Last year, I wrote my first-ever funny story for publication in Total Quack Up Again, an anthology of funny stories in support of Dymock's Children's Charities. Regular readers might remember this post about the experience. One of the editors of the anthology was...
About 200 episodes of So You Want To Be A Writer podcast ago, I created this lovely little round-up of insightful interviews with Australian children's and YA authors. I have decided that it's high time for an update*. If you're hoping to be a published children's or...
In case you missed it, the latest round of #writeabookwithal is over and I have finished the first draft of my latest manuscript. It is, brace yourselves, the 15th first draft fiction manuscript that I have written. Fifteenth. Four were written before my first...
Last week I found myself compiling a list of books about writing for a young writer I know. She's 15, enthusiastic, stymied by the parameters of writing for school assignments, hungry for information, encouragement and advice. I tried to give her book suggestions that...
After a lot of hard work from a lot of people, my online creative writing course for kids is now open for bookings through the Australian Writers' Centre! So much goes into creating a course like this, from developing the course content, to creating each module, to...
If you've listened to the So You Want To Be A Writer podcast recently, you'll know two things about me: video is not my happy place, and I've recently created a new creative writing course for kids for the Australian Writers Centre. These two things came together in a...
To celebrate entering my 10th year of author blogging - which makes me pretty much a centenarian in blog years - I thought I'd rustle up my top three tips specifically for author bloggers. Author blog tip #1: Work out why you're blogging It took me about five...
There's nothing quite like the experience of having your first novel appear on bookshop shelves. And nothing quite like the learning curve involved in getting the book there in the first place. Today, I'm pleased to welcome debut author Louise Allan to my blog, to...
When I asked Australian children's author Tim Harris to write me a post for kids who love to write, there was no question of the topic: remarkable characters. Tim's latest book, Mr Bambuckle's Remarkables, features a fabulous cast of characters and there's no doubt...
