-
I will be at National Young Writers Festival next week
National Young Writers Festival is held every year in the Pambalong people’s land in Awabakal Nation, in Newcastle, in northern New South Wales. What is National Young Writers Festival? It is part of This is Not Art which is a large emerging arts festival based in Newcastle. It runs for four days over the Labour Day weekend. It includes the National Young Writers Festival, CRACK X which is the performance art festival and Critical Animals which is a creative research symposium for those engaged with creative and experimental arts practices. This is Not Art takes place on the land of the Pambalong people of the Awabakal nation. The best thing about…
-
Mentoring Cher Tan via Writers Victoria She writes better than I do so it is a tad bit strange for me
I am now a mentor with Writers Victoria. It is pretty cool. Let me explain. I am trying to become a mentor on the IPEd/CSE mentoring program which caters to just editors but at the moment, I am also now a mentor for Writers Victoria. Writers Victoria is a writing centre for the state of Victoria in Australia. They hold events, run workshops and so on but one of the services they offer is mentoring. The Writers Victoria mentoring scheme operates like this: you apply for mentoring and Writers Victoria assess your application. You also nominate someone you want to mentor you from the list of mentors on their website.…
-
MEAA Update for August 2018
Introduction The MEAA (Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance) is the union for journalists and writers and I thought I should start doing this monthly so that whether you are a member or not, you were aware of what the union is trying to do to help journalism and journalists. It also helps you be more informed especially if you have ideas for how the union can do more. So I will tell you what I can tell you – sometimes there are awesome things I am dying to tell you about that I cannot because they are still in planning stage behind the scenes, so please do keep that in…
-
So You Want To Be A Book Reviewer Panel at Continuum 2018 A lot of you at Continuum missed out on an awesome discussion.
I promised a run down of Continuum and I realised I would have to do it bit by bit so here is the first panel on being a book reviewer. So You Want To Be A Book Reviewer I was joined by Elizabeth Fitzgerald and Stephanie O’Connell (better known as Figgy). Figgy writes for a rock and roll magazine and so her reviewing tends to be mostly within that genre of books though they are expanding a bit to take in other genres. Elizabeth is an editor who has her own book review blog where she reviews science fiction and fantasy work. Me, I was the journalist book reviewer. I…
-
Upcoming events in June 2018 AKA where you can find me this month
I am going to be rather tired this month. But that’s a good thing because you get to see me at several events during June. Check out the events page. Continuum Panels The very first one kicks off in two days time: So You Want To Be A Book Reviewer? This is an awesome panel at the Continuum Speculative Fiction Convention at the Jasper Hotel in Melbourne running from Friday 8 June to Monday 11 June. I am on it with Figgy and Elizabeth Fitzgerald and it starts at 5 pm on Friday. We will discuss how book reviewing changes depending on how you do it, what you need to…
-
I hit 10,000 words! Days 5, 6 & 7 of the Inaugural 2018 KSP - Varuna Foundation Fellowship
I suppose I gave it away in the title but oh my God! 10,000 words! Here’s what happened on each day. Day 5 was the Friday. Nothing got done on Friday. I was really exhausted. My sleeping patterns were out of whack and I was trying to fix my ear issue. I thought I could go out to meet my union colleagues and friends for drinks and come back and write. The drinks part happened and was fun but the writing part did not happen. So I had zero words for Friday. I had about four to five thousand words at this point to write in order to hit 10,000…
-
Day 4: Freedom to write, freedom for writers Day 4 of the Inaugural 2018 KSP - Varuna Foundation Fellowship
Day 4 already. Well, nothing was going to happen on Day 1 given how tired and jetlagged I was. Today, most of the day was pretty boring. I had not slept well the night before. So the day was full of waking, sleeping, doing things I needed to do like eat and so on. I thought about the book a lot. And then I did my makeup, changed, called an Uber and went to see my friend Vicki Laurie interview Peter Greste at the WA State Library. So three things happened today on Day 4: Peter Greste pleasantly surprised me. I was very happy about that. Thank you Peter Greste.…
-
Day 3: So many emotions Day 3 of the Inaugural 2018 KSP - Varuna Foundation Fellowship
Day 3 and I am just grateful. I didn’t get to sleep until five am because I was just so thrilled that I had met my goal. You get a high after you write and type everything in. But I did sleep in bursts till about noon. I would wake up, do some work related things, sleep a bit, write a bit and so on. I woke up at noon and went over to the main house and the office to meet Shannon who is the director here at KSP Writers Centre. I gave her some things from Sri Lanka and she offered to do a pharmacy run for me.…
-
Day 2: A cat is here! Day 2 of the KSP - Varuna Foundation Fellowship
Day 2 and I woke up joyful today. Joyful because it was such a wonderful thought that I could write and everyone was going to be mindful of that. That no one would disturb me, no one would interrupt me, no one would think to themselves “She is free – let’s get a hold of her.” Also annoyance because my article was overdue and I needed to get it done so I knuckled down to do that while battling my ear going strange again. I made a mental note to see my doctor as soon as I get back to Melbourne. I figured out the A/C and I had a…
-
Day 1: Home on my back, home where there is a bed Day 1 of the 2018 KSP-Varuna Foundation Fellowship
Oh good heavens, day 1 and am I tired. It was a whirlwind weekend with a wedding and various wedding related celebrations and the attempt to pack a bag that does not want to take on pairs of shoes, two saris and related accoutrements and another trenchcoat. “Do you think this fellowship will be useful?” my mother asks, as I decide where the notebooks will go: main bag, carry on bag or laptop bag? I look at her. I know what she means – Sedition took twelve years to write because I also had to live and it ended up on the back burner a lot and even after finishing it,…
