NZ POST READERS & WRITERS WEEK
Ursula Dubosarsky (left) - Walking Through DreamsOne of the special bonuses about literary festivals is being exposed to writers one has not come across before. Ursula is a case in point.
Honestly, how many of my New Zealand readers have ever heard of Ursual before? And yet she is a highly talented, hugely imaginative Australia author of children's books.
Australian and New Zealand readers are generally speaking woefully ignorant of each others authors. I know from my own publishing experience that it is easier to export NZ titles to almost anywhere in the world than it is to expoer them to Australia. And I'm sure the reverse is also the case.
Unless of course, they are cookbooks!
I so wished I could be in Wellington to see Ursula who is a most wonderful writer. There are but a handful of children's authors from NZ and Australia who cross the ocean and appear at each other's events. Perhaps our writers are seen as 'local' and our two countries are too close - we see their locals as moving into our local territory, and vice versa.
ReplyDeleteI know there are authors trying to sell books into Australia who try not to mention that they are NZers in order to give them a better chance at getting published there.
A question while I'm here - there is sometimes a tick box on the comment page that you can use to ensure you receive any further messages relating to that blog by email. This is very useful but not always here - eg today there is no box. Any clues?