Nicole Hayes is an author, speaker and writing teacher based in Melbourne. She has an MA in Creative Writing and runs writing workshops at different locations in and around Melbourne. Nicole’s first novel, The Whole of My World, was shortlisted in the 2014 Young Australian Best Book Awards (YABBA) and
This post is by Cathie Tasker, fiction editor and expert in children’s and picture books. When you’re creating your characters in your picture books, what do you need to consider? A lot of things about creating a character are obvious — they have names, they are a certain age, they
This post is by Cathie Tasker, fiction editor and expert in children’s and picture books. The Hungry Caterpillar. Hairy Maclary. The Gruffalo. All popular picture books. Not only do they mesmerise generations of young readers, they also inspire many adults to pen their own picture book. But it’s important to
Most aspiring authors looking to publish their manuscript traditionally can envisage a finish line with a publisher and a contract. But the path to that line is often arduous, which is where agents can help. After more than 25 years in the book industry, Melbourne-based Jacinta Di Mase started her
We love our presenters here at the Australian Writers’ Centre – all of them are either writers or industry experts, meaning you’re getting schooled by people who don’t just talk about the ‘biz’ – they’re out there in it. To illustrate this point, here are 10 of our presenters (that’s
Andy Griffiths is one of Australia’s most popular children’s authors, best known for the Treehouse series, the JUST! books, and the delightfully titled The Day My Bum Went Psycho. The 65-Storey Treehouse hit shelves in August 2015, to the great excitement of children everywhere. And amid this furious launching frenzy,
When journalist Penny Harrison made the switch to writing feature stories, little did she know it would lead to the publication of her first picture book. “I had been working as a local newspaper journalist for 10 years and was just thinking about returning to work after my first baby,”
In episode 58 of our popular So you want to be a writer podcast, Valerie Khoo interviewed Pamela Hart – the name behind the book The Soldier’s Wife, released this year. She also goes by the name Pamela Freeman – author of nearly 30 books and director of the creative writing faculty
Earlier this year, Allison Tait spoke with the delightful Lindsey Kelk – author of contemporary women’s fiction novels. She has sold more than 1.5 million books thank you very much. (You can hear the full interview here on episode 63 of our So you want to be a writer top rating
Brandon VanOver began his career in New York at the literary agency Curtis Brown on the switchboard before becoming an assistant to the legendary children’s book agent Marilyn E. Marlow. He then moved to Sydney and an opening eventually came up as an editorial assistant at Random House. He progressed through the ranks
Nicky Pellegrino was born in Liverpool but spent her childhood summers staying with family in southern Italy. So when Nicky started writing fiction, her memories of those summers came flooding back and flavoured her stories: the passions, the feuds but most of all the food. Nicky now lives in Auckland,
In a recent episode of our weekly writing inspiration and information podcast, So you want to be a writer, Allison Tait spoke with Suzanne O’Sullivan – associate publisher of children’s books at Hachette Australia. With the book world exploding with children’s and young adult fiction over the past decade, Suzanne
Recent winner of the 2015 Ned Kelly Award for her second crime novel, Eden (following up her 2014 win for first book Hades!), author Candice Fox sat down for a chat with Valerie Khoo earlier this year for our So you want to be a writer podcast. Candice is the
In a recent episode of our weekly podcast So you want to be a writer, Valerie chatted with author Nicole Hayes. Among the various questions were three we thought we’d share with you. (To listen to the interview in full, go here.) Why she chooses to write about teenagers in her books:
We interview some great thriller authors on our So you want to be a writer podcast – and they graciously let us into their world (and mind!). Luckily, Michael Robotham is far more pleasant than some of the scenarios he paints on his pages. Here’s one from the vault –
What’s most important in your writing is to get the reader to care – about the main character, the story, the idea. In fiction you don’t necessarily need to like the hero but you do need to care about him or her. That’s what keeps you turning the pages. After
If you’ve ever heard the term “someone who wears many hats” to describe a multi-skilled person, then you may need to be an expert milliner to fathom Matt Nable. Notably he has played top level rugby league for Manly and earned his keep as an actor in a number of high
We love this quote from a 2014 interview we did with author Kim Wilkins (who also writes as Kimberley Freeman). It’s such an important thing to remember in this ‘busy’ world we live in. Thanks Kim! “If you’ve ever found yourself waiting for five minutes somewhere, just five minutes, just
This post is by Pamela Freeman, author of more than 30 books and director of the creative writing faculty at the Australian Writers’ Centre. After a recent class where I discussed my ‘four-colour printing process’ approach to writing scenes, one of my students asked me to do a blog post
Author Sylvia Day has sold more than 16 million copies of her romance novels in just over a decade. But the story of how she first got published goes all the way back to her childhood… “I knew I wanted to be a romance novelist when I was 12. It
Connect with us
© Australian Writers' Centre | FAQs | Terms, conditions & privacy policy
