Here is the evidence:
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| Me signing |
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| My eldest, Mackenna and my hubby, Phillip |
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| My youngest, Brianna and a friend |
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| Flowers from my dept and school. Cupcakes made by Dunedin Cupcake Company. |
E ngā mana, e ngā reo, e ngā waka, e tau
nei. tenā koutou, tenā koutou, tenā tātou katoa.
When I was at primary school, I remember
watching a British children's TV series about an invalided girl who was
confined to her bed. She could only see the world outside through her window. However, her mother gave her a sketching set
and that's when the trouble began: what she drew came into existence the next
day: a lighthouse, a boy in that lighthouse, rocks which later became angry
rocks with eyes and the ability to move and hunt. I also loved the illustrated
childrens' book, Harold and the Magic
Crayon: a wordless story about a curious four year old boy, who with his
purple crayon, created a world of his own simply by drawing it.
Back then, I was fascinated by the idea
that one could have power to make things happen even though one might be
powerless in other ways. As a child who was often at a place of sadness and
fear, the possibility of being able to create a better, happier world was as
strong a desire as perhaps those of you who wished that you could fly.
The television programme and the book were
also cautionary tales: and relevant today because the warning, careful what you wish for or careful what
you say and think.... it might just come true, is, in some respects the
blessing and curse of being a writer.
When I woke that morning way back in 2008 from
a dream of a young boy hunting a deer in the forest, knowing that he was
Banquo's Son and wondering where he'd been for ten years, I had no idea how big
a story it was to become, how difficult it was going to be to write and how
hard I and my family would find the road on which we had to travel for the next
six years.
It has taken that long: from first inkling of
an epic tale to the launch of this, the third and final book.
Banquo's
Son was banged out most of one summer; Bloodlines took a year to write but Birthright has been a more reluctant
issue: when I started it, I thought I knew what the characters would say and do
and think but, who am I? I'm really just a mug who has all these people
rattling around in my head trying to sort out their problems. And they were the
big problems too: the ones we ask ourselves during those dark sleepless nights
when we feel most alone; most isolated; most afraid. Questions like: why do bad
things keep happening to me? Why should I be the one who has to carry the load?
What's wrong with wanting to pull the duvet over my head and stay in bed? And,
probably the toughest and most honest question of all: If God is all mighty and
loving, where the bloody hell is he?
It felt, a lot of the time, that Fleance,
Rachel, Rosie and, later, Bree, were looking to me to help them find the
answers to these questions. All I could do, I confess, is think up the most
awful situations to put them in and watch them deal with it - I think it's
called tough love. It's what we writers do. Perhaps we are a little like the
Boss in Katherine's The Fly or as Glouster says bitterly in King Lear: 'As
flies to wanton boys are we to the gods; they kill us for their sport.'
But, I am also a person of hope. And I want
happy endings. You can't appreciate a happy ending, I think, if you haven't
suffered the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune first. So, I apologise in
advance for what you are about to experience in the reading of Birthright but I
hope that, like me, you too will be left with a few tears among the smiles as
you turn the last page.
Before I shut up and sit down, I want to
publically acknowledge some people - many of whom are in the author's
acknowledgment - the part that only other writers read:
I admit I'm not a bad storyteller but I
could not have produced this without my publisher Penguin and my wonderful
editor Katie Howarth and her team of intrepid editors and proof-readers. I
spent so long in my head with this story and I had so many false starts that I
did lose my way a bit. Katie, patient and astute, drew me back onto the
straight and narrow - there will not be horses lost or misplaced in this book,
I can guarantee you. I am so fortunate to have had Katie helping me these past
few years and she should also be credited with how beautiful the story and the
novel turned out. It's so purty!
This book is dedicated to the memory of
Chloe Anson - a remarkable young woman and a talented writer who I met in 2006
and whose company I enjoyed for a number of years as she made her way up the
secondary school. I am so glad I got to tell her how the trilogy ends. I want
her parents and family to know that this is my way of keeping alive all that Chloe
meant to me and I hope they will take some comfort in this, my meagre offering
to honour her.
I also wish to publically thank and honour
my husband Phillip who has (reluctantly I'm sure at times) stood steadfastly
beside me and often behind me holding me up. Together we have navigated this tumultuous
time of parenting teenagers, managing careers, studying at university and
living with me, a writer who spends as much time in other places inside my head
as I do in the real world. As much as I had a crush on Fleance, Phillip, he
doesn't hold a candle to you.
My daughters, Mackenna and Brianna, have
watched their mother battle with those questions I mentioned earlier - both in
the writing of the books but also in my own life. But, like my main characters,
they possess a indomitable spirit and absolutely goodness that can not be
extinguished by the cruel and incomprehensible behaviour of others. I'm so
proud of you two.
I have put away the purple crayon and I
promise I won't get out the sketch pad for a while although how long I can hold
at bay the other stories and characters who wait in the wings, I can not say.
Thank you to Kay Mercer and the Dunedin
Public Libraries, our host and thanks also to UBS for always supporting local
and NZ writers. I am glad you all could join me tonight as I kick - I mean -
launch this final chapter of Flea's story into the big wide world.
Ko te mutanga tēnei
Kia ora
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