So we went on a road trip—Kaaron Warren, Aaron Dries, Robert Hood, Cat Sparks and I—to Beechworth Asylum and the inaugural AsylumFest. Spent an excellent weekend hanging with friends old and new, spoke with ghosts on a paranormal tour, recorded two live shows of Let The Cat In, sold books, bought books, and generally had a banger of a weekend. Already looking forward to AsylumFest 2023!
Check out photos of the weekend courtesy of the inestimable Cat Sparks (from whom the picture here is lovingly stolen).
So Ariadne, I Love You won best novella at the Ditmar Awards on Saturday. Absolutely bonkers when you look at the books it was up against. I managed to pull it together enough to give a semi-coherent acceptance speech – this time not just a long list of happy expletives.
Congrats to all the nominees and this year’s winners. But an extra solid shout-out to J.S. Breukelaar who won best novel for The Bridge. A twofer for Meerkat Press!
How fkn chuffed do these kats look?
In both 2020 and 2021, I released books into the wilderness of social distancing and lockdowns. Though we held some excellent online events to celebrate at the time, nothing compares to the vibe of a reading in a room full of people. Kaaron Warren and Aaron Dries were kind enough to help me pull this together at the last minute. Wine was quaffed, conversations were had, books were read and sold. A fine time was had by all.
Photos of the launch (taken by the inimitable Cat Sparks) are now up on Flickr. Check them out!
I was in a very particular headspace when I wrote Ariadne, I Love You. Keen to explore a very particular kind of supernatural occurrence: one that could be easily justified in rational terms, without being entirely explained away. At the same time, I was obsessed with the idea of inheritance, of the scars the past leaves on the present, and a particular kind of gothic sensibility that arises when a character worries over the same fixation for decades. While I wasn’t trying to emulate any particular story or author, these five books left marks that – in one form or another – somehow found their way onto the page. They are masterworks of glorious ambiguity, of weirdness, darkness and the unexplained. They embody a particular sensibility – at once bleak and wry – that is a comfort on a wintry grey afternoon. They console with tragedy and fear, chipping away at the foundations of what you took to be real. I hope they give you the joy they have given me…
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