Meet bestselling author and screenwriter Christian White on his novel The Ledge and writing the Netflix hit Clickbait, his writing process, and his transition from books to screenwriting, including his work on TV shows like Clickbait and Apartment 7A.
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01:46 Nat Newman's writing tip
02:41 Nat's creative writing journey
04:34 The importance of elevator pitches
09:07 Win: Cherrywood by Jock Serong
11:20 Word of the week: Panoply
14:01 Interview with Christian White, author of The Ledge
31:43 The journey to Clickbait
33:15 Balancing success and stress
35:16 Appreciating the moment
36:11 From Clickbait to Apartment 7A
41:36 The collaborative process
45:43 Balancing writing and family life
55:30 Tips for aspiring writers
01:01:29 Conclusion
Links mentioned in this episode
- WIN Cherrywood by Jock Serong
- Buy So You Want to be a Writer – the book!
- Facebook group for So You Want to be a Writer
Writer in residence: Christian White
Christian White is an Australian author, screenwriter and producer. His debut novel, The Nowhere Child, won the 2017 Wheeler Centre Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for Best Unpublished Manuscript. Since publication The Nowhere Child has been shortlisted for major awards including the Australian Book Industry Awards’ General Fiction Book of the Year and Matt Richell Award for New Writer of the Year, and the Indie Book Awards’ Debut Fiction Book of the Year. Rights to The Nowhere Child have been sold in 17 international territories, and acquired for a major screen deal.
His second novel, The Wife and the Widow, was released in September 2019 in Australia and January 2020 in the US. It became an instant bestseller and won the 2020 Ned Kelly Award for Best Crime Fiction.
Christian’s third novel, Wild Place, was published on October 26, 2021.
Christian co-created the television series Clickbait, with Tony Ayres (The Slap), which went straight to number 1 on Netflix in 41 countries, including Australia, the US and the UK.
Christian has recently co-written Apartment 7A (with Natalie Erika James), a psychological thriller for Paramount Pictures, and co-wrote the feature film Relic, a horror/drama starring Emily Mortimer, Bella Heathcote and Robyn Nevin, which premiered at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival and was nominated for an AWGIE award for Best Feature Film at the 2019 Australian Writer’s Guild Awards.
Christian has also authored an audio novella for Audible and co-authored two more with his wife, Summer DeRoche.
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This podcast is brought to you by the Australian Writers' Centre and our course Freelance Writing Stage 1.
Find out more about your host, Valerie Khoo (@valeriekhoo on Twitter and @valeriekhoo on Instagram).