him to enter the story and become their hero. On
one level, the book is a fable about the power of
love and imagination. But it‟s also a rumination on
the act of reading and on the real magic of books:
that they can change your life.
If you‟re familiar with my writing, you‟ll know
that I write the same way that I read: I like a good
genre “mash-up”. I like to read and write across the
spectrum (paranormal, mystery, literary, crime,
thriller, romance, you name it).
Like the decaying Fantastica we first encounter
in The Neverending Story, ours is a dark, complex,
chaotic and densely-layered world. When I'm
creating a fictional world, and people to move
through it, I subscribe to that Japanese way of
looking at things that's summed up in the words
wabi-sabi. Paraphrasing badly, it means something
like "beauty from imperfection." To me, a character
is more complete, more beautiful, more memorable
and interesting, if they are flawed. And the world
they inhabit — especially if it looks like ours — has
to be as wide and amazing and conflicted as ours is
if it's going to go anywhere near seeming
"authentic" or "real".
So if I set out to create a female heroine, I will
consciously ensure that she is a think-on-the-fly,
strong and abrasive, yet empathetic character
because I have been surrounded by strong women
my entire life — in the home, in the careers I have
led, in my friendships. I won‟t foreground romance
for the sake of romance because life is often about
difficult choices and getting through. And romance
is the icing, but it‟s never the cake.
Another thing you will notice about my books,
is that people like you and me, the person you stand
next to on the tram, will feature in them. When I
was growing up, no one on Neighbours or Sons and
Daughters looked remotely like me, or spoke a
different language. So when I finally started getting
things published, I was granted the ability to adjust
the "real" world my characters lived in to include
Chinese and Columbian kids, people who spoke
Spanish or Russian or Italian, or who were forced to
work as strippers or waitresses or clairvoyants, just
to make ends meet. I've tried to fill my books with
the kinds of people we live side-by-side with, the
kinds of people we are. I just do it because it adds to
the "reality" of the story and the characters, and
reflects the world I live in. Writing the “real” into
the fictional is what I do.
My take is: if you're going to write fantasy —
urban, steampunk, whatever — you need to ground
it and dirty things up and give it a patina of realism
before you can even go off the map.
Like my novel Mercy, my latest novel, The
Astrologer’s Daughter was a fictional response to
some t errible stories involving crimes against
women that were emerging in the press around the
time I was writing. The “real world” news is a
potent trigger for book ideas. What people do to
each other in real life is staggering.
I don‟t set out to write easy-to-read, teen-chicklit. I‟ve been strongly urged to do it, but it‟s not my
bag. With my books, I always hope to reach readers
who are willing — while being entertained — to
think and worry and be challenged by the themes I
cover. I especially want readers to be aware that —
even if, or especially if — you‟re girly and klutzy