Five alternative professions

If I had the possibility of starting again with the knowledge of life I had now, what profession would I choose for myself? These are my first five choices.
1) Helicopter pilot
I have always loved flying, even the long flights to Italy from New Zealand - approx. 30 hours. When I was a teenager, my parents owned a business which sought out schools of fish by helicopter so the fishermen could zero in on them. My mother has her pilot's licence. My uncle had flown, commercially and otherwise, all his life. One of my first boyfriends was a pilot and took me up in all sorts of planes including an open Tiger Moth and looped loops. So I guess flying permeated a great deal of my early years and left me with a longing to fly. My second book coming out later this year has a heroine who flies helicopters, so I can live vicariously through her. Will I ever get my pilot's licence? Probably not.


2) Game Ranger - in Africa somewhere.
I have been captivated by the parts of Africa I have visited and the animals running free are a marvel to behold. The idea of poachers drives me crazy so if I were a ranger, I could contribute towards keeping the animals alive. I would be constantly out in open spaces - heaven.

3) Travel Journalist.
I was once one of three finalists in a National competition for a new Travel Writer and had a great opportunity to pursue this avenue of writing but, at the time, a Silhouette editor was very interested in my Bombshells and had assured me she wanted me as a Bombshell writer so I concentrated on that for two years, writing five Bombshells before she told me my books were bigger than Bombshells and I should get them published mainstream. In other words after all that writing and waiting, she rejected them all. And the momentum of my win in travel writing was completely lost and no one knew who I was any more. By the way, the book that has just been released by Wild Child Publishing http://www.wildchildpublishing.com/content/view/459/221/ ,Beneath the Surface, was the very first Bombshell I wrote. Travel writing is such a tremendously hard field to break into without credentials that it would be easier to win lotto but what a great excuse to travel the world.


4) Archeologist
Hard work, yes. Frustrating work, yes. Even tedious work, yes. But oh what joy when you strike something. That feeling of accomplishment is what we all crave whether we know it or not. And that feeling is what most of us don't have in our day jobs. We go to work and we come home and repeat it all the next day without significantly achieving anything concrete and that feels like failure - day after day. But if you had an aim, if you knew that in the end, there would be a reward, even though you didn't know when, then it would be all worth it. That's why I would want to be an archeologist. To have a carrot dangling in front of me with the viable hope of reaching it.
5) Forest Ranger
OK, so this is similar to the second choice but this would be in among trees and totally immersed in nature. Solitude with only trees and critters to talk to. What peace - no one to answer back, no bitching, no office politics. Yes, give me animals and trees over most humans any day.

So, I have noticed a theme here with my professions - being outdoors in nature, whether flying over it, walking or travelling through it or digging in it. Strange that all my professions so far have been indoors - Fashion Designer, Teacher, Personal Assistant, Design and Marketing Manager etc. So what does that mean? Any ideas? Because I sure don't have the answer to that question.

Breaking the Rules

About twenty years ago my sister told me about a book she said she couldn't forget. I looked for it in book shops and libraries on and off for years but never found it. Eventually I forgot about it. Then two weeks ago I went to dinner at a friend's home and she told me to read this book she had just finished. It was the same book - Perfume by Patrick Suskind. I took it, grateful that I had eventually found it.

Well, I've finished it and I'm confused. This book breaks so many of the rules that we are constantly told to follow and yet it is a big enough hit to be made into a film.

First of all, the hero is despicable, odious, completely unsympathetic. Aren't we told to make sure that our characters are likeable, that they invoke sympathy, that even if they are off the tracks, that they have redeemable features that make us want to follow their character growth until they reach a point where we can like them. This chap has no redeeming features and certainly, if his character develops at all - and that is debatable - it's only to become even more horrendous. So why do we follow his story? I suppose because he has this incredible gift and it is the development of that gift that we are fascinated by and which makes us turn each page.

Secondly, we are continually told to 'show, don't tell'. This book 'tells' us the story virtually from the beginning to the end. There is one short section of dialogue and this is written up as in a play with the character's name written, followed by a colon and then his words. The rest is all hearsay - he did this and then said that and then he did this. If we do that in our stories, we are instantly rejected just as we would be for the first point. So why does he get away with it? Certainly it was first published over 20 years ago when the expectations of storytelling were different but it is still popular today.

The other fact I found strange about this book was that while reading the book, I found it difficult to put down and yet when I did manage to, I had little desire to go back to it. Can you see why this book has confused me so much?

Back on Track

Thanks everyone for all the advice on my new website. I think I have made all the adjustments but let me know if I have forgotten something.

Well, the news today is that I am back on track. Since finishing my graveyard story, which is doing the rounds, I haven't written anything at all - and that's months now. It's not good to be resting that long or maybe it is. I have been going backwards and forwards through some stories I have part written and then abandoned and have finally found the one I have an urge to complete. This is a story I had almost forgotten even though I started it only last year. It is a complicated suspense thriller and I can't remember why I abandoned it at 37 pages. A confused brain, probably.

The interesting point is that on analysis I find I can't finish stories that I know all the details and ending to. It would be too boring to write what I know. I am definitely a seat-of-my pants writer and so need the mystery ahead of me to keep me writing. In this thriller I know who is the baddie, why the trouble is happening, but I have no idea how I will get my characters to a satisfactory end or who will be killed along the way. Keep it exciting and I keep writing.

The photos are my characters - Space Cowboys meets Dark Side of the Sun.

My New Website

I worked all Sunday on creating a new sleeker website. I'd love you to go have a look and let me know what you think. Any criticism will be taken into consideration and duly implemented if it fits my vision.
http://www.suzanneperazzini.com/

The Five things I am the Most Grateful for

Okay, so I'm going to exclude the obvious, being family, friends and health. You can take those for granted. I'm talking about the small things that might mean nothing to others but are important to me.

1) Every evening, when I get home from work, I feed the cat, get changed and prepare my rum and diet coke with three crackers topped by smoked salmon. I then take it all to my study to check my blogs and write before preparing dinner at 7.30pm. This is a special wind down time by myself - only the cat can interrupt me. When I'm having a hard day, I really look forward to this moment of my day.

2) After dinner I go back to my study to write but these days it's rather chilly in New Zealand - imagine wearing long-johns and thermals to work under my business clothes because the office is so cold. So I dream of how my electric blanket is warming up my bed. Now, I like to stay up late and keep working while the house is quiet so going to bed is not a priority but that electric blanket calls to me all evening. When the weather warms up, I actually go through withdrawal symptoms when I have to eventually turn it off. I don't do drugs, I don't smoke or drink coffee but I have withdrawal problems with an electric blanket. Go figure.

3) Having a good book on the go is essential in my life. When I finish a book, I must have another lined up or I feel bereft until I find a new one. It's like a close friend that I can return to when necessary. I don't have a lot of reading time in my day and I never read for long stretches at a time but just knowing that book is waiting for me makes my life worth living.The one in the photo is perhaps one of my favorites of all time. Even though I wasn't keen on Jodi Picoult's latest book, Change of Heart, I have loved all her others. Any suggestions of 'must read' books?

4) Movies. You have heard me go on about movies before and how they are my weekend passion. Well, give me a bad week and I long for the weekend so I can go lose myself in the wonderland of someone else's fantasy, diet coke and choc-top icecream in hand. The day after tomorrow I'm off to see Hancock - got to see what that twist is all about. Thank goodness no one has yet dropped a spoiler about it unlike that in Wanted, which I am dying to see when it arrives.



5) The sun in winter is such bliss that it should be canned. We have had sunshine for a few days here while the temperatures have been so chilly I have had to wear the above-mentioned bulky underwear. So the feeling of the sun on any bare skin available is a joyous pleasure and of course there is that essential vitamin D that you can't get any other way except through a pill. Unfortunately I just saw the weather forecast and it's going to be yucky again.Enjoy it, you guys in the northern hemisphere, it'll be back here soon enough.

Another book to be published.

Wild Child Publishing has accepted to publish another of my books, Crash into Darkness. I wrote this not too long ago thinking of Harlequin's Intrigue line. However, they said it was too dark for them. I'm glad it has found a home.
I created the image of my cover tonight but it is, of course, not the cover they will use - unless they let me design it. Click on the image and you will be able to see it better. Three books accepted now and counting.

Great Review for Beneath the Surface

I've received a great review with the top possible score at: http://cocktailreviews.wordpress.com/2008/06/17/beneath-the-surface-wild-child-publishing/

This is the last line of the review: "Beneath The Surface has it all. Voice, plots, emotions, imagery, and high-calibre penmanship. I applaud Ms. Perrazini. She is one very talented lady."

I'm over the moon and finally excited about the whole process. It's amazing what a little positive reinforcement does for you.

I also have some other good news but I will keep that to myself for a few days.