Category: Interviews & reviews

Posted on by — 4 Comments

Patrick is dead BUT… Bar Yarns and Beer Nuts lives on!

Beer Yarns and beer NutsPatrick might be dead, but Author Harvest will live on!

I was going to kill the concept off with little regard to my readers at the end of August as it was only meant to be a one year plan. But when word got out … well, the Twitter storm and the social media meltdown that followed said one thing and one thing only …

The country is not ready to lose Patrick AND Author Harvest.

I can’t bring Patrick back, so I hope a reincarnation of Author Harvest will ease your pain.

Starting September 1, Author Harvest will be reborn as Bar Yarns and Beer Nuts.

After a big year of harvesting Aussie authors (you can see a list of 2012/13 authors on my website here), it’s time to take a break from the hard harvesting yakka. And what better way than to drop into the local for a well-earned brew to interview some exciting new and been-around-a-long-time-but-still-got-it authors!!!! Given the Aussie pub is the heart of every small town and the bar is a kind of confessional—at least that’s how it is at Calingarry Crossing pub, which is at the heart of my second novel Simmering Season!—is there a better place to sit and chat?)

With help from the clever Lily Malone (blame her for the chicken and the stapler) Author Harvestprepare for a big year of new and slightly nutty questions in Bar Yarns and Beer Nuts, right here on www.jennjmcleod.com

You can subscribe to posts (top right) so you don’t miss the first chat.

So, yes, #RIPpatrick and #Offspring (shame on you) but Author Harvest lives!

Posted on by — 15 Comments

Ready to lose your erotic genre virginity like me?

The YearningThe Yearning, by Kate Belle, is being marketed as New Adult and age-wise I am a long way from New Adult! But I have been curious about Kate’s new novel. Then I saw the cover (yet another mesmerizing design from Simon & Schuster) and I decided to give this book a shot.

Since erotic fiction hit mainstream publishing lists, I have been wondering if the genre is for me, trying several books to see what all the fuss is about. I can be a bit of a fuddy duddy, and with my reading-for-pleasure time in short supply these days, erotic fiction is not on the top of my list. What I noticed most was that the ‘mechanics’ of the sex scenes tended to add a clunkiness and overshadow the plot (when there is one!)

My first comment about The Yearning is this…

It’s a shame a novel like this has to be categorized (largely so a bookseller knows where to plonk it on a shelf—cyber or real). It’s a shame because there will be people who’ll have their perception skewed as a result of a generic genre label and miss out on a wonderful reading experience.

I loved everything about this story: the writing is evocative, the storyline compelling, the biblical references intriguing. The Yearning is a truly unique and superbly crafted novel and while the author leaves nothing to the imagination, she handles the most intimate scenes deftly, delivering a soft, flowing, sensual (and sensory) journey of a teenage girl’s sexual awakening. I initially worried about the basic premise (blurb)—small town schoolgirl and older, unconventional male teacher in the free and easy seventies. I also thought I knew how the story would pan out. (Pretty predictable stuff this erotic fiction, you know?)

Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! And all I can say (after scraping the egg off my face) is Wow! Wow! Wow!

Wow to the clever, clever plot that, despite the small format paperback of only 300-odd pages, packs a punch in so many ways. Wow to the hauntingly beautiful prose and description that will transport you to a different time and place (and if you are my age, to a few fond memories of that fun-loving decade). Wow to the complex characters, the divine descriptions of small town life, and the delicious metaphors that bring this story to life. The Yearning is a fully dimensional read with great characterisations, beautiful prose, a proper narrative arc and a well-developed theme. The erotic elements are integral and necessary to the story—hence the label!

So… not into erotic fiction? I didn’t think I was either. Still not sure I am. I just know I loved The Yearning and I am so glad I took the genre plunge.

If you don’t want to be like me—a fuddy-duddy—and should you choose to lose your erotic genre virginity and see what all the fuss is about, this is the book—although I fear this novel may have ruined me for any other!

(I have to disclose that Kate Belle and I share the same publisher and I’m very glad. If not for that I may have missed out on reading this novel, which would’ve been a shame because it is absolutely beautiful—from the cover until the very last page.)

The Yearning has left me with a craving, so I look forward to more from Kate Belle.

Need more? Check this article out – written by Kate Belle.

Buy the book. Available in print om May 1. But you can download it now to your e-reader. Buy links.

Posted on by — 5 Comments

I am not reading this book, Mr Park …

… I am living vicariously, watching someone else read it–someone who stops every few pages to read the next ‘great bit’ to me.

I wish I really was reading it now.

______________________________

I hope to one day meet Tony Park (I heard he visits my neck o’ the woods occasionally to catch up with mutual acquaintances) so his books have been on my TBR list for some time.

Problem: Reading time for me has been in short supply this last year, which has made me a little picky about what takes my attention away from my own writing and deadlines.

Solution: I have a ‘reading partner’ – a person to share the TBR pile; a kind of two person book club if you will, delving into book themes and plots, characters and author styles, while on morning walks and over the copious cups of coffee we consume each  day.

The system has worked — until now. Until Mr Tony Park. Not satisfied with the usual second hand summary, I am wanting to read this author for myself – sometime.

africandawnsmAfrican Dawn is the first Tony Park novel ‘we’ have picked up and, to be honest, when I looked at the first few introductory pages with its timeline, a family tree and a glossary, I said “Na-ah!” There is no way my friend is going to get past the first chapter. Don’t get me wrong, my reading partner loves a big story: a complex crime novel, a psychological thriller, a forensic mystery. But this story …?

Well, here I am eating my words. For the last two days, African Dawn has accompanied my friend everywhere: breakfast table, coffee breaks, bed. She is devouring the story and reading excerpts to me with increasing enthusiasm every fifteen minutes, the pages turning so fast they are fanning her menopausal flushes.

So in a way I am reading it, just not in the usual manner – hence my blog post title.

Only one complaint, Mr Park …

Where is Makuti’s family tree? As a character, especially opening the book in his POV, Makuti’s voice is the icing on an intriguing cake! (And as for Chapter 5, I just cried and cheered and cried again.)

Discover Tony Park’s world: http://www.tonypark.net/index.htm

You have a new fan, Mr Park. You are also my token bloke in the 2013 Australian Women Writers Challenge (so if you would like to be a token bloke on my Author Harvest blog, pls let me know. I would love to see your answers to my…ahhh…very different Q&A.)