As many of you know, we've just returned from a holiday in Russia which, yes, was wonderful. And a bonus I was not expecting, although I should have since it was summer—the midnight sun or 'white lights' as they call it in St Petersburg. This resulted in many late nights out celebrating life with our friends as it always seemed too early for bed.

There are a few cultural aspects of Russia that would be known to most people, I would think. For example, Tchaikovsky, one of the greatest composers of all time, was Russian. He composed the music for the Russian ballet, Swan Lake, which may well be the only ballet storyline known to many of us. Likewise, Tchaikovsky's score is easily recognizable even if you do not know him as the composer or the origins of the music, especially since Black Swan.

Some of the world's greatest names in ballet are Russian, for example, Rudolf Nureyev, Mikhail Baryshnikov and Anna Pavlova. Again, they are known the world over even by those who know nothing at all about ballet (although I remember Baryshnikov primarily because of his defection to Canada in 1974).

Australia's national dessert, the Pavlova, was created and named after Anna Pavlova in the 1920s following her tour of the antipodes. The Kiwis (New Zealanders) try to call it their own, but it's as Australian as vegemite and lamingtons. Sometimes we'll add Kiwi Fruit to the top of our pavlovas to keep the New Zealanders happy.

I had previously seen Swan Lake in Sydney some years ago but it was a parody by The Trocaderos, "The Trocks" or long title, Les Ballets Trockadero De Monte Carlo, a company of professional male dancers who make ballet humorous by exaggerating the fundamentals and seriousness of it to the point of comedy. The dying swan scene is memorable and I worried that I would never be able to enjoy the 'real' Swan Lake after The Trocks. Here's the 'real' dying swan scene, which is beautifully poignant, and The Trocks' version. Incidentally, the dying swan was considered the signature dance of Anna Pavlova. 

It was only fitting therefore that while in St Petersburg, we attended a production of Swan Lake at the Grand Palace Theatre. There are several possible endings to Swan Lake including the crowd-pleasing happy ending where Siegfried and Odette's true love defeats Von Rothbart, and Odette is restored to human form. One of the more tragic endings is reminiscent of Romeo and Juliet ie Odette commits suicide, the Prince discovers her lifeless body and does so as well but Odette isn't actually dead. We were lucky enough to enjoy the happy ending in St Petersburg which gave further cause for an evening of celebration, as if one was needed.

Regards
Leigh
 

Leigh K. Cunningham on Facebook and Twitter.

The Writer’s Guild of America recently released its 101 Best Written TV Shows, and it was an awesome list in my opinion. As many of you know, I’m obsessed with Seinfeld – it permeates my life with uncanny and frightening relevance on a daily basis - who would have thought that a show about nothing could represent my life and the people in it so aptly.  Seinfeld, highly expected to come out on top on the list came in at a respectable second place after The Sopranos. I’ve never seen an episode of The Sopranos but I do plan to hire the series on DVD to check out the writing for myself. As a side note, it was sad to see that James Gandolfini, the star of the show, passed away last week at the very young age of 51.

My other all-time favourite TV Show particularly for its clever writing, and perfect casting - Arrested Development – comes in at 16, which is a great result considering it was axed despite being acknowledged for being incredibly good. It is hard to understand why it wasn’t more popular – perhaps there aren’t enough lovers of ‘quirky’ out there and it failed for that reason to build on its almost-cult following.  

M*A*S*H aired from 1972-1983 and even though I was too young at the time to ‘get’ a lot of its humour (and as a child in those days, we didn’t watch much TV), I do recollect having a sense that it was clever and entertaining without understanding why. Max Klinger, who cross-dresses to prove he is insane and should be discharged from service, is much like a character out of another favourite story of mine, Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. John Yossarian wants to be grounded from combat but in order to prove he is unfit he needs to request a mental fitness evaluation, which in itself proves he's sane. I made reference to this character and storyline in my novel, RAIN as a tribute to the book but also because I love the concept of the 'Catch-22' — a term adopted in common language to define those situations. 

Other shows on the list I’ve enjoyed over the years include Mad Men, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, Modern Family, 30 Rock, Homeland, The Office (UK), LA Law, Fawlty Towers, Absolutely Fabulous, The Wonder Years and Get Smart. What about you? What shows on the list are your favourites? 

Regards
Leigh

Leigh K. Cunningham on Facebook and Twitter.

At the last minute in February, we decided to spend 10 days touring Japan in March. If we'd planned for it, we would have booked a tour in the cherry blossom season (April) but as good fortune would have it, the cherry trees bloomed early this year—the second earliest blooming in history. There’s probably a message in that to not try and control everything in life—just go with the flow and wonderful things can and will happen.

Japan is a delight in so many ways. Firstly, the people would have to be the most considerate, respectful, helpful, gracious people in the world, at least based on our travels so far. They’re an example for all of us. Secondly, it is spotlessly clean everywhere. After a few days, I was intent on finding some rubbish on a street somewhere or a dirty footpath that hadn’t been washed clean that morning. It was not until Tokyo did I find a single piece of rubbish on a footpath. That’s quite incredible for a small island country with 127.5 million people and there are no public rubbish bins, anywhere! There are a couple of reasons for this: (1) the Japanese don’t eat and walk at the same time so they do not produce the usual meal time garbage, (2) the Japanese are dedicated recyclers so they take their rubbish home to recycle it correctly, and their process is far more advanced than ours in the west. They have separate see-through bags for paper, plastic, polystyrene, glass, metal, cans and bottles. Each has its own collection system and collectors won’t take bags that aren’t correctly sorted so everyone knows when you get it wrong—much shame to your household.

Our visit to the Peace Memorial Park and museum in Hiroshima was a sobering day, and more so as there is a Peace Watch clock in the foyer which shows the number of days since the first dropping of A-bombs in 1945: 24,702 days, and a second timer for the number of days since the last nuclear test: 40 days (North Korea, January 2013). So basically, after seeing mortifying images and reading unforgettable stories about the first A-bomb, we’re left with a reminder that this can happen again any time. A monument in the Peace Memorial Park says it “expresses the spirit of Hiroshima—enduring grief, transcending hatred, pursuing harmony and prosperity for all, and a yearning for genuine, lasting world peace.”

Regards
Leigh

Leigh K. Cunningham on Facebook and Twitter.

Those of you who know me, know that I’m a happy person…90% of the time. I have every reason to be happy; my life for some strange reason has been blessed, particularly so because I’m able to go through it with my twin soul—the other half of me, much like how Jerry and George teamed up to be one complete person in my favourite Seinfeld episode, The Summer of George :) 

However, I have three pet peeves: (1) pedestrian etiquette, (2) taxi drivers who think I’m a tourist and don’t know the quickest route from A to B, and (3) bad manners, in particular, coughing without placing a hand or tissue over your mouth. I’ve already blogged about the first two, so I figure it’s time to deal with (3).

As a child, we were taught to cover our mouths when coughing or sneezing so that germs, viruses, whatever you had, weren’t spread to those around you. And this seems like a pretty easy thing to do in order to show others that you’re thinking of them and their wellbeing first and foremost.  When someone with a cold, flu or other virus doesn’t cover their mouth when coughing or sneezing, they’re saying, ‘I’m sick and I couldn’t care less if you end up sick as well.’ 

The average human cough fills about 3/4 of a two litre bottle with air together with approximately 3,000 droplets of saliva which fly out of the mouth at speeds up to 80 kilometres per hour (50 miles per hour)! And it’s even worse with a sneeze. Do you like the idea of being doused in someone else’s saliva? If that person is sick with a virus, the virus is on those droplets and can survive in the air for hours afterwards. A single cough can catapult as many as two hundred million individual virus particles in your direction; there is nowhere to hide.

Viruses need a living being (human or animal) to survive so when they land on a surface, their life span is limited to a few minutes or at best, in humid conditions for example, a few hours. They last longer on hard surfaces than on soft surfaces like fabric. And since we wash our hands several times every day, the chance of infection this way is less than if we breathe in the virus—we can't avoid breathing but we can avoid putting hands in our mouth.

The World Health Organization has predicted that the next pandemic that will kill millions, will be spread in this way, and it is not a case of ‘if’ this will happen but ‘when’. So practicing the hand-over-mouth drill now will reduce the risk of this killer virus spreading worldwide in record time. We’ve already had a glimpse/warning with SARS and H1N1, H7N9 and other birth flus but people still seem complacent…except for the Japanese. In Japan, if you have a cough or cold, virus or flu, you wear a mask. It's another easy solution but I guess if you just don't care about other people, it won't matter how easy the solution might be, and that seems to be the way of the world today.

Regards
Leigh

Leigh K. Cunningham on Facebook and Twitter.

This is a wonderfully charming novel set in Melbourne (Australia) featuring Mace Evans who chooses a solitary life and resents the many well-intentioned interferences of her friends and the over-bearing judgment of her mother and sister, Shannon.

There are however some serious themes in the book as Mace deals with her marriage break-down and losing the love of her life, her mother's brush with breast cancer, and the many trials that affect her family and friends. If you've read Cunningham's previous novel, RAIN, you'll see a continuing theme of death, loss and grief. In this book though, it takes on a secondary role to the hilarious misadventures of Mace Evans and her entourage.

I dream most nights and sometimes I have several dreams per night. I love dreaming; I look forward to it. I only wish someone would invent a machine that would record dreams so you could replay them the next day although I can usually remember most of my dreams.  

A lot of my dreams involve snakes but strangely there is never any fear associated with the snakes even in the one dream in which I was bitten. In that dream, I was in bed and a snake was biting my arm but my arm was protected by a thick sleeve, like a dog bite protective suit. I wasn’t afraid of the snake even though it was trying to bite me; I was focused on working out how to get rid of it without waking Steve, who as usual was asleep beside me completely unaware of the problem.

In another dream, I was ‘gardening’ on a large mound of barren dirt then all of a sudden the dirt moved and a snake came out of the mound. That was it. And my most recent dream this week: I was in a hallway and at either end of the hallway there were snakes. At one end were King Cobras curled up ‘resting’ and at the other end, small slithering black snakes. In my analysis of which way to go, I was thinking that while the small black snakes appeared less formidable, they could be baby Taipans and more deadly so I decided to approach the Cobras which allowed me to pass without moving.  When I relayed this dream to Steve, he felt compelled to tell me about Snake Island. I don’t know why.

Snake Island is more correctly known as Ilha de Queimada Grande, an island off Brazil near São Paulo. It is uninhabitable because for every square metre there is at least one Golden Lancehead, a unique species of pit viper with a fast-acting venom that melts the flesh.

The island did once have a lighthouse operator who lived there with his family. One night, snakes entered through open windows and started attacking the man, his wife and their three children. They ran from the lighthouse but were bitten by snakes that dangled from tree branches. Their bodies were found spread across the island when a navy vessel stopped to make a routine supply drop. This is the source of nightmares and I’m waiting for it to manifest in my dreams. Thanks, Steve.

Regards
Leigh

Leigh K. Cunningham on Facebook and Twitter.

This story is written in the first person by a woman called Mace and is a journey of discovery - a discourse on her feelings and thoughts - the state of her emotions about love, life, and family.
The author is a gifted writer and her talent shines through each page. I loved the Oscar quips that were dotted here and there…eg: a true friend stabs you in the front. They added a kind of levity to the story and made me chuckle. A wonderful read!
 

Being Anti-Social chosen as a Finalist at the 2012 Reader Views Literary Awards in the Humor category. Winners announced late March 2013.

After 52 years of life, my husband (Steve) decided it was time he could cook something other than Vegemite on toast, and on special occasions, ham and cheese on toast. Once a week, he was going to cook dinner - words I've longed to hear for nigh on three decades. For completeness though, I must acknowledge that he did bring me breakfast in bed once - maybe it was my birthday - which comprised 1/2 grapefruit and a cup of coffee served on an old wooden chopping board. Clearly he was not yet ready to drop an egg into boiled water or anything else similarly complex but I digress.

That cooking declaration was made November last year and I've been served three meals since, although there have been a few 'kitchen assists'. Alas, this means we're nowhere near ready for the next season of My Kitchen Rules.

The most helpful aspect of the 'kitchen assists', or should I say, the most amusing is that Steve, preparer of three meals plus a 1/2 grapefruit, considers himself quite knowledgeable in the kitchen and now, while acting as Sous Chef, not only contributes ideas but also suggests that I am not doing things right. I do wonder how all those meals over the past thirty years made it on to plates - I've been lucky. 

So why the sudden interest in being able to cook? Master Chef may have played a role. We both enjoy the US version of Master Chef. The judges, I believe, make a cooking show worth watching, or not (pass on Master Chef Australia I'm sorry). Graham, Gordon and Joe on Master Chef US make a great team; they're interesting and entertaining, and this might be why we frequent Mozza's Pizzeria in Singapore (one of Joe's restaurants) or it might be because it has the best pizzas in the world, ever.

Steve also likes to watch Hell's Kitchen (with Gordon Ramsay), usually while I am cooking dinner including on his designated night. Only problem with this show however, is that a lot of the dialogue is 'beeped' out by the Singaporean censors - no swearing allowed here (try keeping up with the story in Californication or Sons of Anarchy!) 

I love My Kitchen Rules and again, the judges play a pivotal role in the show's appeal in my opinion. Manu and Pete are a perfect duo (they don't need to be flamboyant or over-the-top) and the guest judges also are perfect for the show. I also feel it might be a sign that Lee was a finalist in Season 2 and Leigh was the winner in Season 3. That can't be a coincidence. No sign of a Steve though anywhere of note. Who likes to cook? 

Regards
Leigh

Leigh K. Cunningham on Facebook and Twitter.

Often when I read a book, I'll put it down frequently because I have a low attention span but this was one of those rare books I had no trouble keeping in my hands. I had the opposite problem. Making myself put it down so I could get some work done. I loved the lead character, Mace. I loved her independence, her honesty, her quests for self-improvement. And most of all, for her humor. Mace quotes Oscar Wilde often and I enjoyed every reference. As a matter of fact, I may have a t-shirt made with one of the quotes.

I highly recommend this book to all readers that appreciate intelligence and humor in the written word; qualities sadly lacking in most modern fiction.

Once again, it is January and we have another chance to make the most of the year ahead, month by month, season by season.  This year, I’m trying something different – no resolutions. I have a standard set of resolutions that, sadly, simply require minor amendments in December to ready them for the New Year. Often, it just means changing the year at the top of the page. For those of you who have read my novel, Being Anti-Social, you’ll recognize this routine in Chapter 18. From the main protagonist, Mace Evans:

“I have a standard list of annual resolutions that receive the appropriate level of disregard, since good resolutions, as Oscar[Wilde] says, “are simply checks that men draw on a bank where they have no account.”

Needless to say this is autobiographical.

This is quite a challenge for me – not to have documented aspirations and goals broken down into sub-sets with monthly and weekly actions for each; I do love planning. But now that I’m 50, perhaps I have come to accept that this annual process can be abandoned in favour of a more laissez faire approach to getting things done ie without the personal accountability that comes from a written document. Although, anything I declare here in this blog will keep me accountable and I know some of you will take great delight in that.

As usual, my obsession with nutrition and exercise will continue. But again, in my wiser older years, I realize there is no need to resolve this – it’s a fundamental part of who I am and explains decades of exercise journals I started at the age of 22.

I have a book to write this year. It’s titled REWRITTEN and I’m really excited about the story and concept. Once again, it is completely different to my previous work.

I’m also planning a different approach to writing this story. Usually, my first draft process is highly disciplined, traumatic and obsessive; it hurts – a lot. I don’t do anything else but write from 8am to 6pm every weekday, and the weekends are used for catch-up if I failed to meet my weekly goal (words written). I have to fight the constant urge to do anything else; to leave my laptop and not return. I eat a lot of chocolate. I don’t exercise. I don’t go anywhere. I check emails once only first thing in the morning and that’s the limit of my connectivity. This time, however, for REWRITTEN, I’m going to try something called ‘balance’. It’s an unfamiliar concept requiring me to incorporate writing into normal life so it is not to the exclusion of all else. I’m afraid. I fear the book won’t get written this way, let alone finished. I fear I’ll lose momentum or I’ll waste precious time constantly re-acquainting myself with the flow and the story’s voice, where I’m at and where I was going.

However, since this is a new year and I’m now committed to doing ‘life’ differently, this is how it will be for the next two months, with no daily word count required – just a pledge to write something for an hour each day. If my blog post in March is about a secluded villa in Bali, a laptop, bikini and chocolate, you’ll know things didn’t work out as planned.

Regards
Leigh

Leigh K. Cunningham on Facebook and Twitter.

Being Anti-Social is written in a first person format, so it reads like a memoir and could be anyone's life. 

If not for her friends, Mace would probably spend most of her time at home and it pains her when family get together's are on the horizon. 

I could relate to the personality Cunningham envelops Mace into, and as a reader, I can truly relate to her character and feelings of loneliness as her girlfriends and siblings enter permanent relationships leading to marriage and children. Her relationship with her parents and siblings is positive overall, except for her sister Shannon. I found the scenes with her mother painful and heartbreaking and I felt this added the most realism to the story.

Mace is a complicated character who is at times up front and sarcastic in her thinking and throughout the book the author has her quoting Oscar Wilde, whom she calls her mentor and life coach.

Every year we're stunned by how quickly twelve months has passed and this year is no exception. 2012 passed so quickly, it's as if those Christmas decorations on Orchard Road never came down. 

For the first few months of this year, I thought I was in control of time. I was working hard on my next novel, Being Anti-Social (which was published in May), and launching various initiatives for the Association of Independent Authors. And although I was extremely busy, time was not my enemy. Then something happened. We went to Australia late April to catch up with family and visit our favourite place, Noosa (we first went there in 1983 for our honeymoon).

Just a few weeks after our return, Steve's sister, Carmel and husband, Gary visited for the first time, and we had an absolute ball out every night enjoying Singapore's night life. They left and other visitors arrived then three days after their departure we were on our way to South Africa to catch up with our good friends and long-standing travel companions, Donna and Terry from Pittsburgh.

We had an awesome time in Africa (South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe and Zambia) made even more awesome as we were able to meet up with our friends, David and David who we met on a tour of Central Europe in 2008 (they live in Cape Town). It's so incredible to meet people on your travels, to stay in touch for years then finally see them again.

It took the longest while to settle again after holidays and of course we were busy with the usual September birthday celebrations: Steve's birthday, mine five days later and our anniversary three days after that. It's a big and busy week, and of course this year I celebrated a milestone birthday (50). 

I don't know what happened to October and November - they just disappeared, and so now here we are listening to Oh Come All Ye Faithful and assessing Christmas Day lunch options.

It seems every year goes faster than the one before, and certainly so much faster than a year in the life of a ten-year-old. There are a few reasons for this phenomenon:

1. Our early years are full of first-time events:  first day of school, first car, first overseas holiday, first romance, first job etc. We tend to make more detailed and lasting memories of them. And when we repeat the event, year after year, it is less likely to make a unique or lasting impression.

I don't particuularly like this explanation because I think that the more first events in your life, the faster the year would go, not slower.

2. Then there is the 'ratio' explanation ie for a ten-year-old, a year is a tenth of his lifetime and seems to be never-ending, but to a sixty-year-old, a year is a sixtieth of his lifetime and therefore seems to be shorter than that of a child.

This seems logical to me.

3. Finally, time goes faster when you're older because you have more to do; more responsibility and obligation and perhaps less time for those 'firsts'. Perhaps we're also in more of a hurry to get started on that Bucket List or achieve life's goals before it is too late - there's an urgency, and when time is critical there seems less of it. 

Again, this seems logical.

What do you think? Do you find time speeding up as you age, and if so, why do you think this happens? Is it real or imagined?

Regards
Leigh

Leigh K. Cunningham on Facebook and Twitter.

 Review, Being Anti-Social by David Darling

I laughed all the way through Being Anti-Social, award-winning author Leigh K. Cunningham’s second novel for adult readers.

I laughed not because this is the usual situation-comedy froth but because Cunningham’s main character, Mace Evans, chooses to see the humor in the “anti-social” life she’s created for herself—and perhaps enjoys more than she’s willing to admit.

I also laughed because I adore Oscar Wilde’s pithy contrarian aphorisms, which Cunningham sprinkles throughout her story like flowers cleverly positioned in an unusually wild garden.

Mace early on admits she regrets going along with my favorite Wildeism: “The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.” Her doing so—her affair with a man whose talent in bed she can’t help but admire—ends her marriage to Ben, a man she considers a “perfect husband.”

Will the fallen Mace find another man to replace Ben, or will she continue her “anti-social” life, so described by her condescending sister, to the end of her days?

Or is it so wrong to prefer such a life, in which Oscar’s witty—some might say “cynical”—remarks apply every step of the way?

Well it's done, over, and there's nothing at all I can do about it. My birthday this month signified the end of my forties and the beginning of...another decade.

For the past couple of years I've been anticipating the moment without trepidation, and I might even be able to say I looked forward to it but as those last few days ticked away, I found myself obsessively repeating, "I'm in my forties", I'm in my forties". I went to bed late on the 13th, not wanting the day to end but alas there was only one way to avoid the inevitable and that was not an option.

I didn't go through any of this trauma when I was thirty-nine turning forty however twenty-nine was another story, and much worse than forty-nine. As tends to be the case with twenty-year-olds, the idea of turning thirty was mortifying. I thought life was over and it was time to put aside my foolish, fun ways and get serious about life. I had long hair until then but cut it short for something 'sensible and mature'. It was only to shoulder-length but that was dramatic—my hair was so important; it consumed hours every day and a bad haircut warranted a meltdown. Each decade it gets shorter and shorter. By sixty, I'll have a buzz cut but at least I no longer care what happens to it; I know it is unimportant and for that, I would not trade being fifty for a chance to be twenty-nine again.

Of course, nothing much has changed since turning fifty. I’m still waiting for maturity to arrive and life is as it was earlier in the month when I returned from Africa with wonderful new memories to keep me company in those twilight years (nineties). I’ve been welcomed to the club by others who assure me it is ‘the best club ever’. I’ve been told fifty is the new thirty and I should make an appointment for a colonoscopy. I think I’ll get a haircut instead. There’s so much to look forward to I can barely contain my excitement.

What about you? How do you cope with a changing decade?  

Regards
Leigh

Leigh K. Cunningham on Facebook and Twitter.

 Review, Being Anti-Social by Phyllis Wright

If you were the shy anti-social loner growing up or now, this is a must read. The down to earth writing will captivate and engage readers even if they are not socially inept. Mace is easy to relate to despite her dislike of most people. She has a core group of family and friends she is sometimes reluctant to deal with but "at the end of the day" she does. What she does to survive her life with its many road blocks, hazards and pitfalls is sometimes insightful, heart wrenching, witty, depressing, romantic, embarrassing and humorous. One thing it is not, it is not boring in Mace Evans' circle of relationships.

So what is meant by 'anti-social'? 

There are several definitions in various dictionaries on the meaning of 'anti-social', which range from "rudeness and an unwillingness or inability to associate in a normal or friendly way with other people" (ie 'anti-social' in layman's terms and popular usage) to recognized disorders and behaviors known in psychiatry terms that represent a "hostility toward or disruption of the established social order." 

More recently, 'anti-social' is becoming widely used as it pertains to social networks in two respects: in marketing circles, it is a strategy to reduce involvement in social networks (because of ineffectiveness or social fatigue), and on a personal level, it is a rejection of, and/or desire to withdraw from social networks (because of social fatigue and/or wishing to reclaim privacy). In due course, these definitions will no doubt find their way into dictionaries like other words that reflect our times. 

The original meaning of 'anti-social' from the 1700s was 'unsociable' (common usage) and 'hostile to social orders' and in the context of those times would have included behaviors we do not consider hostile to social orders today, for example women objecting to not being allowed to own property or vote, arranged marriages, being excluded from certain clubs etc. 

In Being Anti-Social, the main protagonist, Mace Evans, is accused of being anti-social (unsociable) by her older sister because Mace is reading a book at a family gathering. Mace researches 'anti-social' expecting to prove her sister wrong and the definitions she uncovers are documented in the first chapter. The first definition she comes across is the one used in psychiatry terms and at the extreme end of the definition spectrum, but the last one (unsociable) seems to fit how she feels about people, family, colleagues and social situations. She then embarks on a journey to understand how she came to be this way and whether it is OK to prefer one's own company to social situations one does not enjoy. It is ultimately a story about being true to oneself.

The Title

Being Anti-Social (BAS) is the title I came up with when the idea for this story first germinated. Strangely, I didn’t go through the usual process of considering other possibilities. In BAS, the main protagonist, Mace Evans, references quotes from Oscar Wilde to help guide her through life’s challenges. She considers him her “life coach and mentor”. Oscar Wilde wrote “The Importance of Being Earnest” and so “Being Anti-Social” is a 'play' on that er, play.

It is also a tribute to the movie, "Being John Malkovich", which was a unique, zany concept perfectly executed.  

The Cover

The cover of BAS was designed by Elizabeth Botté, a Melbourne-based illustrator who also designed the covers for my other three titles: The Glass Table, Shards and Rain. I love working with her.

The cover represents Mace (main protagonist) at home doing what she loves most: watching TV, eating pizza, drinking Merlot, alone. On the TV screen is the Belém Tower in Lisbon—it's a travel show (perhaps with Samantha Brown in the foreground). There is a laptop on the floor beside Mace as she does check her emails on weekends, but won