It’s wonderful to be back on stage as writers’ festivals and in-person literary events return. I’m delighted to be in conversation with author and journalist Gary Linnell at Words at Wagstaffe. I’m also looking forward to being part of Newcastle Writers Festival and to being in conversation with Joanne Fedler at the Sydney Jewish Museum.

Australian writer Suzanne Leal discusses her highly accomplished new novel, The Deceptions, the story of an illicit relationship between a young Jewish woman and a gendarme in Czechoslovakia during World War Two and its ramifications decades later.

I was the chair of the fiction and poetry panel for the 2020 Prime Minister’s Literary Awards. Read on to see my comments on the poetry shortlist and the fiction shortlist.

Suzanne Leal’s The Deceptions (A&U) won the People’s Choice Prize, worth $1000, with more than half of all public votes. Leal’s novel, inspired by a true story, moves from wartime Europe to modern day Australia and traces the legacy of long-buried family secrets.

It gives me great pleasure to announce that Leah Kaminsky will be my guest at Thursday Book Club on 3 September 2020. Leah will be talking to us about her work as a writer and a doctor and how she manages to juggle these two roles - especially in the middle of a pandemic.