![\"100](\"http:\/\/janetgover.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/02\/100-Stories-For-Queensland.jpg\" "\\"100")
<\/a><\/p>\nWhen I first heard about the 100 Stories For Queensland <\/a>anthology to raise money for flood victims, I wanted to send them a story \u2013 but every idea I had suddenly vanished from my head. I have a folder full of story ideas. I dived into that and decided I hated every single one of them.<\/p>\n I had to start again \u2013 with just a few days until the deadline. I almost went into panic mode.<\/p>\n Because the floods were such a terrible thing, I wanted my story to be positive and uplifting… so I started to think about all the things I loved about growing up in a small bush town. And the answer to that was simple. The people. The people made the town work. They made it home.<\/p>\n I’ve written a lot about small towns \u2013 there’s Farwell Creek, the town in Bachelor and Spinster Ball. <\/em>There’s the town where Kier and Alex grew up, in Girl Racers<\/em>. I started to think about those towns \u2013 and why I’d written about them. What is it about bush towns that keeps drawing me back again and again.<\/p>\n The centre of any small bush town is the pub. Now, don’t get me wrong \u2013 the townspeople aren’t drunk all the time. The pub is often the only place where people can gather. They meet their friends, eat a meal and talk about the weather, cattle prices and the weather.<\/p>\n A picture of such a pub formed in my head \u2013 then people appeared. Not the people I grew up with. Not even the people in my books \u00a0\u2013 different people.<\/p>\n Characters who wanted me to tell their story.<\/p>\n I wrote the story in an hour, sitting at the airport waiting for a flight to Canada. I spent a couple of evenings polishing it, making it the best it could be. Then I had to correct the spelling and punctuation (not my strong points). I sent\u00a0 On The Road East <\/em>\u00a0off with a couple of days to spare.<\/p>\n In March you’ll be able to buy the Anthology \u2013 knowing the money is going to help people who desperately need it. The list of 100 stories looks great. The authors and titles suggest it’s going to be incredibly varied \u2013 with something for everyone.<\/p>\n \u00a0I can hardly wait.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Writing is a funny thing \u2013 sometimes I wake and up have 2,000 words written before lunch. Other days, I can’t seem to construct three consecutive sentences. Ideas are the same. Sometimes…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1444"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1444\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnhocking.net\/jg2025demo1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a>