Today is my last post as the guest blogger for Margaret River Press for the month of July. In five weeks I’ve managed to meet one deadline (I think) and even then it was a few hours late (sorry!). It’s not just book stuff either. I’ve always struggled with deadlines. I’m that person who knows […]

What draws you to write short stories, and who has influenced your writing practice of this form? I had never written a short story until I started studying creative writing at university. Writers that influenced me included Tim O’Brien, Janet Frame, Jorge Luis Borges, and Alice Munro. O’Brien’s story, ‘The Things They Carried’ (1990), was […]

The prize is getting into the chair every day. The prize is saying to myself, this isn’t over. Because my story isn’t finished. I regard submission of a story as an achievement. It signifies that I’ve written a story, which puts me a long way in front of the earlier me, the person who dreamed […]

In some writing workshops, there’s an inverse ratio between how closely someone has read a story and how much they’ve got to say about it. I’m a diligent reader. I pay attention to the stories people have submitted; some might say too much attention. My friends judge me as intense. The judgement of others tends […]

What does an editorial board member look for in a submission? There is no easy answer to this question. There are some motherhood statements that spring to mind—like well written, original, an arresting voice, an engaging narrative—and so on. But to unpick...

Water always runs to the deepest point, to where the land is lowest. For me, the same is true of writing. The words fall into the places that lie deep beneath. I think of them as the 2am places. The ones you usually hide with conversation and movement. The voice in your head that you […]

A few years ago I decided (the sort of decision you make when blind ignorance and extreme optimism collide) that when my third and youngest child started school it might be fun to do a PhD. I was interested in Australia’s involvement in the Vietnam War and the differences between that experience and popular culture […]