Friday Finds

- Flavorwire has the 10 Best Debut Novels of 2012! I've only read The Yellow Birds which, to be honest, I wasn't overly impressed with. That said, I do really want to read Tell the Wolves I'm Going Home (I mean, the title alone) and Threats too, which I've heard good things about. It's a pretty good list though, albeit a hipster one.

- Chuck Wendig has compiled a list of 25 Gifts for Writers, told with his usual flair for cussing and hilarity.

- If fonts were cats! Helvetica is the most precious.

- Six Things You Didn't Know About Ada Lovelace.

- And equally great, 30 Lessons We Learned from Amy Poehler in 2012. I mean, this is basically just a lovefest for Amy Poehler, but I am horrifyingly on board for that.

Your Mid-Week Art Break: Hannah Christenson

I'm loving Hannah Christenson's work at the moment. Dense and fantastical, they're all worlds I want to live in or write about. Lot's of awesome ladies doing awesom things too, which is always an addition plus in my book.

Lula FW 2012

I am heartrendingly in love with this photoshoot of Lula's Fall/Winter 2012 collection. Annemarieke van Drimmelen has upped the whimsy and added total life and charm to the clothes and collection. Lovely, lovely stuff. (via theclotheshorse)

Friday Finds

One of my favourite posts this week comes from Michelle Law, a local writer, who lives with alopecia areata. She talks about coping and visibility, about body image, hair and the effect it can have on many levels, particularly on a woman's self-esteem and perception of herself by herself and society. It's really interesting and not a topic I see covered all that much. You can check it out here.

- Pages and Polish may be my new favourite tumblr. Nail art! To match book covers! They get pretty creative too which adds to the awesome.

- Top ten rules for writing a space opera!  This is so, so great.

- If you're looking for some character-inspiration too, check out Lauren Bamford's photography. She has some gorgeous portraiture photos of a really interesting selection of people.

- These totally wonderful photos of grown-up treehouses.

- To take you out for the weekend (no pun intended), the first female-specific body armor has shipped out to Afghanistan. Huzzah for lady safety!

Your Mid-Week Art Break: Marguerite Sauvage

Check out the gorgeous illustrations of Paris-born, Sydney-based illustrator Marguerite Sauvage. Lovely stuff. Also kinda NSFW, if you didn't get that from the pic above.

Sunday Short: Mnemosyne by Lucy Faerber

Seizure has recently launched an online flash-fiction series for pieces of creative writing between 50 and 500 words. The callibre so far has been a mixed bag of kind-of-good to pretty-great. It certainly poses a challenge because to coax any sort of emotional reaction out of a reader in such brevity is hard as hell.

My favourite so far is an ultra-short piece by Lucy Faerber, Mnemosyne. At just over 200 words, I feel like any real synopsis would give it away, but it is a wonderfully emotive piece and reads even better the second time around. 

Nancy remembered how to make scones without using butter. On a Tuesday, she visited a blood bank to check if she was afraid of needles (no), stood at the edge of a fire escape to check if she was afraid of heights (no) and then wandered a reptile house. When a pretty girl in a department store smiled at her, she smiled back. In the change-room she wrote in her notebook:

Sexuality? Or just polite?

 You can read Mnemosyne over at the Seizure website.