brought the ‘real life’ feeling back for me; “Childhood slips away when death settles in.” Slightly depressing, but the reality people were faced with, not only in Iran, but the world over.

I don’t want to put anyone off reading Children of the Jacaranda Tree. Google the book and you’ll find many reviews from people who dearly loved it. If you want a heart-felt story, set during a truly interesting and harrowing time in history, do take the time to check out this debut. No doubt we’ll be seeing more from Sahar Delijani.

Link to Q&A on author’s website

Children of the Jacaranda Tree

by Sahar Delijani

Published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson

ISBN 9780297869030

The end's not near, it's here.

Yes, the end is here. Thanks to Band of Horses for the title. And I think I've saved the best to last, well what I think is super pretty. 

This is for You by Rob Ryan was published in 2007, and when it first came out I pleaded with my sister, working at vicbooks at the time, to buy it for me. Being the loving sister, she did. And it is beautiful. Here's a picture of the dust jacket and book itself. The book explores themes of love and loneliness, and the prominent colours on the covers help to emphasis this. The thing that first caught my eye with this book with the bright red pinned against a very white background. As well as this, the cut-out nature of the book intrigued me. As did the endorsement by Sophie Dahl; the same cut-out lettering has been used for the endorsement, and she's pretty awesome - writing and modelling and stuff. The continuation of the red to the back cover is also a nice way to continue a theme. 
Before you ask, no I did not take this picture upside-down. When you take the dust jacket off, this is how the book looks - upside-down. I don't know if mine's an awkward dud or if this is how it's supposed to be - I've never seen another copy. But anyway, the red theme has continued through from the dust jacket, which makes me happy - red is the colour of love, people, and that's what this book is all about. If I saw this book on the shelf, without it's jacket, I'd still pick it up. The simplicity of the cover alone is enough to intrigue me, plus the bell on the front is pretty cute.

To the inside! Well almost the inside, to the end papers and dust jacket flaps! I'm a very sentimental person, and a bit of a hopeless romantic, so the first thing I saw when opening the book was the left-hand flap here. I love it. The typeface is the same as the cover - a handmade sans-serif that's actually pretty easy to read when you take the time. This isn't a book to rush through, the pages can be confusing, as you'll see soon. The endpapers are beautiful too, it's the first time I've seen ones that incorporate the actual title of the book into the pattern. 

As an illustrated book, there are no page numbers, which is nice. Each page does stick to a frame, as you'll see in later pictures. Ryan sticks to the margins, probably so no picture is wrecked if the cutting goes wrong. The green of this page stands out wonderfully, like the red, against the white stock. The green also tied in nicely to the leaves in this spread, as the man walks and thinks. The text is in the same all caps as the cover and flaps, enforcing his walking and thinking and making it super easy to read. So simple, and so lovely. 

This is probably the hardest spread in the book to read. The pages mirror each other, as a son and mother talk. The colours compliment each other, while reflecting the gender of each character. The typeface is still the cutout style and a sans-serif, however it's in lowercase and much harder to read. This comes back to this being a book you read because you want to know what it has to say. It may make you work hard, but it's worth it.

Here's another full page spread. You can even see the stitches for the binding - still good quality. This has the easy-to-read all caps sans-serif, and really is just a beautiful page. You can see in this spread, and the previous one, the way Ryan does keep inside the invisible margins. By being consistent, it helps the reader to become familiar (to a basic level) with how each page will be laid out. I also like they way 'that' is stretched out over the two pages, there's no effort on his cutting to cram it or unbalance the heart.

I just wanted to throw this spread in because it shows the theme of loneliness that's explored with love through the book. The first time I looked at it, I read 'I am not alone' but missed the 'And I wrote and wrote'. Ryan's ability to create a stunning piece of visual art that acts as great narrative too. This is one of the pages that you can actually see that the images are Ryan's cutout pieces of paper - bottom right-hand corner. Not sure if it's intentional, but it adds to this spread, since he tells the reader nothing's gonna happen until you start, and he started cutting and clearly never stopped. He has a store even!

Last spread I promise! It's the last pages of the book, so it kinda has to be anyway... I love that he's kept the fun cut-out for the dedication, while switching to a more traditional sans-serif for the imprint. It makes it super easier to read, and this is important information for some people. As with most illustrated books, the imprint appears at the back of the book. It doesn't disrupt the flow of the book, and since most people reading this book won't actually need to know this information, it makes the most sense.
I see new things in This is for You every time I look at it, which is exactly what a good book should offer - continuous learning.


Man, this post has the best design ever! So proud of myself, it's only taken a few posts to get the hang of blogspot... But anyway, that's it from me about book design, my scrapbook is due in today. Unless something looks super awesome, then maybe I'll share it with you.


Until next time,
K.

Amazon, you ol' dog you.

I've said it once, I'll say it again - I don't particularly care for ebooks. Due to my lack of one, and lack of being organised in the slightest, all of the following pictures have been borrowed from the internet and the caption will send you to the original link. 

I'm going to look at the Kindle, I've got pictures from the touchscreen, keypad, and the other one that's not either of those two. I'm not looking at the Fire, as I just want to focus on the ink display. Kindle, as we know, was created by Amazon, who is taking over the world. I don't want to get in to it, mainly because I'm super tired but also because that's not what I'm here to talk about. Instead, design. Let's start with a cover. Naturally.

Left - http://bit.ly/O3euGx; right - http://bit.ly/R8Y56P

Here we have One Summer, published in 2011 by Grand Central Publishing. However, on the left, the 6" E Ink display Kindle, retailing for $109.00 on amazon.com right now. On the right, a book, or at least the cover of a real book, most likely hardback. The colours in the cover are fantastic, the subtle tones of summer make you want to pick up this book and find out what this one summer was all about. The author's name is first, due to the fact he's established and written enough novels to have his name known. The typeface is a classic serif, making him look even more important. The typeface for the title feels nice and flowy, giving the impression this book's going to be full of fun and drama. But to the Kindle. My main issue with the Kindle is there's no ink technology to make the screen colour yet. Maybe you look in to every ebook you purchase, but with this one, I wouldn't buy it based on the cover on a Kindle. Does that makes sense? Anyway, I've been told Kindle's don't automatically go to the cover on an ebook, you have to choose to. I buy books because I love the physical object with a pretty cover you can hold - ebooks just don't appeal. 
To the body text!

The Paris Wife prologue. http://bit.ly/O3euGx

Here's a sample page on the same Kindle as above. The original printed page looks the same as this - same typeface, same capital T, and roughly the same space between PROLOGUE and the beginning of the body copy. The typeface is a nice serif, easy to read and attractive looking. The margins around the text is also great, a nice amount of space so the page doesn't look or feel cramped while reading alone. I assume this is probably the preset size typeface, since it's easy to change the size on a Kindle, as you can see. 

http://amzn.to/MT9doe

Apologies, this isn't from the same book.
You can even sneakily choose a sans-serif typeface - blasphemy! This is one cool feature I'll give the Kindle. I know when I get tired or my eyes are just feeling lazy for no reason, I'd love to be able to make the typeface of my book bigger. The other great thing about this feature is that it opens it up to a whole other market of readers, older people. I mean no offence when saying this, but it's true! I've heard people buying ereaders for parents and grandparents so they don't lose reading. I'm aware that libraries often stock large print books, I'm just not sure how much of a market there still is for this. 
One more picture, and it's pretty awesome. 

http://bit.ly/dNFLaW

At least I think it's awesome. I'm not a huge fan of manga or graphic novels, but I've dabbled. You can purchase graphic novels and manga for Kindle, but this one I've found was using a programme called Mangle. I think it's come out great considering it's not made for the reader. The images have come out really well, although I'm sure it would look better in colour. They're really clear and easy to read, which is probably due to the converter too. The only issue is the pages don't totally cover the whole screen, so they overlap a bit like on the right hand side. Because you can adjust the typeface size and manga is in panels, it wouldn't be too difficult to create a setting that's perfect for this genre. This is the Kindle keyboard with 3G and wifi, which is currently $189.00 on Amazon. They're managing to do pretty well for themselves, are Amazon.


A few more to come,
K.

I don't like...

Mondays, do you ask? No, well, not always. Spiders? Yes. So much yes. Ew. But what I really don't like is the book design I'm going to talk about now. Yes, I'm talking about flippin' flipback books. 

Four titles out of 18. Thanks to vicbooks Pipitea for the books. Apologies for all the photos,
they're not great.

Originally designed in the Netherlands, the flipback book opens vertically with the pages turning from bottom to top. According the flipback website '...you get a full length novel in little more than the size of a smartphone.' They're actually 12cm by 8cm, and around 1.5cm - they've managed to keep them all around the same width despite the differing lengths of the original texts. On average, they weigh less than 145 grams and are printed on a very light and thin, almost Bible-paper paper. You'll see some shots further down of the insides.

So above are the spines of four of the titles I've picked out - Misery, Pride and Prejudice, Cloud Atlas and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. I've got close ups of Misery and Cloud Atlas further down this post. From first glance, these books look nice. The titles stand out well in a basic san-serif, and a different colour for title and author. The colour of the title actually ties in to the cover image, which you'll see in the next picture.

Covers, looking all pretty. The publisher on the cover alternates between Hodder, Sceptre
and John Murray. I assume this is depending on which imprint currently holds rights?

So here are the covers of the four. They're all covers I've seen before, with the exception of P&P. And I don't really like it at all - there are many, many covers of Austen's novel and it seems odd to pick one so plain compared to the others. I mean, flowers are fine but they're not on the same level as the typewriter for Misery. Or at least that's what I think. The other three are great though, the cover and spines link together nicely and below you'll see Cloud Atlas open fully.

Look how nice and pink it is!

I'm not 100% sure, but I think this cover is an adapted version of the original - someone correct me if I'm wrong! I love it though. The colours stand out, contrasting the pink and blue works so well.The title has an awesome pattern running through it. I'm also really enjoying how short the blurb is, however I'm not enjoying it as a whole. We had a session on blurb writing, and this one screams 'no' to me now. Back in the day I wouldn't have minded, but now I can't allow the author's name to be used to describe the book - a book shouldn't need it's author's name to describe it! Also, as you might be able to see, it's $27.99. Not exactly cheap when the paperback of this book is only $28.99. I guess the convenience the size?

I just realised I didn't get a picture of this, but thanks to the internet I can explain what I'm talking about! Check out the picture below.

Check out the cover and spine... Ooo!

Ooo indeed! As you can (hopefully) see, the spine and front cover aren't attached. The text block is stuck on to the back cover, but not to the spine or front cover. This is so the book holds itself open more easily than you having to push down on the pages of a hardback to make it stay open by itself. This is quite a cool design; my only issue with it is  the wear and tear of it all. When these first came in to the shop, I picked it up and flicked it open and the thing nearly fell out of my hand. If you were to accidently pick it up by the front cover alone, you run the risk that the back starts to rip off. Maybe I'm just rough with my books... I just don't think this will survive in your bag like a usual book would. 

Now for some internal shots, I'm just going to put a few from Misery below. 

Praise the glory!

In case you didn't know.

Start of a chapter.

Example of typewriter text in the novel.

Buy all the flipbacks!

So there you have it, an entire flipback in five images. One thing I have to say straight of the bat, and I hope you noticed it to - the typeface. It's all sans-serif. Urgh. Now, earlier I said I liked it for the cover title, and that still stands. And if you've read my other posts, you'll know that I like sans-serif for kid's books. But not for an entire novel. And especially not for a tiny little format like this. I'm getting worked up just writing this! We discussed in class the main reason a serif font is used over sans-serif for narrative, and that's because there are more points of difference between characters. When you're writing something, your 'a's and 'd's can get mixed up, because generally the only thing showing the difference between this is the vertical line on a 'd'. But with serif, the a comes out like this one does, and you can easily tell that it's an a and not a d. Now the most frustrating thing is that the font I'm using right now, trebuchet, isn't a serif, but Times New Roman is. See the difference? I hope so. Anywho, I hate the flipback for using this. Especially with the typewriter text (second to last image). Doesn't that look shocking? Every 'n' looks like it's italicised, even though I don't think it's supposed to be. Gah. Just dislike on so many levels. Also, the typewriter sections are ragged right, while the rest is justified. Make up your mind people!
Another thing to note is the margin sizes. As a woman, I have hilariously manly thumbs, as a good friend told me when we were 13. Holding the book open on the side with one hand actually isn't that easy, and it definitely gets in my way when reading. I'm fairly certain that the left side is slightly larger, have a look in the 'about the author' picture above. But I'm right-handed anyway, so that's not helpful. 


That's my rant about flipbacks. I really just don't like them, I think the design is just a little crazy and although people went nuts for them when they first came out, the novelty has definitely worn off.


More to come,
K.

The Babysitters Club, part one.

Don't worry, this post isn't about the Babysitter's Club, that would just be terrible (I never actually read those books anyway...). I was babysitting for some friends on Saturday night, which was a very uneventful time - their daughters are stunning sleepers! As they are both literary people, they have a library I would be proud to call my own. And in the spirit of the design scrapbook, I waded through them and took photos of a few that caught my eye. Here's my favourite one.

Steven Hall, The Raw Shark Texts, Canongate, 2007.
Click on the images for a better view. 

Apparently the title is a play on 'Rorschach Tests', the inkblot tests. I didn't pick up on it, but Wikipedia told me, so it must be true. The novel takes place in our world with certain aspects that don't exist here, but do in their world, and are hidden by dedicated organisations. If that makes sense... It actually sounds like a really good book. However, I won't lie, the only reason I picked this book of the shelf was because it has review quotes on the spine - something I've never seen before. The main body text on the cover is in a typewriter-like typeface, with the title in a nice large typeface and the all caps helps it stand out. The blue, I feel, ties it back to the shark image (blue = ocean in my mind...) as well as standing out very well against the pale background. The blue is a continuing theme, as you'll see in a few pictures below. 
The quotes down the spine are rather interesting - the blue highlighting is around '...The Matrix, Jaws and The Da Vinci Code', which is what this book is apparently the bastard child of. Very intrigued, plus it made me read that section first and then move back up and read the rest of the quotes. Plus, like I've said, I've never seen this before. There are a whole heap more on the inside cover (see next picture), so maybe they're not necessary. This said, it's the thing that caught my eye and made me pick up the book, so it must work.
The image of the shark fin going through both the text on the front and the Canongate logo is great. If you stare at it for long enough it looks like it's actually moving. Also the blots of blood give the book an ominous, 'there's actually going to be a shark' kind of feel. Also, the blurb on the back is simply cut off and doesn't finish anywhere else. Weird, but I feel this may reflect the mysterious nature of the book - the main character wakes up and has no idea who he is or where he is. Intriguing.

First page. Apologies for my hand.

As you can see, the designer loves the blue. Which is lucky, 'cause it definitely catches the eye. Also, the reviews given here are just the long versions of the ones on the spine, which kind of takes away from the special-ness of the spine reviews. Sigh.  I'm not 100% happy with the white on blue for the reviews though. Although this blue is a repeat feature, the typeface isn't quite heavy enough for me to make me want to read it. Making it slightly heavier, I think, would make it more legible. Any who, the text on the first page is actually a copy of the text on the front cover, and unlike the review quotes, I really enjoy this repetition. Obviously you can't read the text fully on the cover as it's wrecked by the 'ripple' of the water the 'shark' is 'swimming' through, and it's nice to repeat it. I get frustrated if something I want to read or watch isn't repeated.

Front and back inside covers. Again, hand apologies.

Here's the front and back inside covers. I really love this, the back is just an upside down repeat of the front. They both start waaaay too high up, and finish with plenty of room at the bottom, or in the back's case, heaps at the top, not so much at the bottom. As it's a repeat, what I've said above about the front applies to the back too.


Now to the text itself. I like what's done, check out the pictures below.

Apologies for fingers and smallness - click for bigger version.
You'll know why they're so small soon...

Here are two section markers and the chapters that begin directly after them. Not sure if it's a coincidence, but the two quotes on these section markers are by Jorge Luis Borges and Haruki Murakami. Both of these authors are actually noted in two separate reviews on the inside covers, go on, look up! Maybe the review quotes were picked deliberately for this edition because of that? It seems awfully coincidental... Good work marketing team!
Anyway, to the design! The typeface used is a serif, for section headings, quotes and their authors, chapter headings and body text. I'm pretty happy with all of that. As a novel, a serif is generally considered to be the best choice. As I've mentioned in previous posts, this is due to it's easy-to-read nature. One thing I enjoy about the headings throughout is that there's no bolded text used - it's simply larger for the section numbers and chapter titles. As well as this, they have used italics in a nice and effective way for quotes and the chapter titles. This makes them stand out without throwing them in your face. Also, I'm a big fan of first line indents rather than full breaks between paragraphs, which is what is used in this book.


Now, you're going to see my favourite part of this book, and why the previous photos were so small. Apologies for the mass amount of pictures coming up, but here we go. Might be best to click on the first one and scroll through to the right before checking out what I have to say below.

So as you can tell by the nine photos I've put up that I think this is awesome. I've never seen this done before, and I haven't read the book but from the title I'm sure it's safe for us to assume that the shark (or something similar) is very key to the story. In the second to last picture, so can see the text is repeated and fades out, giving the impression of the narrator drowning (little depressing, I know). This sentence runs on to the next page and the story continues like it wasn't interrupted for 51 (!) pages. As you can tell, I just skimmed through the pages so you readers weren't bogged down with even more photos! This part of the book definitely leaves a lasting impression on me, and I think I might just ask to borrow it I'm time I'm over there.


This is it for this wonderful looking book, more books to come soon.