Writer Jill Murray

About me:

Writer and perpetually injured wanna-b-girl, Jill "J-fic€" Murray dances when no one is watching... Read More »

Busy week for Canadian hip hop videos

August 22nd, 2008

Here’s Shad’s new video for The Old Prince Lives at Home. It’s pretty funny if you remember The Fresh Prince of Bel Air.

Shad also has a couple of songs on Nadine’s MixTape.

Quill & Quire review for Break On Through

August 21st, 2008

“From its original plot, centred on the world of breakdancing, to its determined, complex heroine, Break on Through is an engaging slice-of-life read for teens interested in something beyond the usual boys-and-gossip plotlines… It’s hugely refreshing to read such a thoroughly urban Canadian novel – the hip-hop-flavoured story plays well against the backdrop of big-city downtown-versus-suburbia tension.”

Read the full review here:
http://www.quillandquire.com/books_young/review.cfm?review_id=6130

New WordBurglar video!

August 20th, 2008

I’m excited to report that SJ the WordBurglar has released a video for one of my favourite songs: The Route! It’s pretty fun; I’m loving the strawberry milk and how he keeps waking up in the printing plant.

I had a paper route when I was thirteen. It definitely felt a lot like that some mornings. I didn’t last one year at that job. Summer and fall were OK, but I couldn’t handle waking at 6am in the pitch black dead of February, to wade through snow up to my waist, the frigid air gnawing my face through my scarf. And I hated going door to door to collect money from my customers.

Most papers have stopped using paper boys and girls, in favour of adults in vans and direct debit. What do kids do for cash these days in those long years before they’re old enough to flip burgers, man the mall, or lead camp groups? There’s still babysitting I guess (in neighborhoods where the parents haven’t turned paranoid), and then what? Monetizing your blog? It doesn’t have quite the same gloriously tortured ring as The Route’s chorus: “I was risking my life to bring you the news,” does it?

The Route is featured on Nadine’s MixTape, which you can still pick up with Break On Through at either location of Babar Books, or from me in person at a reading this fall.

B-girl or Breaker: What’s in a name?

August 18th, 2008

I was talking to some friends recently about some of the quirks, advantages, limitations and particularities of b-girling, b-boying, breakdancing– whatever you might like to call it. Something that came up was the use of the term b-girl or b-boy, and how one can be a great breaker but not a b-girl, or a lifelong b-girl, but actually not much of a dancer, generally.

What’s the difference? As Nadine might tell you if you dared to cross her in Break On Through, a b-girl not only practices, but battles, and essentially “lives” b-girling outside of the studio or the cypher or what have you. She might be walking to the bus, thinking about her footwork or getting ready for bed, planning to call someone out first thing in the morning (morning meaning noon or so ;-). So you could have killer toprock, and have mastered three kinds of flares, and even perform on stage five nights a week, but still not be a b-girl.

You could also eat, breathe, live, sleep b-girling and be totally stumped by any other kind of dance– kind of like Mr. Fantastic in season 4 of So You Think You Can Dance. (See video above– although he was a popper/locker/funk stylist… don’t even get me started explaining the difference between b-boying and locking or popping… or get me started, but in another post, say.)

Can you imagine what it would be like if other sports or dances carried the same stringent requirements?

X: Are you a figure skater?

Y: (defensively) No!

X: But you’re skating now. You just did a triple axel!

Y: Well yeah, I figure skate but I’m not a figure skater. Geez, get a clue.

B.O.T.Y. Canada

August 13th, 2008

Hello, b-girls and b-boys and people like me who just like to watch and dream and maybe try on a few moves from time to time!

Are you all aware of Battle Of the Year, Canada, which is just 10 short days away, in Toronto?

Battle Of the Year Canada, 2008

BOTY Canada is a face-off between Canada’s best b-boys and b-girls, competing to win a trip to the World finals in Germany. Definitely a not-to-miss. Whether you want to dance or spectate, it doesn’t get much bigger than this.

There are also some great workshops scheduled, so you could make a pretty awesome b-weekend out of it if you wanted to.

For more information you can check out the BOTY Canada pages on Facebook and MySpace.

And here’s a short video from last year’s BOTY international, for inspiration:

http://www.myspace.com/boty_canada

*Update* Street Dance Academy is looking for volunteers to poster and flyer for BOTY. If you’re in Toronto and up to the job you can email them at info@Streetdanceacademy.com for more info.

Hipsterical sound bites

July 17th, 2008

Overheard at choice writing locations:

Hipster Guy #1 to Hipster Guy #2:
“This is why I’ve been watching The L Word so much! I’m like, this is my life!

T-shirt Man to Ladyfriend:
“I never know where to go to be seen, and when I do go to a place like that, usually I haven’t showered and I kind of smell.”

Publishing and The Media

June 4th, 2008

There was a recommendation for Break On Through in the Summer Reading feature of Montreal’s Hour magazine last week, and I almost missed it! I did an interview with these guys in March, but they didn’t use it for a long time, so I almost forgot I was supposed to be looking for it! Thanks Hour, for the mention.

“It twists and turns, spins and hops. Break on Through is a hip-hop right of passage.”

I quite like that.

Something I’ve learned while talking to friends, family, and pre-published writers since the release of Break On Through is that there are some widespread misconceptions about the way publishing and media work, and especially about the way they work together. This above blurb can be used to highlight a few realities:

  1. There’s no well-oiled rube goldberg machine responsible for reaching across the universe, connecting things together, and communicating to an author the exact moment when something happens with the promotion of her book. We rely on Google, bloglines, technorati, etc…, even word of mouth for that. Really big media firms will often have clippings services that scour the universe electronically and by hand and let you know every time your name is mentioned, but these are expensive enough that its generally agreed that the money that should go into promoting the book instead.
  2. Sometimes a media piece will come out a long time after you do the original interview. News outlets prioritize news before all else: the weather, politics, violence, the economy, the appearance of Kanye West for one night only in a barn on the edge of your small town… things that impact the largest numbers of people, and which must be published or broadcast right now to capitalize on their relevancy. Your interview about your teen novel can run pretty much any slow week, because that thing is actually going to take a 6 months or more to get stale.
  3. Releasing a book generally isn’t like releasing a CD or a vial of smallpox. The time sensitivity is much lower. A book stays “new” for much longer. And for that matter, if it takes you 10 books to get famous and beloved, this is actually regarded as normal. This is wonderful and fantastic. I’m glad I’m not a musician. Those guys are too often expected to prove themselves within a year of the release of their first album.
  4. Many people, even journalists, do not fully understand what fiction is. They look for deep personal connections to material, because those make for great stories. (See: James Frey) Sometimes interviewers are disappointed to learn that unlike my protagonist, Nadine aka Lady 6Sky, I am not and have never been a gritty, teenage, inner-city street dancer. This can put a damper on interviews, but there you have it. I write fiction, and fiction is fictional.
  5. If you do an interview, a review or smaller blurb might run instead. This is pretty normal. Maybe you had a bad day. Maybe the interviewer had a bad day. Maybe the tape recorder didn’t record, or the editor wanted something different, or there wasn’t enough space, or it didn’t turn out newsy enough, or it wasn’t quite perfect for the mandate of the paper, or you turned out not to be inner-city enough, or, or, or… it’s still all good because…
  6. Maybe by the time the thing actually runs, what you could really use are more reviews and short, quotable blurbs and…
  7. Media rarely translates directly into sales. Exposure is helpful. You definitely want to generate a buzz. But the usefulness of media clippings is really in building credibility. As a first time author, a decent folder of clippings and quotes gives you credibility you wouldn’t otherwise have. It says, “look: these credible people think my book is awesome and has the following useful properties.” You can use that backup when trying to arrange school bookings or apply for grants, residencies and other opportunities because…
  8. Book sales are important, but on a day-to-day basis, they actually make up a very tiny part of an author’s concern, mainly because the author has absolutely no control over what a publisher does with a book. The things that authors can do to encourage a healthy shelf-life for a book are all indirect– try to give good interviews, try to get those school bookings, try to establish good relationships with book stores, try to do all the things that will build a good, long-term career, and most importantly, keep writing– because writing isn’t one book, its a whole life.

So, if you’re writing, don’t worry too much about the eventual publicity for your eventual masterpiece. And brace yourself for a lot of funny questions about those eventual things you won’t be able to control.

If this topic interests you, you might also want to check out this Managing Expectations post by Caroline Hickey that ran on The Longstockings blog last Friday, as well as Daphne Grab’s A Funny Question from Thursday.

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