Archive for the Category »Blue Skies «

Mar

Meet Cal. She’s the brains behind Blue Skies.

When we first started talking about what the next book would hold, we came up with a few ideas.

1. Cal’s house is very old (it was actually the first double-brick home built on farming land in Esperance) and is steeped in history. I can’t remember the year, but she had a flood come though her house in the late 60’s that damaged her floor boards. That got us thinking about floods.

2. We were both set on the idea of twins.

3. There had to be a death! (We’re rather obsessed, Cal and I, with forensic science and bodies!)

4. We are both really interested in history – Cal in particular loves both family and Australian/English history. (Actually, any history!)

I tried to start writing but nothing was sitting right with me. We had planned out chapters, but it wasn’t coming together. I actually almost gave up and decided that it was a fluke I had got a book published and I couldn’t write anything, ever again!

After months of tearing my hair out, things finally began to click. But only after Cal had driven an eight hour drive to her sister’s place and spent the whole time planning a new direction for Amanda. She wasn’t going anywhere in her present form! When she got back from her holiday, we had numerious phone calls, lunches and emails and finally it began to take shape.

With Cal’s tough love: (“Get off the phone and start writing,”) she drew up a family tree for a family that didn’t exist to get the time lines right and right at the end, when I had about a month to go before my deadline, we sat down over lunch one day and planned the last ten chapters.

Blue Skies is as much her story, as it is mine.

My other friend, Gill, was also a huge reason that the book got finished!

Cal and I were pretty happy, last Friday, when we got to catch up and see our work finally finished and in book form.

To win a copy of Blue Skies, can you tell me what Amanda’s horrible job was at the dam? (Answer is in the first two chapters, which are available for download on the right.)

I’ll draw the winner on Sunday night and yes, I post anywhere in the world!

Category: Blue Skies, Books, Giveaways, The Writer's Life 16 Comments

Feb

Blue Skies Launch and Book Signings!

Fleur

I have an opportunity to offer you guys a pre-release copy of Blue Skies! Our local bookshop, Le Grand bookshop, has secured 200 copies before Blue Skies is due out. Now these are for a couple of events.

First one is that the Blue Skies Launch will be held at the Condingup Community Fair on the 20th of March. I’ll be having a chat in hall with the MC of the day and then signing books. So we’d love to see out at Condy. The fair is a family orientated day and the main aim of it is to raise money for our local school, so it’s geared towards children and familles.

The second reason is that people outside of Esperance don’t miss out! If you ring Joy at Le Grand bookshop, give her your credit card details and who you would like either Red Dust or Blue Skies made out to, I’ll head in once a week (mostly on a Friday) sign them and take them to the post office! This offer is open for all year, so if you miss out on the first lot of copies there will be more opportunities to grab a signed copy!

Also, I’m giving away of copy of Blue Skies , every week leading up to April. I’ll be all over the place offering giveaways, but the first one will be on here. Good luck and I hope you’re as excited about the release of Blue Skies as I am!

I’m also guest blogging at Inkyblots about how I juggle my life! I’d love it if you could pop over and say hi and leave a comment!

Category: Blue Skies, Internet, The Writer's Life One Comment

Jan

Blue Skies

Fleur

Here is the final packaging for Blue Skies! I just love it – and I love the blurb on the back.

So, meet Amanda and journey with her two best friends, Hannah and Jonno and her distant father, Brian. Feel the passion she holds for Kyleena, the sun on her skin, the dirt between her fingers and the heartache and loss she experiences.

I hope when Blue Skies finally hits the shelves that you’ll pop back and let me know what you thought of it.

For regulars to my site, thanks for coming along on this journey called Blue Skies – I hope your anticipation for this book is well worth it!

Must be time to start on Purple Roads now!

Blurb for Blue Skies

In the tradition of her bestselling novel, Red Dust, Blue Skies tells the inspirational story of a young woman battling to save the family farm no matter what it takes.

Amanda Greenfield dreams of employing all the skills she’s learnt at college to help her father turn their farm, Kyleena, from a debt-ridden, run-down basket case into a thriving enterprise.

Then tragedy strikes and, wearied by the long struggle to keep Kyleena a going concern, Amanda’s father decides to sell up so they can get on with their lives away from the vagaries of drought and fluctuation stock prices and crop yields.

Desolate at the idea of losing the farm that’s been in her family for generations, Amanda summons all her strength, grit and determination to save Kyleena. And things are just starting to look up for her in both life and love when Amanda comes face to face with obstacles from an unexpected and mysterious source…

With its wonderful heroine and spot-on evocation of life on the land, Blue Skies is an utterly compelling read.

Category: Blue Skies 8 Comments

Dec

The Edit!

Fleur

I love getting the first clean, fresh, pages, back from Allen and Unwin – it looks like a book and is ready to read. It’s like starting again and seeing the book through fresh eyes.

This edit was particularly difficult for me. We were going flat chat with harvest and I had a deadline to have the edit finished by… deadlines and harvest just don’t work.

I spent hours sitting in the tractor, waiting for Anthony to call me over to the header and take a load of grain away from him! It was frustrating when I spent time sitting, waiting, not doing very much, when I had Blue Skies hanging over my head. Then I decided to take the manuscript with me and see if I could read through it while I was waiting! Well, that was an interesting experience!

When I’m driving the chaser bin, I often take a book – there is always time to read – it doesn’t matter if you read the same sentence twice or skip a page – it doesn’t effect your work. Editing a MS does! I don’t know how many times, after getting so caught up in what I was doing, that I didn’t see the signal (auger out from the header), to take a load of grain back to the silos. There were a few terse calls on the two-way, asking if I was intending to help that day!

By the end, there were lots of dirty finger prints all over the MS and a couple of pages that had water spilt on them, when the kids jumped in the tractor for their daily ride. But more to the point, there was lots of green marks that indicated the changes I was making… it was slowly getting done.

It was then a process of transferring everything I’d changed onto an email and sending it back to my editor. I made the deadline and we finished harvest… I’m not sure I want to try doing both of them at the same time, ever, again!

Category: Blue Skies, Harvest, The Farmer's Life, The Writer's Life 3 Comments

Dec

Full moon, an end to harvest and a finished edit!

Fleur

I must say, after a fairly intense three weeks, harvest has finally finished and I, for one, am glad! I love seeing the grain come in and finding out what we’ve produced! But three weeks of 4am starts and after dark finishes, as well as trying to edit Blue Skies, has taken its toll!

I was feeling pretty pleased when I went to sit outside in the peace and quiet to watch the moon rise, complete with a glass of wine! We had finished harvest, I had just hit the ’send’ button on an email to my editor containing all the changes for Blue Skies, so that had been put to rest and how could anyone not enjoy watching this moon rise? It was massive and the light it cast across the country side, was magical.

So now I’ve enjoyed my feeling of freedom, I’m back to waiting! Waiting for my editor to get back to me and for the unedited proof book form to arrive, waiting for the last silo of grain to be cleaned and delivered and waiting for the next pile of jobs to build up! We start today weaning our calves and preg-testing the cows, so the waiting for Blue Skies won’t seem so bad.

But at the moment, I’m just as happy to raise a glass of wine to the moon and enjoy the feeling of not being busy- for a short time!

Category: Blue Skies, Farm animals, Harvest, The Farmer's Life, The Writer's Life 4 Comments

Dec

Blue Skies

Fleur

Well, this is the cover for Blue Skies! As you can see it’s fairly similar to Red Dust, but there is a reason behind that. Allen and Unwin are making it easy for you guys to know that the book is by me – you might forget my name, but you should be able recognise the cover as one of my books!

Anne-Marie Ladegaard is a photographer who takes wonderful photos and it’s her photo that is on the front – the windmill, tank, hills and misty morning. It caught my editors attention and the next thing we knew, it was on the cover! How cool is that? You’ll be hearing the story behind the photo, shortly.

The competition for the five signed copies of Red Dust comes to a close on Friday, so if you haven’t entered and you want to get in quick! I’ll get all the books posted off on Monday next week, so the winners receive them in time for Christmas. Click ‘here’ to take to you to the competition.

Category: Blue Skies 6 Comments

Nov

Harvesting

Fleur

Flickr Video

When we did the first edit for Blue Skies, we got to the part about harvest and Ali asked me to insert what a header was. Now, I’m sure most of you who jump on here to have a look know what a header is! But, just in case there are any city folk who haven’t seen harvesting, I’ve taken a video – it’s not the best quality, but you’ll see the dust, hear the roar of the engine and rustle of the dry stalks.

The dust is so itchy – especially in this variety of barley. If you accidentally walk through it when you’re unloading, you’ll tear yourself to pieces for the rest of the day!

As you’ll see from the background, we were harvesting as fast as we could before the thunderstorms hit again – that night the thunder was right over the top of us! But not much rain, although with the amount of lightening hitting the ground, we were grateful for the small amount we had – it was just enough to discourage any fires that thought about starting.

Category: Blue Skies, Country Life, Harvest 2 Comments

Nov

Blue Skies for Harvest!

Fleur

Well, after a week of rumbling and grumbling, lightening and torrential rain, in a few spots, we’re off harvesting again today.

We’re down in our far back paddock and this is the view from the chaser bin. I took this one of the hottest days we had this week (about 40 degrees) but you wouldn’t know by looking at it!

I love the golden stalks that crunch under my feet when I walk through it, but the cut off stems play mary-hell with your legs! I’ve got little round cuts all over them from where the stems stick into them as I’ve been walking through the crop!

On the Blue Skies front, I’m looking forward to getting the first pages back this week. Even though it will still be printed on A4 paper, it will be set out like a book and for some reason, that just makes it easier to read and therefore, edit.

I’ve got the cover for Blues Skies and will be putting it up shortly, along with a small piece, written by Anne-Marie, who took one of the photos used on it. She’s going to be telling you about the time she took it and so forth. But before the cover goes up, I’m just waiting for a few little bits and pieces to be perfected.

Category: Blue Skies, The Farmer's Life, Weather Leave a Comment

Oct

Blue Skies and New Additions

Fleur

I’ve been really busy since I received the Blue Skies edit last week. Ali has done a really intensive edit that then needs me to read through and either say yes to the changes, or no. The changes can range from something as tiny as a suggestion to change a word, to wiping out whole scenes. Thankfully there’s not many of the latter!

When I got my first edit back for Red Dust, it was like learning a whole new language. I guess the symbols that are used are similar to shorthand, but they were still symbols I had to learn on top of trying to decipher Ali’s suggestions.

This time, it’s much easier.

But as well as the edit, Nyssa and I have been slowly up-dating the web site! There’s a new ‘contact Fleur’ button, which will send me an email – it might take me a week or so to answer you, but I will do it! There are five photos down the bottom of the page that, if you click on one of them, will take you through to my Flickr site. There’s the link to my Facebook page and also, under the Bibliography link, are some of my old notes for Red Dust.

Under the writing link there’s a couple of commissioned articles that I’ve written about how I got into writing and also a blurb about Friday Pitch Day, which is run, for unpublished authors, by Louise Thurtell from A&U’s Arena imprint. This is where I got my start and it’s such a wonderful idea from A&U – they promise a response on your submission within a week.

So, Nyssa and I hope you like the new-look website, with all the new little things that are on here – please leave us a message to let us know your thoughts and if you’d like to see anything else up here.

But now, it’s back to Blue Skies…

Category: Blue Skies, The Writer's Life Leave a Comment

Aug

The hardest part is done!

Fleur

manuascript

I’m feeling wonderfully relieved! The Blue Skies manuscript is winging its way to Sydney, via the internet! And earlier than my deadline – which I’m really happy about!

I finished the final touches and now its a waiting game to see if Louise, my publisher, likes it (that’s always really nerve wracking!), then its onto the first edit done by freelance editor, Ali Lavau, and Siobhan, my A&U editor!

Over the next three months, I’ll be listening to what Ali and Siobhan have to say, looking at all the changes they’ve made and adding my own thoughts and changes.

The publication date for Blue Skies is set for April 2010, not May like I thought and its going to print in January 2010! It all seems so fast after Red Dust taking ages to get onto the shelves!

Category: Blue Skies Tags: writing Leave a Comment

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