Eating by the book – Gretchen Shirm

The Crying Room Launch

Come along to the launch of The Crying Room, at my local bookstore Ariel Books in Paddington, on Thursday, 6 July 2023. The Crying Room will be launched by the multi-talented, novelist and critic, James Bradley. There will be wine! Where: Ariel Booksellers, 326 Oxford Street, Paddington NSW 2021. When: 6 for 6.30pm on ThursdayContinue reading “The Crying Room Launch”

The Crying Room

The Crying Room movingly explores family boundaries and stories, finding original ways to express the contradictory experience of belonging to a family, and being an individual at the same time. When Bernie and her husband move to Ballina in coastal NSW, Bernie Rodgers finds that there is more than a physical distance separating her fromContinue reading “The Crying Room”

Start to Write

I will be teaching a ‘Start to Write’ course through Faber Academy at Allen & Unwin on 10, 11 and 12 November 2020. The course will run in the evening from 6.30pm to 8.30pm and will be offered online. For details and booking, visit the Faber Academy website here.

Helen Garner’s Collected Stories

Helen Garner’s Postcards from Surfers was a revelation to me when I started writing. The silences within her stories are so bold and radical, it really showed me that writing is as much about what is on the page as what’s left off it. The book also contains one of my favourite sentences ofContinue reading “Helen Garner’s Collected Stories”

My review of Nicole Krauss’s Forest Dark appeared in The Age and Sydney Morning Herald over the weekend and can be read, here. Reading Forest Dark, was one of the most disorientating experiences I’ve ever had reading a book. For much of the time, I found the book difficult to read, the prose leaden and quiteContinue reading

Review of Elizabeth Strout’s Anything Is Possible

I’ve always admired Elizabeth Strout’s writing. Olive Kitteridge was a huge influence on me as a writer and I thought it was a career defining book for her until she produced Anything Is Possible. I tried to sum up my thoughts about this book for The Australian, you can read my review here.

Where the Light Falls – Nominated for the Christina Stead Prize for Fiction in the NSW Premier’s Awards

I’m thrilled that my novel has been shortlisted for the Christina Stead Prize for Fiction in the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards. You can also vote for it or any of the other excellent shortlisted books in the NSW People’s Choice Award, here. NSW Premier’s Literary Awards, Judges’ comments: ‘Where the Light Falls is brimming with virtuosoContinue reading “Where the Light Falls – Nominated for the Christina Stead Prize for Fiction in the NSW Premier’s Awards”