Final Draft - Great Conversations

Great Conversations features interviews with authors and writers, exploring books, writing and literary culture from Australia and the world.

Today's episode features Jock Serong discussing his new novel The Burning Island.

In 1830’s Sydney Eliza Grayling is something of an oddity; too tall, too old too sure of herself without a man to marry; she teaches unappreciative children and wonders what the world might have in store for a woman such as her.

When the merchant Srinivas appears in search of her father, Eliza is thrown into a world of old enmities and new perils. Guiding her now blind father aboard the ship Moonbird with its ragtag crew of misfits, Eliza embarks on a journey to discover and perhaps settle score with the mysterious figure of Mr Figge…

Join me as we discover Jock Serong’s The Burning Island

Books don’t just emerge fully formed on our bookshelves. Writing NSW is at the heart of our writing community providing support to writers across their careers through festivals, courses and opportunities to network. All that is at risk following a funding announcement by Create NSW that ends Writing NSW’s ongoing state funding. The funding slashes a third of Writing NSW budget at a time when Coronavirus restrictions have already shut down so many events and opportunities for writers.

Writing NSW CEO Jane McCredie joined Andrew to discuss these funding challenges and what they tell us about how the arts are valued in the community at large.

Great Conversations features interviews with authors and writers, exploring books, writing and literary culture from Australia and the world.

Today's episode features Georgina Young discussing her debut novel Loner.

Lona is stubborn, creative & wilful. She dropped out of uni because she’d rather be making art than handing in 2000 words on what art is in a world that would rather talk about the weather.

Understandably she’s often her own worst enemy, but if she can survive pushing trolleys for a living and DJing the under 12’s roller disco then just maybe she can figure the rest out too.

Join me as we discover Georgina Young’s Loner

Great Conversations features interviews with authors and writers, exploring books, writing and literary culture from Australia and the world.

Today's episode features Kate & Jol Temple discussing the third instalment in their Alice Toolie series The Battle of Book Week.

Everyone knows Book Week is the best week in the school year. Alice Toolie has secured the coveted title of library monitor and has some ingenious ideas for making it a spectacular event. But her best frenemy Jimmy simply won’t let her of easy. Alice has suspended his borrowing rights until Jimmy returns his overdue loans. Jimmy won;t let Alice trample all over his borrowing rights and decides to run against her for library monitor status. Who will prevail and will it steal the thunder of the not particularly famous authors coming to visit the school?!

Join me as we discover Kate & Jol Temple’s The Battle of Book Week

Great Conversations features interviews with authors and writers, exploring books, writing and literary culture from Australia and the world.

Today's episode features Ashley Kalagian Blunt discussing her memoir How to Be Australian.

Ashley Kalagian Blunt escaped the positively arctic climate of Winnipeg to study in Australia. How to be Australian is her journey to becoming an Australian citizen, trying to convince her partner Steve to pack up his life and move and figuring out what this country of strange noises and even stranger birds is all about. Ashley has penned an outsider’s view on life down that explores our history and our present and what it might mean to come to terms with them to become Australian.

Join me as we discover Ashley Kalagian Blunt’s How to be Australian.

Great Conversations features interviews with authors and writers, exploring books, writing and literary culture from Australia and the world.

Today's episode features Chistopher Raja discussing his memoir Into the Suburbs.

Christopher Raja was eleven years old when his mother and father moved the family from Calcutta to Melbourne in the 1980s. The contrast is immediate; from the densely populated streets of Calcutta he is transported to a world that is almost unbearably quiet. Where previously he had family surrounding him, not even his relatives keep to their manicured quarter acre blocks. In this new world Christopher must face down racism and discover new ways of being to make the suburbs of Melbourne into something he can call home.

Great Conversations features interviews with authors and writers, exploring books, writing and literary culture from Australia and the world.

Today's episode features Victoria Hannan discussing her debut novel Kokomo.

Victoria Hannan is a writer and photographer living in Melbourne. Kokomo, her first novel, was the winner of the 2019 Victorian Premier's Literary Award for an Unpublished Manuscript.

Mina has lived in London for seven years. Good job, nice apartment and then there’s Jack.

Mina’s mum Elaine hasn’t left the house for eleven years. Mina doesn’t like it. Maybe she even left for London to escape it. But that’s just the way things have been since her dad died.

That’s her life until a call arrives from Melbourne “Mina it’s your mum, she’s left the house”.

Great Conversations features interviews with authors and writers, exploring books, writing and literary culture from Australia and the world.

Today's episode features Karen Wyld discussing we live on, in story her story in the anthology After Australia.

After Australia offers a selection of twelve incredible Indigenous Writers and Writers of Colour including Ambellin Kwaymullina, Omar Sakr, Future D Fidel and Zoya Patel. Together they imagine Australia for 2050 and beyond.

Karen Wyld’s debut novel is 2013’s When Rosa Came Home. She is the winner of the 2020 Dorothy Hewitt award for an unpublished manuscript. She is the author of we live on, in story in the After Australia Anthology of speculative fiction.

We live on, in story chronicles generations of a family weaving through their history and into untold and deliberately forgotten stories...

Join me as we discover Karen Wyld's we live on, in story

Great Conversations features interviews with authors and writers, exploring books, writing and literary culture from Australia and the world.

Today's episode features Hannah Donnelly discussing her work in the anthology After Australia.

After Australia offers a selection of twelve incredible Indigenous Writers and Writers of Colour including Ambellin Kwaymullina, Karen Wyld, Omar Sakr, Future D Fidel and Zoya Patel. Together they imagine Australia for 2050 and beyond.

Great Conversations features interviews with authors and writers, exploring books, writing and literary culture from Australia and the world.

Today's episode features Khalid Warsame discussing his story in the anthology After Australia.

After Australia offers a selection of twelve incredible Indigenous Writers and Writers of Colour including Ambellin Kwaymullina, Karen Wyld, Omar Sakr, Future D Fidel and Zoya Patel. Together they imagine Australia for 2050 and beyond.

Khalid is a Melbourne based writer, editor, and arts producer. He’s a former fiction editor at the Lifted Brow and co-director of the National Young Writers Festival, and is also writing his first novel.

Khalid’s story in the anthology is List of Known Remedies. It’s a seemingly innocuous tale of friendship, relationships and a sick dog that hides a startling and sinister future…

Join me as we discover Khalid Warsame’s List of Known Remedies