Tuesday, July 09, 2013

NZ writer living in Sydney, Martin Edmond on the history and art of taxi driving

Third 10k ebook published

 NZ writer living in Sydney, Martin Edmond on the history and art of taxi driving.



Having tried it before, he swore he wouldn’t again: Martin Edmond was a reluctant taxi driver on the streets of Sydney — three times taking up a trade like Charon’s, ferrying souls to keep himself in writing time. In this essay he explores the history and challenges of the profession, carrying the good, the bad and the delinquent through the underbelly of Sydney. He describes his ambivalence, coping with tedium, with idiotic or unsavoury behaviour and with his own early disinclination to work as a servant; how he made an accommodation with himself, finding a parallel in writing — and ultimately transforming his practice, allowing him to serve his clients with a kind of grace:
“Thus it makes perfect sense to treat them as honoured guests; and to do all that is in your power to bring them safely, happily, perhaps even changed, to their destination.”
Edmond is the sort of writer that makes you feel smarter, more creative and more civilised simply for having read him. Landfall Review Online



Martin discusses his work with Rosa Mira Books.

Winged Sandals
is available for US3 dollars here. Those buying a copy in the next two weeks will be offered another 10k ebook free, by follow-up email: The Siren, a short novella by Aaron Blaker, or The Happiest Music on Earth, three stories by Sue Wootton.

Within a few days, Rosa Mira Books will publish The Linen Way, a memoir by the extraordinary American poet Melissa Green.

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