Michael Gerard Bauer Author

blog 100: In which I post the stunning conclusion to my 2 week odyssey in WA WA Land!

Posted on June 14, 2017 by mgbauer

(* If you missed my blog about Week One or you want to recap go HERE.)

Author’s Log: Star Date Saturday June 3/Sunday June 4.

PREVIOUSLY on my Western Australian trip with Lesley Reece presenting writing workshops on behalf The Literature Centre, I had just returned to Fremantle to stay in the Centre for the long weekend.

You can read all about the wonderful work of the Centre here but as mentioned in the last blog it is housed inside the walls of the Old Fremantle Prison in what used to be the hospital section. This is the view from the back veranda of the Centre.

I’m pleased to say that I handled my time inside the Big House with ease. I mean it’s not like I became obsessed with locks and walls and stuff…

If you ever go to Fremantle a tour of the Old Prison is well worth taking. Although I must admit I found their advertising below terribly misleading.

Seriously, I searched both sides of the prison and for the life of me I couldn’t see the Pyramids of Giza or The Great Wall of China anywhere. Quel disappointment!

While released on weekend parole for good behaviour, I checked out the beautiful buildings and sites of old Freo…

…including the statue located between the football ground and Fremantle Markets which commemorates the best mark ever taken on a roundabout while dislocating an opponent’s neck…

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…and this iconic Freo street art which clearly depicts ‘some kind of an animal’…

…as well as this sculpture which I think marks the site of Fremantle’s grizzliest ever murder.

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Back at the Centre I prepared for the week ahead by successfully doing all my washing – once I figured out which way the clothes line drying thingie went.

I also spent time perfecting my justifiably famous Shadow Art Performance entitled “One-Armed Man with Llama”.

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Author’s Log: Star Date Monday June 5 – Wednesday June 7.

Lesley and I flew from Perth airport and arrived at Port Hedland around 6.00pm. Checked in at the Esplanade Hotel.

Port Hedland is the world’s largest bulk tonnage export port, exporting 372.3 million tonnes per annum. World’s largest! Bet you didn’t know that. I’m pretty sure it’s also the home of the longest trains in the world.

P.H. is a heavy industry town of course but during our stay the weather was lovely and mild, and the skies were crystal clear, so it had a stark, eerie beauty – especially at night.

They tell me it’s salt but I’m not convinced. Over the two days we were there that already huge mound doubled in size.

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At Hedland SHS we had great writing workshops with Yr 7/8 and Yr 9/10 students from the Centre’s Talented Young Writers Programme as well as afternoon sessions with junior and senior indigenous students taking part in the Follow the Dream Programme.

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Author’s Log: Star Date Thursday June 7.

We left Port Hedland and were transported around 400 kms through the magnificent Pilbara to Newman by our fantastic Taxi driver Mick who is originally from Romania.

The ever-changing landscape was spectacular and check out that sky!

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Author’s Log: Star Date Friday June 9.

The final day of writing workshops with small groups of Yr 7/8s and Yr 9/10s at Newman SHS. A great way to finish the fortnight.

Left Newman airport at 4.05pm and arrived in Perth at 5.50pm. Spent the night back at the Literature Centre.

Author’s Log: Star Date Saturday June 10.

Left The Literature Centre and the beautiful clear skies of WA early in the morning and flew back home to Brisbane and the Sunshine State.

Where it was raining. And still is, as I write this.

A big thanks goes to Lesley Reece for inviting me on the Talented Young Writers Programme for a second time and for her guidance, support, companionship, good humour and sheer hard work over the two weeks.

Thanks too to the teachers and librarians at the various school for their support and friendly welcome. And of course a huge congratulations and thanks to the awesome kids in all the workshops whose enthusiasm, co-operation and love of writing made my job a pleasure.

The Literature Centre does an amazing job supporting Australian authors and in encouraging and nurturing young writers right around WA. None of it would exist in the first place without Lesley’s foresight or continue without her passion and dedication and that of her wonderful support team at the Centre. If you know anyone with spare cash looking for a good cause tell them about the Literature Centre. They are in desperate need of funding to continue their wonderful work and programmes.

Cheers
Michael

ps: I had the great pleasure of spending some time at the Literature Centre with the super-talented writer, artist, musician and composer Matt Ottley. He even played some flamenco guitar which he has done professionally in the past. He was brilliant.

I am not brilliant, but I leave you with a brief video of me attempting some simple 12 bar blues on Matt’s expensive flamenco guitar in front of a wall of Matt Ottley artwork. (Naturally I never played a note in his actual presence.)

All my life I’ve suffered for my music. Now it’s your turn.

blog 99: In which I visit WA WA Land – Part the First.

Posted on June 4, 2017 by mgbauer

This is a log of the first week of my two week trip to Western Australia presenting writing workshops as part of The Literature Centre’s Talented Young Writers’ Programme.

Author’s Log: Star Date Sunday May 28.

Woke up dull and early Sunday morning. Departed Brisvegas 8.40am. Crossed the wide, brown land. Views from window confirm both width and browniness of Australian landmass. Arrived Perth WA approx five and a half hours later. My decision to fly rather than undertake the journey on foot seems totally vindicated.

Three hour wait at Perth airport before next flight to Albany. Spent the time eating, relaxing, reading and navel-gazing. Ceased navel-gazing after third warning from airport security that navel gazing must be limited to my own navel. What’s the fun in that?

Eventually joined at the airport by Lesley Reece – Founder and Director of the Fremantle Literature Centre (TLC), champion of Children’s Writing and Australian Children’s Authors for over twenty years, Order of Australia recipient and all-round remarkable woman. We fly to Albany arriving at 5.15pm.

After eating at a nearby Indian Restaurant, we call it a night. (Although to be fair, we probably weren’t the first ones to come up with that description.)

Author’s Log: Star Date Monday May 29.

Youth Literature Day at Great Southern Grammar. All day writing workshops with approx 60 Yr 9-12 students from various schools. Lovely kids. All goes well. Great way to start the week.

In the afternoon I walk around Albany town centre and down to the harbour. The water is like a mirror. Only wetter. And much more difficult to hang on a wall.

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Author’s Log Star Date Tuesday May 30.

Second day of workshops at Great Southern Grammar. This time with around 110 Yr 6 – 8s from a variety of schools. Awesome kids. Great day.

Important toilet and fire drill info being imparted.

Depart Albany by plane 5.40pm. Arrive Perth 6.50pm. Stay at Hotel near airport overnight.

Author’s Log: Star Date Wednesday May 31.

Leave Perth 7.00am. Fly to Geraldton . Arrive 8.00am.

They really shouldn’t have gone to all this trouble. It’s embarrassing!

At John Willcock College for a Young Writers’ Day with 45 Yr 6 students.

Lesley casting a spell on the children.

During the day I discover to my horror (but not surprise) that my ‘friend’ and fellow author Barry Jonsberg who has presented writing workshops with these same students a few months earlier has attempted to poison the kids’ minds against me by telling them that I ‘sucked’! BUT in a totally unexpected counter move, I somehow manage to turn the tables on him by actually ‘not sucking’!

As evidence of my suck-less status I’d like to table two short extract from the student feedback sheets.

Perhaps this could be my epitaph. “He wasn’t great, but at least he didn’t suck.”

Take that Baz! As you can see from the second comment it’s obvious that my talent can only be adequately encompassed by the use of double superlatives! From now on I will be referring to Barry as Mr Ninety-five Percent.

Once again the kids were beautiful and it was a pleasure to work with them.

At night I made Lesley Reece AM watch some of State of Origin 1.

It was the first time in her life Lesley had ever watched a Rugby League match. She assured me it would never happen again and in future if she wished to witness a no-holds-barred contest she would stick with Master Chef. (Secretly though I think that Lesley, like me, was just heart-broken that the Mighty Maroons didn’t win. I’ll be sending her an email just before the second game to remind her to get her Queensland supporter’s jersey on.)

Author’s Log: Star Date Thursday June 1.

Second day of writing workshops at John Willcock College. This time with about 35 yr 7/8 students.

Yet another bunch of wonderful, inspiring young people (except at the start maybe when they were super keen to inform me that Barry Jonsberg told them to tell me that I ‘sucked’!) Baz is the gift that keeps on giving!

Thanks to the lovely library staff for the author display and for the masses of delicious homemade food they forced me to eat. In the sessions I attempted to put the students nerves at rest by doing a writing activity based on FEAR.

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Author’s Log: Friday June 2.

Youth Literature Day workshop at Geraldton Senior College with 45 yr 9-12 students.

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Caught up with the school’s librarian and fellow author and friend, Dr Glyn Parry which is always a lot of fun. Glyn’s a terrific storyteller with some wonderful and at times eye-popping stories to tell!

Another really enjoyable day of sessions.

I feel so fortunate to get to work and spend time with so many enthusiastic, friendly, funny, dedicated, co-operative and talented students. Have not got a single bad word to say about any one of them. Great, great kids and a real treat and honour to get to hear their words and stories.

A big thanks and shout out also to the magnificent, over-worked and often under-appreciated (by some) teachers and the more-than-worth-their-weight-in-gold librarians and TLs who help and support all the students.

Thanks too to Geraldton (and Albany) for turning on the beautiful weather and for the gorgeous sunrises and sunsets.

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Departed Geraldton by plane 6.10pm. Arrived Perth 7.15pm. Taken in our driver Peter’s very comfortable taxi to The Literature Centre which is housed inside the Old Fremantle Prison.

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And that’s where I am now and will be until Lesley and I fly out on Monday afternoon for another week of talks and workshops this time in Port Hedland and Newman.

More about all that and my two and a half days in Freo in the next blog.

Cheers
Michael

ps: A lot of authors I know who have stayed here at The Literature Centre inside the Old Fremantle Prison say that it’s haunted and have posted messages on my Facebook page obviously trying to scare me.

But seriously, do I look scared to you?

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Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Albany, Barry Jonsberg, Freo, Geraldton, Geraldton Senior College, Glyn Parry, Great Southern Grammar, John Willcock College, Lesley Reece, Newman, Old Fremantle Prison, Perth, Port Hedland, Talented and Young Writers Program, Teacher-Librarians, Teachers, The Literature Centre Fremantle, Young Writers' Day | 3 Comments

blog 98: In which I tell of some things that have happened.

Posted on May 2, 2017 by mgbauer

DISCLAIMER: Ok from now on whenever I start a new blog, I’m not going to even mention that in the previous blog (and every blog before that) I apologized for the long time between posts, made a firm and sincere promise that I would definitely blog more frequently, and then … well obviously didn’t. Let’s just take that as a given in future so we can all move on.

Right. So since my last blog, here’s SOME THINGS THAT HAVE HAPPENED …

# My wife and I have gone on a bit of a fitness and diet kick to lose a few kilos and get fitter. It’s going well so far. I’m just a shadow of my former self and my wife is so slim I haven’t actually seen her for weeks. At least I’m assuming that’s because of the diet …

Anyway, here’s a recent picture of trimmed-down me on the day I auditioned for the lead role in the live action version of Kung-Fu Panda. Sadly I didn’t get the gig because apparently there wasn’t enough light and shade in my performance. Can you believe it? And of course, that’s my svelte wife standing beside me.

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# I’ve had some great school visits recently at Mt Gravatt SHS, Brisbane State High, Marist Ashgrove, Ambrose-Treacy College, Emmaus College Jimboomba and St Aloysius College Sydney. Thanks to all the students and staff for making me feel so welcome.

They are all terrific schools of course, but for views it’s pretty tough to beat the one below from the library windows of St Aloysius in Sydney. Hi to Serena and all the team there!

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# I attended the Romancing the Stars event organised by Book Links Qld at Nudgee College. As always it was a lot of fun and on the night I also had the honour of launching Brian Falkner’s exciting new book Shooting Stars.

At Romancing the Stars with author Ben Long (Ready, Steady, Hatch!)

# I had the pleasure of being one of the Book Slammers (along with Megan Daley, Chris Bongers, Trish Buckley and others) at an event put on by the CBCA Qld branch. For the Book Slam you are required to choose a book from the 2017 CBCA Notables List and spruik it for 3 minutes in any way you like. At first I considered bringing my guitar and singing my slam, but then I thought, “These poor people have never done anything awful to me. They don’t deserve that.” So in the end I presented it in poetry form.

My chosen book was Glenda Millard’s beautiful The Stars at Oktober Bend. There were 20 verses in my slam poem. You’ve never done anything awful to me either (that I’m aware of!) so here are just the last 10 verses.

Deep within Oktober Bend
The Nightingales are hiding
A family shattered by the past
Their secrets not confiding.

A father dead, a mother gone
And papa locked in jail
A loyal brother armed with love
A grandma sick and frail

So goes this tale of broken lives
Of shameful deeds and malice
Of courage, love, of letting go
All told by broken Alice

A girl whose words die on her lips
From things once cruelly taken
A poet with a shattered voice
By brother not forsaken

Until inside the poet’s world
A running boy appears
Whose secret past is sad and harsh
Awash with guilt and tears

Can poetry set them both free
And ease their pain and sorrows?
Can yesterdays be held at bay
By hope of shared tomorrows?

Will broken boy and broken girl
Find healing in each other?
Can broken sister learn to share
The love of loyal brother?

Could it be true that we can’t mend
Until we show we’re broken?
And are the words that scar us most
Those ones we leave unspoken?

All these answers you might find
Upon the tale’s unfolding
But lose your heart you will, like me
Within the book you’re holding

And so, I recommend to you
This story, true and tender
My vote goes to Oktober Bend
My heart belongs to Glenda

# My wife and I spent a few lovely and relaxing days with some good friends at beautiful Caloundra Beach on the Queensland Sunshine Coast .

# I continued my daily walks around the neighbourhood – except for the days when the creek ate my bridge …

… and on my walks I continued to take random photos.

# My wife Adrie (95% of the work) and I (5% of the work) did catering for our son Joe and daughter-in-law Rita’s month-long film shoot of six new episodes of their hilarious You Tube comedy series THE VOID. They finished up doing the final green screen shots at our place last night.

You can watch lots of Joe and Rita’s fantastic ARTSPEAR productions HERE including the entire first season of THE VOID and their hugely popular (215,000 subscribers and over 20 million views) TOON SANDWICH MOVIE TRAILER SPOOFS.

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Catering Queen.

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# As far as writing goes, I’ve been busy working on a new teenage novel (male narrator this time) where the action takes place over just one day. I’m into my 4th draft and each draft has made me a little happier so that’s a positive sign. I’m also really looking forward to the release of my first picture book with Scholastic Australia in September.

This is a shot of me not working at my desk.

# I was really pleased to see The Pain, My Mother, Sir Tiffy Cyber Boy and Me make the Older Reader’s Shortlist for the WAYBRA Awards. Thanks guys! Also really happy to learn that the book will be published in Germany by Carl Hanser and translated once again by the amazing Dr Ute Mihr. She has already worked her magic on eight of my books. Speaking of Germany, it was great to receive copies of the hardback German edition of Eric Vale 3 from Carl Hanser/dtv. Joe and I love these editions.

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# And lastly, following on from my previous blog where I foolishly gave into the enormous pressure and posted a picture of myself with a giant fruit ice block that so many people had been demanding for so many years, I now find myself inundated with bizarre photo requests!

So this time I’m posting these two photos in response to the countless requests I’ve had for shots of me with Bruce Lee and me pointing at a sign that says, ‘The revolution will not be televised’.

Enjoy.

And keep those photo request rolling in!

Cheers
Michael

Apart from all those trivial things above, I just want to end by saying that all my love, thoughts and prayers, and that of my wife and family, go out to Megan Daley (Children’s Books Daily) and her beautiful family in a time of incredible loss and sadness.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged Ambrose-Treacy School, Artspear Entertainment, Ben Long, Book Links, Book Slam, Brian Falkner, Brisbane State High, Caloundra, Carl Hanser, CBCA Notables, Children's Books Daily, Chris Bongers, Dr Ute Mihr, dtv, Emmaus College Jimboomba, Eric Vale, Joe Bauer, Marist Ashgrove, Megan Daley, Mt Gravatt High School, Ready Steady Hatch, Rita Artmann, Romancing the Stars, Scholastic Australia, Shooting Stars, St Aloysius College, The Pain My Mother Sir Tiffy Cyber Boy and Me, The Stars at Oktober Bend, The Void, Toon Sandwich, Trish Buckley, WAYRBA Awards | Leave a comment

blog 97: In which I wake up and realise that 2017 has started already!

Posted on January 27, 2017 by mgbauer

Hi All.

Well 2017 is already well underway so I thought I should blog something before I missed it completely.

In terms of writing, it’s been about half a year since my last book The Pain My Mother Sir Tiffy Cyber Boy and Me was released and I’m really happy with the way it’s been received. You can see some great reviews HERE.

Of course these are just the really favourable reviews (or the best bits carefully edited from the luke-warm ones). The ones that accused me of committing crimes against literature, I shredded, raked together in an enormous pile and incinerated in what my neighbours described as “a very tasteful and moving ceremony”.

Currently I’m writing (in between watching tennis) a semi-serious YA novel. Haven’t decided yet what it will be called, but the working title is My Current Semi-Serious YA Novel. I like to think of it as a boy meets girl romantic comedy with a dark heart. I also like to think of it as a Nobel Prize winner, but that’s probably going too far.

Here’s a photo of where my Work in Progress is being progressively worked on.

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One of the exciting things for me about 2017 is that my first PICTURE BOOK will be released!

I think.

I haven’t heard an actually released date yet. Can’t say too much about it except that it may or may not involve a furry animal and that I really like the illustrations that I’ve seen so far. (Not by Joe Bauer this time.) They’re even better than my alternative Eric Vale illustrations!

scan0085 This year as always I’ll be visiting schools and attending a number of festivals and literary events. (Just in case you were wondering, yes, I’m always happy to get paid to travel to exotic locations. So don’t hold back on those invitations!)

You can check the current state of my bookings by going to this page of the blog: BOOKINGS 2017.

You can contact BOOKED OUT SPEAKERS AGENCY and inquire about booking me at any time of the year. But if you’re particularly interested in a booking in AUGUST, which is usually a busy and packed month for authors, I will be in:

MELBOURNE from AUGUST 14 -18

BRISBANE (Book Week) from AUGUST 21-25

ADELAIDE from AUGUST 28 – SEPTEMBER 1

There are already a few dates taken so it’s best to get in early if you can. (Of course I could just be saying that to panic you into booking. But I’m not. Truly. Come on, is it really that hard for some of you believe that there are people out there who are keen to have me visit? Oh … I see … well that’s pretty depressing.)

Anyway, I’m also looking forward in May/June to visiting Femantle, Albany, Geraldton, Port Headland and Newman in Western Australia as one of the guest authors in the Talented and Young Writers’ Program which is run by The (fabulous) Literature Centre in Fremantle.

And just a reminder that in February BOOK LINKS will be running THREE of their very popular and fun ROMANCING THE STARS evenings. You can check out the details of all three HERE. (In case you wish to avoid it, I’ll be attending the one at Nudgee College on Feb 23 where I’ll also be launching Brian Falkner’s new book Shooting Stars.)

As far as my own reading goes I’ve started off the year with a series of autobiographies. I really enjoyed Jimmy Barnes’ and Bryan Cranston’s books and now I’m running with The Boss.

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And finally to all those people who have repeatedly emailed me asking why I’ve never posted a photo of myself with a giant fruit ice block – here you go.

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