Literati Glitterati

Award-winning writer Gretchen Shirm joins the show to talk about her third book The Crying Room, which takes a close look at three generations of women to ask who we are as individuals and in relation to our families. Gretchen and Mel discuss the book's speculative elements, its inventive structure, its timeless themes and its kindred reads (Elizabeth Strout, Helen Garner). And how, at the end of...

Sanya Rushdi joins the show to talk restlessness, nuance and the power of language in her debut novel Hospital: a lucid and unflinching account of psychosis and hospitalisation in Australia, inspired by her own lived experience. Plus, from surfing dogs to bookish birthday parties, Mel gets the lowdown on the 20th annual Willy Lit Fest with Program Director, Emily Westmoreland. 

How do we become who we are? In this edition of Literati Glitterati, Mel chats to the authors of two books consumed by precisely this question.  The first is Where I slept , an autofictional work set in nineties Melbourne by writer and poet Libby Angel, which charts a young woman’s journey towards artistic self actualisation as she traverses the city’s sharehouses, squats and streets. Libby chats...

Mel is joined by English writer, Max Porter. Multi award-winning UK novelist and master of the tiny perfect book, Max Porter, joins Mel on the show this week. The pair riff on magic, music and mix tapes, experimentation and writing without judgment, as they unpack his latest novella Shy: an outsider story with a beating heart. Plus, Max treats us to a reading.

Mel is joined in the studio by Bora Chung, author of the Booker International Prize-shortlisted Cursed Bunny . They talk about trusting your translator, thinking and writing in different languages, and the freedom of writing without genre. Plus, John Tjhia shares the latest issue of Debris Magazine – and the tension in its theme The Urge to Know.

Mel is joined in the studio by Madelaine Lucas to discuss her New York Times’ Editors’ Choice debut novel, Thirst for Salt, a love story set in an isolated Australian coastal town. Madelaine has come across the globe from New York, where she is a musician, writer and teacher at Columbia University. Plus, how does a literary festival come together? We’re staying coastal with Jane Finemore, Program...