People who become enthralled by the world of books, as I am, are often thought to have dull lives, but I feel that my own life is made of the stuff of myth. Or anyway, I intend to make it so. Some say that books are an escape from real life. But the beauty of books is that they are crammed with real life. No one is more aware of real life, in all its trivia and glory, than a novelist. In novels you will find mention of things like measles, chocolate, ferry crossings (and eating chocolate on ferry crossings), train journeys, adultery (and adultery on train journeys), bacon, junkies, the Sydney Harbour Bridge, gas ovens, lost jewellery, wedding dresses, shower caps, snot, randy bakers, honey, miso soup, spider webs, lost mothers, abandoned children, rainforests, immortality, angels and toe rot. Not to mention love. Novels are full of life’s impurities, and love must be the most impure thing of all. But now, with Hetty growing older, I couldn’t read as much as I’d have liked. It’s very easy to spend almost all day reading with a small baby at your breast, but now she needed to be talked to, and played with, and be read aloud to something other than the Great Works of literature.
What do You think about My Candlelight Novel (2008)?
