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Tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā tatou katoa. Ko Mary McCallum ahau. I'm the publisher at Makaro Press. Um, thank you, Marion, and thank you Unity for having us today. Marion is the most amazing person, anyone who ever comes here knows. And M- uh, Mia came in to do a little signing, um, one day and with her, when her book had hit the shops, as you do as an author, and she came in and she [00:00:30] was probably a little nervous about it, yeah, and, um, Marion greeted her like a long lost friend and then promptly bought a copy of the book herself. So that just tells you the quality of this gorgeous person. Um, so, uh, it's wonderful to be here. Um, uh, uh, what an event, and that's so many people. I don't think I'm surprised, Mia. I've never seen an author do quite as much social media and emailing as you have to get your lovely friends along, and not only [00:01:00] people here, but people overseas. So we're live streaming as we talk, and people in England and other places, uh, God knows what time it is there, quite early in the morning, are watching, which is lovely. So welcome to you all. Um, I don't usually think this, but I was writing my speech for the launch tonight and I thought for And How Are Things With You?, and I found myself lighting on a title, Catullus, Cat Sitters, and Chocolate: The Making of an Unusual Book- ... which it is. Catullus being the Roman poet and one [00:01:30] of the many writers Frannie, the protagonist of this novel, quotes as she pursues her research. A cat sitter is what Frannie is at the start of the book in London, and dark chocolate is what Mia Faurlane brings when we're working with her on a book. And I think Frannie is partial to it, too, and also green tea. Yeah, all of those things. Um, so Catullus isn't the only writer quoted in this novel, which is packed with literary allusions, multiple languages, [00:02:00] to an extent that is unusual in New Zealand fiction. You'll read it, you'll see. Those who have read it would agree. There's a s- a heck of a lot of languages in there, quite a lot of French and, and definitely English. I mean, in between, you know, everything else. Um, so d- uh, that- that's an unusual, uh, aspect of it, obviously, there. And the book is also overflowing with references to New Zealand culture, real-life events, and politics, to the extent that one reviewer called it a, I think, a found novel. Was that right? Yeah. And the ... Of course, [00:02:30] the overarching theme, as you've heard, is suicide. Not something that's dropped in as an incident or event, but is actually front and center of the book. When Mia submitted her manuscript two years ago, I had a look, and that's two years ago, it wasn't one that I wanted to read. My mother had recently died, and I was spending a bit too much thinking about death anyway, uh, without needing to bring suicide into the mix, and I think I said that to you, Mia. But I took it anyway. It was nicely printed out. C- what could I say? And I took it and put it by the bed and thought, "Mm, I'll [00:03:00] leave that a while," which I did. Um, yeah, and I'll get to how I eventually picked it up. But I would say this, the unusual aspect of this book are also in the way Mia came to me. So I was at Newtown Library once after an event that we'd run there, and two women came up to me, smiling congenially, and introduced themselves. To say it was a pincer movement would be to overstate it, but it- I had a sense there was no escape. Behind me, [00:03:30] the shelves of books, and in front, two smiling, very pleasant authors on a mission. They seemed nice. Uh, one was Kristin Phillips, who's somewhere around here, um, who had written a book about dementia that was looking for a publisher, and the other was her partner, the writer, Mia Faline. All well and good. Um, as I said, seemed very nice. They told me later that they had planned this assault, sorry, this meeting- ... um, uh, well ahead of time. We published Kristin's book at my other press, the Cuba Press, and [00:04:00] after that, I heard Mia was one of the winners of the RNZ Short Story Competition, which sounded fantastic. I thought, "Yay. Well, who is this? What, what is her writing like?" So I invited her to read her story at an event at Undercurrent, the bookshop in Tory Street. Well, she sat on the stage, read her story, and we all sat there in silence, completely absorbed and excited by what we were hearing Some months later, and by now Mia and Kristen were in my writing group, I know a good thing when I see it, [00:04:30] Mia offered me her manuscript. I hadn't seen this at all. As I say, I put it to one side for a while, but then one weekend thought, "I'll pick it up, give it a go." And almost immediately was drawn into the voice and head and character of Franny. She wouldn't let me go. How clever the writing and incredibly, for the subject matter, how funny. I found myself laughing at things I thought I would never publish. I al- read almost nonstop, and that [00:05:00] week I offered you a contract. Mm-hmm. I ... For some reason we spoke on Zoom- Yeah ... for that. Like, I don't know why 'cause you just live up the road, but anyway. For some reason we spoke on Zoom. You were sick. I was sick? Yeah. Thank you, Kristen. Steel trap memory. Okay, that's why. So now, I haven't finished yet with the unusual aspects of Mia's novel. So one day, while we were in the thick of editing the book, a talented young designer walked into our office and casually mentioned that he would like to design a cover in the front window of Unity.[00:05:30] Immediately I know- knew it'd have to be for your book, Mia. It just, it was such a perfect match. It, it ... Todd is here somewhere. Does he wave? Yeah. There at the back. So huge thanks to obviously the talented young design- Todd Atticus for his brilliant idea, and for carrying it out over one week in May with his apples and his bowls of cereal, and all these other things he bought- Mm and sat in the window there. And thank you to Unity for supporting him. It was just amazing that you did that and let him sit there all that time. And to Mia [00:06:00] for embracing, and also to Paul, my fellow publisher, for taking it on. And actually for the people of Wellington for embracing it. They used to be standing at the bus out there, and then coming in and having chats. It was just most wonderful, wasn't it, Todd? Oh, so wonderful. It made t- you think differently about design a bit. You know, what, what ... Everyone liked something different, and it was just the most energetic thing. So amazing that you did that. I can't get over it. I was worried about you sitting there all that time. But you seemed to get through it and live through it, so thank you. [00:06:30] The result is utterly wonderful, and does things I didn't expect. Well, how could I? I mean, he, he saved the one that he really wanted right to the end. We hadn't even seen it till he brought it to the office at the end, had we? Amazing. Um, so here we are back at Unity, full circle, ready to launch the novel, and Todd's cover is the face to the world. So thank you again, and thank you Unity, uh, for that, for your support then and now. Um, thanks to Kristen for connecting me to Mia and for supporting her through this journey, [00:07:00] to my writing group for their support, some of them here tod- tonight, to Carl Schouker and Scottish writer A.L. Kennedy for reading the novel before anyone else to give an endorsement for the cover. Both of those matter so much. They're just perfect. Uh, to Sian Robins, who's here, for proofreading the book, both the English and the French. The woman is magic. Uh, to Paul, who has been with me on the Makaro journey since we started the press in 2013, and is now working for me only sadly part-time, uh, [00:07:30] because, um, I'm sort of downsizing my publishing empire, if you like. Uh, and he's doing a lot of work elsewhere, but he's still involved. Um, Mia's book was not an easy one to lay out, but he approached it with his usual pizzazz and personality, and it's as brilliant as its cover. A lovely thing to hold in the hand. Um, I'd like to thank our distribution rep, Sarah Hillix, for her work getting the novel into shops. Thank you to Mia's mother, Marilyn Duckworth, and the rest of the whānau for their support of Mia, me, and Makaro. Um, and all [00:08:00] of you obviously for coming along. I want to finish... Yeah. Well, no, that sounded a bit of an aside. Thank you for coming along. It matters a lot to get it out into the world. So I just want to finish with a very, very quick little story. Just recently, I did a Google search online to see about a review we were expecting for Mia's book. I included what I was looking for and the title of the book, And How Are Things With You? All is helpful AI gave me some details on the reviews I was looking for. Then it said, [00:08:30] "How are things with me?" "As an AI, I don't have feelings, a personal life, or a physical body, but I'm operating at full capacity and ready to help." "I am doing great and always happy to dive into in- info deep dives for you." Oh my God. I know. Anyway, after that shocking, uh, little thing from online, um, [00:09:00] yeah, so, so mu- so, so much is said about AI in books. In thinking about what I wanted to say to you today, I realize how much this book is all about people. Not just the human story, the very human story in its pages, but all the people who helped bring it to us here today, starting with an extraordinary author called Mia Faaleen. I'm very proud of you, Mia. It's an amazing feat. I feel quite emotional now. It's been an amazing thing working with you. Congratulations. Thank you again, [00:09:30] everyone. So now, so now we're going to hear from, uh, Tracey Farr. Your book's behind, behind you. Do you wanna pick it up and hold it up? So dear Tracey, I published her with The Cuba Press, another one of my marvelous authors. She published Wonderland. So, um, yay. Woo-hoo. And she's just the most [00:10:00] fabulous person, and she has read Mia's book, and has some wonderful things to say, and is going to launch it for us now. Thank you Kia ora koutou. Kia ora to everybody here in the room, and to those of you on the little computer there. Kia ora. Ko Tracey Farah au. It's my, uh, it's my absolute honor to play a part in [00:10:30] helping to launch Mia Faalane's astonishing new novel into the world tonight. Um, I do wanna acknowledge, before we go any further, that in her acknowledgments at the back of the book, Mia calls this a strange book on a tricky subject, and that tricky subject, as a couple of people have mentioned, is suicide. And I just wanna say that this novel is rich with resources, you know, where [00:11:00] you can go to for help- But I'm going to start by judging this book by its cover. The remarkable, beautiful, clever cover of And How Are Things With You? was designed, as Mary has already said, and many of you will know and remember, right here in the window of Unity Books by Todd Atticus in a week-long in-store [00:11:30] live design performance. I could talk at length about this cover. I love it. I won't. But let me just say that, like its cover, the novel within is a thing of beauty, rich with significance and signifiers, with symbols and symbology. And like the cover, the novel is a game of two halves. Right down the guts. Uh, the novel opens last decade in the [00:12:00] aftermath of the Brexit referendum, and the novel spends its first half in London, where our protagonist, Franny, just shy of her 50th birthday, has been living for some decades. The novel's second half is set right here in Te Whanganui-a-Tara after Franny quits her job as a translator, quits London. She escapes, you could say she Frexits, but I wouldn't say that- ... and returns home here to Wellington in early 2019, which feels [00:12:30] simultaneously forever ago and just yesterday. And How Are Things With You? strikes me as a novel in motion. We catch the bus and the tube with Franny. We walk to the pool. We swim with her. We attend protests and parliament with her. We clean the house with her. We feed the cat and forget to feed the cat with her. We fly across the world with her from England to Aotearoa. And even though Franny spends so much of her time, so much of the novel's time, at her [00:13:00] computer or on her phone or reading books, obsessed with her private research project on suicide, because the novel, novel unfolds in the continuous now, in the present, including real-time events and characters and politicians, it feels somehow the opposite of static or sedentary. It feels somehow un-still, in motion, dynamic. It almost seems to vibrate at times. And as we walk and swim and move with Franny [00:13:30] in the here and now of the novel, there's a slow and drip-wise reveal of Franny's past, both distant and more recent And this is a novel that is very much about language and meaning, as you've already heard. The text moves between languages and symbols. It uses different modes and codes of meaning. There's the language of social media, the likes and shares and friends, all of them in italics, unconnected from their real-life meanings. Uh, there are emails and text messages and [00:14:00] emojis and hashtags, and Franny works as a French translator, so French shows up often in the novel, but it's also peppered with te reo Māori, with Mandarin, with braille, with Latin, Greek, New Zealand Sign Language. There are other codes and symbols, too: Dewey Decimal numbers, protest signs and banners, crawl text looping on repreat- repeat across the bottom of a TV screen. Franny spends a lot of time drafting emails, composing texts, writing postcards, [00:14:30] thinking and overthinking them, sending them, not sending them, deleting, delaying. Hard relate, Franny. Got me there. Uh, the novel is full of messages not sent and messages not responded to, of computers glitching - also hard relate - computers glitching and dying, web pages not loading, buffering, buffering, buffering, and Wi-Fi signals dropping out. There's often a sense of miscommunication, of meaning being lost or lost in translation or [00:15:00] withheld. And this is a novel of parentheses and asides, of meandering and missingness, of obliquity, of gaps. It's a novel of ellipses and escape, of endings that are unresolved, dot, dot, dot. But what I want to end on, and what I want to leave you with, are two standout features of this novel for me: a sense of hope and a sense of humor Although it's a novel about [00:15:30] suicide, and that's at times unsettling and challenging, of course it is, this novel left me, in fact it carried me throughout, with an overriding sense of hope. And I can attribute that to the skill of Mia's writing and the clever construction of the novel. I can also attribute it to the Papageno effect. Here's Franny imagining writing yet another email she won't write or send, "Thank you for sharing your story. Have you heard of the Papageno effect? It's [00:16:00] from Mozart's The Magic Flute. Papageno is thinking of killing himself, and these three characters help him see another way to deal with his pain. Actually, Pamina, another character in the opera, was also suicidal, but three spirits give her hope. Kiri Te Kanawa sang Pamina's aria. You can listen to a recording made at St. David's Hall, Cardiff in 1990. I thought perhaps there could be a Pamina effect, #hope." And so this novel surprised me, surprised me [00:16:30] constantly by filling me with hope. And this novel is threaded through with humor. I, uh, I did actually lol. I, uh, yeah, I actually lol'd more than once. Uh, Carl Schucker called the novel darkly comic. A.L. Kennady, Kennedy called it darkly funny. And while Mia consistently treats difficult taboo topics with respect and care and intelligence, she also does so with humor, with playfulness, with curiosity. It's clever and delightful, [00:17:00] and often unsettling. But as reviewer Chris Reed observed, "The humor matters because it refuses solemnity as the only ethical mode. It allows the book to remain alive even when its subject is death." So Mia and Mary and Makaro, congratulations on this absolute marvel, And How Are Things With You? May it find the many readers and accolades it [00:17:30] deserves, and may it have a beautiful life. Kia ora. It's now my very great pleasure to introduce me as partner, Kristen Phillips. Thank you. Oh, thank you so much, Tracey. Amazing. Thank you. Uh, kia ora koutou katoa. Um, thank you [00:18:00] everyone for coming here this evening. It's very special to have every- lots of people that you like in the same room at the same time, so, and love, so thank you. Um, big good morning, ata mārie, um, to the friends and whānau in the Northern Hemisphere, and pō mārie to the friends in the Southern Hemisphere. Hi. Um, and Mia and I, we want to mihi to our mothers who are here tonight. So to Penny [00:18:30] and to Marilyn, thank you for coming. And we also mihi to our fathers, uh, Don and Ian. So it's my great pleasure to introduce Mia, of course, but first, a few words about Franny. I've known of Franny for a long time. Uh, I'm familiar with Franny's challenges, which I revisited when [00:19:00] I recently read And How Are Things With You? Um, Franny is not in a great mental and emotional space, but as Tracey so well said, Mia's telling of Franny's story drew me on. I cared about Franny, I was curious, and I still found myself laughing out loud in places, even though I were familiar with these pieces from draft. So there were also times when I was [00:19:30] so me- moved that I just needed to stop for a bit. And one of the times for me when that happened was reading the quiz, or more accurately, the two quizzes in the first part of the book. I just had to stop for a bit after I read that. Um, okay. So I'm Mia's partner, and I've got partner bias, um , and privilege, so I have seen [00:20:00] firsthand, um, Mia's integrity, her commitment, and the care that she has when it comes to her writing. So thank you, Mia, for bringing Franny to us. Um, Franny's indeed "a charmingly singular protagonist," to quote A.L. Kennedy, and I hope you all have a rich experience of discovering her Mia. How [00:20:30] crazy to write a second novel with the theme of suicide. It's just crazy. Uh, it's not a great career move. And yet here we are, lots of people here tonight, oh, and this morning. So just ... So I can vouch firsthand, um, for Mia's singularity of purpose when it comes to her writing. I also want to acknowledge the vulnerability in [00:21:00] Mia's writing, which takes great courage, and so I congratulate you, Mia, on this original and necessary novel, and please welcome Mia, um, to say a few words and to read So thank you, Kristen. I've lost you already. I'm over here. Oh, Kristen, [00:21:30] um, and Tracy. Wow. Thank you. Gosh, thank you. Um, and Mary, thank you. Uh, Kia ora. I'm very grateful to see family and friends here in person and online, um, including writer friends, former colleagues from the National Poetry Library, Lorraine, who I know is here, Lorraine Mariner, um, and I'm not sure, [00:22:00] perhaps Chris McCabe. Um, and, um, anyway, thank you, all of you, for being here. Um, what an interesting crowd. Um, also 国有爱心的卡尔·莫特森， i korokororareka. Korokororareka. Um, I'm going to say a few words of thanks to many people and finish with an adapted [00:22:30] paragraph from And How Are Things With You? Firstly, I got an email the other day, this is relevant, wanting me to verify that I-- it was me who had changed a password on one of my accounts. I won't go into it, but just to say it took some hours to recover various accounts and to recover. I had one of those days that Franny, the protagonist in And How Are Things With You?, would relate to. But anyway, [00:23:00] I've made it to today with help. Just as although I can verify that I am the author of this piece of fiction, I created it with so much help, and that is why the acknowledgements at the back of the book are six pages long. So you'll be glad to know that I received a timely text from my publisher, Mary, [00:23:30] just after I'd prepared a wee speech, not so wee, for today, recommending I don't try and thank everybody. So thank you to Mary McCullum at Makaro Press for choosing to publish And How Are Things With You? For your immediate enthusiasm after you'd read it, close reading, and fine [00:24:00] editorial response. Thank you, Paul Stewart, for expert typesetting, and to Sian Robins for meticulous proofreading of both the English and the French. I'm grateful to my London writing group, um, the first book- the book's first readers. Thank you to Christina Dunhill, and thanks to Reuben [00:24:30] Lane for your unwavering confidence in the writing and for sending me, or rather Franny, fiction and nonfiction on suicide from London and from Violette & Co. bookshop in Paris. Mark Blackburn for kind and helpful replies to last-minute questions, and Alan McCormick for your excellent light touch feedback and for identifying the value of humor. [00:25:00] Thank you to Sarah Waters for your belief in this novel back when it was called Parallel Hell. Thank you, Fiona Kidman, for your support of my proposition to Creative New Zealand of real-time writing this book. Franny, as perhaps you know, is a big reader. You'll find my inexhaustive list of thanks to authors on her behalf in [00:25:30] the acknowledgments. But I'll just mention one very helpful book here, When It Is Darkest: Why People Die by Suicide and What We Can Do to Prevent It by Rory O'Connor Franny also watches a lot of thematically relevant films, TED Talks, documentaries, and shows. Just one I'd like to mention, Nanette. I'm [00:26:00] grateful to Hannah Gadsby for her courageous use of humor to tell hard stories I'd like to acknowledge three of the many real people who appear in this book. Jeanne Marie Katene, Liv Worsnop, and Susie Harris, creator of the exhibition Monuments of Hope. Mandy Hager Thank you. I can't see you, [00:26:30] but thank you. I have seen you, but I can't see you at the moment. But thank you. Thank you so much for reading the, my f- the first draft. Um, it helped me, it helped me keep faith with this book. As I say, uh, this strange book on a, I'm calling it a difficult subject Um, over some time. Merci infiniment, Marine Plus, for taking time off being on [00:27:00] holiday from directing films to take my author photo. Merci également, Christa Didier, for answering my French language questions. Thank you to Carl Schucker and A.L. Kennedy for your words inside and on the stunning cover. Thank you, Todd Atticus, many times. Thank you. And Unity Books, where this cover was [00:27:30] designed. Kristen, thank you for being there on the front line and for wisely disappearing now and then to write your own books. I'm grateful to my aunt, Fleur Adcock, for being so happy for me whenever I had any good writing news And thank you to my mother, [00:28:00] Marilyn Duckworth. I was about to get your name wrong. Incredible. God. Anyway, for being an example of keep going, as in she's got a book coming out next year. Yes. As well as being an example of how, in her words, "You can always use, make use of things." [00:28:30] So I thought I'd now read you a snippet from, a snippet of how I used things, events that I fictionalized when I was writing And Tower Things With You, where I wandered around with or as Franny But always being the author taking notes. In this example, Franny and I are in a secondhand bookshop in Te Whanganui-a-Tara, [00:29:00] where I'm asking for books on suicide on her behalf or as Franny. Someone working there asked if I was okay, and then the shop owner asked if I was okay. This is adapted from the novel to show you the workings behind the writing. It was the Are You Okay shop, one to avoid, in Franny's opinion. Although I, too, felt I might [00:29:30] want to avoid the shop for a few weeks or months after this event that was taking place partly in my head, my main feeling was that of delight to have found such an eager, unwitting participant in my future book. Anyway, so, "Are you okay?" He said, and I said, "Why do you ask?" Which was another way for Franny of saying, "Go [00:30:00] away," but more polite. Unless it was also, if I am honest, and this is not a certainty, the question of a writer scavenger doing her research. He said, "Well, because of what you are looking for, and you seem a bit..." He used a word like either disturbed or dis-distressed. But in that I, and of course, Franny, found it disturbing or [00:30:30] distressing or some other word meaning something similar, that her behavior, third person detachment, can be a helpful tool in life and for a writer, was being so closely monitored, not good, not good for a writer either. I really am. We, Franny and I are, we both are more suited to big cities. I didn't catch the qualifier. "So I wondered," [00:31:00] he said, back to reality, and pay attention, I told myself, this could be usable. He s- he seemed annoyed to have to spell out the obvious. "If you were okay." "Oh," I said, or that might only have been Franny. Thank you.
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