Lame, I know.

But hey, it’s also cheap and and only took thirty-seven attempts, in four different locations, around the house.

Personally, I would’ve preferred a real photographer. but not many keep an appointment slot free on the off-chance that a good-hair day coincides with a blemish-free complexion, and the desire and will to stare down a camera lens.

I also find their professional pride suffers when you say things like ‘Uh, uh, that’s ugly’ thirty-six times in a row. Whereas we selfie photographers are pretty much impossible to offend.

Normally, I wouldn’t have picked outside the laundry as the ideal setting (and yes, it did take a bit of editing to get the mop out of the shot) . But man, the lighting was so much more flattering down there in the shade. And it did remind me to get yesterday’s load hung out before it stiffened and dried into something scary…

So here ’tis…my latest  author pic, taken today. If you’re disappointed when you meet me in real life, I’ll judge it a winner.

It’s that time of year again. The Children’s Book Council of Australia has announced its Notable and Shortlisted books in their 2013 Book of the Year Awards.

If, like me, you’re always on the lookout for quality books for kids, click on the following links for this year’s  CBCA Notable Books and Shortlisted books.

It was a big thrill to see Trust Me Too make the Notable list for younger readers. The Ford St Publishing anthology included my Killer Stories as one of more than fifty contributions from some of Australia’s top writers and illustrators for kids.

It caps a great year for Trust Me Too which  has also been chosen for The White Ravens 2013, an annual selection of the top 250 books for young people from around the world prepared by the International Youth Library in Germany.

Congratulations to all Notable and Shortlisted authors and illustrators, and especially to the ever-affable Gus Gordon, whose short-listed picture book Herman and Rosie  I was privileged to launch in Brisbane last year. Always nice to see the good guys get a guernsey!

Judging a Drongoes art competition at the local school seemed like such a great idea at the time…. but then in came more than a hundred entries from Grades One-to-Three at St Ambrose’s, Newmarket, and every dang one of them was as cute as a bug’s ear.

Jack vs Rocket Robson, by Tessa, Year One

Talk about diversity and depth of talent among our local 6-to-8 year olds. After listening to only two chapters from Drongoes , each child created a unique pictorial take on the story.

Some focused on the race between Jack and his arch-rival Rocket Robson….

Best mates, by Charlotte, Year Two

others on the strong bond of mateship that sustained Jack and his best bud, Eric through their toughest times….

and more than a few were inspired by the asthmatic Eric’s nickname, Puff the Magic Dragon!

The special place where Jack went to be alone with his drongo ‘mates’ was one of the most beautifully depicted scenes …

Down the creek, by Luke, Year 3

…as were the drongoes that flit in at the end of the story to unexpectedly save the day.

Drongo by Charlotte, Year One

Congratulations – not only to Tessa and Charlotte in Year One, Charlotte (another one!) in Year Two, and Luke in Year Three – but to each and every one of the entrants from St Ambrose’s.

You are all winners in my book.

And the winners are…

Growing up in the bush, I cut my chops on prime Aussie slang.

Life was full of dills and drongoes, drop-kicks and silly galahs, useless buggers who couldn’t run a bath, and funny buggers who claimed to have hit every branch of the ugly tree on the way down.

Language was full of fun and effect. Cheating and stealing were lower than a goanna’s gearbox, and if you were caught in the act, you took off like a choko vine over the back dunny….

Yet these days, using Aussie slang can be a bit like speaking a foreign language to today’s kids. Hands immediately shoot up in the classroom. ‘What’s a dill? What does drongo mean?”

It occurred to me that some Aussie vernacular was in danger of dying a death if someone didn’t do something….so I wrote Drongoes to help breathe some new life into a favourite Aussie expression.

This latest chapter book in Scholastic’s Mates series of great Australian yarns introduces drongoes – (the bird, the word, and the dogged little triers it has come to represent) – to a whole new generation of newly independent readers.

Drongoes will meet its first readers at the Brisbane schools launch at St Ambrose’s, Newmarket, on Sunday 3 March from 3pm.

First reviews are now in – yay! You can read Fran Knight’s review for ReadPlus by clicking here, Dimity Powell’s review for Boomerang Books, by clicking here and Megan Daley’s review and teaching activities at Childrens Books Daily by clicking here.

Teachers Notes can be found at http://www.scholastic.com.au/schools/education/teacherresources/assets/pdfs/Drongoes.pdf

BUT we did get a kick out of our daughter’s V-day surprise.

One enterprising lad gave my little cupcake flowers flours - two kilos of self-raising flours, to be exact.

An inspired V-day gift for our family’s uber-baker.

Hope your Valentine’s Day was full of sweet surprises too.

It’s here, it’s here, my first little Aussie Mate. (And seriously, with a title like Drongoes, what else could it be?)

When the fabulous Dyan Blacklock at Scholastic first asked me if I’d like to write something for their Mates series for newly independent readers, my immediate reaction was hell, yeah - I’m a sheila from Biloela, I live for great Aussie yarns.

And I have to say that writing Drongoes was about as much fun as I’ve had at a keyboard. It took me back to my own early reading discoveries and the thrill of graduating to big kids’ books with proper stories and chapters and everything (just like younger readers will find in Drongoes )

Drongoes is out now, so look out for it in Scholastic Book Club in schools. Or if you’re really keen, you can order it by clicking here.

Love to hear what you think of it.

Can Jack beat arch-enemy Rocket Robson in this year’s cross-country? If only! A heart-warming story of mateship and drongoes, where the real winner isn’t always the first over the line.

Bille Brown has died and I find myself grieving for the most famous man I never knew, growing up in Biloela.

‘I am not a star,’ he wrote in one of his vivid memoir pieces for Griffith Review, ‘but I am famous in Biloela, where I grew up, and all fame is local and subject to the indifferent stoke of time’s air brush.’

When I was growing up, he was already a legend-in-the-making, a decade older, long-gone from Biloela, and making his name at the Royal Shakespeare Company by the time I finished high school.

I didn’t know him back then, but I knew his mum, the ever-gracious and beautifully spoken Mrs Maureen Brown, who worked in Creevey’s music store in Biloela.  Mum and I would buy our Abba and Neil Diamond records and Mrs Brown would keep us up-to-date on Bille’s latest and most thrilling achievements on the stage in Brisbane, and then good heavens, in London, while keeping an eagle eye on the shenanagans of the store’s teenaged browsers.

I remember her once pointedly asking my good mate Kevin if she could help him after he’d spent an inordinate amount of time looking but not buying.

‘Um,’ he hesitated, searching the shelves behind her for inspiration. ‘Could I have a can of Coke, please?’

‘This is a music store,’ she intoned in her mellifluous voice. ‘We don’t sell cans of Coca Cola.’

‘Oh,’ said Kevin dead-pan, ‘could I have a can of Fanta then please?’

Bille roared when I told him that story decades later. As he did when my friend Sue recounted her favourite Mrs Brown story in which that most proper of matriarchs kept a secret stash of contraband tapes of banned musicals like HAIR under the counter for special customers like Sue’s Mum.

His was a generous spirit that always found time for anyone with a Biloela connection. He proved it by launching a small novel called Dust by an unknown writer for no reason other than it was set in Biloela, the landscape of their youth.

In his short memoir piece Playing with fire published by Griffith Review, he finished a poignant tale from his childhood with the telling rider: ‘What happened, happened, but not quite as well as a short story can lead you to believe. All memory is fiction and has different rules from life.’

Like great fiction, Bille Brown will live on in many memories, not just as a  boisterous giant of the theatre, an actor, a playwright, and an evocative writer, but as a big-hearted man who not only inspired generation of kids to dream big dreams, but who helped in his own inimitable style to make them come true.

My deepest sympathies to his sister Rita, friends and family for their loss. Bille was a great presence and leaves both a huge gap and a lasting legacy.

A memorial service celebrating his life will be held at the Playhouse QPAC on 4 February at 4pm. I hope to see you there.

There’s still some room left on the shelves that I’m hoping to fill this Xmas.  And if like me, you’ve left your shopping run a bit late, here’s my hot tips for great book buys for the holidays.

For the pampered pooch or pet lover in your life, it’s hard to go past pet photographer Seth Casteel’s Underwater Dogs. (Next year’s edition needs a photo of Huggy dive-bombing water dragons in our pool!)

For historical fiction buffs, look no further than Hilary Mantell’s Bring Up The Bodies, the superb follow-up to one of my favourite reads of last year, Wolf Hall.

My YA pick-of-the-year is Vikki Wakefield’s mesmerising Friday Brown and for the slightly older new adults in your life, Laura Buzo’s Holier Than Thou is an invigorating shot of life after school, after Uni, when growing up becomes grown up.

Brigid Kemmerer’s Elementals series (Book One Storm and Book Two Spark) are the hottest thing in paranormal romance for teens.  Trust me, your  teenage miss will loooove them…

Fantasy freaks should treat themselves to the complete three volume set of Melina Marchetta’s Lumatere Chronicles: starting with Finnikin of the Rock and Froi of the Exiles and finishing with the heart-stopping Quintana of Charyn.

Toddlers won’t be able to resist Brave Squish Rabbit by Brisbane author-illustrator Kath Battersby. An adorable read with a glow-in-the-dark cover which has proven admirably resilient after being test-driven by my nineteen-month-old nephew over the past two days.

He’s just driven off to spend Christmas with Nana up in Yeppoon, and the next round of family will hit our place tomorrow.

Wishing you and yours a happy and safe festive season. surrounded by those you love.

She’s pictured here (at Kemp Beach, Yeppoon, with the younger twins), looking effortlessly elegant in her brother Neil’s hat.

Forty-six years later, she’d probably still fit into that dress… legacy of a lifetime of taking only one potato – and then promptly offering it to the nearest child in need (I suspect I was that child a bit too often for my own good).

I often wish I could be more like my mum – but it’s probably too late now to say no to potatoes – so tonight I’ll simply settle for being with her.

I’m hopping on a plane and flying up to Bilo to help celebrate her birthday. She didn’t think turning 82 was worth making a fuss about, but I beg to differ.

Every birthday is a cause for celebration. And we’ll remind her of that every year from now on:

You only live once, Mum…but if you do it right, once is enough.

The tiny people in my life are squealing with pleasure over this one.

The lovely Kath Battersby’s new picture book Brave Squish Rabbit is an adorable story about conquering fears. And when you’re tiny and squishable, even the smallest fears can take on gargantuan proportions.

For a fun morning with your favourite short people, feel free to join us at Brisbane’s Black Cat Books at Paddington for the launch of Brave Squish Rabbit.

We’d love to see you there.