Current project: Afterdark.
Initial development supported by the Victorian Government’s Sustaining Creative Workers Program through Creative Victoria and Regional Arts Victoria (funded period: 20 December 2021 to 20 April 2022).

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Broken Rules and Other Stories. Transit Lounge, 1 September 2020. RRP $29.99. Trade Paperback 240pp. ISBN: 9781925760552.

Shortlisted in the 2021 Queensland Literary Awards, for the University of Southern Queensland Steele Rudd Award for a Short Story Collection.

The book is supported by the Victorian Government through Creative Victoria and by a fellowship from Varuna, the National Writers’ House. It is listed by The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald in ‘The books to read in 2020’. An advance review in Books+Publishing calls it an ‘accomplished debut’. An early review appeared in The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald on Saturday 27 June 2020. Other reviews, including those in Westerly, Australian Book Review, and The Weekend Australian, are available here.

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My short stories are published in Australia, the UK, and the USA, and have been recognised in awards including the Overland Victoria University Short Story Prize, the inaugural City Of Melbourne Lord Mayor’s Creative Writing Awards, the Bridport Prize, and The Age Short Story Award. Publications include American Writers Review, Tincture Journal, Dazed, The Bridport Prize Anthology, Roomers, 21D, and Award Winning Australian Writing. Interrupter, published in pocketbook format by In Short Publishing Co., was dramatised in 2018 on Vision Australia Radio’s weekly literary program Cover To Cover.

I write pieces of very short fiction for the web-log section of this website.

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Professional memberships and affiliations:

Alumni Association of Varuna, the National Writers’ House;
Elwood Writers;
Roomers Project – an initiative for residents and former residents of rooming houses, private hotels and supported accommodation;
Fundación César Egido Serrano and the Museo de la Palabra, Ambassador of the Word.

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Publications:

20 Artists Issue 4 | Handwritten, inaugural literary edition – 1 December 2023

American Writers Review 2023 | Captured in a Moment…(Blink) (San Fedele Press)

Working Writer Mar/Apr 2023 (Vol. 25 No. 2): ‘A Writing Framework’

BookBub Partners Blog | 5 January 2023: Goals for the New Year: Ideas and Advice from 52 Authors (number 33)

American Writers Review 2022 | The End or the Beginning? (San Fedele Press): ‘Half Life’

Island: ‘Fisher Girls’ published 5 November 2021

‘How to Maintain a Thriving Writers Group’, a guest blog post on The Writer Laid Bare at Lee Kofman’s website, published 19 October 2021

American Writers Review 2021: Turmoil and Recovery (San Fedele Press); ‘Glassy’, ‘Afterdark’, and ‘First Day Of Summer’.

Broken Rules and Other Stories (Transit Lounge, 1 September 2020)

Every Second Tuesday | Stories by Elwood Writers (Rightword Enterprises, November 2020)

Roomers #67 Summer 2020: Will the real news please stand up?

Roomers #66, Winter 2019: Reading, WRiting and Roomers

American Writers Review, Summer 2019 (San Fedele Press). Available from Amazon.

Roomers #65, Summer 2018: That was then, this is now

Roomers #64, Winter 2018: Done to Death

American Writers Review, Summer 2018 (San Fedele Press). Available from Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Roomers #63, Summer 2018: What’s your superpower?

Tincture Journal Issue Twenty (Tincture), 1 December 2017. Current and previous issues of Tincture Journal are available from the website or the Kobo and Google Play bookstores.

Contributor to PILOT 2018: A Diary for Writers (Pilot Press)

Roomers #62, Autumn/Winter 2017: There’s Something Living in My Ear

2016 – Featured in Star Weekly newspaper: ‘Tangled webs rewoven’ in January 13 print and online editions.

Written contribution to Walking the Hills | Malcolm Ashman and Inger Karthum; an exhibition at Bath Contemporary (now Axle Arts), 7th – 29th October 2016

Overland 221, Summer 2015

Roomers #59, Spring/Summer 2015: Music

Interrupter (In Short Publishing, Australia) 2015

Star Observer, October 2015

2015 – Commissioned by HERO Magazine, London, to write a themed short-story for issue 13 of the magazine

Spring/Summer 2014 issue of Dazed (London, UK), and online at Dazed Digital

Bridport Prize Anthology 2013 (Redcliffe Press Ltd, UK)

2011 – Longlisted for The Big Issue Fiction Edition (Ed#388)

Award Winning Australian Writing 2010 (Melbourne Books, Australia)

The Sleepers Almanac No. 6 (Sleepers Publishing, Australia)

21D – Street (21D, Australia)

21D Anthology I (21D, Australia; Smashwords)

21D Short 3 (21D, Australia; Smashwords)

Victorian Writer (Writers Victoria) May–June 2011

Melbourne News May and June 2011

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Awards:

2021: Queensland Literary Awards, Broken Rules and Other Stories (Transit Lounge) shortlisted for the University of Southern Queensland Steele Rudd Award for a Short Story Collection.

2015: Winner, Overland Victoria University Short Story Prize (announced 6th November). ‘Their cruel routines’ was described by the judges as “exceptional and unnerving”. Read the full judges’ report here.

2015: Finalist and Diploma Award winner, IV Edition of the Museo de la Palabra Flash Fiction Competition (October). There were 13 finalists from 35,609 stories entered from 149 countries. The first prize was $20,000.

2014: Winner, Dazed Short Story Competition. Winning story published in Spring/Summer 2014 issue of Dazed, and online at Dazed Digital.

2013: Prizewinner, Bridport Prize International Writing Competition. “Mention the Bridport Prize and the eyes of writers everywhere light up. It’s not just the money – though that’s not to be sneezed at – it’s a prize really worth fighting for in terms of prestige and genuine literary accomplishment” – Fay Weldon CBE, patron of the Bridport Prize

2010: Highly Commended, The Age Short Story Award

2009: Winner, Short Story and Lord Mayor’s Award in the inaugural Melbourne Lord Mayor’s Creative Writing Awards. The Lord Mayor’s Creative Writing Awards are an initiative to celebrate and strengthen Melbourne’s status as a UNESCO City of Literature

2009: Special commendation, Manchester Fiction Prize

2007: Award-winner, CAE Short Story Competition

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Professional events:

2023: Literary Soiree, Melbourne | invited with Helen McDonald to represent Elwood Writers by Margaret McCaffrey (2 December 2023) | read short fiction ‘Cupcakes’ and ‘The Writer’

2023: Writing retreat, Katoomba, Blue Mountains NSW | 9 to 16 October 2023

2022: Writing retreat, Katoomba, Blue Mountains NSW | 5 to 12 September 2022

2021: Australian Short Story Festival, panel sessions ‘Masculinity’ and ‘Writing the Family’. Full program here. 2021 writers here.

2020: One of the five judges in this year’s Lord Mayor’s Creative Writing Awards. The awards aim to support and give recognition to unpublished Victorian writers, strengthen Melbourne’s status as a UNESCO City of Literature, and promote the City of Melbourne and its libraries as a place of ideas and creativity.

23 November 2020: International Day of the Word | Ambassador of the Word, Fundación César Egido Serrano and the Museo de la Palabra.

25 Aug 2018: A night of literary readings at St Kilda Library with Elwood Writers. I read The Birthday and The House In The Sky.

14 Aug 2018: Delivered a micro-fiction workshop for the Roomers creative writing group.

Flash! Co-facilitated two flash fiction workshops with Melissa Goode at this year’s Sydney Writers’ Festival. Saturday 28th April 2018 at Varuna, the National Writers House, Katoomba, NSW.

2018: Alumni residency at Varuna, the National Writers House, Katoomba, NSW (23rd to 28th April).

2017: Alumni residency at Varuna, the National Writers House, Katoomba, NSW (9th to 16th October).

2016 to 2017: Publisher Introduction Program Fellowship at Varuna, the National Writers House. Included a week’s residency at Varuna from 22nd to 29th August 2016.

2013: Shortlisted for the inaugural Writers Victoria Templeberg Residential Writing Fellowship, Sri Lanka.

2011: Invited to perform ‘Larry’s Way’ at the State Library of Victoria, as part of the Summer Reads event.

2007: Volunteer, Melbourne Writers Festival.

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Radio:

Cover to Cover episode 472, broadcast on 12 May 2023, repeated 14 May, featuring ‘The Americans’ and the story behind the story

Cover to Cover 15 April 2022 (repeated 17 April), Vision Australia Radio: ‘A Standard Night’ (part of Elwood Writers dedicated program, theme: Adelaide)

Cover to Cover: a celebration of the launch of the Elwood Writers anthology Every Second Tuesday | broadcast 11 December 2020, repeated 13 December. My stories ‘The Longstanding Arrangement’ and ‘Tongue’ were read by Tim McQueen

6 November 2020 (repeated 8 November): ‘Playful Arrangements’ and ‘Broken Rules’, both from Broken Rules and Other Stories, read by Tim McQueen on Cover to Cover, Vision Australia Radio.

23 October 2020 (repeated 25 October): ‘Their Cruel Routines’ and ‘The Americans’, both from Broken Rules and Other Stories, read by Tim McQueen on Cover to Cover, Vision Australia Radio.

1 October 2020: interview, Published…Or Not, 3CR.

18 September 2020 (repeated 20 September): ‘Careering’ from Broken Rules and Other Stories read by Tim McQueen on Cover to Cover, Vision Australia Radio.

10 July 2020 (repeated 12 July): a rebroadcast of last year’s ‘Winter‘ on Cover to Cover, Vision Australia Radio, featuring stories written, and in some cases read on air, by Elwood Writers.

12 July 2019 (repeated 14 July): Elwood Writers featured in ‘Winter’, a themed edition of Vision Australia Radio’s weekly literary program Cover to Cover.

9 November 2018: The work of Elwood Writers featured in the Cover to Cover Armistice Day Centenary Special on Vision Australia Radio in November. Broadcast Friday 9 November, repeated Sunday 11 November. Podcast available here.

Friday 2 November 2018 (repeated Sunday 4 October): The House In The Sky was read by Tim McQueen on Cover to Cover, Vision Australia Radio. Podcast available here.

Friday 5 October 2018 (repeated Sunday 7 October): ‘The Birthday’ was read by Mike Cannon on Cover to Cover, Vision Australia Radio. Available in a podcast, here.

The short story Interrupter was dramatised and broadcast on Vision Australia Radio’s Cover to Cover program on 6th April 2018, repeated 8th April 2018. The program is available as a podcast here.

2018: the January 26th edition of Cover to Cover on Vision Australia Radio featured the work of Elwood Writers in a Back To School program. The program was repeated and is available as podcast.

2017: Elwood Writers created the material for the Father’s Day Cover to Cover program on Vision Australia Radio. The program was broadcast on Friday 1 September, and repeated on Sunday 3 September. The podcast is available here.

2016: Elwood Writers created the material in the Mother’s Day Cover to Cover program on Vision Australia Radio. The podcast is available here.

2015: ‘Nothing’, ‘Pastel’, and ‘Henry’ read on Cover to Cover on Vision Australia Radio (16th and 20th August).

2015: ‘The Hot Spell’ was read on Cover to Cover on Vision Australia Radio(11th and 15th January) in an hour-long program of material developed by the Elwood Writers. The program was repeated on 31st December as part of a Best Of Cover To Cover series.

2014: ‘The first buyer’ was read on Cover to Cover on Vision Australia Radio (7th and 11th September).

2011: ‘Randy’was read on The Fiction Room on Vision Australia Radio (7 August).