The First Time

This episode our featured book is brought to you by Allen and Unwin and we are delighted to be talking to Heather Rose about her memoir of loss and discovery, NOTHING BAD EVER HAPPENS HERE.

Heather Rose is the Australian author of eight novels, writing for both adults and children. Her books have been shortlisted, long-listed or won awards for literary fiction, crime fiction, fantasy/ sci fi and children’s literature. Her seventh novel - The Museum of Modern Love - won the 2017 Stella Prize and the Christina Stead Prize and her most recent, Bruny won the ABIA Fiction Book of the Year. Heather lives by the sea in Tasmania.

Check out show notes for this episode on our website www.thefirsttimepodcast.com or get in touch via Twitter (@thefirsttimepod) or Instagram (@thefirsttimepod).

Don't forget you can support us and the making of Season Five via our Patreon page. Thanks for joining us!

Our first international recording! Kate is logging on from the Michael King writers centre (i.e. her New Zealand residency) and has been walking up volcanos, writing in her journal and doing *some* work on her forthcoming book. Meanwhile Katherine is Melbourne and it is wet. It has been wet forever.

Lots of great things to read / watch / listen to including
* Returning to Adelaide by Anne Freeman
* Seeing Other People by Diana Reid
* Where Shall We Begin (podcast) by Esther Perele
* Thrust by Lidia Yuknavitch
* Bad Sisters (Netflix)
* George Saunders Substack 
   
This episode our featured book segment is brought to you by Affirm Press and we are delighted to be talking to Sean Wilson about his debut novel GEMINI FALLS.

Sean Wilson is a writer, playwright and communications professional from Perth, Western Australia. His short stories have been published in Australian and international journals, anthologies and literary magazines including Island and Narrative, and he was previously shortlisted for the Patrick White Playwrights Award by Sydney Theatre Company. He now lives in Melbourne with his fiancée. Gemini Falls is his first book.

Check out show notes for this episode on our website www.thefirsttimepodcast.com or get in touch via Twitter (@thefirsttimepod) or Instagram (@thefirsttimepod).

Don't forget you can support us and the making of Season Five via our Patreon page. Thanks for joining us!

In this episode Katherine speaks to Dervla McTiernan how her writing life began, the importance of setting in crime writing, good vs bad, and all the stuff -- from Plottr to Scrivener and Goodnotes -- she uses to write. Enjoy! 

Award-winning, number one bestseller Dervla McTiernan has established herself as one of the biggest names in crime fiction. Her books have garnered critical acclaim around the world and sold over 400,000 copies in Australia and New Zealand alone.

Dervla’s book include The Ruin, The Scholar and The Good Turn (all part of the Cormac Reilly detective series). Her most recent book is The Murder Rule.

Dervla spent twelve years working as a lawyer. Following the global financial crisis, she moved from Ireland to Australia and turned her hand to writing. Dervla is a member of the Sisters in Crime and Crime Writers Association, and lives in Perth, Australia, with her husband and two children.

Check out show notes for this episode on our website www.thefirsttimepodcast.com or get in touch via Twitter (@thefirsttimepod) or Instagram (@thefirsttimepod).

Don't forget you can support us and the making of Season Five via our Patreon page. Thanks for joining us!

Kate is about to head off to NZ for a long awaited residency (via Varuna the Writers House) and Katherine is making comics -- check out her 100 day challenge via Insta). The hosts talk data, creativity and what the best selling book of all time is (it might surprise you!). Lots of mentions this ep, including: 

The Chronology of Water by Lidia Yuknavich 

Out of Breath by Anna Snoekstra 

Writing NSW YouTube 

The Palace Papers by Tina Brown 

Lucy by the Sea by Elizabeth Strout

Reasons Not to Worry by Brigid Delaney

The Settlement by Jock Serrong 

Leaf Bookshop YouTube book reviews 

This episode our featured book segment is brought to you by Hardie Grant and we are delighted to be talking to Jayne Tuttle about her second work of literary auto-fiction MY SWEET GUILLOTINE (2022). 

Jayne Tuttle's first book was Paris or Die (2019). Paris or Die was developed into a solo theatre show with director John Bolton and performed in 2021 and 2022 in a variety of venues including La Mama in Melbourne. 
Jayne graduated from the Lecoq theatre school in 2006 and went on to live and work in France as an actor, voice-over artist, playwright, translator and bilingual copywriter.
Jayne was awarded the Eric Dark Flagship Fellowship in 2021 from the Varuna Writer’s House.

Check out show notes for this episode on our website www.thefirsttimepodcast.com or get in touch via Twitter (@thefirsttimepod) or Instagram (@thefirsttimepod).

Don't forget you can support us and the making of Season Five via our Patreon page. Thanks for joining us!

In this episode Kate speaks with best selling and award winning Australian author and television presenter, Holly Ringland, about her creative process, writing through fear and grief, the road to publication for her debut novel The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart and the writing of her new novel The Seven Skins of Esther Wilding. 

Holly Ringland is the author of the international bestseller The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart, which has been translated into thirty-one languages and is being adapted into a seven-part TV series starring Sigourney Weaver and produced by Amazon Prime and Bruna Papandrea's Made Up Stories. It will screen in more than 240 countries and territories in 2023. In 2019, The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart won the Australian Book Industry Award General Fiction Book of the Year. In 2021, Holly co-hosted an eight-episode ABC TV series, Back to Nature, alongside Aaron Pedersen and wrote her latest novel from her vintage caravan writing studio, Frenchie.

Check out show notes for this episode on our website www.thefirsttimepodcast.com or get in touch via Twitter (@thefirsttimepod) or Instagram (@thefirsttimepod).

Don't forget you can support us and the making of Season Five via our Patreon page. Thanks for joining us!

This special bonus episode was recorded with Ben Hunter from Booktopia's 'Tell Me What to Read' podcast. Ben, Kate and Katherine review and recommend some of their favourite debut reads from this year. (It's by no means a definitive list!) 

Books mentioned include: 

Son of Sin by Omar Sakr | 

Only a Monster by Vanessa Len |
Sunbathing by Isobel Beech |
Everything Feels Like the End of the World by Else Fitzgerald |
Found, Wanting by Natasha Sholl |
Every Version of You by Grace Chan |
The Whitewash by Siang Lu |
The Natural History of Love by Caroline Petit |
The Furies by Mandy Beaumont |
All That's Left Unsaid by Tracey Lien |
Wake by Shelley Burr |
Denizen by James McKenzie Watson |
Dirt Town by Hayley Scrivenor |
The Torrent by Dinuka McKenzie |
Banjawarn by Josh Kemp |
Show Me Where it Hurts by Kylie Maslen |
Ruth & Pen by Emilie Pine |
Hovering by Rhett Davis |
Gemini Falls by Sean Wilson |
The Upwelling by Lystra Rose |
Check out show notes for this episode on our website www.thefirsttimepodcast.com or get in touch via Twitter (@thefirsttimepod) or Instagram (@thefirsttimepod).

Subscribe to Tell Me What to Read wherever you get our podcasts (links here), join the Facebook group or follow on Insta or Twitter. 

Don't forget you can support us and the making of Season Five via our Patreon page. Thanks for joining us!

Kate and Katherine catch up -- It's school holidays which means no writing is getting done but there's lots of reading and listening and general book talk. Katherine's obsessed with life coaches, maybe Kate will be too soon? The hosts talk academics and serendipity and The Artists Way gets mentioned for oh about the hundredth time. Enjoy! 

Today our featured book segment is brought to you by Scribner and we are delighted to be talking to Anne Casey Hardy about her new collection of stories CAUTIONARY TALES FOR EXCITABLE GIRLS.

Anne Casey-Hardy was born in Fremantle and grew up in Melbourne as the eldest of seven children. She won the 2018 Peter Carey Short Story Award, was shortlisted for the 2019 VU/Overland Short Story Prize and was awarded a 2021 Varuna Residential Fellowship. Her short stories and poetry have been published in Meanjin Quarterly, Island Magazine, Overland Journal, Westerly Magazine and several anthologies.

Check out show notes for this episode on our website www.thefirsttimepodcast.com or get in touch via Twitter (@thefirsttimepod) or Instagram (@thefirsttimepod).

Don't forget you can support us and the making of Season Five via our Patreon page. Thanks for joining us!

In this episode Kate speaks with internationally acclaimed Australian author, Margo Lanagan about her writing career in which she has written a formidable number of award winning titles spanning children's lit, YA, fantasy, realism and speculative fiction and including the short story collection Black Juice, the novel Tender Morsels and the NYT bestselling Zeroes trilogy with Scott Westerfeld and Deborah Biancotti.

Margo has been a judge of the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards and the Australian–Vogel’s Literary Award. She served on the Literature Board of the Australia Council for the Arts for three years. She has been an instructor at six residential Clarion workshops, in Brisbane, Seattle and (with Maureen F. McHugh) San Diego. She has also conducted numerous creative writing workshops both for school groups and for adult writers.

In this conversation Lanagan discusses playing with language, the hierarchy of lit stripes, scrapbooking, what to do when a novel falls apart in your hands and so much more.

Check out the full transcript of the interview and show notes for this episode on our website www.thefirsttimepodcast.com or get in touch via Twitter (@thefirsttimepod) or Instagram (@thefirsttimepod).

Don't forget you can support us and the making of Season Five via our Patreon page. Thanks for joining us!

Kate and Katherine Catch Up PLUS Featured Book CUT by Susan White

Kate has been gadding about at Melbourne Writers Festival, Katherine is still waiting to hear back re her MG novel and they have an epic number of reading and listening recommendations. Diaries, upcoming events, a desperate plea to get a contact for the Duffer Brothers...it's a full ep.

This episode's featured book segment is brought to you by AFFIRM PRESS and we talk to Susan White about her new novel (and first for adults) CUT, how her time as a doctor in hospitals informed the exploration of misogyny and sexism in her novel and the writing advice she loves most.

Check out show notes for this episode on our website www.thefirsttimepodcast.com or get in touch via Twitter (@thefirsttimepod) or Instagram (@thefirsttimepod).

Don't forget you can support us and the making of Season Five via our Patreon page. Thanks for joining us!

Kate has been gadding about at Melbourne Writers Festival, Katherine is still waiting to hear back re her MG novel and they have an epic number of reading and listening recommendations. Diaries, writing facebook groups, upcoming events, a desperate plea to get a contact for the Duffer Brothers...it's a full ep. 

This episode's featured book segment is brought to you by AFFIRM PRESS and we talk to Susan White about her new novel (and first for adults) CUT, how her time as a doctor in hospitals informed the exploration of misogyny and sexism in her novel and the writing advice she loves most.

Check out show notes for this episode on our website www.thefirsttimepodcast.com or get in touch via Twitter (@thefirsttimepod) or Instagram (@thefirsttimepod).

Don't forget you can support us and the making of Season Five via our Patreon page. Thanks for joining us!