... and are willing to excuse this bit of self-advertising, my conversation about it at Brisbane has been edited and made available online and as a podcast here:

The Book Show

There's a shortish (5 mins?) item before it, on Frankfurt, and I couldn't work out how to skip it, but that's probably just me being thick. The conversation itself was long enough to get in reasonably deep, (as opposed to the numerous bright little chats I did with radio presenters who hadn't read more than the first half of the press release).

In fact, if anyone can clue me in to how to get the podcast saved properly onto my computer (that is what you're supposed to be able to do, isn't it?) I'd be grateful.

Emma

Ooh, I'm listening now, Emma - I've never done this before. It's really exciting!!

)

Hey, I can type and listen at the same time - but you're not on yet. It's like magic!!

A
xxx

Cor, is that you? Cool! I'm listening now.

Hey, this is like real-time listening/typing stuff. At last I'm making it into the 21st century.

And another scary thing is that when I logged into Compuserve to get my mail, the Compuserve woman was talking to me over the broadcast as well!

Ooh, Emma - you're about to be on!! Double magic.

A
xxx

Just finished this - very interesting indeed, Emma. Particularly about the photography and how it links in with everything. Great stuff!

)

A
xxx

Thaks for the link, Emma. I really enjoyed that - and you came across really well too.

Sorry, but I've no idea whatever as to how you'd save it. Sorry!

Nik.

Fascinating, Emma (and lovely to hear your voice)

I particularly enjoyed listening to you talking about Cecil and his drawings. When I was reading the book, I felt like yelling at them I know what he’s doing, and you don’t!

Dee

Just listened to it with my husband. It was fascinating and you sound very cool!

I was able to save it on my PC by right-clicking on the 'download audio' bit and selecting 'save link as.' I think you should be able to do it by right clicking this link: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/feeds/bsw_20061005.mp3.
It's a massive MP3 file so it took ten mins to download it. Let me know if you have problems. Well done again, Emma!

Thanks, guys! Glad you enjoyed it.

Lisa, you're a star. Being the internet-savvy, publicity-conscious modern author that I am (or something), I wanted to put it on my website, and now - I think - I can.

Emma

Emma,

You can dip into the recording at any point by moving the little white dot along the black bar if you are using Realplayer (as you're doing this the time elapsed will appear on the right). Hope that helps.

It's an interesting exercise listening to someone that you've only 'met' through the medium of the internet - putting a real voice to an email voice I guess. Filling the gaps of perception...I feel an idea coming on.

This is wonderful!

The experience of hearing you read your book is fantastic!

I have not got around to looking for it yet but I shall head off to the bookstore tonight. It is available in Canada I hope.

Surprised you didn’t call it: ‘The Evolution of Love’. Sorry, couldn’t help it.

Brian.

Brian, yes, it's available now in Canada, in the UK edition. I'll forgive you for the joke, if only because I've taken to counting the pieces of media coverage that don't mention it - it's much, much quicker than counting the ones that do.

Sibelius, thanks. The listen-online version looked distinctly odd, but now thanks to Lisa I've got it safely ensconced as an MP3, and that has all the controls I'm used to!

Emma

Wow - that was amazing. What a great reading! And it was great to hear you talk about the book too, Emma. You were very impressive and articulate. You made it seem easy, but I'm just thinking how scarily hard it must have been - or rather would be for me!

By the way, I know Rachael Hall from another writers' site, and in fact met her earlier this year when she was over seeing her Picador editor. She sent me an email today saying she was on a panel with you at the Christchurch Writers' festival. (She saw my blog bit about TMOL.) She said you talked about babies and historical novels! (Not sure whether that was the panel discussion or just your own chat.)

She said very nice things about you anyhow.


<Added>

Sorry, Rachael King, not Rachael Hall. Got my Rachaels mixed up.

Just listening to this. Wonderful to hear you talk about TMOL. S