Jane Rusbridge's Blog, page 9
July 16, 2012
Wordfeast: part of Littlehampton Music and Arts Festival
I am delighted to be invited to judge Littlehampton Wordfeast’s Prose and Poetry Competition in September.
I’ll be reading the winning entries at a FREE, but ticketed, event on September 22nd in the Windmill Studio, Littlehampton.
First Prize: A workshop voucher for the Forge Gallery
Second Prize: Fish Factory in Littlehampton, meal for two
Third Prize: £5.00 book tokens
Entry: £2.00
Deadline: 5th September
For details on how to enter the competition, please email ilovelittlehampton@gmail.com for an entry form and further details
Canada Water Library:private event for librarians
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I'm delighted to have been invited, as an old CHSG girl, to talk to the Independent Schools’ Librarians Group when they visit the impressive Canada Water Library. This new library, completed at the end of the last year, is designed by Piers Gough and stocked with 40,000 brand new books. I'm going to be leading a ‘fun’ informal session on the impact of memory on writing before we are given a formal tour of the Library.
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Gough believes that libraries still hold magic realms of invention, realms of ideas; hence this ‘celebratory’ building (Moore, Rowan. (2011) Canada Water library – review Available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesig... (Accessed: 17/09/12).
I'll also be signing copies of ROOK and The Devil's Music provided by George Hanratty from ‘Tales on Moon Lane’ Bookshop, who is kindly offering a 10% discount .
Photograph of Canada Water Library per kind favour Len Abrams
Photograph of Jane Rusbridge per kind favour Karen Abrams
Canada Water Library author event
Details to be confirmed
July 15, 2012
Jane Rusbridge in conversation with K.J. Orr at University of Chichester
Jane Rusbridge is interviewed by the short story writer K.J.Orr, shortlisted for the National Short Story Award in 2011.
Both writers have connections with the University of Chichester. Katherine is completing a PhD in Creative Writing and Jane began writing her debut novel, The Devil’s Music, nominated for the International IMPAC Literary Award 2011, while studying for her MA at the university. Jane also won the University’s Philip LeBrun Prize for creative writing while still an undergraduate, and has been Associate Lecturer in English and Creative Writing there since 1999.
VENUE: Cloisters, University of Chichester, Bishop Otter Campus, College Lane, Chichester PO18 9PE
Time: 5.15 – 6.30 pm This is a FREE event
There will be a chance to chat with both authors, ask questions and buy books.
K.J. Orr on her short listed entry for the National Short Story Prize 2011: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00kgqpf
Interview with Katherine Orr at University of Chichester
Jane Rusbridge is interviewed by the short story writer K.J.Orr who was shortlisted for the National Short Story Award in 2011.
Venue: University of Chichester Details to be confirmed
July 14, 2012
GOING DIGITAL: Social Networking & Digital Marketing for Writers
Jane Rusbridge will be speaking at a social networking seminar with PR expert Lucy Middleton, and novelist Annemarie Neary with Vicky Grut (chair) at a London Writing Workshop in October.
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A new departure for London Writing Workshops, this half-day seminar led by PR expert Lucy Middleton is an opportunity for writers to look at the challenges and opportunities of the digital environment.
Writers are increasingly involved in promoting their work – whether they’re self-publishing, or working with a small or a mainstream publisher. The seminar will look at ways that traditional PR techniques can be reinvented, as well as exploring the online tools that allow writers to connect directly with their readers and build new audiences for their work.
Novelists Jane Rusbridge (The Devil’s Music, Bloomsbury 2010, and Rook, Bloomsbury Circus, summer 2012) and Annemarie Neary (A Parachute in the Lime Tree, the History Press, March 2012) will be on hand to talk about their experiences of promoting new books in 2012. (Click on the authors’ names to see their bios.) The seminar will be followed by drinks and networking for participants and speakers.
Lucy Middleton has been in PR, Marketing and Advertising for over 20 years, working with Blue Chip companies as well as small to medium-sized enterprises. She is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing and has lectured in Marketing Theory at several academic institutions, including the MBA course at Cambridge University’s Judge Management Institute. She specializes in advising companies on their Social Networking Marketing Strategy as well as Strategic Branding Solutions and Crisis PR.
Cost: £46 includes a handout on Digital Marketing for Writers, tea/coffee break and a free drink at the end. Group limit: 30.
The seminar will be followed by networking/drinks.
Find out about more London Writing Workshops
July 9, 2012
Diary of a Rook Obsession, in pictures
‘The creative habit is like a drug. The particular obsession changes, but the excitement, the thrill of your creation lasts’ Henry Moore
Now that I have just finished checking the page proofs for Rook, to be published in August, will my 4 year obsession with rooks begin to dwindle? An obsession shared by my daughter Natalie, a photographer.
Autumn, 2007: Noticed rooks’ nests in the trees either side of the lanes on my drive home. Wanted to learn more.
Read Mark Cocker’s Crow Country . 
Fell in love with rooks.
December, 2007: Went to Norfolk seeking rooks. Watched thousands and thousands of them fly in to roost, near Buckenham Carr. One of the most uplifting, cathartic experiences of my life. Three nights in a row.
Spring, Summer, Winter 2008: Read and talked, a lot, about rooks. Collected stories about pet rooks.
January, 2009: Returned to Norfolk, with my daughter, Natalie Miller and her camera. Nat fell in love with rooks too.
Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter, 2009: Nat and I continued to be distracted by sightings of rooks, rookeries and roosts. Nat took more photographs, near where we live in Sussex:
January, 2010: Nat went to back to Norfolk, with a friend who loves birds, and took more photos.
Summer, 2011: Talked to Nat about Nora, the main character in Rook. Told a little of her story. Which gave Nat some ideas:
Autumn, 2011: Sent some of Nat’s rook pictures to Bloomsbury.
December, 2011: Senior designer Greg Heinimann created the first version of the cover, using one of Nat’s photographs of rooks in Norfolk:
I had one or two ideas. Discussed them with my editor, who passed them on to Greg. Version 2 of the cover design:
Loved the Bayeux Tapestry in the sky on the back cover. Suggested a scene more relevant to the themes of the novel.
3rd, and final, version:
All photographs of rooks in this post taken by Natalie Miller . Prints available for sale via website contact form.
Rook by Jane Rusbridge available to preorder from Amazon here , and from Bloomsbury here
Three Sussex Writers at Stoughton Fete
Gabrielle Kimm, Isabel Ashdown and I had fun at Stoughton Village Fete despite the torrential rain. Lashings of tea, chunks of lemon cake and lots of chat about books and writing kept us cheerful! Thank you to all the lovely people who stopped by our Meet the Author corner.
£1 from every book sale went to the church fund to help maintain the beautiful Saxon church at Stoughton.
July 2, 2012
Psychologies Writing Workshop with Vanessa Gebbie and Jane Rusbridge
Place: Bloomsbury Publishing, 50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP
Cost: £20
In association with Writers’ & Artists’ Yearbook
Psychologies Magazine presents a workshop on writing from life with authors and creative writing experts, Vanessa Gebbie and Jane Rusbridge, at Bloomsbury Publishing, Bedford Square, London. They will be running a writing workshop for people with a story to tell and offering their advice on turning your own experience into a novel.
Jane Rusbridge is the author of Rook and The Devil’s Music. She taught at primary and preschool levels before returning to education herself as a mature student to study English at Chichester University, where she went on to gain Distinction for her MA in Creative Writing. She has won many awards for her writing. For the past ten years she has worked at Chichester University as an Associate Lecturer in English. She has taught across a range of critical modules, including Race and the Literary Imagination, Reading Women’s Writings, Genre: Poetry and Genre: Prose Fiction, but her particular teaching interest is Creative Writing. She lives on the coast in West Sussex with her husband, a farmer, and three of their five children.
Vanessa’s debut novel The Cowards Tale was chosen as a Financial Times Book of the Year. She is author of two collections of short fiction and contributing editor of the creative writing text book, Short Circuit. She is a freelance writing teacher working with writers of all ages and abilities. She has been invited to lead workshops by The National Association of Writers in Education, by literary festivals, by universities, schools and writing groups. She has worked as Writer in Residence at Stockholm University, run week-long workshops on short fiction at Anam Cara Writers’ and Artists’ Retreat in Ireland, and will be leading a course on the novel later in 2012 in Austria, at The Vienna Writing Studio.
June 30, 2012
Buy a Turk’s Head bracelet inspired by The Devil’s Music
Through our joint love of the sea, jewellery designer Harriet McAlonan (@seasparkle_x ) and I ‘met’ on twitter some months ago. I adored her beautiful sea glass jewellery range; she bought and read The Devil’s Music. I was delighted when she told me the details of sailors’ knots in the book had inspired her to make a gorgeous bracelet, one very similar to the bracelet Andrew makes for his mother at the end of the novel.
Now we’ve had an idea for this very special Summer Offer! If you go to Harriet’s website, you can buy your own Limited Edition Turk’s Head bracelet designed by Harriet, along with a signed copy of The Devil’s Music. Or, if you’ve already read the book, perhaps this would make the perfect gift for a friend who loves the sea.
Hurry though – only 5 available!
