Thursday, April 1, 2010

Dead parrot society

It was stiff, and green and mysteriously dead on the porch. While I did some swearing at their early morning loudness I really have no desire to eat Mr John Roswella. I buried him in the paddock in front of the house, and heaven wept. Well it rained on me, at least.

We had a rather flat morning fishing (total bag some kelp for my garden and some saltbush to try drying.) John's mention of the next book made me have a look on Amazon. I'm sure the release date was around the 12th but either my publisher changed it or I got it wrong, because SLOW TRAIN TO ARCTURUS came out on the 30th of March. So I missed it. It was a sort precient book in many ways - it's the first serious attempt at addressing some of the issues that bedevil the really possible with present science sort of space-travel (not the warp speed and beam me up sort of thing)that sf writers have made for some time. The real issues of how we get from here to there on a trip in a small habitat, lasting many years, haven't been en vogue since Clarke's Rendesvoux with Rama and Harry Harrison's Captive Universe. I tried to keep it real (or possibly real) and yet accessible, because I am rather passionate about the idea of colonising space. Of course being me I couldn't resist satire too, so it is quite funny in among the adventures. The many little isolated habits - islands if you will - had a lot of material for it. I didn't -- when I wrote this book -- anticipate living on a remote island myself! I wish I'd done so before I wrote it. I would have had a better understanding of Ferries.

Anyway I look forward to my author copies showing up at the Island post office. Any day now, I'm sure.

6 comments:

  1. There is a slightly larger relative of the rosella called a galah, which isn't quite as large as a cockatoo. There is an old traditional swaggie method of cooking a galah that may be of interest to you next time you have the opportunity.

    Take your billy, fill it 3/4 full of water, and add a river rock to the bottom of it. put it on the fire until the water is almost, but not quite, boiling.

    Add the galah.

    You know the meal is ready when the rock is soft. Throw away the galah and eat the rock.

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  2. hmm remarkably like the carp-in-clay method of cooking carp. Is it necessary to pluck the galah (or the rock)?

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  3. Do you think it was a message from the island mafia?

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  4. I used to love watching the Galahs in the morning. They would gather on the oval across from the house I shared. I've heard of people keeping one as a pet and teaching it to talk.

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  5. Dave, as far as I know Carl has your author's copied of this book, unless you asked him to send them to you.

    Lin

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  6. Francis - if it had been in my bed...
    Chris - if these ones learned to talk it would HAVE to be as pirate birds.
    Lin - I've notified them 3 times of the change.

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