The Fremantle Press Podcast

Maria Papas, winner of the 2020 City of Fremantle Hungerford Award, chats with Marie O’Rourke about her shortlisted manuscript, Kintsugi, a wise and gentle piece of narrative non-fiction. Kintsugi is inspired by the Japanese artform by the same name, celebrating beauty in breakage. Marie discusses how her manuscript uses a delicate touch to work with […]

Gerard McMann joins Maria Papas, winner of the 2020 City of Fremantle Hungerford Award, to talk about his manuscript called Tell Me the Story, a generous and insightful personal narrative non-fiction. Tell Me the Story is a compelling read that reinforces to publisher Georgia Richter that when a story is well told, anything is possible. […]

On today’s podcast, Molly Schmidt discusses her manuscript, Salt River Road – a beautiful and moving piece combining verse and prose – with Maria Papas, winner of the 2020 City of Fremantle Hungerford Award. Salt River Road is set in the Great Southern region of Western Australia and follows the aftermath of a beloved mother’s […]

Speaking to host Brooke Dunnell on the Fremantle Press podcast, novelist David Whish-Wilson said the main problem he sees from his students as a Creative Writing teacher is ‘overcoming the fear of the known; overcoming this fear that your life is somehow not authentic and your life is not as interesting as other people’s.’ David’s […]

Tyrown Waigana joins the podcast to chat to Helen Milroy about the importance of learning the Noongar language and believes his collaborative book with Jayden Boundry, Noongar Boodja Waangkan, could change how we interact as a culture. Tyrown says, ‘It would be cool if this book influences everyone around here and we start talking Noongar […]

Speaking to Brooke Dunnell on the Fremantle Press podcast, novelist Karen Herbert says she didn’t know how the narrative was going to pan out until the end of her writing. Karen says, ‘The story started with chapter four … It was really one of those stories that evolved as you write them. I didn’t know […]

Bron Bateman sits down with Unlimited Futures contributors Yirga Gelaw Woldeyes and Afeif Ismail to chat about translating texts and the consequential loss of original meaning and intention. ‘Because language is very much intimately linked with the history, the experience, the culture of the people in question,’ says Yirga ‘when we are unable to bring […]

In this episode of the poetry podcast Andrew Sutherland talks to Bron Bateman about how he found his queer identity as a teenager through cult TV, horror movies and science fiction. Andrew says, ‘I really enjoy as an art-maker bringing academia or bringing the canon or the classics down to play in the dirt with […]

In Nadia Rhook’s latest collection Second Fleet Baby she writes of the differences and similarities between motherhood in contemporary and convict times. Nadia says of herself and her ancestor Susannah Mortimer, ‘As white women we have in common that part of our desirability, or function in the colony, is to reproduce the settler population. And […]

Paula Hayes says she hopes young people find comfort and escapism in her books. Reading as an adult took her out of her day to day and immersed her in a world she didn’t want to leave. ‘You just enter a different world for a while, but the themes of your own reality are still […]

Growing up, Kathryn Lefroy was not allowed to watch television, and was instead encouraged to create stories for herself and read books. Kathryn gave up writing for fun when academia and university studies took her away from her path. So when she did circle back to it, Kathryn said she made a conscious decision not […]

The amazing Helen Milroy returns to the podcast chair for her first interview of 2022. Helen chats to the co-creator of Stars in Their Eyes, Aśka. You’ll love hearing about Aśka’s journey from high flying physicist to high flying visual storyteller – what a leap of faith! She chats about her unique collaboration with Jessica […]

Speaking to Brooke Dunnell on the Fremantle Press podcast, novelist Maria Papas said when she was younger some people told her ‘Writing’s not really a career for a girl from Bunbury … you have to pick something safer’. But, as she points out, her enjoyment of writing has held her in good stead so far. […]

Olivia Lanchester, CEO and company secretary of The Australian Society of Authors, joins Claire Miller and Georgia Richter for a chat about the ASA and what writers can gain from being members. Olivia discloses the advocacy work of the ASA being a national body that speaks for authors and talks about the importance of writing […]

Our 2021 Fogarty Literary Award winner, Brooke Dunnell, is behind the wheel and driving this year’s Fremantle Press podcast series. In her first episode Brooke visits the Western Australian Wheatbelt to experience the heat and intensity of the harvest through the eyes of her guest, novelist and combine harvester aficionado, David Allan-Petale. His book, Locust […]

By his calculations, Penguin Random House account manager Gavin Burbidge attempts to place 432 books into Australian bookstores per month. Across the publishing industry, that means your book will be competing against thousands of titles and your account manager’s pitch could be less than ten seconds long. For a deep dive into sales, Penguin Random House account managers Gavin Burbidge and Jane Pa...

James Foley says the transition from a part-time day job to making a living from his craft was huge and he does not recommend any one quit their job, overnight, on a whim. It took James 14 years to get himself to the point of earning an income from his work as an author/illustrator. In […]

Jessica Walton, co-creator of the new graphic novel Stars in Their Eyes , says when young people become disabled or are born with a disability, they're often in a family of non-disabled people and don't always get connected to the disabled community soon enough. She’s passionate about all young people getting to see themselves represented in literature, film and television and believes that adults...

Born in 1927, Gladys Milroy was taken to the Parkerville Orphanage at two years old and spent the next 14 years separated from her mother, Daisy. Gladys say, ‘I think the thing is about growing up in an orphanage is that you live in a story all the time because that’s the way you survive.’ Now in her tenth decade, Gladys says she getting more stories than ever before. ‘A lot of stories I get at ni...

Leanne Hall joins us on the podcast! We are so pleased to have a bookseller chat to us. Leanne is an author of young adult and children's fiction and works as an online children’s and YA specialist at the independent bookshop Readings. Once you’ve listened to this podcast you’ll feel like you know your local bookseller, and the business of selling books, a lot better.    Though she acknowledges th...

Katie Stewart said she turned to art because she couldn’t keep up with her two older sisters who were incredibly bright. Drawing was her way to do something that distinguished her from them. With pressure on her to go to university and make the most of the opportunities her mother never had, Katie first did a degree in archaeology then had many career twists and tangents. Katie was well into her f...

Lesley Reece, founder and former director of The Literature Centre, joins Claire Miller and Georgia Richter for a chat about how to prepare yourself to face a room full of under-17s! Leslie ìmparts top tips for aspiring children’s book writers while Claire and Georgia discuss the merits of book hoovering. Writer and editor Amanda Curtin shares her reading recommendations, and the Comma Chameleon h...

Ruth de Vos says children’s books inspired her textile art long before she became an illustrator. With six children in the house, she says storybooks were always a big part of family life, and she developed an appreciation for their brilliance and their accessibility as an art form. In this podcast, she takes us behind the scenes for a glimpse into how she created the illustrations for Shine by Da...

In this episode of the Love to Read Local podcast Mel Hall tells to our host Maria Papas that curiosity led her to writing her novel, The Little Boat on Trusting Lane . Mel says, ‘I was living in Fremantle and I was pretty curious and a bit questioning about some sort of wellness stuff that I was around … I was also having a lot of good talks with a close friend, who is a massive sceptic. I grew u...

Susan Midalia says families can be nurturing, or they can be really damaging, but most of us have them. Family plays a key role in her latest novel, Everyday Madness . Susan says the book is about the ways in which ordinarily rational people can become irrational due to certain personal or social circumstances. She says she didn’t use the word ‘madness’ in a pejorative way but wanted people to thi...