South Coast Readers & Writers Festival 2025 Sessions
Saturday 5 July
Welcome Address
10.00–10.15am
By 2024 Wollongong Citizen of the Year Aunty Barbara Nicholson.
The Voices of This Place
10.20–11.15am
Nardi Simpson, Yuwaalaraay storyteller and performer, and Dr Debra Dank, Gudanji/Wakaja academic and author, are both recent recipients of the ALS Gold Medal. Debra and Nardi sit down with Gamilaroi writer Judi Morison to yarn about their new books, Terraglossia and the belburd, and about the importance of listening to the voices of this place.
Literary Spirits
10.20–11.15am
Zahid Gamieldien’s All the Missing Children is a literary mystery-drama novel with creeping supernatural elements. In Jessie Tu’s Honeyeater, it’s ghost month in Taiwan and in translation, all is not as it seems. Myoung Jae Yi discusses the layers in these works of literary fiction with their authors.
Linguists & Book Binders
11.30am–12.25pm
Pip Williams’ The Dictionary of Lost Words is a NYT bestseller and is currently touring the country in its stage play format with sold-out performances. Her latest book, The Bookbinder of Jericho, is another story about women and knowledge—who makes it, who can access it, and what is lost when it is withheld. Pip is joined by Professor Catherine McKinnon to discuss the magic behind her award-winning novels.
Climate Futures: Writing YA
11.30am–12.25pm
Isobelle Carmody’s latest book, Comes the Night, is set in the near future of a dystopian Canberra. Helena Fox’s award-winning second novel, The Quiet and the Loud, explores coming of age against the backdrop of the 2019 bushfires. They sit down with Dr Christine Howe to talk about writing YA fiction in an uncertain climate future.
Our Wild Selves
1.15–2.10pm
All of internationally best-selling author Charlotte McConaghy’s novels touch in some way on the relationship between wild animals, human-impacted environments, trauma and healing. She discusses our wild selves with Dr Christine Howe.
Storytelling Before Colonisation
1.15–2.10pm
Both Dr Debra Dank and Darren Rix are the holders of First Nations knowledges that predate colonisation, from the living languages and deep intellectual traditions of First Nations Australians to the vivid stories of the arrival of Cook. They talk about storytelling before colonisation with Lillian Rodrigues-Pang.
Fantasy & Mythology
2.25–3.20pm
Isobelle Carmody and Kate Forsyth are multi award-winning, bestselling, and beloved names within the Australian fantasy genre. They are joined by A.L. Tait to discuss writing fantasy, mythology, and their latest novels, Comes the Night and Psykhe.
The Business of Publishing
2.25–3.20pm
Want an insiders perspective on the business of publishing? Publishers Meredith Curnow (Penguin Random House) and Elizabeth Weiss (Allen & Unwin) discuss key issues in Australian and internationally with author Meredith Jaffé.
History, Lost & Found
3.45–4.45pm
Darren Rix’s Warra Warra Wai and Ryan Butta’s The Bravest Scout at Gallipoli are histories that recover lost perspectives and people, bringing them back into light, from pre-colonisation to the First World War. They discuss Australian history and how it is lost and found, with Jeremy Lasek.
Womanhood
3.45–4.45pm
Lucy Nelson’s Wait Here is a collection of stories about women who can’t, don’t or won’t have children. For these women, being childless is a hard-won prize, a freedom, a stain, a joy, a battle, a conundrum, a wound, a sinister comfort on a burning planet. Lucy discusses her collection of stories with Suzanne Leal.
Sunday 6 July
Current Affairs
10.00–11.00am
Jan Fran digs into what’s going on nationally and globally with some of Australia’s most esteemed political and science writers and thinkers—Amy Remeikis, Antony Loewenstein and Tim Flannery.
Poetry: Beyond the Personal
10.00–11.00am
Poetry is both a personal and social act. Meet Eileen Chong and David Stavanger—two esteemed poets whose new works are deeply personal but also social and political. In conversation with Peter Frankis they speak about their work, non-linear time, and what poetry is good for in times of loss and erasure.
Authors, Readers & Publishers
11.15am–12.15pm
Vanessa Radnidge, Hachette’s Head of Literary Publishing, NSW State Librarian Caroline Butler-Bowdon and bestselling local author Hayley Scrivenor speak with Professor Catherine McKinnon about the vital contemporary issues for authors, readers and publishers.
Writing Women: From Memoir to Thriller
11.15am–12.15pm
Nikki Gemmell is one of Australia’s bestselling authors, known for her provocative and honest writing style. Her latest novel, Wing, is a searing examination of what it means to be female today. She sits down with author Meredith Jaffé to talk about writing women from memoir to thriller and everything in-between.
Big Ideas
1.00–2.00pm
Journalist Amy Remeikis is the chief political analyst at the Australia Institute think-tank. Amy joins Jan Fran to discuss the big ideas in Australia’s current political landscape: from fresh thinking about climate action and safeguarding our democracy, to the housing crisis and our relationship with the United States.
Gallows Dark
1.00–2.00pm
Bruce Nash and Malcolm Knox’s latest novels—set in an aged-care facility and Stalin’s Soviet Russia respectively—tell very different stories. But both do so by deftly wielding dark humour and satire, skating that line between drama and comedy as a way into complex and challenging subjects. They speak with Dr Joshua Lobb.
Gaza & Lebanon
2.15–3.15pm
Theodore Ell’s memoir Lebanon Days brings an outsider’s eye to examine the country’s hardships, tragedies and hope. Poet Omar Sakr and illustrator Safdar Ahmed, both multi award-winning writers, collaborated on The Nightmare Sequence, a searing response to the atrocities in Gaza and beyond since October 2023. They join Antony Loewenstein, author of The Palestine Laboratory, for an important discussion on Gaza and Lebanon.
Literary Figures
2.15–3.15pm
Emily Maguire’s novel Rapture, the soaring story of the girl who became pope, is drawn from a mix of history, legend and myth. Author Gail Jones’ prolific recent literary output includes One Day, a literary mystery connected to the life of Joseph Conrad, and Salonika, an historical fiction set in Macedonia in 1917 featuring Stella (Miles) Franklin. Her new book is The Name of the Sister, a literary crime thriller. They talk about writing literary fiction with author Hayley Scrivenor.
Poetry Reading Showcase
3.30–4.30pm
Join us for exceptional poetry read by poets David Stavanger, Joel Ephraims, Eileen Chong, Omar Sakr and Ali Jane Smith, with MC Adara Enthaler from Enough Said poetry.
Mermaids & Beehives
3.30–4.30pm
History and folklore collide in Lauren Keegan’s All the Bees in the Hollows, set in 16th-century Lithuania, Camille Booker’s The Woman in the Waves, set in a fictional Illawarra town in the 1920s, and Kell Woods’ Upon a Starlit Tide, reimagining fairytale in 18th-century France. These authors discuss historical fiction, folklore and fantasy with Dr Ellie Crookes.
PLUS! Festival Workshops
Friday 4 July
Writing Historical Non-Fiction:
From Research to Structure
with Ryan Butta, Friday 4 July 12–2pm
With experience across the full spectrum of non-fiction writing—from idea generation and research, to shaping a compelling narrative, editing, and successfully pitching to publishers—Ryan Butta, author of The Bravest Scout at Gallipoli, will bring practical insights and industry knowledge to this workshop. Whether you're starting out or refining a historical non-fiction manuscript, Ryan offers guidance grounded in experience, a journalist’s curiosity, and a storyteller’s eye.
Compelling Fantasy Worlds
with Isobelle Carmody, Friday 4 July 3–5pm
Join renowned author Isobelle Carmody in a fantasy workshop that will guide you through the process of building a world from the character out, creating settings that serve to advance their story, rather than merely decorating it.
Participants in this workshop will undertake practical steps that draw on their own lives and experiences to build both compelling settings and characters shaped by an exploration of their own questions and concerns in the real world. This approach enables the creation of genuinely original and compelling fantasy, rather than being fantasy that is little more than a re arrangement of tired fantasy tropes.
& A FREE Young Readers & Writers Session
Saturday 5 July
FREE Young Readers & Writers Session
How to Write (& Solve) a Mystery
with A.L. Tait, Saturday 5 July 10–11am
In this session for young readers and writers from ages 9 – 12, award-winning children’s author A.L. Tait will talk all things mystery. Participants will have the opportunity to map their own mystery with her.
