I am PSYCHED to be hosting a night of complaint letters at the Australian Short Story Festival in Adelaide on November 22nd - our first interstate outing, how exciting! As both a pedant and a writer, Andrew Roff has the perfect skillset to deliver a complaint that will knock your socks off. Grab your tickets here: /australian-short-story-festival-2025/tickets#group1
Book mail! Can't wait to dive into The Family String. I first met @denisepictonwriting in 2016 when we were both pitching books via @writerssainc . And now here we are in 2022 with our respective debuts!
Jane Rawson's 'A History of Dreams' is a cracking read -- a thought-provoking, page-turning, historical, alternate-universe, timely story about how we can live, and maybe even be okay with ourselves, when everything around us seems to be falling apart.
I find that many lit-fic novels are super engaging explorations of a theme for the first 100 pages... and then they go on for another 200-300 pages. Not this book! It starts off as great historical fiction... and it just gets better, weirder, more gripping, and more tender.
I can't think of a story with a shape (particularly in the final third) like this. And it's left me with a kind of grounded hope about the future that has stayed with me since I finished it. Highly recommended!
'...hills like scrubby sheep leaning on their blistered sides'...
Ben Walter's sentences reward slow reading. A rich, delicious, chilli-infused chocolate mudcake of a collection. 5 stars, would consume again.
I spent way too long this summer shooting a promo video for my new short story collection. Check it out via the link from my bio, or search 'Wakefield Press' on youtube to find it...
This is NOT the cover for my new book - it's an alternate design by Duncan Blachford at @typographystudio , who also came up with the amazing final cover design. Over on the Wakefield Press blog (linked via my bio), I talk about the cover design process, and share some other alt designs.
