Our Tutors

Writing Your Relationships in Memoir and Creative Non‑Fiction

Alexandra Collier is an award-winning Melbourne writer who has written for theatre, screen and print. Her memoir Inconceivable: Heartbreak, Bad Dates and Finding Solo Motherhood about her journey to becoming a solo mum by choice was recently published by Hachette. She is currently a writer on the new ABC/BBC detective series Return to Paradise. Alexandra lived and worked in New York for a decade where her plays were produced Off Broadway. She has written for  a range of mediums and people, including Esther Perel, Showtime (TV network),  The Guardian, The Age/Sydney Morning Herald, Harper’s Bazaar and Mamamia. She is a MacDowell fellow, a winner of the RE Ross Trust Playwrights Award and a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize.  

Crime Writing Masterclass: Editing Your Crime Novel

Anna Snoekstra is an award-winning author and screenwriter. She is the author of Only Daughter, Little Secrets and The Spite Game. Her novels have been published in over twenty countries and sixteen languages. She has written for Meanjin, KYD, Lindsay, SMH, LitHub, The Griffith Review and is a profile writer for The Saturday Paper. Her most recent novel is Out of Breath (2022) and in 2023 she released her first audio drama This Isn’t Happening. 

https://www.annasnoekstra.com/

The Story of Your Life: Making Magic Through Memoir

Anna Spargo-Ryan is the author of A Kind of Magic, The Gulf and The Paper House. She was the inaugural winner of The Horne Prize and is the current non-fiction editor at Island magazine.

https://blog.annaspargoryan.com/

Let’s Talk About… Publishing Poetry

Anne-Marie Te Whiu is an Australian-born Māori who belongs to the Te Rarawa iwi in Hokianga, Aotearoa NZ. She is a cultural producer and festival director, editor, weaver and poet. She has been awarded residencies and fellowships and her writing has been published broadly across so- called Australia and Aotearoa NZ. Her debut poetry collection, Mettle, will be published by UQP in 2025.

Let’s Talk About… Publishing Your First Book

Ashley Goldberg is a writer from Melbourne, Australia. His stories have appeared in Meanjin, New Australian Fiction 2021 and Award-Winning Australian Writing among others. His work has been longlisted for the Commonwealth Short Story Prize and the Galley Beggar Press Short Story Prize. His debut novel, Abomination, was published by Penguin Random House Australia in 2022 and won the Debut Fiction Prize at the National Jewish Book Awards in 2023 (USA). 

www.ashley-goldberg.com

Clinic Workshop: Drafting a Poem

Clinic Feedback Rounds: Poetry

Autumn Royal creates drama, poetry and criticism on unceded Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung land. Autumn is an arts worker, sessional academic and the Interviews Editor at Cordite Poetry Review. Her poetry collections include She Woke and Rose, Liquidation and The Drama Student, which was shortlisted for the 2023 Queensland Premier’s Judith Wright Calanthe Award. The Drama Student (Giramondo) was also shortlisted for the 2024 Prime Minister’s Literary Awards.

On-Demand Webinar – The Craft of Structure

Cate Kennedy is the author of the highly acclaimed novel The World Beneath, which won the People’s Choice Award in the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards in 2010. She is an award-winning short-story writer whose work has been published widely. Her first collection, Dark Roots, was shortlisted for the Steele Rudd Award in the Queensland Premier’s Literary Awards and for the Australian Literature Society Gold Medal. She is also the author of a travel memoir, Sing, and Don’t Cry, and the poetry collections Joyflight, Signs of Other Fires and The Taste of River Water, which won the Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for Poetry in 2011. She lives on a secluded bend of the Broken River in north-east Victoria.

On-Demand Webinar – Introduction to Point of View

Claire G. Coleman is a Noongar woman whose family have belonged to the south coast of Western Australia since long before history started being recorded. She writes fiction, essays, poetry and art criticism while either living in Naarm (Melbourne) or on the road. During an extended circuit of the continent she wrote a novel, influenced by certain experiences gained on the road. She has since won a Black&Write! Indigenous Writing Fellowship for that novel, Terra Nullius. Terra Nullius was published in Australia by Hachette Australia and in North America by Small Beer Press. Claire’s second Novel, The Old Lie, was written in response to what she learned when traveling and was published in 2019 by Hachette Australia. Lies, Damned Lies, Claire’s first non-fiction book, unpacking the effects of the history of Australia’s colonisation, was released in 2021. Since mid-2020 Claire has been a member of the cultural advisory committee for Agency, a Not-for-profit Indigenous arts Consultancy (https://agencyprojects.org/).

https://clairegcoleman.com/

Let’s Talk About… Publishing Poetry

Dan Hogan (they/them) is the author of Secret Third Thing, which won the Five Islands Prize and was named one of the ‘best 25 Australian books of 2023’ by The Guardian. Dan’s poetry has been recognised by the Peter Porter Poetry Prize, Judith Wright Poetry Prize and Val Vallis Award among others. Dan runs DIY publisher Subbed In and edits the working- class literary journal Industrial Estate. 

Vampire as Text

Diego Ramírez is an artist with dreams, a writer with hopes and a facilitator with beliefs. Ramírez has written locally for Art Gallery of Western Australia, Art and Australia, Disclaimer, MEMO, un Projects and internationally with NECSUS (NL) and BLUE journal (US x FR). As a facilitator, he is the former Director of Seventh Gallery and sits in panels for Creative Victoria, City of Melbourne, and is a peer assessor for Australia Council. He is represented by MARS Gallery. 

On-Demand Webinar – What is Creative Nonfiction?

Elizabeth Flux is a freelance writer and editor at large for the Melbourne City of Literature Office. Her nonfiction work has been widely published and includes essays on film, culture, and identity as well as interviews and feature articles. She was the winner of the inaugural Feminartsy Fiction prize, has been shortlisted for the Rachel Funari prize three times, was shortlisted for the Liminal Fiction Prize and the Fair Australia Prize, was longlisted for the Peter Carey Short Story Award and her fiction has been published in multiple anthologies including New Australian Fiction 2020, Collisions, Best Australian Stories, Best Summer Stories and The Big Issue Fiction Edition. She is also a past Wheeler Centre Hot Desk Fellow.

https://elizabethflux.com/

Theme, Imagery and Symbolism

Emily Bitto is an award-winning writer of fiction, non-fiction and poetry. Her debut novel, The Strays, won the 2015 Stella Prize. Her second novel, Wild Abandon, was the winner of the 2022 Margaret and Colin Roderick Literary Award. Emily has taught creative writing for over a decade and is currently a course advisor at the Faber Writing Academy.

https://www.emilybitto.com/

Plotting, Structuring and Pacing when Writing for Children

Gabrielle Wang is an award-winning children’s author and illustrator. She has written and illustrated more than twenty novels for young readers. Her latest middle grade novel Zadie Ma and the Dog Who Chased the Moon was Shortlisted for the 2023 Prime Minister’s Literary Awards, Queensland Literary Awards and NSW Premiers Literary Awards. Gabrielle was the Australian Children’s Laureate for 2022 and 2023 and is the Victorian Premiers Reading Challenge Ambassador 2024.

https://gabriellewang.com/books/

Lunchtime Bite: Essential Ingredients for Your Author Website

Jeanie Watson is the Marketing and Communications Manager at Writers Victoria. She has worked in communications roles across the not-for-profit, arts, health and government sectors in Australia and New Zealand. Jeanie wants to use her marketing and communications skills to help writers connect with their readers and writing community.

Clinic Feedback Rounds: Short story

Julie Koh is the author of two short-story collections: Capital Misfits and Portable Curiosities. She was a 2017 Sydney Morning Herald Best Young Australian Novelist. Her short stories have been published widely, including in the Best Australian Stories and Best Australian Comedy Writing. She has also judged several literary awards including the 2018 Stella Prize and the 2022 and 2023 Steele Rudd Awards. Julie has been a reader for the Oxbelly Fiction Writers program and a peer assessor for Creative Australia. She is the current Fiction Editor for Westerly.

https://jylkoh.com/

On-Demand Webinar – Introduction to Writing First Nations Characters

Being a proud Wotjobaluk woman from the Wimmera, Kat gradually developed her craft by combining her skills and knowledge in community engagement, mentoring, music, the arts, screen, and education. Her grassroots, transparent vitality and forthright approach enable her to work and consult with various government, mainstream, community, arts, and film organisations. Currently she is involved in many community, youth, film and arts projects, and is collating her first poetry book, which she aims to publish in the coming year.

https://kathrineclarke88.wordpress.com/

On-Demand Webinar – The Power of the Verb

Kate Cuthbert has worked with writers for almost 20 years, in several different capacities. A genre fiction advocate, she notably launched the Escape imprint for Harlequin Australia, and remains a proud popular fiction enthusiast. Kate is currently Editorial Director at Pantera Press, and is pursuing a PhD examining paratexts in Australian popular fiction.

Character Development Through an Actor’s Lens

Kate Ellis is first and foremost an acting coach. Kate has taught actors in Wicked, Rent, Hamilton, Godfather of Harlem, That’s Not Me and Safe Home. She has taught at acting schools such as 16th Street Actors studio as well as the University of Melbourne, TAFTA and schools all over Victoria through initiatives by Drama Victoria and the DET. She has hosted panel discussions for MPavilion, the Victorian Arts Learning Festival and Abbotsford Convent’s Open Spaces. 

Cooking Up a Synopsis

Laurel Cohn is a book editor passionate about communication and the power of stories in our lives. As a developmental editor, assessor and writing coach she has been helping writers prepare their work for publication for over three decades. She is a regular workshop presenter for Writers Victoria, Writing NSW, Queensland Writers Centre and Byron Writers Festival. She has a PhD in Literary and Cultural Studies.

https://laurelcohn.com.au/

On-Demand Webinar – Introduction to Character

Lili Wilkinson is the author of sixteen books, including Green Valentine, The Boundless Sublime and After the Lights Go Out. She established the Inky Awards at the Centre for Youth Literature, State Library of Victoria. Lili has a PhD in Creative Writing from the University of Melbourne, and now spends most of her time reading and writing books for teenagers. Her latest books are The Erasure Initiative and How To Make A Pet Monster: Hodgepodge.

http://www.liliwilkinson.com.au/

School of Dreams: Poetry and the Unconscious

Manisha Anjali is a writer and artist. She is the author of Naag Mountain (Giramondo 2023). Manisha is the founder of Neptune, a research and documentation platform for dreams, visions and hallucinations. Manisha has been a recipient of BLINDSIDE’s Regional Arts & Research Residency at Mooramong, a Writer-in-Residence at Incendium Radical Library and a Hot Desk Fellow at The Wheeler Centre.

https://manishaanjali.com/

Personal Mythologies: Race, Identity and Culture

Rashida Murphy is the author of a novel and a collection of short stories. Her prose and poetry are regularly published in journals and anthologies worldwide. Recent achievements include shortlistings in the NSW Premier’s Literature Awards and the Nillumbik Awards, publications in the anthology Ourselves and FemAsia Journal and features as guest poet in festivals in India and Dubai.

https://rashidawritenow.com/

Nature Writing

Rebecca Giggs is an award-winning author from Perth. Her non-fiction focuses on how people feel towards animals in a time of technological and ecological change. Fathoms: The World in the Whale, Rebecca’s debut book, won the prestigious 2021 ALA Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction in the US, and was shortlisted for the Stella Prize in that same year. 

www.rebeccagiggs.com

Let’s Talk About… Jealousy among Writers

Robyn Dennison is a writer living in Narrm / Melbourne. Her debut novel, Blind Spot, is out now with Text publishing, and her short fiction has appeared in Australian literary journals, including as a runner-up for the Overland VU Short Story Prize. She is currently completing a PhD at Melbourne University, researching the history of queer girls in Australian YA.

Online Creative Non-Fiction Clinic

Sam van Zweden is a Melbourne-based writer interested in memory, food, mental health and the body. Her writing has been published by the Saturday Paper, the Guardian, ABC Life, Meanjin, The Big Issue, The Lifted Brow, Cordite, the Sydney Review of Books, The Wheeler Centre and others. Her debut book, Eating with my Mouth Open, won the 2019 KYD Unpublished Manuscript Award, and is available now. 

https://samvanzweden.com/

Let’s Talk About… Jealousy among Writers

Thabani Tshuma is a multi-award-winning Zimbabwean writer and performance poet. His work can be found in publications such as Dichotomi magazine, Cordite Poetry Review, CUBBY ART, and ABC ArtWorks’ SLAMMED. Thabani is co-curator of Thin Red Lines and his debut collection, The Gospel of Unmade Creation, released in 2023 through Recent Work Press. Writing is the aperture through which he views the world and experiences self in relation to others. 

Let’s Talk About… Publishing Your First Book

Yen-Rong is an award-winning writer of creative non-fiction. She is also an arts critic, an avid crafter, and and a musician. Her first book, Me, Her, Us, is a collection of essays that explores the intricacies of navigating sex and relationships as a young Chinese-presenting woman in a Western society. It won the Glendower Award for an Emerging Queensland Writer in 2022 and was published by UQP in 2023.

www.yenrongwong.com