northerly july-august

northerly The Northern Rivers Writers’ Centre Magazine

FESTIVAL EDITION July-August 2015

EMMA ASHMERE ON LITERARY GARDENS · RUSSELL ELDRIDGE’S ROAD TO PUBLICATION · SHENG KEYI EMILIE ZOEY BAKER · SELF-PUBLISHING · NIMBIN PERFORMANCE POETRY · REVIEWS & PREVIEWS

CONTENTS

>> THIS ISSUE

JULAUG2015 002 Director & editor’s note 003 News A new adaptation initiative, SCU anthology launched, BBWF opportunities

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006 Choke point An extract from Sheng Keyi’s short story, ‘Fishbone’

008 Poem

Emilie Zoey Baker: ‘Spooning’

009 Competition

Win the ultimate literary giveaway with Feros Care

010 A book’s birth

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Russell Eldridge on his debut novel’s path to publication

012 In bloom

Emma Ashmere on her favourite gardens in Australian fiction

014 Writers’ Group

Coffs Harbour Writers’ Group

015 Rising

Q&A: Emerging writer Stevi-Lee Alver

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016 Land art & working girls The line-up of ADFAS talks for July and August

017 Residential Mentorship Reflections on a special week from Jarrah Dundler

018 Nimbin Performance Poetry World Cup Interview with organiser Gail Clarke about Australia’s most vibrant spoken word weekend

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019 Book Review

Lisa Walker on Sarah Armstrong’s His Other House

020 Learning Curve A guide to self-publishing with Christina Larmer

021 Workshops 023 Competitions

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024 Writers’ Groups & Member Discounts

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>>HELLO

DIRECTOR’S NOTE

Photo: Angela Kay

It’s Festival time! In early August, more than 140 writers and thinkers will converge on Byron Bay for Australia’s largest regional literary event; an ocean of minds unfolding stories against a backdrop of migrating whales. Together, they will deliver a stimulating program comprising over 160 sessions exploring the many layers that comprise new and retold stories. This issue of northerly features some of those writers; just a taste of the guest politicians, novelists, historians, journalists, biographers, poets, memoirists, comedians and songwriters who will challenge, entertain and share their inspirations and insights.

In an Australian exclusive, BBWF is proud to present Nigerian writer Chigozie Obioma whose startling debut novel The Fishermen has received plaudits from across the literary world. Mexican-based Jennifer Clement, whose compelling novel Prayers for the Stolen was shortlisted for this year’s PEN Faulkner Award for Fiction, will also debut.

The Festival will offer you a chance to catch up with some of your favourite writers and discover new voices in our new one-on-one sessions 30 Minutes With... including Stella Prize winner Emily Bitto, Man Asian Literary Prize winner Miguel Syjuco, New York Times bestseller Liane Moriarty, celebrated artist Joshua Yeldham, master of psychological thrillers Michael Robotham and Noah Rosenberg of Narratively, a platform for untold stories.

Make sure you see long-standing NRWC board member Russell Eldridge, whose novel will be launched at the Festival. Set against a fascinating period of South African politics, Harry Mac is a coming-of-age story full of heart, soul and hope in the tradition of Jasper Jones and To Kill a Mockingbird. Not to be missed!

We invite you to join us at the Festival to examine the world as it is and imagine how it might be.

northerly

northerly is the bi-monthly magazine of the Northern Rivers Writers’ Centre. The Writers’ Centre is a resource and information base for writers and readers in the Northern Rivers region. We offer a year-round program of readings, workshops and writer visits as well as the annual production of the Byron Bay Writers Festival. The Centre is a non-profit, incorporated organisation receiving its core funding from Arts NSW. LOCATION/CONTACT Level 1 28 Jonson Street, Byron Bay P: 02 6685 5115 F: 02 6685 5166 E: info@nrwc.org.au W: www.nrwc.org.au POSTAL ADDRESS PO Box 1846 Byron Bay NSW 2481 EDITOR: Barnaby Smith, northerly@nrwc.org.au CONTRIBUTORS: Emma Ashmere, Terry Denton, Jarrah Dundler, Russell Eldridge, Angela Kay, Sheng Keyi, Christina Larmer, Natasha Mulhall, Julia Pannell, Lorraine Penn, Lisa Walker, Emilie Zoey Baker NRWC COMMITTEE CHAIRPERSON Chris Hanley VICE CHAIRPERSON Lynda Dean SECRETARY Russell Eldridge TREASURER Cheryl Bourne MEMBERS Jesse Blackadder, Kate Cameron, Marele Day, Lynda Hawryluk, Anneli Knight, Emerald Moon, Jennifer St George, Adam van Kempen, Teresa Walters.

LIFE MEMBERS Jean Bedford, Jeni Caffin, Gayle Cue, Robert Drewe, Jill Eddington, Chris Hanley, John Hertzberg, Fay Knight, Irene O’Brien, Jennifer Regan, Cherrie Sheldrick, Brenda Shero, Heather Wearne.

MAIL OUT DATES Magazines are sent in JANUARY, MARCH, MAY, JULY, SEPTEMBER and NOVEMBER MAGAZINE DESIGN Kaboo Media PRINTER Quality Plus Printers Ballina

Edwina Johnson Director, NRWC

ADVERTISING We welcome advertising by members and relevant organisations. A range of ad sizes are available. The ad booking deadline for each issue is the first week of the month prior. Email northerly@nrwc.org.au.

FROM THE EDITOR A memorable saying from peripheral Bloomsbury Group writer Vita SackvilleWest was that, such was the precarious nature of life in her beloved garden, it “rivalled infant mortality in the Middle Ages”. Gardens have long been beautifully and tragically depicted in literature (some might say, of course, since the very dawn of man), so it was wonderful when local novelist Emma Ashmere agreed to pen this issue’s feature on her favourite gardens in Australian fiction, celebrating well-known and contemporary novels as well as the obscure and out-of-print.

Ashmere is one of a selection of writers featured in the following pages that will find themselves behind

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a microphone at Byron Bay Writers Festival 2015. Russell Eldridge offers a fascinating account of the highs and lows – mostly highs – of his path to publishing Harry Mac. Other Festival writers inside are Emilie Zoey Baker, Sheng Keyi, Sarah Armstrong and Lisa Walker, not to mention a typically impish illustration by Terry Denton that adorns our cover.

May the first weekend in August bring all NRWC members an illuminating Festival for 2015. And may the weather hold.

DISCLAIMER The Northern Rivers Writers’ Centre presents northerly in good faith and accepts no responsibility for any misinformation or problems arising from any misinformation.

The views expressed by contributors and advertisers are not necessarily the views of the management committee or staff. We reserve the right to edit articles with regard to length. Copyright of the contributed articles is maintained by the named author and northerly.

CONNECT WITH US Visit www.nrwc.org.au. Sign up for a membership. Stay updated and join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. www.facebook.com/pages/ Northern-Rivers-Writers-Centre twitter.com/bbwritersfest Cover illustration: Terry Denton

Barnaby Smith Editor, northerly magazine

The Northern Rivers Writers’ Centre, Byron Bay Writers Festival and northerly magazine acknowledge and pay respect to the traditional custodians of this land.

>> NEWS

FROM PAGE TO SCREEN A new professional development program will offer a unique opportunity for authors and screenwriters to learn the creative and practical process of adaptation, writes Lisa O’Meara of Northern Rivers Screenworks.

A recent collaboration between Screenworks and the Northern Rivers Writers’ Centre is destined to bring more adaptions of Australian books to the screen. Books-2-Screen, a joint initiative between the two not-for-profit organisations, will match authors and screenwriters with mentors and industry professionals with the aim of developing book-to-screen projects, and pitching them to producers and broadcasters.

Authors and screenwriters can participate in the initiative through a series of proposed events, including a workshop on adapting works across multiple platforms in the lead-up to this year’s Byron Bay Writers Festival, panel discussions at the festival itself and a special Screenworks workshop to be held later in the year, that will guide participants through the process of adaptation and optioning for screen production.

Authors interested in this special project will then be encouraged to form teams or partnerships to apply to be supported by an industry mentor, who will help them to develop a book-to-screen adaptation, and pitch it to producers and broadcasters at a pitching event organised for 2016.

While book adaptations make up more than fifty percent of films made in the United States, only twenty percent of Australian films are adapted from books.

“The adaptation model is often successful for both the film and the book,” explains Screenworks general manager Ken Crouch, “which is why we are keen to support more adaptations and drive this local initiative.”

It has been repeatedly demonstrated that a film or TV adaptation attracts fans of the book it was based on as well as a new audience. There are many Australian

adaptations that have proven successful on both the big and small screens, including local screenwriter and creative producer Deb Cox’s TV adaptation of Kerry Greenwood’s Phryne Fisher series, Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries, and Jan Sardi’s adaptation of Kate Grenville’s The Secret River. Box office hits include Daniel Taplitz’s adaptation of Louis de Bernières’s Red Dog and Baz Luhrmann’s adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, to name a few.

There is an increased interest in supporting more Australian adaptations with events such as Books at Miff, part of Melbourne International Film Festival; Pages to Screen, an event hosted

by Screen NSW and the Australian Publishers Association at this year’s Vivid Festival in Sydney; and Screen Talk: Adaptations at this year’s Sydney Film Festival. In the Northern Rivers region, there was strong attendance at

Essie Davis as Miss Fisher in Every Cloud Productions’ TV adaptation Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries, based on Kerry Greenwood’s books.

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>> NEWS Screenworks’ Screen Adaptations panel at the 2015 Byron Bay Film Festival.

Screenworks and the Northern Rivers Writers’ Centre have thoroughly researched the workshops and programs that various organisations have been implementing, arriving at a program designed to give authors the strongest possible opportunity.

More details on Books-2-Screen will be available at www.nrwc.org.au and www.screenworks.com.au

SCU anthology sets sail

The fifth volume of Southern Cross University’s Coastlines anthology is now available. The collection was produced by students studying the Introduction to Editing and Publishing course in 2014 and is dedicated to the founding editor of Coastlines, Dr Janie Conway-Herron.

The theme of Coastlines 5 is that of home and homelessness, and features 28 writers including Jessie Cole, Jim Hearn, Martin Chatterton, Virginia Barratt and Stevi-Lee Alver (see page 15).

The contributors range from first-year students to PhD candidates, while the anthology’s artwork is also designed by SCU students.

Coastlines was first published in 1999 and thereafter in 2001, 2003 and 2006.

Coastlines 5 is available from the SCU Co-op Bookshop, at a price of $22.

BBWF opportunities

There are a number of events and opportunities organised by the Byron Bay Writers Festival in the lead-up to this year’s event (August 7-9) for authors to take advantage of. They include: • The 2015 BBWF Meet The Agent Opportunity. These thirty-minute sessions will take place on Thursday August 6th in the Arakwal Room at Byron Bay Library. Vastly experienced literary agent Margaret Gee will be on hand to consult with writers, while application fees, manuscript samples and query letters must be received by 2pm on Wednesday July 22nd.

• Pitch Perfect 2015. If you have a manuscript that is ready to go and a publishing idea that you think

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might appeal to publishers, the BBWF Pitch Perfect competition could be for you. The top three pitch submissions will be invited to deliver a five-minute pitch live to a panel of publishers on festival Saturday (August 8th). A short pitching workshop will be organised for successful applicants ahead of the festival. The deadline for submissions is 2pm on Wednesday July 8th.

• Susie Warrick Young Writers Short Story Competition. This award is for young local writers aged between 14 and 25. Stories of up to 1,000 words are invited, with the

first prize being $1,250 towards skill and career development, a threeday pass to BBWF, inclusion in the BBWF program and publication in northerly. The competition closes on Tuesday July 7th.

More information and application forms for all opportunities can be found at www.byronbaywritersfestival.com

Volunteer thanks

The Northern Rivers Writers’ Centre would like to extend its heartfelt thanks to several key volunteers who work behind the scenes.

>> NEWS Firstly, Polly Jude, a regular at workshops and BBWF, is taking a break from volunteering as she is pregnant.

Polly always jumped at any opportunity to assist and her good humour and common sense will be missed.

Susie Reynolds offered a vast amount of her time to clean, reorganise and revitalise the NRWC library. Susie inspected every single book and made room for the all the new books we have received. Next time you visit the Centre make sure you notice the immaculately ordered library.

Melva volunteers one day a week at the Centre and has quietly established herself as an essential part of operations.

The Centre is grateful to have Melva in the office with her calm and positive attitude.

Finally, a big thanks to the northerly mail-out team: Ralph, Shirley, Nan and Victor, who laugh and eat quiche as they package up the magazine into envelopes.

The Centre is immensely grateful for their willingness to drop everything and appear at short notice.

Gender bias in literary awards

An analysis of the winners of six major literary awards over the last fifteen years has found that a novel is more likely to receive a prize if the narrative is malefocused.

The study was undertaken by awardwinning British-American author Nicola Griffith, who looked at the Pulitzer and Man Booker prizes, among others. She collated the gender of the winners as well as that of their protagonists, and for the Pulitzer Prize, she found that “women wrote zero out of fifteen prize-winning books wholly from the point of view of a woman or girl”.

Meanwhile, between 2000 and 2014, the Man Booker was won nine times by books by men about men or boys, three times with books by women about men or boys, two books by women about women or girls, and one book by a woman writer about both. The US National Book Award was found to have a similar disparity.

Griffith wrote in summary, “It’s hard to escape the conclusion that, when it comes to literary prizes, the more prestigious, influential and financially

remunerative the award, the less likely the winner is to write about grown women. Either this means that women writers are self-censoring, or those who judge literary worthiness find women frightening, distasteful, or boring. Certainly the results argue for women’s perspectives being considered uninteresting or unworthy. Women seem to have literary cooties.”

Griffiths’ full article and analysis, with pie charts, can be found at http://nicolagriffith.com/2015/05/26/ books-about-women-tend-not-to-winawards/

New organisation for literary women

Staying with the gender theme, a new organisation has been established to support women working in the literary industry in Australia. Women in Literary Arts Australia (WILAA) was set up by writer and producer Lefa Singleton Norton, and also includes Melbourne Writers Festival CEO Lisa Dempster and Emerging Writers’ Festival general manager Kate Callingham.

According to Singleton Norton in a statement, a 2014 roundtable of women working in writing and publishing found there was “a lack of centralised information and formal networks of support for women writers. WILAA is an attempt to remedy this. From networking opportunities, mentorships, events, workshops and marketing campaigns, we will endeavour to find practical ways to support women to excel.”

WILAA will conduct a national survey in order to “ascertain what is needed to better support women” and will also research the representation of women on “our literary stages”.

For more information, visit www.wilaa.org

St Albans launches new festival

A new addition to the Australian literary festival calendar is St Albans Writers’ Festival, set in the Hawkesbury region of NSW, two hours northwest of Sydney. Taking place September 18-20, the inaugural event will feature names such as Kate Grenville, Jane Caro, PM Newton, Michael Robotham, Patrick Cook, Hugh Mackay, Courtney Collins, Nikki Gemmell and Traci Harding.

Events will be held in three historic venues: the St Albans School of Arts, the sandstone church of St Alban the Martyr and the garden of the Settlers Arms Inn. Tickets for the event are now available and can be purchased at www. stalbanswritersfestival.com.au.

OBITUARIES JS HARRY Australian poet; January 4, 1939 – May 20, 2015 TANITH LEE English science fiction, fantasy and horror author; September 19, 1947 – May 24, 2015 HILARY MASTERS American novelist and short story writer; February 3, 1928 – June 16, 2015 VEIJO MERI Finnish novelist, poet and dramatist; December 31, 1928 – June 21, 2015 RUTH RENDELL English crime novelist; February 17, 1930 – May 2, 2015 JAMES SALTER American novelist and short story writer; June 10, 1925 – June 19, 2015 ARYEH SIVAN Israeli poet; August 4, 1929 – June 19, 2015 LUDVÍK VACULÍK Czech writer and journalist; July 23, 1926 – June 6, 2015 FRANZ WRIGHT American poet; March 18, 1953 – May 14, 2015

QUOTATION CORNER “The people who feel no horror or sorrow or revulsion are the very people who have the most right to, the people living those lives. That is the central error of the literary imagination: the idea that other people are like us and must therefore feel like us. Fortunately for humanity, each man is only himself and only the genius is given the ability to be others as well.”

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>> READ

EXTRACT: FISHBONE

BY SHENG KEYI An author of China’s ‘post-Seventies’ generation, Sheng Keyi has emerged as a fascinating new Asian voice partly on the back of her critically acclaimed novel Death Fugue, her second novel to be translated into English following Northern Girls.

Here is the opening to her short story ‘Fishbone’, translated by Death Fugue translator Shelly Bryant. A version of this story originally appeared in Pathlight, a quarterly journal of Chinese literature in translation.

A dozen people surrounded a table piled with dozens of dishes. I raised my wine glass, making the rounds to toast each guest in turn. I felt like the lazy Susan rotating at the table’s centre. To tell the truth, throughout the whole routine of toasting, my mind was on the platter of steamed fish. At first, it was still piping hot, shallots covering its white flesh. By the time I’d offered my respects to the third person, the other diners had already brutally swept the shallots aside. Or perhaps someone had taken a special interest in the shallots and, like an animal stuffing itself with grass, gobbled them up. Everyone’s chopsticks flashed chaotically, crossing like swords, frantically picking up bits of meat and stuffing them into their mouths and washing it all down with alcohol. In their bellies, the meat soaked in the wine, while the precious Mandarin fish lay riddled with gaping wounds. I was, painfully, left only with scraps. My eyes, bloodshot with the excess of alcohol, could only turn to the fish when I gulped down each cup. To be precise, they were glued to the curve of its fin, for that was my favorite part of a fish.

When I finally finished my dutiful toasting, I slumped heavily back into my chair. The others all seemed to be discussing the mayor’s affair with a woman at the local television station. They laughed knowingly. In the midst of their mirth, I reached out resolutely with my chopsticks, going straight for the plate of fish. I quickly transferred the back of the fish, abandoned by the rest but long coveted by me, to my own territory. As a show of courtesy, I turned it over in my bowl a few times, then brought it to my longing lips and popped it into my mouth at last. It was no longer hot, and the roomtemperature of the fish allowed me to quickly satisfy my hunger.

My teeth and tongue worked with meticulous care, anxious to send the meat along its journey down my throat. I devoted all of my energy to the eradication of meat from this ridge of bone.

While my tongue and teeth were fully engaged, cooperating to remove a small bone from the meat, I heard my boss mention “Zhang Lixin.” Zhang Lixin. That’s me. I immediately stopped chewing. A smile filled my face as I looked at my boss. At the same moment, I felt a small bone slide down my throat, slipping away as lightly as a feather floating on the wind.

If I had immediately given a harsh cough, perhaps the fishbone would have been dislodged. But of course I could not

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cough. In the first place, I was too likely to spew the residue of fish meat from my mouth right onto my boss, practically spitting in his face. The embarrassing repercussions of such a circumstance would be humiliating and potentially disastrous.

Furthermore, I really did not think the fishbone had slid too far down my throat, since I had not swallowed. And finally, I had experience with fishbones trapped in the throat, and knew that if I just swallowed a spoonful of rice all would be fine, as if nothing had happened.

I smiled at my boss, preparing to offer a flattering word, when I suddenly felt a prick, causing extreme pain in an area about the size of the point of a needle. I could not tell whether the feeling that followed was an impulse to cough or to vomit.

I covered my mouth. The sight of a forty-year-old man with tightly pursed lips must have been quite comical. I covered the lower half of my thin face with one hand, and with the other waved an apology to the guests seated around the table as I walked quickly and calmly to the washroom.

No doubt, they thought I was drunk.

I closed the door to the men’s room, stuck out my tongue, and coughed. I gasped and gagged so hard that tears began to fill my eyes. Flushed, I faced the toilet. My stomach turned, and its warm contents rushed into my throat, gurgling into the toilet bowl. I pushed the button to flush. The toilet considerately swept away the first fruits of my retching. It was the fish I’d just eaten, along with several cups of rice wine, a couple of mouthfuls of rice, a few peanuts, and a chicken’s foot. When I’d finished vomiting, I put my fingertips into my throat, trying to locate the fishbone. I intended to squeeze it between my fingers and extract it. Bad idea. A new torrent of vomit began. My hands gripped the edges of the toilet bowl. My face must have looked like an elderly man’s withered backside. In the second round, I lost the lunch I’d had at Great White, one of the city’s most upscale restaurants. Delicacies such as shark’s fin soup and bird’s nest rushed out. As the flavor of the bird’s nest erupted from me, I regretted the loss. I had hoped to greet my wife and child with kisses that tasted of shark’s fin and bird’s nest, but I’d lost it before I’d even had a chance to go home. Now, if I announced to my wife that I’d had lunch at Great White, there was no way she’d believe me, and all my evidence was there in the toilet

>> READ

bowl. Dejected, I turned and sat on the commode. I swallowed desperately, but could get no relief from the spur stuck there. It responded warmly, reminding me of its presence with a sharp prick. I thought back to the unlit corridor in the office where, after hours, I’d embraced the office typist Zhao Yanling. Even the saliva sample I’d taken from her was in the toilet bowl now.

But my extensive efforts in the washroom only seemed to have lodged the fishbone all the more firmly in place. # When I got home, my son Dian Dian was already asleep, and my wife was watching soap operas alone. The words ‘Episode 33’ appeared on the screen. My wife, once something of a beauty, had formerly worked as a salesperson in a department store owned by a textile company. After some corporate scandal, however, the store went bankrupt. As a result, my wife was now a stay-at-home mom. She was five years younger than me, and very energetic — particularly so since her dismissal. In the past, I would take the initiative to stir her up several nights a week.

Now, she was the one who mercilessly tormented me every single night.

“You’re still up?” I asked casually. I knew any nonsense would invite even more nonsense from my wife.

“You still remember you have a home, do you? Just look at how miserable you are. Can’t you just come home early after work?” Sure enough, she was in a scolding mood. Reproof was how my wife chose to express her concern, love, and resentment. but I was often in some confusion as to which it was she wished to express. I was becoming more perplexed all the time, not knowing in such circumstances whether I should be pleased, happy, or angry with the reproof. In this particular case, for instance, my wife’s voice was a jumble of emotions, all mixed together.

My face must have reflected my bewilderment. My wife stood up and looked at me in surprise. She was a head shorter than me, a thirty-five-year-old matriarch. Her face was beginning to show signs of age spots, making her look dull even under the incandescent lightbulb’s glow.

“Yes. I was tortured all day at work, and then came straight home to be tormented by you too. My whole life is one huge frustration!” I wanted to voice all of these complaints to my wife, but the pain in my throat was excruciating. I swallowed carefully. The fishbone was still stuck. Zhao Yanling’s face, with all the purity of her twenty-two years, flashed before me.

Frowning, I swept my gaze leisurely over my wife. After being laid off, she had become more sensitive. Not only was her sex drive operating in high gear, but she was also very alert to the slightest sign of disparagement from me. The expression I wore as I looked her over was the sort that was sure to provoke a fresh attack. I quickly changed it to a smile, reached up and pointed to my throat and said, “I swallowed a fishbone.”

‘Fishbone’ can be read in its entirety in Pathlight magazine, available at http://paper-republic.org/pubs/pathlight/. Sheng Keyi will appear at Byron Bay Writers Festival 2015 on the panel New Asia: The Best Young Writers in Asia Today

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>>POEM

Spooning Emilie Zoey Baker

Love spends the night polishing its silver arm around your waist front to your back or back to your front padded fetal a flesh curl born with a silver moon in our mouths the top drawer opens cutlery clangs I can feel your every breath and every dog dream you are the ideal to my ism the wish ran away with the spoon you mash my sentences like potato I spoonfeed you flannelette and night noises close like a wet wax fingerprint I yeed new pew are yerfect we are parentheses failing to maintain their distance a smiling emoticon with no eyes commas breaking all the rules to lie in the bad grammar of their love

bending together Uri Geller-style I am a children’s book, I am a lullaby, I am not here to buck your frains out we are closer than water, indivisible I wanna bend the night polishing you silver

Emilie Zoey Baker is an award-winning poet, international slam champion and spoken word performer who has toured the world. She teaches poetry in schools and has been published widely. She will appear at Byron Bay Writers Festival 2015 on the panel Leaping Off The Page: Spoken Word Art.

Photo: Julia Pannell

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>> ADVERTORIAL

Win the ultimate literary giveaway from Feros Care by sharing your thoughts on ageing

Get involved in the conversation around ageing, and go in the draw to win the ultimate literary weekend at Byron Bay Writers Festival (August 7-9).

T

he ultimate literary weekend at Byron Bay Writers Festival is an initiative of Feros Care and aims to ignite discussion about the hopes, dreams, and concerns of getting older.

Whether you’re a bookworm, a writer, a festival-goer, old or young, be part of the conversation on ageing and help challenge the perceptions and stereotypes of what ‘old age’ looks like.

By shining a spotlight on ageing, Feros Care hopes people will feel inspired to put their thoughts into words and contribute to the great ageing debate.

To enter the competition, visit http://feroscare.com.au/as-I-age, and share your thoughts hopes, dreams and/ or concerns about ageing in twenty-five words or less.

The winner will enjoy three days with some of the world’s best literary minds at one of Australia’s most popular destinations – Byron Bay. The prize includes two nights accommodation in a one-bedroom suite (for two people), two three-day passes to the Byron Bay

Writers Festival and a festival book pack.

This prized is valued at $1130 and is the perfect getaway.

This literary giveaway coincides with Feros Care’s over-sized chalkboard (pictured) that will be appearing at the Byron Bay Writer’s Festival, asking people to finish the sentence “As I age….”

This chalkboard is a public art installation and is designed to be thought provoking, and to get the conversation started on how we all interpret getting older.

The competition closes on July 19 and the winner will be announced on July 20.

Competition entries will appear on the virtual ‘as I Age’ wall on the Feros Care website and Facebook page.

About Feros Care Feros Care is a multi-award-winning not-for-profit organisation, that’s been providing quality care and support services for seniors for 25 years. As an industry leader in aged care services,

Feros Care’s focus is on helping seniors to remain independent, healthy and socially connected.

Our mission is to support seniors in living fulfilling lives for as long as possible, by providing reliable, flexible, and innovative solutions to meet their individual needs. Our services include home care packages, medical and social transport programs, respite care, teleheathcare alarms and monitors, and a variety of allied health solutions to keep people healthy and active.

We are an inclusive organisation that welcomes everyone, regardless of their ethnicity and culture, gender, identity, sexual orientation or disability.

Feros Care is recognised for its excellence in aged care services, and its positive approach to ageing. We, in fact, celebrate ageing and actively fight ageism by recognising the achievements and contributions our seniors have made, and continue to make to society.

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>> FEATURE

Harry’s game: Russell Eldridge’s path to publication

Ahead of his debut novel’s launch at this year’s Byron Bay Writers Festival, local author and NRWC committee member Russell Eldridge tells the story of the occasionally frustrating but ultimately triumphant journey to publication for Harry Mac. our entertainment was an audiobook, Colleen McCullough’s The Independence of Miss Mary Bennet. It is the imagined life of the least interesting of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice sisters, but it bogs down hopelessly in forensic details of the Derbyshire cave systems and Georgian religious sects. Where’s the bloody story?

So, a chunk of 2012 passed in discovering facts on Wikipedia that no one else could possibly have known.

Diversions aside, my premise was what happens to a neighbourhood as the terrible shadow of apartheid spreads across the land. I started to imagine who might live in the lane where the action takes place, and jotted down character notes and descriptive passages as they came to me, replete with that seductive trivia. (Bet you didn’t know that the fugitive Nelson Mandela had a safe house in my grandparents’ street?)

It was late October before I sat down to start the first draft.

By then, every publisher had failed to recognise the merits of my crime novel, each rejection as painful as the last, and the wondrous thing was relegated to the bottom drawer, on top of the long-ago first manuscript that dare not speak its name.

F

orget writer’s block. Waiting on a publisher’s decision is worse. Far, far worse. But for me, that awful time in limbo led to a different, unexpected outcome.

I’m told the timeframe for my debut novel, Harry Mac, from conception to birth is not long by industry standards. But I’ll still have to break it up into years.

2012: The year of hope and rejection A publisher had agreed to read the completed manuscript of a crime novel that I knew to be a wondrous thing. The months passed in silence. I then submitted it to every publisher in Australia. Ice ages came and went, species became extinct, and I walked the beach like a lovelorn fool, muttering “They love it; they love it not.”

How to fill in the time? Well, duh, write, you idiot. And in that moment I knew what it would be: it was that story, about those times, which for some reason I had always been reluctant to tackle.

Ah, what a dangerous seducer research is. You get an idea, a location and a period. Mine was apartheid, South Africa, 1961. I lived there then. But it was a long time ago, so I started reading, struck a seam of rich historical snippets, and of course they had to go in the book. All of them. You can find these indulgences in every bookshop. Just recently I drove to Melbourne and among

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God, I love first drafts. Anything goes, like a hen’s party disgorging from a nightclub on wobbly stilettos. I wrote every day that I could for as long as possible, gulping meals so I could get back to the story and see what my characters had got up to while I was away. That’s no exaggeration. All writers know it; the story outgrows you, the characters become wilful and take perilous new paths, despite your best warnings. “Oh, shit, how’s she going to get out of this one?”

Each new day of writing would start with a read over the previous effort. Until the manuscript grew too long, I would go back to the beginning each time just to pick up the flow again.

My problem is I’m an inveterate fiddler (blame journalism and short articles) and I’d have to force myself to let go and start fresh work.

And then those ecstatic moments when you enter the zone: you’re unaware of the writing, the world grows still around you, time slows. Federer glides a backhand; Bergman catches Bogie’s eye in Rick’s Cafe; you forget to feed the dogs.

This is the buzz of writing. People who say they can’t find time to write? Writing makes its own time. Sounds wanky, but it’s true.

So I wrote through the summer of 2012/13. The kids got over a present-free Christmas and the dogs farted in furious protest at my feet. By early February I was a monosyllabic arthritic hunchback, but I had 76,000 words and a story.

2013: Dancing with the goddesses Now the shit starts. Getting sharp eyes on your writing is the hardest and most necessary thing for a new work. I submitted fifty pages to the Northern Rivers Writers’ Centre Residential Mentorship and was accepted. Marele Day is a goddess for a

>> FEATURE

week in May – a mentoring deity who misses nothing and gently puts your purple passages to the sword, then helps you nourish the weak but promising pages. By the Friday afternoon you’ve grown wings.

it. “Dear Annette, you may remember me...”

But you’re only fledging to meet a far less forgiving goddess, for the next part of the NRWC mentorship deal is to send your reworked pages to a publisher, in this case the courteous Annette Barlow of Allen & Unwin, who takes no prisoners.

August 2: coffee with Allen & Unwin. They still like it, but say bluntly their decision will be a purely commercial one.

They’ll let me know by the end of August. The world is turning blue in the face.

June was all about redrafting those 50 pages and then they were off to Allen & Unwin, where they were assessed in preparation for a face-to-face meeting with Kali herself during the Byron Bay Writers Festival in August. Annette doesn’t present with a necklace of skulls, but she tells it like it is, because a publisher doesn’t have to stroke anyone’s ego.

Annette smiled and told me to go away, keep on with the redrafts until the book was finished, and then get back to her.

Yes’m.

In the meantime, I had entered and been accepted into a NSW Litlink Residency at Varuna, the writing house in Katoomba. It’s a no-brainer to try for this. You get two weeks in a glorious environment to write as much or little as you want, with a dedicated writing consultant. Mine was Jody Lee, another pair of eagle eyes and pinpoint perception.

Without these two mentorships, I would have struggled to get Harry Mac into shape to present to a publisher.

The second draft was completed in August at Varuna. My spirits were soaring, having also won the Varuna Unpublished Manuscript Award.

The rest of 2013 was redraft, redraft, redraft, with version number four notched up late in the year. People say writing is rewriting. It’s in these stages that the rough beast takes form, and when it works, the calm thrill is equal to the head-out-thewindow-tongue-lolling ride of the first draft. It’s like you and your manuscript have grown up a bit.

2014: Here comes the chopper, no wait...

It’s February 28 and 84,942 words are gathered in a 12-point Times New Roman, double-spaced Word document with generous margins. Email to A. Barlow: “You may remember me...”

Yes, she did, and my baby was launched into the unknown like Laika (you’ll get that when you read the book).

And then the waiting. TS Eliot said April was the cruellest month. For a wannabe writer, pick a month, any month. “They love it, they love it not.”

I waited. The world waited. Glaciers melted. The Russians invaded somewhere and the Americans bombed somebody. But no one noticed, as six billion people held their collective breath.

The dogs complained to the RSPCA but no one was listening.

Late July: an email. They like it but want to know more about the book, what’s fact and fiction and would I like to meet for a coffee at the Byron Bay Writers Festival in August?

August 20: an email. “We are thrilled to be in a position to make an offer to you for publication...”

The global exhalation flattens a Siberian forest, and the Chinese pause while building an island in the Pacific.

I signed the contract a week later and it arrived on their doorstep with the ink still wet.

By late November the commissioned editor Ali Lavau had sent me her detailed report. I received two digital versions of the manuscript – one with the ‘track changes’ marked, and the other with the changes accepted. I was advised to work on the ‘changes accepted’ document, but I had to write with both open to know what I was doing. Oh, and could I finish the redraft, answer all their queries and return my completed manuscript in three weeks, please? I’d been working on it three years, been waiting for a decision for six months, and now it had to be wrapped up in three weeks. Did I care? I was floating a foot off the ground; hell, I’d have it back in three days.

The kids got Christmas presents, and the little dogs laughed to see such fun.

2015: go, go go Harry Mac and I were never treated with anything but respect, but publishing works to a relentless schedule once a decision is made. We had a hiccup with the cover when the image became unavailable, but two goes later we had it. Annette came up with a new title (I won’t tell you the original be-cause it causes me shame).

In mid-February, I received in the mail the actual pages with the proofreader’s pencil marks on them. This was it. Anything I missed now would be in the book. I was terrified, and even more terrified a few days later to put the package back into the postal system – the same one that delivers my mail soaking wet with torn envelopes.

At the time of writing (late May) the unproofed review copies have gone out, the cover is complete, the blurbs written, acknowledgements done, permissions granted, and the final version is at the printers.

“What are you working on next?” says Annette.

Harry Mac will be launched officially at the Byron Bay Writers Festival by Marele Day on Saturday August 3. You’re all invited.

February, March, April, May… by mid-June I couldn’t stand

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>> FEATURE

GARDEN PLOTS

Gardens – both the wild, sprawling variety and the immaculately pruned – are places of nourishment, sanctuary and sometimes ruthlessness, making them perfect literary fodder. Indeed, gardens lie at the centre of many compelling novels. In others, a mere tendril might snake its way into the imagery to devastating effect. Here, Emma Ashmere, author of The Floating Garden, guides us through her favourite Australian novels that feature gardens and gardening as a motif.

The Secret River by Kate Grenville Gardens are usually seen as the triumph of order over chaos. In The Secret River, gardening brings chaos and dispossession.

When ex-convict William Thornhill takes up a piece of land on the Hawkesbury, he establishes a house and a garden.

Armed with a bag of seeds, precious tools, and labouring help, he is determined to slough off his old life of austerity and petty crime. The aim is to move up in a society where the hierarchies of Britain don’t necessarily apply.

But Thornhill’s seemingly simple act of gardening can never be innocent or neutral in a colonial land. As soon as he plants his plot, something ­— or somebody — digs it up. His garden becomes a “message”, the equivalent of “hoisting a flag up a pole”, a claim that this “insignificant splinter” of the country is now his.

In The Secret River, Kate Grenville reminds us that Australian history is contested ground. One person’s feast is another person’s famine, depending on which side of the fence you’re on.

The Ungardeners by Ethel Turner Ethel Turner (aka Jean Curlewis) is best known for her classic novel Seven Little Australians. Her less well-known work, The Ungardeners, was published in 1925. Part fable and part witty political satire, the original colour plates suggest it might stretch to a children’s book.

Australian poet and gardener Annie travels the globe with her English stockbroker husband, Peter Purcell. After he suffers a nervous breakdown, they settle in Australia for a gentler life.

Eventually Annie lures Peter out of the sick bed and into her world: the quiet joy of the garden.

But times are tough and Annie is forced to sell off some of her land. When she returns from a brief trip away, she discovers “the bit of creek fringed by wattles” has become a housing estate

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clustering around the busy chimney of a jam factory. Soon her flowers begin to disappear. The neighbouring “slum” children are the culprits, and claim they need flowers for a relative’s funeral. Is it manipulation or ingenuity when Annie discovers the children are selling off her flowers at the local cemetery?

The Ungardeners is about many things, including Australia’s place in a fragmented and rapidly changing world, the universal tension between materialism and art, and the idea of development versus nature.

The Hanging Garden by Patrick White The Hanging Garden was published posthumously, accompanied by a level of controversy. This ‘unfinished’ novel centres on fourteen-year-old Eirene Sklavos who arrives in Sydney from Greece with her mother, the flighty Australianborn Geraldine. Eirene’s father, a Greek “patriot”, has been tortured and killed in prison. Once Eirene has been delivered, her mother returns to war-weary Europe.

Eirene ends up creeping about a boarding house on the harbour, inhabited by the migraine-prone but not unkind Mrs Bulpit, and another teenage exile, Gilbert Horsfall. Gil has been evacuated from the London Blitz and suspects his father was pleased to offload him.

Gil sees Eirene as a fascinating “black snake”. He’s impressed by her casual snippets of Greek myth, her worldliness, and firsthand experience of communism and volcanos. For Eirene, Gil is a “sinewy white monkey”, who swings between being her friend and a traitor.

In the no man’s land of Mrs Bulpit’s overgrown garden above the cliffs, Gil and Eirene discover the fragile possibility of companionship. But loyalties continue to shift as quickly as the fickle harbour light. The garden is their shared but fleeting sanctuary, poised between childhood and adulthood, the world and home.

>> FEATURE

Heat and Light by Ellen Van Neerven Heat and Light is divided into three parts: Heat, Water and Light. In the Water section, the line between people and plants blurs. Set in the 2020s, the Australian government is evacuating islands in Moreton Bay so Indigenous people can apply to live on a kind of “super” island. However, some of the islands’ mysterious original inhabitants, known as “the plantpeople”, are proving difficult to move.

The protagonist, Kaden, is a young Indigenous botanist.

She comes into contact with the plantpeople when she scores a job distributing a scientific formula to them on behalf of the government. Larapinta is the first “specimen” she meets. Greenskinned and of fluid gender, Larapinta “has a face like me and you”. As their relationship develops, Kaden becomes more politicised and suspects her seemingly benevolent role at the company has another agenda.

Heat and Light has been described both as a novel and an anthology, and as a sci-fi/fantasy work. Like the character Larapinta, the book resists neat classification as it pushes back and forth through the porous borders between human and nonhuman; truth and myth; past, present and future; the other and self.

A Curious Intimacy by Jessica White A Curious Intimacy is inspired by the nineteenth-century botanist and plant-hunter Georgina Molloy. The protagonist is Ingrid Markham, who rides her horse around Western Australia in pursuit of plants. Back in her hometown of Adelaide, Ingrid has been trained in the rigours of botany by her ageing but liberal-minded father. Unable to make field trips himself, Ingrid sets off with a bruised heart, a passion for discovery, and the latest in collecting kits. With Victorian-era fervour, she is both woman and explorer, finding, cataloguing, and painting her discoveries.

During her expedition, Ingrid meets Ellyn Ives, whose husband has been away for months. The differences between the women are stark. Ingrid flourishes outdoors, and easily

fixes a broken water pump. Ellyn rarely steps further than the water-deprived rose beds encircling the dilapidating homestead.

Ingrid is enlivened by studying plants she hasn’t seen before.

Ellyn is reluctant to leave the unhappy domestic atmosphere where an empty cradle haunts one room. To her the bush looks “all the same”, and is a place where she will become lost. As the two women form a tentative bond, the homestead garden serves as a rickety bridge between their worlds.

The Watch Tower by Elizabeth Harrower The Watch Tower opens with Laura and Clare Vaizey being abandoned by their mother and cast out of their boarding school. Sydney is in the grip of war. The sisters are adrift until Felix Shaw, a small-time businessman with a purring car and grand ideas offers to take them under his wing.

Laura is persuaded to work at Felix’s box factory. As soon as she settles into the tedium, he abruptly changes his line of trade.

Felix keeps both girls off balance, playing them against each other as he zigzags from one shady venture and extreme mental state to another. Any seemingly kind action is attached by a web of strings.

As Felix moves up in the world, he wants the flashy house and garden to match. Once the sisters are installed, Felix marries Laura and Claire begins to refer to her sister as “Hostage Number One”. Felix takes to working outdoors, lunging at the garden like a bayonet-wielding soldier charging across a battlefield.

The garden is only a fleck in the tight weave of this narrative, but it is a potent symbol of Felix’s obsession with appearances. As he tries to assert control over nature, and others, he attempts to maintain his dominance in his relentlessly vigilant corner of the world.

Emma Ashmere worked as a research assistant on two Australian gardening history books Green Pens and Reading The Garden (MUP).

Her debut novel The Floating Garden is published by Spinifex Press. She will appear at Byron Bay Writers Festival 2015 on the panel Herstory: Historical Fiction, as well as two other panels. www.emmaashmere.com

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>> WRITERS’ GROUPS

Coffs Harbour Writers’ Group

This thriving writing community on the Mid North Coast has been scribbling since the mid-Eighties, making it among the longest-running writers’ groups in New South Wales. President Lorraine Penn introduces us to this enduring and extremely active bunch of budding authors.

Coffs Harbour Writers’ Group was formed out of a creative writing seminar held at Orara High School in Coffs Harbour in 1986. Jean Bedford, author in residence at the University of New England, Armidale, facilitated this initial workshop.

Since then, the Coffs Harbour Writers’ Group has organised countless workshops to assist its members in improving their writing skills. We have invited various well-known authors, guest speakers and academics to conduct workshops. Initially these workshops were financed through grants from the Arts Council and the Fellowship of Australian Writers.

In the twenty-nine years since inception, the group has grown substantially and to our credit we have published four anthologies: Words on a Wing, Pens on Parade, Turning the Page and Pens of Purpose, which was published for our twenty-fifth anniversary in 2011.

We are now planning on publishing an anthology to mark our thirtieth year. Included in this publication will be an acknowledgement that Coffs Harbour Writers’ Group is one of the oldest continual writers’ groups in New South Wales. The anthology will be launched in September 2016.

During 2011, five of our members worked collaboratively with Coffs Harbour Amateur Theatre Society (CHATS) on the highly successful cabaret show The Invisible Woman that was performed at the Jetty Theatre, Coffs Harbour.

Our highlight for 2015 was hosting this year’s Grassroots Writers Weekend over two and half days, May 8-10, at Coffs Harbour Community Village. The weekend also included the launch of one of our member’s science fiction/fantasy books: Exiled Autumn’s Peril by Rosalie Skinner.

Our initial Grassroots Writers Weekend was held in April 2014, as an initiative of Dorrigo Writers’ Group. The aim of the weekend was to provide affordable, hands-on, practical workshops for both the aspiring and published writer for the

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low price of $25 per person. This enabled many writers from our region and beyond to attend and take advantage of the opportunity to learn new techniques and network with other like-minded writers. This well-priced event was made possible

by Coffs Harbour Writers’ Group receiving a grant from the Coffs Harbour Council Arts & Cultural Development Small Grants Program for 2014/15.

We were extremely pleased with the final outcome, with the weekend demonstrating Coffs Harbour Writers’ Group’s ability to organise and present an amazing array of concurrent workshops and plenary sessions suitable for everyone’s needs in learning new knowledge and writing techniques. And, of course, there was the opportunity for invaluable social interaction during the optional dinners, and forging new friendships in the writing community.

Over the past three decades, Coffs Harbour Writers’ Group has positioned itself as a responsive organisation where we encourage and support our members, give positive feedback, provide ongoing learning opportunities and provide a portal of information, which includes the promotion of our members’ works on our website.

The group meets twice a month. Our first meeting is on the first Wednesday of the month at CeX Club in Coffs Harbour, while the third Thursday of the month is our social gathering for a coffee, read and chat. These social gatherings are held at a suitable café or a member’s home.

Our website is continually evolving and includes information on upcoming events, workshops, milestones, member profiles and stories, newsletters, links, projects and resources. For more information phone 0404163136 or email lmproject@bigpond.com. www.coffsharbourwriters.com

>> RISING

Stevi-Lee Alver In this new section, northerly will hear from a series of emerging writers who have had some publishing success but whose voices and styles are still coming into being. Some will come from the Northern Rivers, some will come from further afield – either way, each will be an exciting nascent talent.

Based in Bangalow, Stevi-Lee Alver is currently taking a break from studying at SCU and working at the North Coast Cancer Institute. Her poetry and fiction have recently appeared in Writing to the Edge, Jabberwocky, Homegrown Ghosts, Questions, northerly, Rochford Street Review, Living Life Loving Life Young & Old and Coastlines 5. Her first chapbook, Cactus, will be published later this year by Rochford Street Press.

Can you describe your own work in terms of style, practice and form?

I wouldn’t say that I have a particular style, practice or form, as I’m still experimenting with these things. At the moment, I’m working on a collection of stylistically uniformed short stories, in which small fragments of confessional anecdotes appear in a nonlinear and random fashion. But, of course, each vignette has been carefully placed to form the larger textual pattern. The style is playful and fun to write, but I wouldn’t consider it my style. I guess poetry is my default form, but I also write fiction, reviews and essays.

When and how were you first drawn to literature and a desire to be an author?

My mum made books and reading fun, I can still hear the different voices she created for the characters in Ruth Park’s The Muddle-Headed Wombat, which was an early favourite.

Other childhood favourites were Possum Magic by Mem Fox, Snugglepot and Cuddlepie by May Gibbs and Storm Boy by Colin Thiele. My brother and I also collected Jennings’ Cabbage Patch and Gizmo series, Stine’s Goosebumps series and Gleitzman’s books, such as Misery Guts, Blabber Mouth and Puppy Fat. As for the second part of the question, I’ve always written (predominantly poetry) but never with thoughts of, or ambitions toward, publication. A couple of years ago, with Moya Costello’s encouragement, I started submitting my work and entering writing competitions.

Which writers have influenced you most?

This is a difficult question! I have phases of completely obsessing over writers, or groups of writers, and my writing during that

time can be almost palpably influenced by my obsession. Some past preoccupations have been with Diane di Prima, Allen Ginsberg, Lawrence Ferlinghetti and the Beat Generation in general; with Lyn Hejinian, Bernadette Mayer and their associations with the Language Poets and the New York School, and with Gertrude Stein, Harryette Mullen and Maggie Nelson.

On the other hand, people often ask me, after hearing or reading my poetry, if Dr. Seuss was a big part of my childhood. I can’t remember reading any Dr. Seuss as a child, we didn’t have any of his books, but my cousin did. So, perhaps Dr. Seuss, unbeknownst to me, has influenced my writing the most.

What is the most important piece of writing advice you have been given?

It probably has to be something Moya Costello says: writing is rewriting, rewriting is writing. I find rewriting the most enjoyable stage of writing. This is when I feel most at ease, inspired and creative.

Are there enough opportunities for young writers like yourself in Australia?

Yes, I think so. Although the process of searching for, submitting, and following different writing competitions and publication opportunities can be time-consuming, a little expensive and, at times, disheartening, there are plenty of opportunities to be found online and in different magazines, such as northerly.

In the beginning I spent a great deal of time searching for the most appropriate places to submit my work, and submitted as much as possible. Now, with a few things published, opportunities are presenting themselves, which is really awesome.

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>> ADFAS

Land art and working girls ADFAS Byron Bay continues to dazzle with its eclectic program of lectures, with the coming months offering an insight into artists who transform natural landscapes into works of art, and a playful overview of depictions of the world’s oldest profession.

explain the artists’ debt to the earlier traditions of romantic landscape art. He will also talk about the sculptors’ links to other artists using performance and installation as a way of circumventing the physical and commercial constraints of galleries. As a former curator, he has shown the work of all three sculptors whose work will be the focus of the talk.

Andy Goldsworthy’s Carefully broken pebbles scratched white with another stone, created in St Abbs, Scotland in 1985.

Landscape Into Art: Andy Goldsworthy, Richard Long and David Nash

Gerald Deslandes studied art history at Cambridge University and the Courtauld Institute of Art. For many years he worked as a curator in publicly funded galleries curating exhibitions of sculpture by some of the best-known artists working in the UK. He lectures in art history and visual studies and is a consultant to museums and galleries in the UK. He also leads cultural tours to France, Italy, Austria and other European countries, as well as to many areas of the UK.

An illustrated lecture by Gerald Deslandes, Monday July 20.

During the late Seventies, a group of British sculptors emerged whose work altered natural elements in the landscape rather than represented them as images in the studio. Andy Goldsworthy created small poetic configurations of leaves and stones that sometimes resembled miniature bird’s nests. David Nash used a chainsaw to transform whole trees into sculptures in ways that seemed a halfway house between natural and man-made forms. Richard Long undertook long walks that he punctuated by carrying out pre-programmed actions such as moving a heap of stones into a line or creating a circle in the landscape.

Deslandes’s talk will place these three sculptors in the context of other international artists such as Robert Smithson, Walter de Maria, Giuseppe Penone and James Turrell. He will

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Great Tarts in Art: High Culture and the Oldest Profession An illustrated lecture by Linda Smith, Monday August 17.

Linda Smith’s presentation is a mixture of art history and scandalous anecdote.

Smith takes a lighthearted look at the changing attitudes to sexual morality down the ages. She will examine the portraits and careers of some of history’s most notorious mistresses and courtesans, and chart the complex and ambiguous attitudes of society towards the numerous anonymous working girls at the lower end of the scale. She will do this by investigating how they have been represented in art at different times and places from the seventeenth to the twentieth century.

This presentation is very much a social history, carefully placing the works of art in their proper historical context, revealing many nuances and meanings in well-known works which might not otherwise be immediately apparent to the modern eye.

Linda Smith is an art historian with a special interest in British art and the art of the twentieth century. She offers illustrated talks, presentations and study days on a variety of art-historical topics, and has taken on various types of assignment at a wide range of venues, including public galleries, secondary schools, universities, cruise liners, and private arts societies in the UK and overseas. She works as a guide and lecturer at the Tate Britain and Tate Modern in London.

Thomas Gainsborough’s portrait of the ballet dancer and mistress of the Duke of Dorset, Giovanna Baccelli.

Both presentations are held at the A&I Hall on Station Street, Bangalow. Presentations begin at 6:30pm, with doors opening at 6pm for welcome drinks. Guests are welcome at $25 per person, including drinks and a light snack. www.adfas.org.au

A week of words

>> RESIDENTIAL MENTORSHIP

The Northern Rivers Writers’ Centre Residential Mentorship capped off another successful year in May with four local writers honing and developing their manuscripts under the guidance of author Marele Day. Kyogle-based writer Jarrah Dundler was among the mentees, and here he reflects on an inspiring and productive week shared between emerging talents in a Suffolk Park beach house.

I

n our house is an internal staircase leading to my office. I aim to descend the stairs at least once a day, close the door and write.

I don’t usually get down till after my kids are in bed. Some evenings it’s a foot-dragging journey. I make detours – indulging in a few segments of The 7:30 Report, cleaning the reasonably clean kitchen – and when at the top of the stairs, I linger. I grip the banister and sway, contemplating whether curling up into a ball and rolling down would be the easiest way to descend. Sometimes recalling words of encouragement from friends or family on my writing helps to keep me moving.

Some evenings this doesn’t work and I don’t make it down at all. Other evenings I don’t mess about. I can’t. I just need to get down. I may have had an ‘ah-ha!’ during the day and have been dying to get down there and make a start on a short story, work through a tough scene, or write a draft of a picture book. Other times I may be in the middle of a ‘golden zone,’ a period of a week or two when it feels like my writing is flowing like liquid gold and I need to return to it so I can discover how my riveting story unfolds. Other evenings, deadlines get me moving (and I don’t mean those self-imposed ones).

Short story competitions, applications for writers programs, or the ‘we are accepting

manuscripts for this month only’ are deadlines I often work towards. The pressure they bring gets me moving quick smart (at least for the few days before the due date).

Earlier this year I had a deadline.

The Northern Rivers Writers’ Centre Residential Mentorship applications were due on March 26th. I got stuck back into a novel I’d been working on and began rewriting. The staircase got a real work out. I was up and down, alternating between rest and parenting and life upstairs and writing downstairs. I snatched sleep when I could.

Fuelled by adrenaline and coffee I made it through and submitted my application, just in time.

When I got the news a couple of weeks later that I’d been accepted, I was thrilled.

I had a few celebratory nights off and then, with a newfound confidence, I tackled the stairs every night. I entered the golden zone a few more times. Some nights I raced down those stairs. When it came time to attend the mentorship, ‘the end’ of my first draft was in sight. Before even attending the mentorship I’d gained a lot. During it and afterwards, I gained a whole lot more.

Along with the other mentees, I received valuable feedback on my manuscript from Marele Day, a fabulous writer, inspiring person and astute teacher.

Marele guided us through practical

writing tasks, such as coming up with catchy one-line descriptions for our books.

Who wouldn’t want to read novels about the impossible choice between love and survival; broken bonds and brotherhood; lost loves, an island and a bat; or the biography of a complex woman and the child who changed her life? Marele taught us new ways to look at our work and ways to overcome hurdles. She introduced us to local authors who shared their writing and publishing experiences with us.

Marele helped me to grow as a writer.

But it wasn’t just her. The other mentees helped too. They provided me with feedback and suggestions and thoughts on my writing. They inspired me with their writing. As a group we worked through problems and helped each other along in our journey as writers. In between work sessions we bonded – talking politics and literature, reciting poetry, eating out, sharing wine, and even adopting stray dogs. And despite the cool autumn breezes creeping in, our beach house was warm.

I returned home and in the weeks following the mentorship got to ‘the end’ of my first draft. The mentorship provided me with new skills and knowledge to help get me there. And it introduced me to friends and allies whose words of encouragement lightened my feet for the journey downstairs.

The mentees for The 2015 Residential Mentorship with Marele Day. From left: Jarrah Dundler, Marele Day, Annie Barrett, Jeremy Tager, Ahliya Farebrother.

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>> FESTIVAL PREVIEW

Nimbin’s parade of poets

Photo: Natasha Mulhall

Australia’s most illustrious and consistently popular “outlaw” poetry shindig, the Nimbin Performance Poetry World Cup, will this year take place on the weekend of August 1-2. The event was established in 2003 and over the years has awarded the top prize to the likes of Candy Royalle (pictured), David Stavangar, Emilie Zoey Baker, Tug Tumbly and Scott Wings. Last year’s winner was local poet Rebecca Rushbrook.

Co-founder of the NPPWC is Gail Clarke, who continues to organise everything from sponsors to submissions to scheduling.

Impressively, the World Cup offers the highest pool of prize money ($6000) of any performance poetry competition in Australia. Here, Clarke offers a guide to this unique celebration of spoken word.

How many entries do you anticipate receiving for NPPWC this year?

As with each year, we do not know how many will sign up, most likely between thirty and forty – that’s enough to deal with in the heats.

Has funding the event through donations, sponsors and so on become easier over the years?

Finding the money has become a little easier – the years have proven how successful this event is and how many visitors it brings to the area. I don’t go out searching too much – mostly locals, businesses and friends make it happen. At our monthly poetry nights we have a raffle, with all the money going into the account, and we usually have one big fundraiser for the final dollars needed.

How have you seen the nature of spoken word poetry change since the World Cup’s inception in 2003?

I have definitely noticed that the quality of performance has improved, possibly because I encourage anyone interested in coming along to check out the past finalists on our web page, always encouraging them to practice, practice and get their timing right. Timing plays a big part in this event. Eight minutes is eight minutes. That has become a mantra for a few of the truly dedicated poets who have gone on to greater things. Some poets return year after year, honing their skills, determined to win or be a finalist.

Others come along to get feedback, support and encouragement to continue writing and performing.

What is the longest journey anyone has made to attend the World Cup? I think the furthest someone has travelled would be from New Zealand. Mostly we get Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane poets.

We’ve also had a few from Western Australia and Tasmania.

As many of the younger poets have said to me, the experience of

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simply getting to Nimbin, staying in the village and meeting the locals and other like-minded folk, is all part of the adventure.

Who makes up the judging panel?

The heats are judged by people who have been involved with the poetry scene in Nimbin, Lismore and surrounds for many years and know what to look for. Encouragement awards are given in the heats. The next day, the semi-finals, is judged by two judges who were not at the heats and are seeing the performers for the first time on this stage. Judging gets tougher on this day; I have one good male judge I use every year and then pair him up with a woman.

For the final, I always use the winner of last year’s event to judge if possible, and two others, generally drawn from the performing arts world.

You’ve said that the NPPWC is “largely unacknowledged by the poetry establishment in Australia”. Why do you think this is?

Over the years, the Nimbin Performance Poetry World Cup has copped a lot of flack, mainly because of the name, I reckon. It was always tongue-in-cheek.

Those of us who live here know how much disrespect and ignorance is out there in the wider world about Nimbin. We carry a stigma of being “the drug capital”, when this village is so much more than that. It’s not until people come along and experience the warmth, understanding, acceptance and compassion of most of the folk in the village, that they get to understand and know us as more than doped-out hippies living in the hills.

As I get out into the poetry world and get down to Sydney gigs now and then, I see that poets spread the word about this event and appreciate the opportunity to be part of it. Its reputation is growing as a platform to push boundaries and get yourself heard and seen.

As for the establishment, I don’t push it too much. Those who deride this event as unimportant do not bother me. The original reason for starting it was because of the stuffiness and correctness of the poetry scene at the time.

Do you have any unfulfilled ambitions for the event?

I always said I would do ten years, and now this is our thirteenth year and I have said fifteen, because the poets were howling to me that there’s no way I can stop now. We still have plenty of up-andcoming poets out there and I want to encourage them all to keep at it, and for them to have a chance to win this event. Every poet that signs up is a winner to me – just getting here can be taking a week out of their lives.

More information can be found at www.nimbinpoetry.com

>> BOOK REVIEW

Between two worlds HIS OTHER HOUSE

By SARAH ARMSTRONG Review by Lisa Walker

His Other House is local author Sarah Armstrong’s second book, coming ten years after her Miles Franklin-shortlisted debut novel, Salt Rain. Both books are set in the Northern Rivers and the region’s lush environment is an intrinsic part of both narratives.

His Other House is a tense domestic drama focusing on a love triangle of sorts. The book was inspired, Armstrong says, by a news story she read about a man who lived a double life with two wives and two families for many years.

Quinn is a doctor whose marriage is pushed to its limits by efforts to have a much longed-for child. A succession of IVF rounds and miscarriages leave him drained and needing a break, but his wife Marianna wants to press on with another attempt. She can’t see how her life will ever be complete without a child.

While Quinn lives in Brisbane he is doing a stint as a visiting doctor in Corimbi, a town much like Mullumbimby. Here he meets Rachel, a disillusioned journalist taking a break from her job. A night-time swim in the town pool leads to an unplanned kiss and soon Quinn and Rachel are involved in a passionate affair.

Quinn’s resolve to leave Marianna is tested when she unexpectedly falls naturally pregnant. It is at this stage that the tension ratchets up. Quinn decides to keep his relationship with Rachel a secret, a decision which tangles him in a web of lies. “He was dismayed how readily he took to lying,” writes Armstrong.

“He’d always thought of it as a decisive abandonment of the truth.

Instead, he realised, it was simply a matter of one word slipping into the place of another.”

While it would be easy to judge Quinn, by now we know him so well that we can only empathise, even if we suspect that it’s going to end badly.

The time this novel has taken to come to fruition shows in its insight and many delightful turns of phrase. As in Salt Rain, Sarah’s writing is evocative and striking. While all the characters are believable and finely drawn, it is the children who linger most strongly in my memory. His Other House is both a page-turner and a powerful story of morality within relationships.

Macmillan / 368pp / RRP $29.99

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>> LEARNING CURVE

Self-publish with style

With any stigma associated with self-publishing slowly becoming a thing of the past, going it alone in this way can sometimes be a more viable option than the traditional publishing pathways for both emerging and established writers. Local author Christina Larmer has successfully self-published eight books, and here offers a practical guide for getting started with this increasingly popular means of getting your work out there.

Five years ago I never imagined I’d self-publish my own novels.

Back then I had two completed manuscripts, an enthusiastic literary agent and an ego the size of Mount Warning. It didn’t take long for that ego to crumble as my ‘gripping stories’ got rejected time and again, not by the publishers who loved them enough to put them to their (euphemistically titled) acquisitions meetings, but by those pesky number crunchers in sales and marketing.

Eventually, with my agent’s blessing and my self-esteem at around sea level, I decided to go it alone; better to DIY and sell a few books to friends than leave them festering on my hard drive.

For a brief period it felt like I was holding up the white flag.

After all, as anyone worth their weight in printing paper knows, self-publishing is for wannabes who haven’t got a book worth publishing, right? When the positive reviews and royalties began pouring in, I knew I was on the right path.

Whatever your journey to self-publishing, it can be a rewarding way to liberate your stories and find your core readership.

What’s more, self-publishing has changed dramatically since I first started. It’s not only cheaper and easier to do, it’s a force to be reckoned with – indie self-published authors now outearn those from the big five publishers combined, on sites like Amazon.com.* And while it can be fiddly and frustrating at first, if you believe in your work and are happy to take control of your literary destiny, it’s such a worthwhile thing to do. Here’s how to DIY: Format your book for sale online Unless your surname is Dymock, it’s tricky getting into bricks-and-mortar bookstores, so the web is your marketplace.

You need to turn your manuscript into a format that can be downloaded on e-readers like Kindle and iPad, and printed as a paperback (more on that later). Various sites will offer free formatting advice including Amazon and Smashwords, a publishing and distribution platform that supplies to the big players like Apple and Barnes & Noble. You can also pay someone to format for you.

Get a great cover While you fiddle with the formatting, you need to get cracking on a cracking cover design. You can DIY – Amazon and Smashwords provide templates and tips – but unless you’re a design whiz, the way I see it is this: would you ask a cover

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designer to write your next novel? It needs to look slick even at stamp-size, which is usually how it appears online. Find a local designer or source online, and be sure to get two versions: a front cover for digital and a front/spine/back for paperback.

Get two ISBNs The International Standard Book Number is your book’s unique identifying number that enables you to distribute, sell and track your book globally. While many authors now sell e-books without them, they can be worthwhile and you will need a separate ISBN for your paperback. In Australia you buy them through Thorpe-Bowker.

Upload your book Once it’s properly formatted, you can sell it via your own website (using an e-commerce tool) and/or by uploading to e-retailers like Amazon (via Kindle Direct Publishing) and Smashwords.

Both will take you through the uploading process, asking you to input your book’s metadata (title, synopsis, price and so on), formatted file, cover, ISBN, author bio and so forth. If formatted correctly, your book will be on digital shelves within 24 hours.

Format your paperback version Gone are the days when you needed to print thousands of copies and store them in the garage. Today you can simply provide a separate digital file of your paperback and it gets printed as required. Use Google to find the best print-on-demand service for you; they vary on price, quality and speed. Some services will format for you, others provide free templates so you can DIY. Amazon’s CreateSpace will print a 282-page book for about $4 and have a proof to you in ten days.

Promote, promote, promote!

Remember those pesky marketing people? That’s now your job. Set up a website, Facebook page, Twitter account (the list goes on) and start connecting with the millions of readers who buy books online and don’t care what publisher is listed in the license notes. Best wishes on your journey to publication. * http://authorearnings.com/report/january-2015-authorearnings-report/ www.christinalarmer.com

WORKSHOPS

>> WORKSHOPS

To sign up for Byron Bay Writers Festival workshops visit www.byronbaywritersfestival.com.au

BYRON BAY WRITERS FFESTIVAL 2015 IT’S NOT ALL ABOUT YOU

Scenario 1: Okay, so you’ve left yet another meeting or dinner party and you’re kicking yourself because once again you know the other person hasn’t really ‘got’ what you do or what you care about.

Scenario 2: You’re trying to write your ‘About’ page or a funding proposal or your bio and you’re mystified that the person emerging seems to bear no resemblance to the person you have become. Or how you want to be seen.

There’s nothing harder than writing or speaking about yourself. How do we show up without showing off? Moya Sayer-Jones is a novelist, columnist and story activist but this workshop is not about her. It’s about you!

Presenter: Moya Sayer-Jones When: Monday August 3, 1:30pm – 4:30pm Where: Lone Goat Gallery, Cnr Lawson & Fletcher St (Byron Bay Library), Byron Bay Cost: $50 NRWC member or $60 non-member BLOGGING FOR WRITERS

A blog is a way for writers and creatives to share their work and develop a community around their writing. Unlike social media platforms, we can create a blog in any way we choose – it’s like designing a home. It’s our own personal space. This workshop will introduce you to the wonderful world of blogging, and help you create your own blog. We’ll talk about the incredible opportunities blogging can create for writers and creatives, and discuss ways to build your community of readers. Zanni Louise is a children’s author living on the North Coast.

Presenter: Zanni Louise When: Monday August 3, 1:30pm – 4:30pm Where: SAE Creative Media Institute, 373 Ewingsdale Rd, Byron Bay Cost: $50 NRWC member or $60 non-member HAVING THE LAST WORD

Imagine if the person who was an important or intimate part of your life, gave you a treasure in their passing. Not something to wear or put on a shelf, but rather something precious that they wanted to share with you. Sentiments to enrich your journey, words to guide you as you grow and experience life, a gift to hold in your heart forever. If this speaks to you, come and create your own written gift for those you love who you will eventually leave. It will be an intimate opportunity to explore ways to leave a lasting legacy. It may be meaningful events from your life story, life’s most important lessons, or your own eulogy. Zenith Virago is a deathwalker, celebrant and author.

Presenter: Zenith Virago When: Tuesday August 4, 10am – 4pm Where: Lone Goat Gallery, Cnr Lawson & Fletcher St (Byron Bay Library), Byron Bay Cost: $85 NRWC member or $100 non-member WHAT’S YOUR STORY?

After publishing her third ‘observational memoir’, Home Truths, Mandy Nolan has found the key to what she says is the “Pandora’s box of story writing! Lived Experience! Who would have thought

that my life wasn’t just my life, it was a research project!” Nolan believes that very often people don’t recognise the treasure of their own lives. “Even the most ordinary grim places can hold the most extraordinary insights. In this workshop Nolan will tease out the storylines and narrative threads that bind us all. Mandy Nolan is a stand-up comedian who has leapt into print with three humorous memoirs.

Presenter: Mandy Nolan When: Tuesday August 4, 10am – 4pm Where: Byron Community College, Jonson Street, Byron Bay Cost: $85 NRWC member or $100 non-member FINDING YOUR WRITE DIRECTION

If you have always wanted to write but are unsure what to write about; wanted to write to reflect upon life’s challenges and changes; dealt with health issues and sought to write about the experience; sought to broaden the scope of your workday academic or business writing; suffered from writer’s block or simply want to spend a day having fun with words, then this workshop could be for you.

Participants will be offered a range of short writing exercises to assist with gaining confidence with your written voice. It will be a pleasurable day, away from life’s incessant demands. Dr Hilton Koppe is a GP and internationally recognised medical educator, whose workshops have met with critical acclaim in Australia, Europe and North America.

Presenter: Dr Hilton Koppe When: Tuesday August 4, 10am – 4pm Where: SAE Creative Media Institute, 373 Ewingsdale Rd, Byron Bay Cost: $85 NRWC member or $100 non-member CAPTURING YOUNG HEARTS: WRITING FOR THE MIDDLE GRADES (8-12 YEARS)

The ages of 8-12 are known as the golden age of reading – a time when children fall in love with books and develop as independent readers. This workshop will focus on developing the storytelling skills needed to write for this age group. Jesse Blackadder is the author of three adult novels and three children’s novels.

Presenter: Jesse Blackadder When: Wednesday August 5, 9:30am – 12:30pm Where: Byron Community College, Jonson Street, Byron Bay Cost: $50 NRWC member or $60 non-member BRAVE NEW WORLD OF PUBLISHING

Options abound in the brave new world of book publishing – e-book, print-on-demand, DIY publishing, traditional publishing.

These terms trip off today’s aspiring author’s tongue – but how do you know what’s right for you? This hands-on workshop will help you unpick the options best suited to the style and genre of your writing and your motivations for writing and getting published. Roz Hopkins has worked in book publishing for over 20 years.

Presenter: Roz Hopkins When: Wednesday August 5, 10am – 4pm Where: SAE Creative Media Institute, 373 Ewingsdale Rd, Byron Bay Cost: $85 NRWC member or $100 non-member

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>> WORKSHOPS SIGNING YOUR RIGHTS AWAY

A publishing workshop looking at the business side of the publishing industry, focusing on copyright and publishing contracts, what is a standard payment for your manuscript, traditional publishing versus self-publishing contracts, negotiating tips and tricks, how to spot a scam publishing offer and what a literary agent does anyway. Alex Adsett is a publishing consultant specialising in copyright and contracts, and a literary agent focusing on fiction for adults and young adults.

Presenter: Alex Adsett When: Wednesday August 5, 1:30Pm – 4:30pm Where: Byron Community College, Jonson Street, Byron Bay Cost: $50 NRWC member or $60 non-member FABER WRITING ACADEMY

How to get your foot in the publisher’s door with Annette Barlow, publisher at Allen & Unwin. A one-day course offering aspiring writers the opportunity to find out what really goes on inside a publishing house, how publishers make their choices and how to improve one’s chances of publication. The program will include sessions on sure-fire proposals, editing your first page, opening chapters, how to write a great covering letter and the top ten reasons manuscripts are rejected. This workshop is targeted at students who have manuscripts written for the adult market, either fiction or nonfiction.

Presenter: Annette Barlow When: Wednesday August 5, 10am – 4pm Where: Lone Goat Gallery, Cnr Lawson & Fletcher St (Byron Bay Library), Byron Bay Cost: $100 NRWC member or $120 non-member WRITING ABOUT ME, WRITING ABOUT YOU

I can’t write about me, without writing about you. This workshop is about creating powerful portraits by building relationships. The person I am when with a parking officer (who’s just booked me), is likely to be different to the person I am when being seduced by Brad Pitt. Bring a photograph of yourself as a child. Let’s unearth some great characters from your memory. And conjure some others from the ether. How do we get inside other people’s heads and see the world through eyes other than our own? And how does this free us up to write more fulsomely about ourselves?

Presenter: Hannie Rayson When: Thursday August 6, 9:30am – 12:30pm Where: Lone Goat Gallery, Cnr Lawson & Fletcher St (Byron Bay Library), Byron Bay Cost: $50 NRWC member or $60 non-member FEATURE WRITING

David Leser is an award-winning journalist and author who has been writing feature articles for Australian and overseas publications for over 30 years. In this workshop he explains the ingredients of a good feature. How to structure the story. How to find the right voice.

How to get the angle of vision right. How to use quotes. What to leave in. What to take out. He will also look at the art of storytelling as opposed to news reporting. What are the essential ingredients that make a feature story memorable?

Leser is the author of seven books, including his recent memoir, To Begin To Know: Walking In The Shadows of My Father.

Presenter: David Leser When: Thursday August 6, 9:30am – 12:30pm

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Where: Byron Community College, Jonson Street, Byron Bay Cost: $50 NRWC member or $60 non-member STORYWORLD AND ADAPTATIONS ACROSS PLATFORMS

In the digital age, audiences are devouring stories on all manner of platforms - we read, we watch, we play, we binge. For writers, this a huge opportunity to develop and adapt their stories across various media genres, engaging vibrant audiences in different ways on different platforms. But to take advantage of these possibilities writers need to be flexible, they need to think holistically and not define themselves or their work by a singular form. This lively interactive workshop will take participants through a process of defining their stories as multiplatform storyworlds – narrative engines that can generate ongoing stories for page, screen and interactive media.

Presenter: Mike Jones When: Thursday August 6, 10:30am – 4pm Where: SAE Creative Media Institute, 373 Ewingsdale Rd, Byron Bay Cost: $85 NRWC member or $100 non-member THE WRITERS’ WORKSHOP

Sharing, reading critically, editorial feedback and revision are key to a writer’s development. This class is a barebones, no-nonsense creative writing workshop where students each submit one story to receive constructive criticism from their peers. Such scrutiny and feedback will help each aspiring author see their work with fresher eyes. It will also give participants a better understanding of how short stories are constructed and how revision can help them improve. Due to the intensive nature of this workshop, number of participants will be limited. Journalist and writer Miguel Syjuco’s debut novel Illustrado won the Man Asia Literary Prize.

Presenter: Miguel Syjuco When: Thursday August 6, 1:30pm – 4:30pm Where: Byron Community College, Jonson Street, Byron Bay Cost: $50 NRWC member or $60 non-member WRITING YOUR NOVEL IN A YEAR

Krissy Kneen has published five books in just seven years. In this half-day workshop you will visualise and plan your own project, committing to writing your book in a year and setting yourself on the path to completion. Kneen is the award-winning author of the memoir Affection and the literary fiction novel Steeplechase. In 2014 she won the prestigious Thomas Shapcott Award for her poetry collection, Eating My Grandmother, to be published in 2015.

Presenter: Krissy Kneen When: Thursday August 6, 1:30pm – 4:30pm Where: Lone Goat Gallery, Cnr Lawson & Fletcher St (Byron Bay Library), Byron Bay Cost: $50 NRWC member or $60 non-member

NRWC WORKSHOP CREATIVE NON-FICTION: BRINGING REAL LIFE TO THE PAGE This workshop focuses on anything from memoir to travel to general nonfiction, contemporary or historical. It will be aimed at all writers – those who might not have yet committed a word to paper, through to those who might have a substantial portion of their manuscript completed.

Presenter: Matthew Condon When: Saturday September 19, 10am - 1pm Where: Byron Community College, 107 Jonson St, Byron Bay Cost: $45 NRWC member or $55 non-member

>>COMPETITIONS

COMPETITIONS

MY LIFE SHORT STORY COMPETITION

Organised by children’s author Tristan Bancks, this competition is open to students aged 8-13 in Australia, who can get a parent, teacher or legal guardian’s permission to upload a 500-word short story about their life at http://www. randomhouse.com.au/competitions/ entryform.aspx?id=633.

Teachers can enter on behalf of students by downloading an entry form, attaching to each story and sending in the post. Prizes include $1000 in cash, the complete My Life series by Tristan Bancks and $1000 worth of books for the student’s school.

Deadline is August 31st.

LANE COVE LITERARY AWARDS

Entries to the Lane Cove Literary Awards will be accepted until August 26th.

Categories are short story ($2000 first prize for works of up to 3,000 words), theatrical ($2000 for maximum of 30 pages/10 minutes performance time) and poetry ($1,500 for a maximum of 50 lines/1000 words). Competition open to Australian citizens/permanent residents of 16 years and above. For conditions of entry and entry form visit http://www.lanecove. nsw.gov.au/Community/Library/Pages/ LaneCoveLiteraryAward.aspx 2015 SCRIBE NON-FICTION PRIZE FOR YOUNG WRITERS

A developmental award to foster talented writers aged 30 or under who are working on a long-form or book-length work of non-fiction (in any genre). Entries must be between 5,000 and 10,000 words. The winner will receive $1,500, a meeting with a Scribe editor or publisher, up to 10 hours

of editorial time and a book of their choice every month for a year. Deadline of August 28th, while more information can be found at www.scribepublications.com.au RICHELL PRIZE FOR EMERGING WRITERS

Hachette Australia, along with the Richell family, has announced the establishment this prize in partnership with Guardian Australia and The Emerging Writers Festival. The prize, to be awarded annually, is in memory of Hachette Australia’s former CEO, Matt Richell, who died suddenly in 2014. The prize is open to unpublished writers of adult fiction and adult narrative non-fiction. The winner will receive $10,000 in prize money and one year of mentoring with Hachette Australia. Full details of the new award and submission requirements can be found at www.hachette.com.au. The deadline for this year’s submissions is August 14th.

2015 ROLF BOLDREWOOD LITERARY AWARDS

The Macquarie Regional Library invites entries for these awards, which aim to foster the writing of prose and poetry with Australian content. The prose category must be Australian-themed fiction or memoir based on family history, maximum 2,500 words. The poetry category is for any form or style on an Australian theme, maximum 80 lines. Entries close September 25th, $10 per entry, $500 first prize in each section. For more information visit http://www.mrl.nsw.gov. au/WhatsOn/rolf-boldrewood.

2015 NEW ENGLAND THUNDERBOLT PRIZE FOR CRIME WRITING

England Writers Centre has six prizes on offer for crime writers, including an Emerging Authors prize for writers who have not yet been published, and a brand new Youth category for writers under 18.

All genres of crime writing are eligible, from hard-boiled to comic, paranormal to rural, historical to contemporary, noir to cosy. Entries welcome from anywhere in Australia across multiple categories.

Entries close on August 24, 2015. Fee: $10 per entry, entries to be sent by post.

Winners announced October 8 2015.

Downloadable entry forms and full details at http://www.newc.org.au/thunderboltprize.html SWWV BIENNIAL LITERARY AWARD

An Australia-wide award for women writers. Poetry of up to 50 lines, short stories of up to 2500 words, articles of up to 2000 words. First prize $400, second prize $200 and highly commended. $7 per entry, two entries $10, three entries $15.

For entry form and conditions of entry visit www.swwvic.org.au. Entries close on August 14.

2015 CARMEL BIRD AWARD

New short crime writing is wanted for the 2015 Carmel Bird Award, organised by publishers Spineless Wonders. Closes August 31. Maximum of 5000 words. First prize $500. All stories will be considered for publication in the Spineless Wonders short crime fiction anthology. To be judged

by Zane Lovitt. For more details and competition guidelines see http://shortaustralianstories.com.au/ submissions/the-carmel-bird-award

In this, the third year of the Prize, New

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>> WRITERS’ GROUPS >> Alstonville Plateau Writers Group

Meets second Friday of each month, 10am – 12pm. All genres welcome, contact Christine 66288364 or Kerry 66285662

>> Ballina/Byron U3A Creative Writing

Meets every second Wednesday at 12pm, Fripp Oval, Ballina. Contact Jan on 0404007586 or janmulcahy@bigpond.com

>> Ballina Creative Writers

Workshops meet third Thursday of each month at 10am -12:20pm at Richmond Hill. Focus is on personal development and spirituality. Contact 0404007586 or janmulcahy@bigpond.com

NORTHERN RIVERS WRITERS’ CENTRE 2015 MEMBERSHIP DISCOUNTS BOOK WAREHOUSE 107-109 Keen Street Lismore 02 6621 4204

>> Bangalow Writers Group

Meets Thursdays at 9:15am at Bangalow Scout Hall. Contact Simone on 0407749288

BOOK WAREHOUSE 26 Harbour Drive Coffs Harbour 02 6651 9077

>> Bellingen Writers Group

BOOK WAREHOUSE

Meets at Bellingen Golf Club on the fourth Monday of the month at 2pm. All welcome, contact Joanne on 6655 9246 or email jothirsk@restnet.com.au

>> Casino Writers Group

Meets every third Thursday of the month at 4pm at Casino Library. Contact Brian on 0266282636 or email briancostin129@hotmail.com

>> Cloudcatchers

For Haiku enthusiasts. A ginko (haiku walk) is undertaken according to group agreement. Contact Quendryth on 66533256 or email quendrythyoung@bigpond.com

>> Coffs Harbour Writers Group

Meets 1st Wednesday of the month 10.30am to 12.30pm. Contact Lorraine Penn on 66533256 or 0404163136, email: lmproject@bigpond.com. www.coffsharbourwriters.com

>> Coffs Harbour Memoir Writers Group

Share your memoir writing for critique. Monthly meetings, contact 0409824803 or email costalmermaid@gmail.com

>> Cru3a River Poets

Meets every Thursday at 10:30am, venue varies, mainly in Yamba. Contact Pauline on 66458715 or email kitesway@westnet.com.au

Shop 6 Ballina Fair Ballina 02 6686 0917 BOOK WAREHOUSE 70 Prince Street Grafton 02 6642 6355 BOOK WAREHOUSE Settlement City Port Macquarie 02 6584 9788 BOOK WAREHOUSE Yamba Fair, Treelands Drive Yamba 02 6646 8662 BYRON BAY LONGBOARDS 1/89 Jonson Street Byron Bay 02 6685 5244 CLIX COMPUTER CENTRE 3/3 Marvel Street Byron Bay 02 6680 9166 COLLINS BOOK SELLERS Unit 3. 9 Lawson Street Byron Bay 02 6685 7820

>> Dangerously Poetic Writing Circle

CO-OP BOOKSHOP Southern Cross University Lismore 02 6621 4484

>> Dorrigo Writers Group

CO-OP BOOKSHOP Coffs Harbour Education Campus, Hogbin Drive Coffs Harbour 02 6659 3225

Meets second Wednesday or each month, 2pm-4pm at Brunswick Valley Community Centre.

Contact Laura on 66801976 or visit www.dangerouslypoetic.com Meets every second Wednesday from 10am-2pm. Contact Iris on 66575274 or email an_lomall@bigpond.com or contact Nell on 66574089

>> Dunoon Writers Group

DOLPHIN OFFICE CHOICE www.officechoice.com.au Cnr Fletcher & Marvel Streets Byron Bay 02 6685 7097

>> Federal Writers Group

DRAGONWICK PUBLISHING www.dragonwick.com 02 6624 1933

>> FAW Port Macquarie-Hastings Regional

EARTH CAR RENTALS 18 Fletcher Street Byron Bay 02 6685 7472

>> Gold Coast Writers Association

EBOOKS NEED EDITORS www.ebooksneededitors.com 15% discount to NRWC members Call 02 6689 5897 for further details

>> Kyogle Writers

HUMBLE PIES Pacific Highway Billinudgel 02 6680 1082

>> Memoir Writing Group

KEEN STREET COMMUNICATIONS www.keenstreet.com.au 50 Bulmers Rd Hogarth Range 02 6664 7361

>> Nambucca Valley Writers Group

MARY RYAN’S BOOKSTORE Shop 5, 21 -25 Fletcher Street Byron Bay 02 6685 8183

Writers on the Block. Meets second Tuesday of each month, 6:30pm – 8:30pm at Dunoon Sports Club.

Contact Helga on 66202994 (W), 0401405178 (M) or email heg.j@telstra.com Meets third Saturday of each month at Federal. Contact Vicki on 66840093 or garden1@gmail.com Meets 1pm on last Saturday of each month, Maritime Museum, Port Macquarie.

Contact Joie on 65843520 or email Bessie on befrank@tsn.cc Meets third Saturday of each month, 1:30pm for 2pm start, at Fradgley Hall, Burleigh Heads Library, Park Avenue, Burleigh Heads. Contact 0431443385 or email info@goldcoast-writers.org.au Meets first Tuesday of each month, 10:30am at Kyogle Bowling Club. Contact Brian on 66242636 or email briancostin129@hotmail.com Meets each month at Sunrise Beach, Byron Bay. Contact Diana on 66855387 or 0420282938 or email diana.burstall@gmail.com Meets fourth Saturday of each month, 1:30pm, Nambucca. Contact 65689648 or nambuccawriters@gmail.com

>> Poets and Writers on the Tweed

Meets weekly at Tweed Heads Library, Tuesdays 1:30pm – 3pm. Poets, novelists, playwrights, short story writers all welcome. Fun group meets for discussion, support and constructive criticism. Free membership.

Phone Lorraine 0755909395

NORPA www.norpa.org.au PO Box 225 Lismore 02 6621 5600

>> Taree-Manning River Scribblers

PAGES BOOKSHOP Park Beach Plaza Coffs Harbour 02 6652 2588

>> WordsFlow Writing

THE BOOKSHOP MULLUMBIMBY 39 Burringbar Street Mullumbimby 02 6684 1413

Meets second Wednesday of the month, 9am-11:30am, Taree. Call first to check venue. Contact Bob Winston on 65532829 or email rrw1939@hotmail.com Group meets Fridays during school term, 12:30pm-3pm, Pottsville Beach Neighbourhood Centre, 12a Elizabeth St, Pottsville Beach. Contact Cheryl on 0412455707 or visit www.wordsflowwriters.blogspot.com

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THERE’S ALWAYS MORE HAIRDRESSING Shop 5, 14 Middleton Byron Bay 02 6680 7922

The Northern Rivers Writers’ Centre offers a wide and varied range of literary activities, special interest workshops and reading programs on all aspects of writing as well as the annual Byron Bay Writers Festival. Membership of the Northern Rivers Writers Centre is open to all individuals, non-profit organisations and corporations whose interests are in accordance with the objectives of the Centre.

Most of our members reside in the NSW Northern Rivers, but membership is open to all.

BECOME A MEMBER TODAY INDIVIDUAL

For individual writers, readers and anyone interested in literature and the arts.

Concession rates are available for concession cardholders and students with valid ID. $60 adult $50 pensioner concession $40 student concession

FAMILY

Family membership represents extraordinary value and is available for two adults and up to three children under 18 years from the same family.

The family receives one issue of northerly per edition and multiple discounts for workshops and festival tickets.

Postal Address _________________________________________________________ Male Female 7-16 17-30 31-45 46-64 65+ I identify as an Aboriginal or Torres Straight Islander I am from a non-English speaking background I do not want my details passed onto other arts organisations I am interested in volunteering at Northern Rivers Writers’ Centre I am interested in volunteering at Byron Bay Writers Festival

MEMBERSHIP CHOICE $60 Individual $50 Concession (Govt Pension cards only) CRN# $40 Student (requires ID) $90 Family $120 Organisation Eco Option: Enjoy all the usual NRWC benefits, but opt to receive your copy of northerly electronically (rather than a print copy), help care for the planet AND receive a $10 membership discount.

PAYMENT DETAILS Total Amount Payable $_______ Payment Method Cheque* Cash Mastercard Visa Card no. __________________________________ Expiry date ________/_________ Name on card _________________________ Signature ________________________ Send completed form and payment to: PO Box 1846, Byron Bay NSW 2481 *Please make cheques payable to Northern Rivers Writers’ Centre

For businesses, writers groups and arts organisations.

Each organisation receives five issues of northerly and reduced admission prices for five members per project or workshop. $120

$90

Organisation Name (if applicable) __________________________________________ First Name ______________________ Surname ______________________________ Phone ____________________________ Mobile _____________________________

Are you: Age:

ORGANISATION

MEMBERSHIP BENEFITS • northerly magazine posted every two months

• Access to resources and services from the Centre and guidance from Centre staff • Discounts on workshops, seminars, and Byron Bay Writers Festival tickets, as well as priority copy of Festival program and invitation to program launch • Access to a year-round mentorship program with industry professionals and the opportunity to apply to the annual Residential Membership • Borrowing rights to the Centre library and access to reference materials, wi-fi and reading area • Voting rights at AGM • Discounts at nominated local businesses and subscriber rates to NORPA shows All memberships are valid for 12 months from date of payment

JOIN ONLINE AT WWW.NRWC.ORG.AU OR CALL 02 6685 5115 FOR MORE INFORMATION