Just this once, you may not want to avoid me. This is because an email got buried in an avalanche of other emails and so I didn’t reply when I had to and my research doesn’t have a slot in the Deep Dives. This is probably just as well, because I’m at the stage in …
Category: Worldbuilding
Women’s History Month – guest, Helen Hollick
In Awe of Alison Morton and ‘Roma Nova’ Alison Morton writes a thriller series. But wait a minute, isn’t this supposed to be Women’s History Month, not Women’s Thriller Month? Ms Morton has created what is, I think, something unique for her novels, not thrillers placed in an historical setting – there are plenty of …
Women’s History Month – guest post by Liz Williams
Today’s guest is UK writer Liz Williams, writing about the work of Mary Gentle. Those few words hide so very much interesting stuff. I was going to write a lengthy introduction but I lost all the time to exploring her fascinating web presence. Liz needs her own essay. If someone reading this writes it, I’m …
Women’s History Month – guest post by Jennifer Stevenson
This year is about not forgetting writers who really need to be seen. Some of those writers are still very much among us. The shadows start even when women do their best work. Jennifer Stevenson writes about one such writer. I’m very, very lucky and know both these writers, through Book View Cafe. This means …
How to avoid me at Worldcon 75
This is the post you’ve been waiting for. Now you can plan your Helsinki visit knowing you can avoid me. You’ll also know that I can’t redeem myself with chocolate, for I have tiny scraps of Australia to give everyone instead. Ask me nicely and you could take home some opal or Australian turquoise or …
Discussion – novel where the main character is woman with a chronic illness (or two)
I was thinking about writing another novel about another kind of invisibility, to balance Ms Cellophane and The Time of the Ghosts. I deal with chronic illnesses every day of my life. I’m very much not the only one. Yet this kind of life with all its oddity and excitement seldom makes it into novels. …
The Great Avoidance. How to Avoid Gillian at Continuum 13 (Australian National SF Convention)
My regular guide for the wary. If you avoid me, you will miss my news. There will be news, so avoiding me is a great way of remaining in a state of mildly addled curiosity. If you avoid me, you will also avoid chocolate. I am thus a great aid to dieting. It’s good chocolate, …
The food (including a recipe and test for Cornish Meat Rolls) in The Wizardry of Jewish Women
A group of enthusiastic cooks and lovely people are making recipes mentioned in my new novel, The Wizardry of Jewish Women. I almost always have recipes lurking beneath my fiction. Even my next novel (which I’m editing this week) contains food which I can cook, and it takes place off-planet! My new novel is set …
Structuring a novel
Well, that was unexpected. I’ve got so much stuff for the 17th century novel, and am nearly up to the targeted research. Precise drilling-in on stuff I need. Hopefully that will happen in March. What I’ve been doing during this last however-long is seeking my unifying elements. What kind of story I’m telling, What heart …
On personal safety and on jam tomorrow
I’m finding it slow but very important to develop my own subjective sense of how women compromised and navigated places and social situations to remain safe. It’s such a big part of women’s lives today (I do not walk through certain carparks at night, I do not travel at night alone at all unless I …
Where to find me
