Sharing the stage with John Brumby

I spent yesterday in Geelong.

While I was there I visited Geelong's magnificent new Library and Heritage Centre with my old boss, John Brumby, and former ABC radio host Derek Guille. 

JB and I were there to talk about our respective books; The Long Haul and Catch and Kill. Unsurprisingly, all of the audience questions went to the former Premier.

Sharing the stage with John felt like the completion of a cycle for me because The Long Haul and Catch and Kill are linked. I only started writing my book because I was asked to by John Brumby; and John only started writing The Long Haul because, after I had a stroke in 2012, I told him I probably wouldn't be able to finish Catch and Kill.

By the way, if you haven't seen the Library and Heritage Centre it looks like a giant deconstructed soccer ball. Very cool. 

An unrequited journalist comes in from the cold

Catch and Kill is a finalist for the 2015 Walkley Awards.

It's part of the long-list for the book award, together with nine other books.

Those other books are:

• Quentin Beresford, The Rise and Fall of Gunns LTD,
• Ross Coulthart, Charles Bean,
• Andrew Fowler, The War on Journalism,
• Erik Jensen, Acute Misfortune: The Life and Death of Adam Cullen,
• Chip Le Grand, The Straight Dope,
• Debi Marshall, The Family Court Murders,
• Brenda Niall, Mannix,
• Geoffrey Robertson, An Inconvenient Genocide, and
• Sam Vincent, Blood and Guts.

That's pretty good company to be in, so I am rapt.

Given my career path as a unrequited journalist, it means a great deal to me to be a part of journalism's premier awards. I started out as a 17-year-old copy boy at the Sun News-pictorial on January 29, 1987, and now, all these years later, I have a walk-on part in the big show.

The lessons I learned in newspapers in Australia, then the Internet and TV in the United States, have stayed with me. In fact, you could say journalism and poetry have taught me everything I know. 

And, no, I don't mind that the Walkleys misspelt my name in their media release that announced the finalists. As far as I'm concerned, they can call me anything they like.

Turning a new page

I went out for a long dinner on Saturday night with my wife Kirsten and our great friends, Paul and Meredith. During the night, somewhere around midnight, the subject of writing came up and I heard myself saying that I was now officially working on a new project: a novel. 

Writing is like that for me. New stories creep up on me and, before I know it, before I even acknowledge it to myself, I'm working on them. This is certainly the case with the novel-not-yet-in-progress. 

This story, if I can pull it off, will be my first novel since 2010. I'm intrigued by it. Not yet sure whether I can do it or how long it will take me to get there. And all of that tells me it's a story worth telling. 

And, after all, it is fiction's turn. I've published my first non-fiction book (Catch and Kill) and finished the manuscript of the next poetry collection (Year of the Wasp), which is due out in the first half of 2016. 

As for this work of fiction, there's no title as yet. As for the subject, I've been ruminating a great deal on the subject of vengeance of late. 

To mark the occasion, here's the YouTube trailer to my last novel, The Norseman's Song, which is for sale here if you're interested.

Video trailer for Joel Deane's new novel.

On Australia's Second Chance

I'm looking forward to spending a few days down the beach with the family and catching up with George Megalogenis to talk about his new book, Australia's Second Chance.

I'm reading George's new book now and, as expected, it's an eye opener. What I love about George's writing--whether it's in newspapers, magazines or books--is that his ideas are original, his evidence impeccable and his conclusions illuminating.