every day should be a susie day

Trailer!

Posted on 31. May, 2010 by susie in blog, books i've been reading, girl meets cake, kids' books i've been reading, my invisible boyfriend, other writers

Yep, that is me blethering away there in the background.  (Even the Mycroft Christie bits.)  That’s my special ‘oh no, I’m talking to myself, let’s try to get this over and done with as quickly as possible’ voice.

MY INVISIBLE BOYFRIEND has now been read by lots of people who aren’t my Mum, including the lovely ABA, who’ve picked it for the Kids’ Indie Next List Summer 2010. (I’m rubbing shoulders with Diana Wynne Jones, David Almond, Mark Haddon, David Levithan… mind officially blown, tyvm.)

And here’s what some other people (who also aren’t my Mum, unless she’s been very busy) thought:

‘quirky, hilarious, and entertaining… Heidi is an unforgettable protagonist that will not fail to make readers laugh with her LOL-worthy shenanigans and escapades’ – The Undercover Book Lover

‘a strong first-person narrative voice that reminds me a little of Georgia in Louise Rennison’s series (Angus, Thongs, and Full-frontal Snogging, etc.)… very funny’ – Book Aunt

‘one darlin’ book that I simply couldn’t get enough of’ – Lauren’s Crammed Bookshelf

‘very, very funny… Every single secondary character (Dai, Ludo, Teddy and Fili especially) comes to life on the page, and I want to be friends with all of them’ – Wondrous Reads (on GIRL MEETS CAKE, the UK/World edition)

‘I just really fell for Heidi and her friends… cute and entertaining, and if you like Brit humor the way I do, like fun romantic comedy-type stories, or like books with a funky and diverse cast of characters, you’ll really get a kick out of it’ – Forever Young

Just in case you were, you know, wondering if it was your cup of tea… :)   I think what’s really stuck out in all the reviews so far is how very British people have found it.  I’m still wondering exactly what that means.  Blog on the subject will ensue, once I’ve pondered some more…

I’m reading a book about faeries – and loving it to pieces (despite being a cynical git who tends to find straight fantasy and ‘magick’ a bit of a stretch) because it’s just that good.  It’s R.J. Anderson’s Knife (published in the US as Faery Rebels: Spell Hunter), which so far is reminding me of The Borrowers: an enticing doll’s house world of tiny furniture and monstrous humans (who might turn out to be allies, after all), and a tough bored girl who wants to see the big wide world.  The prose is glorious too.  Zippy clever stuff for 9+ girls.

Still puttering away at the opening chapters of Exciting New Secret Book Thingy, juggling a few scenes around to get the best fit.  It’s like a jigsaw with a piece missing at the moment (sorry, peanut-butter-in-bra story I borrowed from Girl Scout camp, not sure you’re quite good enough) – but I’m itching to get to the next bit.  Plus coffee with agent, shop-talky dinner with an old mate who’s now commissioning teen lit for a living (small small world), and oceans of tea with awesome writer-buddy Sarah Mussi. That all counts as work, right?

Going out for dinner and ending up dancing to random 60s girl groups in an awesomely manky student nightclub; discovering that the Marylebone Oxfam Bookshop is where Scholastic mock-ups go to die (I found a Philip Pullman with a Big Woo cover, and an Ally Kennen which was Girl Meets Cake on the inside: utterly surreal); eating a lot of peas.  Mmm, peas.

Competition Time!

Posted on 09. Apr, 2010 by susie in 7 days of stuff, blog, girl meets cake, my invisible boyfriend

To mark the last of My Invisible Boyfriend’s celebratory 7 Days of Stuff, what better than a giveaway?

Want to get your hands on this little lot?

Up for grabs: a signed copy of My Invisible Boyfriend, a signed copy of serafina67 *urgently requires life*, and a gingerbread goodiebag (not as pictured – they seem to have mysteriously vanished post photoshoot :D)…

In My Invisible Boyfriend, Heidi creates an imaginary BF inspired by a gingerbread man.  To win, create your own invisible friend (no gender required, and you’re very welcome to keep things platonic), and send me a picture.  It can be a real gingerbread cookie, or a drawing of one.  Check out the last Fabulous Bake-A-Boy Challenge gallery for inspiration, and links to a deeply yummy gingerbread recipe.  Send me your invisible friends!

Email your entries to: susie AT susieday.com (or here, with a link to your image hosted online): all images in jpg, png, or gif format please
Contest open to: everyone!  All territories, all ages (please ask permission from a guardian if you are <13)
Closing date: Friday 7th May

Entries must be your own creative work and not infringe copyright.  For example:

THIS IS OK :)

THIS IS CUTE BUT NOT OK :(

Good luck! And if you missed it, don’t forget to check out the rest of the 7 Days of Stuff!

Full T&Cs are listed below:
(more…)

Cover Girls And Invisible Boys

Posted on 16. Dec, 2009 by susie in books i've been reading, doctor who, girl meets cake, my invisible boyfriend, telly

I hear murmurings from the blogosphere that the ARC of My Invisible Boyfriend is beginning to arrive in a few US mailboxes.  For those of you who’ll have to wait till April, here’s a sneaky peek at the absurdly cute cover.

Look, pretty people!   (Don’t get too excited, European readers: this is the US edition of Girl Meets Cake, not a new book: you’ll have to wait till 2011 for one of them.  North American readers, please feel free to get as excited as is humanly possible.)

  I’ve got a copy of Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go sitting next to me – yet appear to be reading Dick Francis’s Forfeit.  Eh, it’s Christmas, right?

  Project Poppy has been speeding along very happily, and has now careened into a wall and fallen down a plothole.  Grr.  Now have to decide whether to skip over the hole and fill it in later, or spend a few days with pen and paper scribbling metaphorical ladders. Hrmmm…

Listening to R4’s Shelved on how abandoned or banned episodes of Doctor Who and The Professionals reveal that people who made TV in the 1970s were, um, bonkers (a shock, I know); discovering my Christmas lights are borked; finally getting around to watching Inkheart and LOVING IT TO PIECES, OOH! – really must get round to reading the other 2 books.

Girls (and dad) Meet Cakes

Posted on 16. Aug, 2009 by susie in books i've been reading, girl meets cake, holidays, kids' books i've been reading, my invisible boyfriend, other writers

How lucky am I?  Not only do I get to write books about cake, but this week I got to have afternoon tea with one of the people who reads them!   The utterly lovely Paige won the Mizz magazine ‘Tea with Susie’ star prize, and she and her family joined me and a few of the divine Scholastic ladies at the Wallace Collection in London.  Much tea, cake, book-talk and giggling was had – not to mention cartwheels in the sunshine (confession: I left that bit to Paige).  Keep up the dancing, Paige, and I hope you’re all having a lovely summer holiday this week!

  Judy Blume, Meg Cabot, and, um, Margery Allingham.  Plus Justine Larbalastier’s original version of this blog post, expressing her frustration at Bloomsbury’s choice of a shockingly disingenous cover for her YA novel Liar.  I’m thrilled to see that sanity has prevailed – and have the utmost respect for her courage in speaking out.

  Ooh!  Aah!  I shall have to be infuriatingly vague (since at the moment it’s still at the back-of-an-envelope stage and I haven’t even decided on the main character’s name yet), but I’m about to start my next book.  (Well, I’m about to go on holiday and do no work on it at all, actually – but after that, workiness will ensue, I promise.)  For the ultra-curious: think Groundhog Year.  Hmm… *plots*

  Frolicking around the Tower of London; building slightly less impressive towers for baby M to knock over; having pretty pictures taken for the My Invisible Boyfriend jacket by my super-talented friend Justa Mili; practising putting up my tent!

Stop! Hammocktime

Posted on 27. Jun, 2009 by susie in books i've been reading, cooking, girl meets cake, internet, kids' books i've been reading, my invisible boyfriend, telly

I’ve wanted a hammock since the summer after my GCSEs, when I spent an entire week at a French campsite refusing to budge out of one, while reading Dune.  (Truly, there cannot be more compelling evidence of the comfortableness of hammocks.  Sorry, sci-nerds, but that’s a 750-page turd of a book.)

Today the sun shone, I read the weekend Guardian cover to cover, and there were raspberries, and much tea.   Bliss.

  Nomnomnombooks. Lately I’ve read Scarlett Thomas’ PopCo, which is marginally less weird than The End of Mr Y, despite being about commercial globalisation, treasure-hunting, and complex mathematical formulae. Brilliant, though: the ideas are magnificent but it’s the characters I still miss, weeks later. Then Nicola Upson’s An Expert In Murder: faux 30s detective fiction, starring actual 30s detective fiction author Josephine Tey (do you see what she did there?), who gets embroiled in a series of murders connected to her play about Richard III.  Being a Tey geek, I adore the concept more than is reasonable, but the execution is a disappointment: in lieu of narrative urgency the point of view wanders from character to character, including to the killer – who conveniently happens not to be thinking “hmm, wish I hadn’t committed that murder” at the time – and Tey is barely in it. I’d go and read Brat Farrar instead if I were you (or Allingham’s Dancers in Mourning, for genuine Golden Age theatreland intrigue). I’ve also finally read a Jaclyn Moriarty, Becoming Bindy McKenzie (YA), which I adored with the queasy reservations of one who recognises bits of her teenage self in the (profoundly unlovely) heroine. The denouement is bonkers, but there’s so much brilliance before that you don’t mind at all. It’s the 3rd of her Ashbury books, and I plan to eat the others as soon as the library lets me.

  I have proofs!  One last pass over the insides of My Invisible Boyfriend (the US title for Girl Meets Cake), which is going to look beautiful.  And I’m playing with a new Sooper Sekrit Project: only a few thousand words in, but I’m getting a wee bit excited.  If I can juuust get the voice right…

Becoming enthralled by the televisual loveliness that is Chuck; watching Don Juan De Marco (Johnny Depp is so young! Marlon Brando is so… many other things); being dead chuffed about Anthony Browne being the new children’s laureate; eating lasagne; still loving RebelliousPixels’ Buffy vs Twilight satire vid (just in case you missed it); wondering if I can bring the hammock indoors at the end of the summer so I don’t have to contemplate life without it…