Dad's Red Dress and Dublin's red squirrel...

During a recent wander of its home city, Dad's Red Dress met the work of Artur Bordalo

He has created sculptures in 24 countries at this stage, using all sorts of waste from bike wheels, radiators, damaged car parts... city waste becomes art. Somehow!

Apparently Bordalo chose the red squirrel because it's endangered - I don't know the last time I spotted one. They're a native species since before the ice age, believe it or not and dependent on woodland. They tend to forage within the canopy and are far more elusive.

The brasher grey squirrel was introduced in 1911. I was told once that two grey squirrels were given to some aristocratic couple as a wedding gift and that's when our indigenous squirrel met its match. They grey squirrel also carries the squirrel pox virus that only affects the red squirrel and is almost always fatal. It has only been identified as present in Ireland quite recently.

If you have time, it's well worth crossing Butt Bridge and staring across at it until you finally start identifying what's in there. Mind you, it does make you wish there were more of these wonderful sculptures around the city, using up our rubbish inn such a magnificently creative way.

To Maynooth, thank you...

This time last year, I was gearing up to begin my Screenwriting Residency with Maynooth University and Kildare Co. Council Library & Arts Service, (supported by the Arts Council).

It was a wonderful experience, from the students and staff in the university and Kildare libraries to the space it afforded me to focus on some writing projects I hadn't had the time to complete. 

I published my first book, Dad's Red Dress during the second semester, and completed first drafts of three others. 

As a result of my Residency, my next next novel, The Angelica Touch, will come out in November. In addition, Write That Script! my new non-fiction screenwriting book, geared to help writers complete their first screenplay as painlessly and creatively as possible, is due out in October. 

There were the coffee shops and cafes in Maynooth that I was only just getting to know - too busy writing, teaching, running evening events, doing a couple of readings and mentoring students to do so until towards the end.

It took me until May to work out the best time to drive over - I normally got the train, and which was the best car park! 

 Oh Maynooth, I will miss you already but your legacy will live on in the acknowledgement pages of my next few books! (Dad's Red Dress is for sale still in the Maynooth Bookshop.) And in the friendships I have made. 

So a huge thanks to Lucina Russell of Kildare Co. Council Library & Arts Service, to Oona Fralwey and Maria Pramaggiore of Maynooth Uni, to Tracey O'Flaherty, Amanda Bent and Ann Byrne for your help through the year, to all the students and tutors and other writers I met during the year. Also to all the talented people who took part in the events I ran on indie film making and interactive and game narrative.

Prologues - love 'em or hate 'em?

What is it about prologues?Do you love or hate them? Dad’s Red Dress, my first published novel this year, had a prologue I loved. I only pulled it years after my first draft. It’s not in the finished book but I had a sneaky idea I might be able to squeeze it into the sequel. Now I’m working on that, I don’t think there’s any place for it.

Yet it gave my book its name. It said so much about the tone of the book and the central character and her dilemma and I still love that little short page. (I’ve attached it at the end so you can make up your own mind.)

So what about the novel I’m finishing now, The Angelica Touch? It had a prologue too but I completely forgot about it until I came upon an older draft. 

Back in 2012, I set up a First Chapters Club for writers to share chapters and everyone there loved my prologue. One said they wept with laughter. So why isn’t it in this draft? 

I’m not entirely sure but the event it describes was peeled out only in this draft, when an editor suggested it was too bizarre, especially as it contained on colourful character that never reappeared in the story.

Only now I'm torn. I’m gathering in feedback from beta readers, getting ready to do a final (is it ever a final?) edit and I’m feeling a little homesick for it. So I'm curious, what do other writers and readers think about prologues?

Prologue for Dad’sRed Dress

“Red or pink?”

Hi. My name is Jessie. My Dad is standing in front of me asking me to help him choose between two dresses. “Red.” It’s a no-brainer. And yes, my Dad.

 “Sure?”

 “Absolutely. It hides your knees.”

“What’s wrong with my knees?!”

Gramma says knees are the ugliest part of the human body, but Gaffa says that someone somewhere probably thinks knees are downright gorgeous. I’m not sure. You couldn’t call Dad’s knees gorgeous. Not even if you were, well, desperate and very, VERY short sighted.

And a bit crazy.

But I’m in one of my ‘nothing bothers me’ moods so I give him a hug and say, “Nothing. You have lovely knees.”

They’re very easily pleased, Dads. Give them a hug and they’ll believe anything. Don’t get me wrong – ‘cos people often do; it’s something about being nearly thirteen that makes everyone get you wrong - I love my Dad to bits. But sometimes when the ‘bits’ are heels as tall as well the tallest thing I can’t think of right now, then the ‘bits’ are a bit confusing.

“Red it is, so. Scarlett Johannson eat your heart out,” he says, whoever she is.

Or he.

You can’t be sure with parents.

And then he whips out two pairs of shoes. “Pumps or heels?”

The joys of having a book out in the world!

One of the wonderful pleasures of being a published author is the people you meet on the way and the response you get to your work. If it was still sitting in my computer or lurking on a shelf in a sheaf of untidy pages, I'd be missing out on so much. 

On Thursday I dropped a copy of Dad's Red Dress into the library at the Ark for their library, one of the most exciting venues in Dublin for innovative art and theatre. I can remember going to the most amazing shows there - from drumming workshops to an entire riveting play by finger puppets to an audience with the wonderful Derek Landy, author of the Skullduggary series. 

Dads Red Dress, and especially Ponchinello the piranha, is so excited to be here The Ark Parrot and Giraffe were commissioned from J Bortoli and B Buckley back when The Ark opened in 1995. 

And, in case it's of interest, I'm available to meet with book clubs, give readings or workshops in schools or libraries or festivals on writing, visual storytelling, creating character, screenwriting and more... (See contact details below) 

Sample or purchase Dad's Red Dress from Smashwords here or from Amazon here  
Also available from select independent booksellers includng Charlie Byrne's Bookshop, Galway, Maynooth Bookshop, Kildare and Books Upstairs, Dublin. 

Twitter: @DadsRedDress

Www.facebook.com/DadsRedDress/

Radio interview on Dublin South FM

Contact details:Lindsay J Sedgwick

Website: Www.lindsayjsedgwick.com

Phone:+353 861663363

Email:books@lindsayjsedgwick.com/

                    

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Dad's Red Dress... A challenge to photographers

In Kalamaki, Crete...

In Budapest....

Little bit jealous of the many places Dad's Red Dress has been at this stage! But it's fun to see it out there, exploring the world.
This time last year, I had no idea I'd have a book published!

So here' the challenge: there's a free signed copy of my next book, due out in September, for the most interesting photo of Dad's Red Dress abroad... or up a tree or in a cave or under the full moon...

Send them to me at dadsreddress@lindsayjsedgwick.com

In Croatia, a place I've never been...
Taking in the sunshine

In Madrid, with cake and coffee...

In Australia, off the beaten trail on
the east coast

On the way to Norway 

And on a London bus...

Children's Books Ireland review Dad's Red Dress... and LOVE it!

Children's Books Ireland just published its review of Dad's Red Dress in Inís Magazine and it's wonderful. Feeling ridiculously happy right now, the glow hasn't worn off yet...

So, sorry, but I'm sharing it cos I love this book and it has been a long time in the making:

"Jessie Keane just wants her family to be normal… utterly, completely normal. Having moved from L.A. back to Ireland, normality would offer a chance to avoid the ‘looks’, the rumours and the bullying that she has dealt with in the past. But ‘normal’ is hardly possible. Not with a little sister who claims to have been abducted by the Virgin Mary (twice), a wildly contemporary artist stepmother and a creative architect father with a penchant for cross-dressing. As she tries to balance this eccentric, yet loving family, and what she hopes will be an ordinary school life, Jessie is put to the test when a new development shakes the façade she is working so hard to craft. She must stop this! Or so she thinks…

Add caption

When I picked up Dad’s Red Dress, I expected a book that was quirky, entertaining and funny. What I did not expect was a novel that spoke to the heart of what it means to grow up. Filled with vivid, genuine characters and complex, conflicting family drama, it is joyous, loving and truly unique among the vast canon of coming-of-age stories. Each character is intricately drawn. Difficult subject matter is handled with great sensitivity. The dialogue is realistic and relatable for any young person. And while the situation may be unusual, the emotional impact is not. It gives the reader much to consider about life, friendship, who we really are and what makes a family. Dad’s Red Dress is indeed humourous; a delight to read. Simply wonderful."

In Charlie's Bookshop, Galway

Review by Mary Esther Judy in Inís Mag for CBI.

http://childrensbooksireland.ie/review/dads-red-dress/

Dad's Red Dress is available from Amazon, Charlie's Bookshop in Galway, Maynooth Bookshop, Co. Kildare and via Paypal by contacting ljsedgwick66@gmail.com.

Guinea pigs - sorry, Beta Readers needed!

Are you interested in reading a new novel pre-publication and giving your thoughts on it?

I am looking for four beta readers for my new book. This means you're the first people to give it a reader's assessment and I can get a sense of anything that is or isn't working before I sign off and send it to print.

Provisionally called The Matchmaker, the book is about Angelica, a 14 year-old who lives with Mum (Molly) in an old hotel on a peninsula in Donegal. Deciding it's her fault that her mum is single, Angelica reasons that she can't rightly have a boyfriend herself until she fixes Molly up. So she sets up a dating website to matchmake her mum. All goes well, for everyone else in the town, except for Molly. A comedy of errors, coming of age story.

What I would be hoping to get is your thoughts on the book. In return, I can give you a reference for your CV if that's of use, a signed copy when the book comes out and my  lifelong and earnest appreciation.

Here's the opening, so you can see if it would interest you to read:

My name is Angelica Moone. I’m neither a vampire with gold eyes and the need to drain cute boy-bands of blood nor a werewolf. You could say my father was a whale but even that’s pushing it a bit. I live with my mum, Molly, in a private flat above the lobby of a hotel called The Drisogue Arms. It stares out over a rugged peninsula that elbows into the Atlantic on the most westerly coast of Donegal. This is the most westerly part of the west of Ireland, which is pretty far west, Europe-wise.

This makes for a lot of wind, rain and storms. We found an empty coffin once and a beach full of mannequin arms, all left handed… I’m sure there have been drugs washed up too and maybe a body or two but nobody will admit it.

Apparently, I’m “too young”.

Pointless to say I’m fourteen. People who say I’m too young smile when I say this, as if my response proves to them that they are completely right. But then they don’t know me. It’s not their fault.

I’ve been way ahead of them since the day I was born. 

(Pix courtesy of Creative Commons.)