Hey there, web surfers (remember when that was a thing? What a bunch of dorks we all were. Or maybe just me.) If you haven’t noticed, World Mental Health Day has been a thing this week. I don’t know exactly what day it is/was because I am on holidays and I don’t know what day it is in general. But it’s sometime around now. Anyway, bumbling aside, I did an interview with the Centre for Public Christianity about my mental health thing, my past life as an awkward teenager, the… Read more Heavy Mental →
First up: if this post raises any concerns for you please, please call Lifeline on 13 11 14, Beyond Blue 1300 224 636 or if you’re a young adult you… Read more So Much to Tell You* (Hi from the psych hospital. No really.) →
Like many humans, I sometimes have conversations with other humans. (Real ones, not the imaginary ones I converse with for money.) Inevitably when chatting with someone new, the question of occupation comes up and that’s when I get to tell them I’m an author. It’s wonderful. My twelve year-old self (who couldn’t spell or do sums but had a catalogue of imaginary worlds and characters in her head) does backflips of glee. I’m not going to pretend for a moment that I don’t love my profession, yes writing novels is… Read more The Madness in the Method – on creativity and mental illness →
There’s been a fair amount of whistle-blowing in sport lately, in all senses of the word. (See what I did there?) What with drugs of all varieties, bribery, corruption, players… Read more Whistle-Blower Edition: The Truth behind the Dragons and NRL →
It’s taken me ten days to write this post because I have been having festival withdrawals. I find the weeks following a festival difficult. It’s hard returning to a life… Read more Somerset: students, lamingtons and book cakes. →
Philip Seymour Hoffman died. But you probably know that already. People far more eloquent than I have already written many words about it in places like the New Yorker. But… Read more Creativity can be a total bitch. →
A few weeks ago I made the declaration that ‘You can’t be a feminist and buy fashion magazines’. This is the bit where I backpedal. My grandmother was a dressmaker. To be more specific she made couture gowns for high society in the 60s and 70s. She also made a lot of wedding gowns and taught pattern making at East Sydney Technical College. I have a memory of standing next to her in a department store, probably David Jones, while she made sketches of designer gowns so she could copy… Read more Oh the places you’ll go: on clothes and shoes and eating my words →
Well hello, dear readers. It’s been a while. I was going to spend this blog reminiscing about my top five books of 2013, but instead I am feeling quite cranky about the world and I know that I do my best writing whilst I have a bee in my bonnet*, so here goes. Hey Australian young men, why have you turned into a bunch of aggressive dickheads? Seriously, what’s your beef, exactly? You used to have the reputation of being friendly, ‘laid back’ and slightly inebriated if there’s a cricket match… Read more What you looking at? On being a dickhead. →