It's All Happening!

Oh wow – with what I am now calling The Pentridge Trilogy  (i.e. my memoir, Breaking Into Pentridge Prison; a new edition of the prison anthology Blood from Stone; and my spin-off chapbook, Letters to a Dead Man) everything keeps falling readily into place. The latest is that just when I need the printer, who lives in Melbourne, to show me some cover stock to make a choice from, it happens that he is visiting this area and will be in my town tomorrow! How's that for perfect timing, synchronicity etc.?

My lovely book designer and her husband and young daughters came through on a holiday road trip not long ago, and took a quick detour to meet me over coffee. A lovely family altogether, delightful to meet. She and I already had great rapport via emails and texts; getting acquainted in person only confirmed it. She has been working extraordinarily hard on my project, even while travelling. I have been doing a fair bit of work myself, to make sure the manuscripts are perfect. It’s all coming to fruition very well.

We’ve settled on launch dates: October 14 in Melbourne, and November 12 (my birthday) in my own locality. They’ll be weekend afternoon events, which hopefully should suit most people.

I’ve asked local poet and educator, my dear friend Sarah Temporal, the moving spirit behind Poets Out Loud, to do the honours with the local launch, which will be held at Pulp Fiction bookshop.

The Melbourne launch will be in Pentridge, which is no longer a prison. I wrote in my memoir that I had no intention of ever setting foot in there again, but writing that book has enabled me to contemplate things which for a long time I couldn’t. No doubt it will be emotional, but also, perhaps, a kind of completion.

I’ve invited Ray Mooney, an ex-inmate (shortly before my time there) and now a noted author and playwright, to officiate at the Melbourne launch. Peter Norden, once Pentridge chaplain, these days a distinguished criminologist and author, has consented to contribute a Foreword to the new edition of Blood from Stone, for which Ray has also provided some thoughtful commentary.

It’s exciting and a bit overwhelming all at once.

All Quiet on the Memoir Front?

 

Yes and no. Certainly I have been quiet about it, here, for a little while!

Interrupted by life

My cover designer / book designer (same person) is currently on a road trip around Australia with her family – which is exciting, as we hope to meet up in person for the first time when they get to these parts, and for her to meet the cover artist too (who happens to be a neighbour of mine). 

This trip was already planned when she agreed to help me, so she is working around it. Before it began, she brought my memoir to a good place to be able to pause, and will be resuming when she arrives back home. We are still looking at a launch later this year.

Meanwhile, as you may recall, we have been making plans to launch, simultaneously, a new edition of Blood from Stone, the poetry anthology which resulted from the Pentridge Prison workshops in the eighties, which are the subject of the memoir. I’ve asked a noted criminologist with knowledge of that prison to write a new Foreword. He too is away travelling at present (overseas) but has expressed interest.

Exciting news

Most exciting of all, he tells me he knows of several of the contributors: that many are still alive ‘and some are quite established in their new lives’. What wonderful news! Although he has no contact details, I am hoping there may be some way he could help me locate them. I still need renewed copyright permission, if possible, from about half the poets in the collection. Apart from which, it would just be so good to know which ones are doing well. Although I only kept in touch with a couple (for reasons which the memoir explains) I regarded them as friends.

Revising the plans

I had thought of making the re-issue of Blood from Stone a facsimile edition, but the original is so old, as well as having been created before the digital era, that scans just didn’t work well enough. I ended up retyping the whole thing – but it was labour of love – and adding a new explanatory note about the way the poems are arranged.

As much as possible, though, it will resemble the appearance of the first edition, including that brilliant cover. 

Is two good company, but three a crowd?

I’ve also created a small spin-off chapbook of my own poems, written during the time of the workshops and since. My cover artist is currently working on an image for this book.

It is definitely connected to the other two books, but is much more personal, much less social history. And even though it’s short, I wonder if launching THREE books at the same time would be a bit much – even if I kept all prices low – and not necessarily for monetary reasons anyhow.

Would this slim volume be overshadowed by the others? Or might it deflect some of the attention they deserve?

Would I do better to release it a bit later? Or should it be tied to the others officially, as it is in fact? 

Perhaps they should come as a package, to be sold together? But no, that would limit potential customers' right of choice.

Decisions, decisions…. Your opinions and suggestions are welcome!

Photo, of one of the old Pentridge buildings, © David A Nissen 2022

'Blood from Stone' cover © Allan Williams 1982