Writers Victoria works with a team of authors, editors and writing tutors to make sure your manuscript is read by someone with expertise in your area.
Amanda Martin
- General fiction (including romance, crime, etc.)
- Young adult fiction

Andrew Nette
Andrew Nette is an award-winning writer of fiction and non-fiction. He is the author of three novels, Ghost Money (2012), a crime story set in Cambodia in the mid-nineties, and two novels featuring his professional character Gary Chance, Gunshine State (2016) and Orphan Road (2023). He also co-edited Hard Labour (2012), an anthology of Australian short crime fiction, and LEE (2013), an anthology of fiction inspired by American cinema icon, Lee Marvin. His short fiction has appeared in various print and online publications. His short fiction has appeared in various print and online publications. He writes a regular newsletter under his own name on Substack.
Specialises in:
- Long and short form crime fiction
- True crime
- Non fiction work relating to cinema and popular culture

Camha Pham
Camha Pham is an accredited freelance editor based in Naarm/Melbourne, with over 10 years of experience in the publishing industry. She has worked in-house at Oxford University Press and Margaret River Press. As a freelancer, she has worked on copyediting and proofreading projects for publishers including Hachette, UQP, Hardie Grant, Affirm Press and Pantera Press, among others. She has sat on the Editorial Boards of Portside Review and Margaret River Press, and also works in the industry as a mentor and manuscript assessor.
Specialises in:
- Literary fiction
- General fiction
- Essay collections
- Short story collections
- Memoir

Cassandra White
Cassandra is an Australian YA writer living in France. She completed her Master of Creative Writing, Editing and Publishing at the University of Melbourne in 2015 and has worked as a freelance proofreader. She is a 2016 Grace Marion Wilson Glenfern Fellow, an alumni of the Djerassi YA Novel Writing Workshop, a judge for the 2016 and 2017 Aurealis Award Illustrated Works category, and a slush pile reader for Aurealis magazine. As well as being a PitchWars alum, Cassandra was a round 4 Author Mentor Match mentor. Her short fiction publications include Softcopy and The Victorian Writer More information can be found at cassfrances.com.
Specialises in:
- Young adult fiction, particularly fantasy, speculative and gothic
- General fantasy
- Gothic literary science fiction
- Speculative fiction

Cath Crowley
Cath Crowley is an internationally published author of young adult fiction. Her novels include The Gracie Faltrain trilogy, Chasing Charlie Duskin, Graffiti Moon, Words in Deep Blue and Take Three Girls, co–written with Fiona Wood and Simmone Howell. She has received the the Prime Minister’s Literary Award for Young Adult Fiction (2011 and 2017), The Gold Inky (2017), and The Children’s Book Council of Australia’s Book of the Year for Older Readers (2018).
Specialises in:
- Young adult fiction

Christie Nieman
Christie Nieman is an award-winning author and essayist currently researching her fourth novel as a State Library Victoria Creative Fellow. Her third novel, her first for an adult audience, is forthcoming and her second novel, for young adults, the literary gothic Where We Begin (Pan Macmillan 2020), won the Davitt Award for Best Young Adult Fiction, an Honour Book Award from the Children’s Book Council of Australia, and was shortlisted for both the Victorian and NSW Premier’s Literary Awards. She lives and works on Dja Dja Wurrung country.
Specialises in:
- Fiction
- Memoir
- Essays
- Publishing Submissions

Emma Cayley
Emma Cayley was formerly the editor at Writers Victoria and has a great deal of experience editing short fiction for publication. She is a fiction aficionado and especially loves thoughtful speculative fiction, edgy YA and middle-grade children’s adventure stories. In addition to her work at WV, Emma is a freelance editor and writer and has worked on a variety of texts, including fiction, non-fiction, illustrated monographs, educational texts, reference books, cookbooks and corporate publications.
Specialises in:
- Literary fiction
- Speculative fiction
- Young Adult and children’s fiction
- Short fiction and collections

Hoa Pham
Hoa Pham is the award-winning author of seven books and a play so far. Her first adult novel Vixen was awarded the Best Young Writer Award by the Sydney Morning Herald and shortlisted by the Aurealis Awards for the Best Fantasy Novel. Her book Wave has been translated into Vietnamese and sold in Vietnam. Silence, a play for three Vietnamese-Australian women, was on the VCE Drama List in 2010. She is also the founder of Peril, an Asian-Australian arts and culture online magazine. You can find out more about her at www.hoapham.net.
Specialises in:
- Adult and Young Adult fiction
- Fantasy fiction
- Magic realism
- Short stories

Josiane Behmoiras
Josiane Behmoiras is the author of Dora B: A Memoir of My Mother published in Australia, the UK, France and Germany, and shortlisted for the NSW Premier’s Award. The paperback edition was published as My Mother was a Bag Lady. Her short stories and essays have been published in Heat, Meanjin, Island, and elsewhere, including anthologies. She was the recipient of fellowships and grants, including Australian Council for the Arts and Varuna writers’ house. Josiane has taught creative writing at The University of Melbourne, where she completed a PhD on the topic of writing the future in times of accelerated reality. She considers the mentoring of fellow writers a privilege.
Specialises in:
- Memoir and biography
- Literary fiction
- Short stories
- Travel writing
- Personal essays

Kate Ryan
Kate Ryan writes fiction and non-fiction and has worked as an editor for publishing houses including Penguin and Lothian Books, as a manuscript assessor, writing mentor and writing teacher. Her work has appeared in publications including New Australian Writing 2, The Sleepers Almanac, Meanjin, Kill Your Darlings, Griffith Review, TEXT and Best Australian Stories (2016), and her children’s picture books were published by Penguin and Lothian. Kate’s short stories have been shortlisted for the Josephine Ulrick and Boroondara Literary Awards and longlisted for the Elizabeth Jolley Prize. She won the Writers’ Prize in the Melbourne Prize for Literature (2015) and in 2016 the novella category in the Lord Mayors Creative Writing Awards. She has a PhD in Creative Writing (La Trobe University, 2013). Her debut novel The Golden Book (Scribe) was published in 2021. Her second novel HOUSE explores the intersection between families, houses and emotion. Read more about Kate’s work at www.kateryanauthor.com
Specialises in:
- Adult fiction – literary and general
- Creative non fiction
- Essays
- Memoir
- Young adult and children’s fiction

Kirstyn McDermott
Kirstyn McDermott has been working in the darker alleyways of speculative fiction for much of her career. She is the author of two award-winning novels, Madigan Mine and Perfections, along with two collections of short fiction, Caution: Contains Small Parts and Hard Places. Her stories and poetry have been published in various magazines, journals and anthologies both within Australia and internationally, with her most recent work being Never Afters, a series of novellas that retell classic fairy tales. She also holds a PhD in creative writing with a research focus on re-visioned fairy tales.
Specialises in:
- General fiction
- Short Story
- Thriller
- Horror
- Gothic

Koraly Dimitriadis
Koraly Dimitriadis is a poet, writer and performer and the author of the poetry books Love and Fck Poems, Just Give Me The Pills and the short story collection, The Mother Must Die. Her opinion articles have been published widely including The Washington Post. www.koralydimitriadis.com
Specialises in:
- Experimental fiction and non-fiction writing
- Poetry

Laurent Boulanger
Laurent Boulanger is an award-winning novelist, scriptwriter and filmmaker. He writes both literary novels and genre fiction. His crime novel Better Dead Than Never was finalist at the 2006 CWAA’s awards. His literary novel The Girl From France won the 2014 Paris Book Festival Awards for Best E-book in all categories (all genres, five languages) and the 2014 eBook Award (#1 Gold) for Best Multicultural Fiction. The Novelist won the Grand Prize and the Best General Fiction at the 2016 Pacific Rim Book Festival. His screenplays have been selected for over 80 film festivals awards, and his films are distributed worldwide via Bounty Entertainment. Laurent has a PhD in Writing and has taught in the postgraduate writing program at Swinburne University since 2004 with a focus on journalism and scriptwriting.
Specialises in:
- Literary fiction
- Crime fiction
- Non-fiction
- Scriptwriting
- Journalism

Liz Kemp
Liz Kemp has spent most of her professional life in the publishing industry, most recently for a decade in the role of Operations Co-ordinator for the Children’s and Young Adult Department at Allen & Unwin. Prior to that she worked in a variety of administrative roles here and in the UK in all areas of the publishing industry, and at the State Library Victoria’s Centre for Youth Literature. She also operates a freelance manuscript assessment and editing business.
Specialises in:
- Young adult fiction
- Children’s fiction (picture books, chapter books, and Middle Grade fiction)
- Popular adult fiction
- Genre fiction – fantasy, science fiction, romance, crime

Lyndel Caffrey
Lyndel Caffrey is a Melbourne writer, historian, mentor and creative writing teacher. She works to help writers build a deeper understanding of the story they have to tell and how to tell it. Lyndel has been published by Southerly, Poetrix, Vignette Press and newmatilda.com, among others. Her novella Glad featured in Griffith Review 38. Her manuscript Gunclub was shortlisted for the 2015 Richell Prize. Lyndel has worked with Writers Victoria’s Writeability program since 2013.
Specialises in:
- Memoir and biography
- Family history
- General fiction
- Historical fiction
- Short story Poetry

Marie Alafaci
Marie Alafaci writes for adults as well as children and has been shortlisted for a number of fiction and non-fiction awards. She has had work on The Age best-sellers list and her most recent title, Zelda’s Big Adventure – a book about a chook who wants to be an astronaut – was a ‘Notable’ picture book in the CBCA Awards and was read by the wonderful Leigh Sales on Playschool. Her writing journey began in 1994 when she was handed a brochure for Holmesglen TAFE that listed the Diploma of Arts – Professional Writing and Editing. She decided then and there to throw in her corporate job and do the course. Fast forward 30 years and she is a full-time copywriter who, in her spare time, runs creative writing clinics, reviews children’s books and writes humorous speculative fiction. Her current work in progress is a humorous, feminist, crime space opera.
Specialises in:
- Picture book texts
- Young adult speculative fiction
- Narrative non-fiction

Myfanwy Jones
Myfanwy Jones is the author of Leap, shortlisted for the 2016 Miles Franklin Literary Award, and The Rainy Season, finalist for The Melbourne Prize for Literature’s Best Writing Award 2010. She also co-wrote, with Spiri Tsintziras, the bestselling Parlour Games for Modern Families, awarded ABIA Book of the Year for Older Children 2010. Her third novel, Cool Water, was published by Hachette in February 2024. Alongside her own practice, Myfanwy works as a manuscript assessor and writing mentor, and has a particular keenness for structure and the character of place. www.myfanwyajones.com

Rachel Ang
Rachel Ang is an artist and writer who makes comics. Their work has previously been published in international journals such as The New Yorker and kuš!, and Australian periodicals like The Age and Meanjin. Their first book, Swimsuit, was published by Glom Press in 2018, and won a Silver Ledger from the Comic Arts Awards of Australia. Their next book, titled I Ate The Whole World to Find You, will be published by Drawn and Quarterly (global) and Scribe (Australia/New Zealand) in 2025.
Specialises in:
- Graphic novels
- Graphic essays, using text and images

Rachel Flynn
Rachel Flynn has written numerous picture books and novels for children, several of which have been published internationally. She also writes short fiction and poetry for adults. Her writing is based on observations of society and relationships, exploring themes of balance and imbalance between adults and children, men and women and different generations. She has a PhD in Creative Writing.
Specialises in:
- Picture books
- Children’s novels
- Short stories for adults
- Poetry Research

Rachel Hennessy
Dr Rachel Hennessy is the award-winning author of five novels: The Quakers (2008), The Heaven I Swallowed (2013), River Stone (2019), Mountain Arrow (2020) and City Knife (2023). She is a Lecturer in Creative Writing at the University of Melbourne.
Specialises in:
- Novels
- Young adult
- Literary fiction
- Short stories
- Creative nonfiction

Ruth McIver
Ruth McIver is an award-winning crime writer born in Ireland, raised between Dublin, Perth and NYC. Her critically acclaimed literary crime thriller debut, I Shot the Devil, won the 2018 Richell Prize for emerging authors and an Affirm Press Mentorship Award. That same year, her first unpublished manuscript, Nothing Gold was runner up for the inaugural Banjo Awards and was included in Bloody Scotland’s Pitch Perfect. Ruth has worked as a reviewer, freelance journalist and completed a novel-in-verse as part of an Australian Poetry residency – The Sunset Club, which was highly commended in the Anne Elder category in 2014. She is also the author of Blackout (Audible Australia) and The Sound (2025) with Blackstone USA. She is represented by the boutique LA agency for bestselling international authors, The Story Factory. She has a PhD from Curtin University and works as a sessional academic, workshop facilitator and manuscript assessor.
Specialises in:
- Crime fiction
- Memoir (non-fiction)
- Horror
- Literary fiction
- Novel in verse

Sherryl Clark
Sherryl Clark writes adult crime fiction and books for young readers. She taught Professional Writing and Editing for 23 years, and now works as a part-time editor, for both independent authors and publishing companies. She teaches writing workshops and speaks at conferences. She also writes articles about writing/editing for Medium.
Specialises in:
- Middle grade fiction
- Young adult fiction
- Picture books
- Adult crime fiction/thrillers
- Adult women’s fiction

Shivaun Plozza
Shivaun Plozza’s critically acclaimed debut novel, Frankie, was nominated to ALA’s Best Fiction for Young Adults List, highly commended at the Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards, shortlisted for the CBCA Book of the Year Awards, and won the Davitt Award for best YA crime novel. Her second novel, Tin Heart, was nominated to ALA’s Best Fiction for Young Adults List and received starred reviews from Kirkus and Publishers Weekly. Shivaun’s most recent YA novel, The Worst Perfect Moment, received three starred reviews and sold into multiple territories. Shivaun’s middle grade debut, The Boy, the Wolf, and the Stars, was a JLG selection. She has written three other middle grade novels: A Reluctant Witch’s Guide to Magic, Meet Me at the Moon Tree and her latest, Summer of Shipwrecks. Shivaun lives in Geelong with her cat, Fenchurch.
Specialises in:
- Young adult fiction (all genres)
- Middle grade fiction (all genres)

Sumudu Narayana
Sumudu is a freelance editor, beta reader and general book addict. Sumudu is passionate about words and the power of stories in our lives, and is strongly committed to preserving a writer’s style, voice, and creative insight in all projects she works on. Sumudu has a background in biomedical science and has a PhD in Biological Sciences. She specialises in literary fiction, romance, YA, fantasy, and crime, with interests in general and historical fiction.
Specialises in:
- Adult fiction
- Young adult fiction
- Fantasy
- Historical fiction
- Crime

- Amanda Martin
- Andrew Nette
- Camha Pham
- Cassandra White
- Cath Crowley
- Christie Nieman
- Emma Cayley
- Hoa Pham
- Josiane Behmoiras
- Kate Ryan
- Kirstyn McDermott
- Koraly Dimitriadis
- Laurent Boulanger
- Liz Kemp
- Lyndel Caffrey
- Marie Alafaci
- Myfanwy Jones
- Rachel Ang
- Rachel Flynn
- Rachel Hennessy
- Ruth McIver
- Sherryl Clark
- Shivaun Plozza
- Sumudu Narayana