Interview with "World Tour" author, Francisca Matteoli

A couple of weeks ago we started off our Potts Point Pin-Ups, highlighting beautiful and inspiring books by showing you some interior pages.  One of those titles was World Tour: Vintage Hotel Labels from the Collection of Gaston-Louis Vuitton published by Abrams.
To our surprise the author of that very book, Francisca Matteoli, saw our blog and contacted us to thank us.  Francisca is an travel author, journalist, and blogger who lives in Paris.  Her previous book Escape:  Hotel Stories is  another gorgeous book highlighting the passion of travel.
Francisca answered some questions about her new book and about being an avid traveller.
Here's what she said to us.

PP: The Gaston-Louis Vuitton Hotel Label collection is the genesis of your book World Tour.  How did you gain access to the collection?

FM:  I was having lunch with Julien Guerrier, editorial director at Louis Vuitton, and I told him about my Chilean great-grandfather and my family who always lived in hotels, and about our life in Chile and France.  He then told me that Louis Vuitton had a magnificent collection of hotel labels and that we could connect our stories.  He knew I liked writing stories and we thought that it would be a very original way to talk about travel.  That is how it all began.

PP:  Much of the research about the origin, design and purpose of hotel labels in the book was done by you and not just sourced from the collection.  Did you approach the history from a design or travellers' point of view?

FM:  The traveller's point of view.  As all South Americans, I adore telling stories. And writing stories.  My favourite hotel labels bring back many personal memories such as the Hotel Gloria in Rio de Janeiro for example, because I lived in Rio and because it's situated in one of the most legendary cities of the world.  I also like very much the label of the Hotel Le Meurice in Paris because it epitomises for me French elegance of a city I love.  The label of The Grand Hotel d'Angkor is another of my favourites.  It's more a painting than a label.  I wanted to bring an emotion when you look at those labels that makes you think "I'd love to go there, to see that place".

PP:  Hotel labels have had many a renaissance in their design over the centuries.  How important do you think the hotel label is in leading design in other areas or do you think it was a follower?

FM:  A lot of labels in the book are from a period characterized by optimism and peace in Europe.  When Paris was decadent and beautiful, with the building of the Eiffel Tower, the Opera Garnier, the Gare d'Orsay, the Grand Palais, the grand hotels.  There was a desire of new and extraordinary things.  In fact, hotel labels have accompanied all the important art periods and movements.

PP:  There are 21 stopovers in the book including destinations from Saint-Raphael to Monaco, Libya to Israel,  Mexico to Uruguay .  Are these based on real journeys people would have taken over the past couple of centuries?

FM:  Yes, absolutely.  I wanted to write real travel stories when travel was associated with comfort, luxury, adventure and mystery.  A time when people were proud to show the stickers on their suitcases, to discover new places and live adventures.  I remember when I came from Chile to France with my family we took a ship and did a travel that lasted 3 weeks - with our luggage, trunks and even some pieces of furniture.  It was not only a travel, but also an incredible adventure.  Strange, epic, tragic, crazy.  I wanted to feel all that again and make the readers feel those emotions too.

PP:  The combination of pictures, quotes and vintage labels collected together in World Tour is incredibly evocative and romantic.  Was that your intention?

FM:  Yes.  My family knew the golden age of travel, the steamer-trunks, the luxury liners, an age of elegance.  It was an age of hopes and dreams and of people settling into a new country.  A time when everything could arrive.

PP:  You have written for National Geographic and have also published other books about travel?  How did you come to be a travel writer and what is your favourite part about your job?

FM:  Well, I've always been surrounded by travellers.  And also by adventurers.  My Scottish mother and my Chilean father were also driven by an intense curiosity.  So like everyone I think, I have been influenced by my background and as I come from South America where everyone likes to tell stories, it was kind of natural for me to mix stories and travels.  I published some stories for magazines but I really started to write seriously after I went to Rwanda with the French Doctors and did a story for National Geographic.  I wanted very much to write something about this experience, so I went to see the editor of the magazine and asked him if he was interested in a story.  I had never written for such an important magazine before.  I knew that very few people had been to Rwanda in those conditions and had the opportunity to see the country from that angle, and I felt that it was going to be a once in a lifetime experience.  The editor of National Geographic said he was interested in a story, he asked a photographer from Magnum agency to join me, and that is how I started writing real travel stories.  That was my first real work as a travel writer.
My favourite part about my job is the fact that I have the chance to see life from so many different angles.  Life is a kaleidoscope.  We never get to see all the colours or all the sides because they are changing all the time and we are changing too.  But it's so exciting to try to catch the most of it, no?  One of my biggest reward as a travel writer is being able to change the false impression that somebody has on a country and people.

PP:  Who do you think will be interested in reading World Tour?

FM:  Everybody!  People of all ages and all kinds who want to travel or to dream, to live adventures, to see unexpected things; beautiful, moving, funny, special, to read stories which make us love the world where we live.

Author Interview with Inga Simpson, author of "Mr Wigg"

Mr Wigg is a truly wonderful Australian novel due for release later this month.  It is filled with the stuff of rural life and routine, and yet it is suffused with great warmth.  The gentleness of Mr Wigg himself permeates every page making this a memorable must-read.

We asked the author, Inga Simpson, some questions about Mr Wigg.  Take a look.

PP: I laughed when I read that you thought Peter Cundall (of Gardening Australia) would make an excellent Mr Wigg should a movie be made of your book.  I can see it too! Was there anybody in particular who inspired you to write this wonderful character?

IS:  To an extent, my paternal grandfather.  He grew magnificent peaches!  White ones especially, which I've never tasted the like of since.  Wigg is the family name of one of his French ancestors, which really stuck in my head.  When I travelled to rural France and saw the way people live - with their village plots and walled orchards, and so much emphasis on growing and cooking and sharing food - I wondered if my grandfather had been living out of that part of his genetic heritage without having ever been to France.  A character began to take shape, and I was calling the novel Mr Wigg long before I started writing.  Mr Wigg took on his own character as the book evolved - one quite a way from my own grandfather - but some of Mr Wigg's stories about the old days are borrowed from my family.

PP:  Whilst Mr Wigg is an intrinsically Australian novel, we find ourselves dipping into European folklore in some parts.  Where did the story of the Peach King, the Orchard Queen, her gardener and his daughter come from?

IS:  I've read plenty of fairy tales (and reworked fairy tales) and love high fantasy - so it's a natural place for my imagination to wander.  The fairy tale came late in the writing of the first draft, so I already had Mr Wigg's fruit trees' voices and the main elements of the story.  The Peach King appeared in a passage about a peach orchard that Mr Wigg had dreamt up, and the rest almost wrote itself, echoing aspects of the plot, especially Mr Wigg's relationship with his daughter.  I wanted to suggest that European lineage, as you suggest; Mr Wigg's alternate self, perhaps.

PP:  The novel is set in the 1970s and there are some interesting references, such as the Vietnam War and the boycotting of South Africa by the Australian cricket team.  Why did you chose to set the novel in this period in particular?

IS:  Well, that's as far back as I can draw on my own experience, avoiding the need for too much research.  It was also - or so it seems to me - a time of great change for farming, cricket, politics, and the rural Australian way of life.  I was interested in the idea of change, and really wanted to celebrate some things about that period that are now gone.  The reason I ended up beginning with the summer of 1970/71 was all about the opportunities presented by (relatively) dramatic events in the cricket when England toured for the Ashes that season.

PP:  The characters in your book range from very young to old, ocker to foreign.  Did you find it difficult to find any of their voices, particularly that of the elderly Mr Wigg?

IS:  Mr Wigg and the children were probably easiest - certainly the most fun.  At first I had to concentrate a bit on writing from the point of view of an older man, and brought in the cricket to help me try and get his voice, but once I put him in the room with his grandchildren, I had it.  The vernacular of that time and place - and of people his age - is one I know well.

PP:  In 2011 you took part in the Queensland Writer's Centre/Hachette Manuscript Development Program, which lead to Hachette Australia publishing your book.  How invaluable was that experience?

IS:  It was a wonderful experience.  The opportunity to receive feedback on my work face-to-face from a publisher, and current information about the publishing industry from those who know best was, as you suggest, invaluable.  The ongoing support and friendship of the other writers who participated that year has been fantastic as well - developing those peer support groups is so important for writers.
Hachette contracting Mr Wigg as a result was a bonus, and a dream come true.  It didn't happen immediately, though, and was very much a collaborative effort.  I had to go away and rework the manuscript in response to the feedback I received and resubmit the novel.
A high proportion of participants have gone on to be published; I really recommend applying for the program to anyone with a draft manuscript.

PP:  And now, you are the owner of Olvar Wood, a retreat run by writers for writers, which holds masterclasses and workshops in Queensland.  Can you tell us a little about that?

IS:  Olvar Wood has been a really rewarding experience.  We wanted to share a beautiful part of the world - the Sunshine Coast hinterland - with other writers, and try to fill what we saw as a bit of a gap between what writer's centres and universities can offer.  We are great believers in the mentorship model; working on a manuscript over a period of time with personal support from someone more experienced - a bit like an apprenticeship.  We have met so many wonderful writers, some of whom have become good friends - and many of whom have gone on to be published.
Running the retreat didn't leave much room for our own writing.  At the moment, I do some nature writing workshops for government, and focus on one-on-one mentorships, with the option of  residential support at the lovely B&B down the road.  That way one someone else cooks the writer breakfast while I'm at my own desk - where I need to be.

PP:  Are you working on anything new at the moment?

IS:  I'm working on a new novel, set where I live, in the Sunshine Coast hinterland.  It's about a wildlife artist returning to the area where she grew up, and the impacts on a community of a child going missing.

Mr Wigg due for release 25 June $26.99

Looking for a reason to read The Great Gatsby? Let Naomi let F. Scott tell you why.....

It's all about first impressions.

If personality is a series of successful gestures, then there was something gorgeous about him, some heightened sensitivity to the promises of life, as if were related to one of those intricate machines that register earthquakes ten thousand miles away.

With all of the hype surrounding the release of Baz Lurhman's film of The Great Gatsby you might feel like there's no need to read the book, but there are many good reasons why it has been called the greatest American novel.

And grandiosity.

The lawn started at the beach and ran towards the front door for a quarter of a mile, jumping over sundials and brick walks and burning gardens - finally when it reached the house drifting up the side in bright vines as though from the momentum of it's run.

The main reason to read,or even re-read The Great Gatsby before you see the film is Fitzgerald's beautiful prose, which cannot be transcribed to film.  

Inscrutable beauty.

He smiled understandingly - much more than understandingly.  It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four of five times in life.  It faced - or seemed to face - the whole world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favour.  It understood you just so far as you wanted to be understood, and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey.

Unlike anything else on my shelves, I read The Great Gatsby over and over.  The impulse to pick it up is governed by the knowledge that I will wholeheartedly enjoy it and I'm reminded of what a beautiful and romantic book it is.

Excitement.

There was an excitement in her voice that men who had cared for her found difficult to forget:  a singing compulsion, a whispered "Listen", a promise that she had done gay, exciting things just a while since and that there were gay, exciting things hovering in the next hour.

And smouldering ambition.

This is a valley of ashes - a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens; where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke, and finally, with a transcendent effort, of ash-grey men, who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air.

Here's a few of my favourite examples, chosen from so many fabulous passages so as not to give away any of the plot. Resist if you can.

What's it like to be a Miles Franklin Literary Award judge?

Miles Franklin!  That's a lot of books.

We were very lucky to secure one of the Miles Franklin Literary Award judges (our boss Anna Low) to answer some questions about what it's like to be a judge for not only Australia's most prestigious prize but also it's most talked about!

We have watched Anna toiling away these past months, reading and re-reading the very large towers of books (as seen above) submitted for this year's award and we know firsthand that being a judge is not for the fainthearted. Here's what Anna had to say about it all.

Give us an idea of the Miles Franklin Literary Award judging timeline.  How long does the process take from submissions to a winner being chosen?

AL:  I only know my timeline and can't speak for the other judges.  This year I received my first box of books in October and a further two boxes in December.  The judges meet several times throughout the process and the winner is finally announced in June.

How does one become a MFLA judge?

AL:  The Miles Franklin judging panel consists of five judges who come from different areas of literary life.  The prize is administered by the The Trust Company; they approached me to join the panel.  With the exception of the Mitchell Librarian, each judge stays on the panel for about five years.

How important do you think awards such as the MFLA are to both writers and readers?

AL:  Very important.  For writers, awards recognise and acknowledge the hard work and commitment that it takes to write a book.  Awards, like the Miles Franklin, reward excellence.  Readers are drawn to books that have won a prize, as prizes draw attention to an author's work and generally this encourages readership.

And in regards to the wider book industry?

AL:  For the book industry, awards are important.  Of course, some are more successful than others but anything that starts a conversation about books or singles one book out from all the others is a good thing.

Do you have a new respect for the MFLA and other awards?

AL:  I think I have always had respect for the MFLA and other awards, but I realise now how hard people work behind the scenes to give life to awards.  I think I am much less likely to criticise the decision of an award having been through the judging process twice.

Recently, the judges of the Vogel Literary Award decided not to award a winner and the same thing happened last year with the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.  Do you believe that this should be an option or that judges are somehow letting down the reading public?  Or even that perhaps it might suggest a flawed submissions process?

AL:  The judges of the Vogel Prize would not have made that decision easily; there would have been much heartache and pain getting to the point of not awarding the prize.  I think they were really brave and that it is in the best interests of the prize, past winners and future winners to not award the prize if the work is not up to standard.  I have read quite a few books that have been through the Vogel prize process and they are universally of a very high standard.  I think it is far more important to maintain the quality of the prize than award a prize for the sake of it.  Having said that, it must be devastating for the authors who have submitted manuscripts.

What do you think of all the fuss the MFLA has generated in recent years?

AL:  I think that anything that gets people talking about books is a good thing.

Can you tell from reading the first page whether a book is an award winner?

AL:  Sometimes I wish you could tell from the first page of a book whether it is an award winner but no, I don't think it's possible.  It is certainly possible to discern the quality of the writing from the opening page and to be excited and want to read more.

How do you drown out outside influences?  For instance, Anna Funder's "All That I Am" won several awards last year before it was awarded the MFLA - can that be an agent of distraction or emphasis?

AL:  It can be very hard to drown out outside influences.  Once people discover that you are a judge they constantly ask you who is going to win or put forward who they think should win the prize.  Quite often, this is the only book they have read on the list.  As a judge, it's important to remember to consider each book fairly and with the criteria of the prize in mind.  The judges have long and full discussions about each book.  It is impossible to ignore the fact that a title may have won other prizes, but it is also important to remember that every prize has different criteria for judging them and you must judge your books by the criteria laid out in Miles Franklin's will.

There has been quite a concerted effort this year to engage readers and to encourage Australians to read the MFLA longlisted and shortlisted books. In effect, you've been responsible for curating a reading list for 2013.  What do you think of that?

AL:  I hadn't thought of that, that I was responsible for curating a list of books for people to read.  That is what I do everyday in my shop, curate the selection of books available for people to read and look at.

On one level this makes me very happy because I believe the books on the shortlist are excellent and deserve a wide readership.  I would also like to encourage people to read more widely than just the longlist, there are many wonderful books out there.

This year there will be an award for the best Twitter review of a MFLA shortlisted title - do you and your fellow judges have to read and award those as well?

AL:  I haven't been following the Twitter campaign but I will definitely check it out.  As judges we don't have to read and assess these entries but I imagine it would be quite fun and probably quite challenging to do so.

Having spent the past six months reading carefully and critically with one objective in mind, has it changed the way you read going forward?

AL:  Yes. One thing that continues to surprise me is that when you read a book for the second or third time, you can discover new elements and nuances - no matter how carefully you read it in the first place.

Nothing beats a good editor.  When you read such a large quantity of books in a relatively short space of time you can really see the effect of a good editor.  Some of the books that are submitted are really good, but one can't help but feel that they could be fantastic with a little more time spent on the editorial process.

Interview with "Burial Rites" author Hannah Kent

Bound to be one of this year's most talked about books, Burial Rites is Hannah Kent's first novel and is based on the true story of the last woman to be publicly beheaded in Iceland in 1829.
Hannah is the co-founder and deputy editor of the literary journal Kill Your Darlings.  In 2011, she won the inaugural Writing Australia Unpublished Manuscript Award, which brought about an international bidding war for publishing rights.
Hannah very kindly agreed to answer some questions for our blog.

Congratulations Hannah on your first novel.  As deputy editor and co-founder of the literary journal Kill Your Darlings, you are no stranger to publishing.  However, was it a little daunting crossing over from editor to published novelist?

HK: Thank you!  I started working on Burial Rites and Kill Your Darlings at the same time, so I never really felt as though I was crossing from one side of the industry to another.  If anything, I think the editorial skills I honed as deputy editor of KYD made me able to appraise and edit my own work more efficiently.  Similarly, as an aspiring writer, I always felt an affinity with those who submitted their work to KYD, and edited their stories with this in mind.  It was a harmonious to-ing and fro-ing between both sides of the fence.  Publishing a first novel has been daunting, but for other reasons!

Your central character, Anges Magnusdottir, was one of the last people to be executed in Iceland. How did you hear of her story and what compelled you to write about it?

HK:  I first heard about Agnes Magnusdottir and the murders committed at Illugastadir when I was living in Iceland ten years ago, as a 17 year old exchange student.  The first few months of my stay there had been quite difficult:  It was winter, the days were gripped by darkness for up to twenty hours at a time, and I felt both conspicuous yet isolated as a foreigner in a small northern Icelandic town.  It was during this early time of loneliness that I was driven through a strange tract of land with my host parents - a valley mouth covered in hundreds of small hills.  Asking my host parents if the area was significant for any reason (I thought the hills looked like Viking burial mounds), they told me that it was the site of the last execution in Iceland.  Immediately intrigued, I pressed them for details, and learned that it had been a woman.  Agnes had been a 34 year old servant, condemned for the murder of her employer.  I think I must have seen something of my own experience of loneliness in her story and in the isolated place of her death, for thoughts of her haunted me during the rest of my exchange, and also in the years that followed.
I eventually decided to write Agnes' story after being continually frustrated by portrayals of her as an unequivocal evildoer - the orchestrator of an attack on two sleeping, defenceless men - in accounts of the crime and execution.  Burial Rites was my attempt to find the human being behind the stereotype of Agnes as a monstrous woman.  I suppose I wanted to give her an opportunity to tell her side of the story.

Much of Burial Rites is written from a first person perspective - Agnes' perspective.  How difficult was it to strike the right tone with Agnes' voice?  And were you worried about giving her a sympathetic back story considering her notorious status in Iceland?

HK:  Agnes' voice arrived very organically.  My first attempts at writing this story were first-person poems, and while I soon realised that I needed to turn to prose, I think something of that early lyricism remained in Agnes' first-person passages.  There were times during the writing process when I had no idea how to structure scenes, or how I'd bring it all together, but Agnes' voice never gave me any trouble.  It was always there - I felt I knew her intimately enough to write her first-person passages intuitively.
I didn't set out to give Agnes a sympathetic back story.  Much of what is there is either fact or likelihood, suggested by my research - it's true she had a tough childhood.  I haven't conscientiously sought to make her sympathetic - I never wanted to protest her guilty conviction - rather I wanted to explore her ambiguity and motivations.  My approach was one of empathy, rather than sympathy, and I think the distinction is a necessary one.  That said, I do wonder whether some Icelanders will take issue with the way I've portrayed certain historical characters - some of whom might be descendants!  I guess I'll have to wait and see.  At the end of the day, it's a work of fiction based on research and speculation, and I hope people will understand that.  I don't pretend to be a historian.

You are taking part in an event at the Sydney Writer's Festival called "Love Letter to Iceland".  Without giving too much away before the festival, can you tell us what is it that excites you as an author about the Icelandic experience?

HK:  I loved living in Iceland as an exchange student, despite those early months of loneliness, and I've been there four times or so now.  There is simply no other place on earth like it.  The landscape, particularly, gets under your skin.  When I first saw the extraordinary vista of the north country, with its sweeping glacial valleys and vast skies interrupted only by the snow-covered mountains, it felt like a homecoming - it felt spiritual.  Then there is the history, the sagas, the ancient, unchanged language - you feel the stories of this place under your feet.  There is a literary heartbeat to Iceland.  This is what excites me as an author about the Icelandic experience - the depth of feeling the place inspires in me.

You won an award in 2011 for your unpublished manuscript which became hotly sought after.  How important do you think these types of awards are for writers trying to find publishers?

HK:  They're crucial.  The Writing Australia Unpublished Manuscript Award was my foot in the door, in that it attracted some early publisher interest, and allowed me to sign with an agent.  The prize money is always useful for a writer - we're all looking to buy time to write - and the mentorship with Geraldine Brooks was an extraordinary experience, but the attention and wider opportunities awards such as these bring is truly of most benefit to an emerging writer.  I have no doubt that, had I not received the WAUMA, Burial Rites would not be published today.

It will be a wonder if you have time to read at all, but I'll ask anyway.  Are you reading anything of note right now?

HK:  I've slipped into my old bad habit of reading one hundred books at once - there's just so many wonderful stories out there, and I'm very greedy for them all.  On my bedside table, all stuffed with bookmarks at various intervals, are Galore by Michael Crummey, The Hungry Ghosts by Anne Berry, Astray by Emma Donoghue, Welcome to Your New Life by Anna Goldsworthy and the remarkable A Death in the Family by Karl Ove Knausgaard.  They're all fantastic.

Burial Rites in store now $32.99.