You might have guessed from the paucity of recent updates that we’ve been gallivanting around, and you’re right.

We had a marvellous few days at the Fairy Springs Motor Lodge in Rotorua, right next door to the fabulous Skyline luge and Rainbow Springs Nature Park, which were hugely enjoyed by the little nippers. And then there was the Cosy Corner Holiday Park at Mount Maunganui, complete with decent-sized pool and mere steps away from the beach. (We also spent a little while at a certain holiday park between Ohope and Opotiki, but the less said about that the better.)

Anyway, returning to the matters in hand, it seems that there has been a veritable flurry of localised literary activity during our absence. So, in no particular order:

• John Pule (pictured) - painter, poet, novelist and printmaker - will soon be reading from his recent poetry collection 100 Love Poems at the Corban Estate Arts Centre in Henderson. That's on Tuesday 7 February at 7pm. Admission is free; for more info contact Diane Blomfield on (09) 838 4455 or diane@ceac.org.nz.

• Wellingtonians of a literary bent should check out Landscape with Rowers, a Dutch Literature Workshop at the City Gallery on 3 March 2006 from 10 – 4.30. The line-up includes Marc Kregting, Jan Lauwereyns, Bill Manhire, Gregory O’Brien, Heidi Thomson, Lydia Wevers and Dietlinde Willockx.

• February will see the publication of the Writers International (NZ) anthology, World Words, a ‘diverse and vibrant multicultural collection of international writers in New Zealand.’ Contributors to the 160-page anthology of fiction and poetry include new and established poets and fiction writers: T M Schaefer (Germany), Kevin Cudby, Riemke Ensing, Mark Pirie, Ron Riddell, L E Scott, Jo Patti, Yilma Tafere Tasew (Ethiopia), Basim Furat (Iraq), Rosalie Carey, Puri Alvarez (Spain), Mavis Boyd and others. World Words costs $34.95 and is available from selected bookstores or from Addenda Limited: email ngaire@addenda.co.nz.

• Dunedin illustrator Robyn Belton has won the 2006 Margaret Mahy Medal. The award is given annually by Storylines Children's Literature Foundation of New Zealand for a distinguished contribution to children's literature and literacy. Belton's debut work The Duck in the Gun won the Russell Clark Award and was one of ten children’s books selected for the Hiroshima Peace Museum. Belton’s lecture will be presented at the Storylines' annual Margaret Mahy Day, on Saturday 11 March.

• And finally, entries to the 2006 Clendon Award close on 24 February. Open to unpublished writers, this annual contest for a full-length romance manuscript has an international reputation as one of the genre’s career-launching contests. Final judging is by a senior editor at Harlequin Books in New York, and many past winners have gone on to publication. It is not easy to get published in romance: Harlequin sells 148 million books a year to 50 million romance readers, and receives over 20,000 unsolicited manuscripts each year from aspiring writers. Yet of the publisher’s 1300 authors worldwide, twelve are Kiwis. So you could say that romance is one of our export successes. If you’re interested, email membership@romance writers.co.nz or visit www.romancewriters.co.nz.

And that, I think, is it.