Jumaana Abdu is the author of Translations (Vintage), her debut novel. She is a Dal Stivens Award winner and an alumnus of the Wheeler Centre Next Chapter program. Her work features in Thyme Travellers (Roseway Publishing), an international anthology of Palestinian speculative fiction. She has been published elsewhere in Kill Your Darlings, Westerly, Griffith Review, Meanjin, Liminal, Overland, and Debris.

Munira Tabassum Ahmed is a 19-year-old writer. Her work has been published in Frontier, Best of Australian Poems, Meanjin, Liminal, Red Room Poetry, and elsewhere. She was the 2022 Kat Muscat Fellow, 2024 WestWords Accelerator Recipient, and is currently working on her first novel.

Kgshak Akec is a South-Sudanese writer, performing artist, storyteller, and a lover of words. Since the moment she learned how to write in English at the age of six, Kgshak has been writing out the stories that live inside her mind. As a migrant and non-native English speaker, Kgshak is fascinated by the unspoken words and unsung songs of the day-to-day. Her debut novel Hopeless Kingdom, inspired by her own journey of migrating to Australia, explores the relationship of a mother and daughter as they settle, break, evolve, and adapt in new lands through multiple heartaches and triumphs

Mega Anindyawati is a writer from Sidoarjo, East Java. Mega completed her studies at Airlangga University. She is emerging writer of Ubud Writers and Readers Festival (UWRF) 2024. Her writings have been featured in Jawa Pos, Kompas.com, Radar Mojokerto, Harian Bhirawa, and others. Some of her books that have been published include Sabar Menanti Buah Hati (2019), Sepotong Kenangan dan Senja yang Memakannya (2021), Unconditional Marriage (2022), Manusia Setengah Udang Memakannya (2022), Miracles of Love (2022), Cepet Ndhelik! (2023), and others.

Manisha Anjali is the author of Naag Mountain (Giramondo, 2024). She is the founder of Neptune, a research and documentation platform for dreams, visions and hallucinations. She is one half of Whelk, an ambient music project with multi-instrumentalist Genevieve Fry.

Whelk is an ambient music collaboration between multi-instrumentalist Genevieve Fry and artist Manisha Anjali. Whelk is made up of ethereal harp, textural percussion and otherworldly incantations.

Pelaya Arapakis is a cultural worker, musician and writer based in Naarm.

Tīhema Baker is a Māori writer who descends from the iwi (nations) of Raukawa te Au ki te Tonga, Ātiawa ki Whakarongotai, and Ngāti Toa Rangatira. His writing often deconstructs the complex interactions between the Māori and Western worlds, based on professional and personal experience. He is the author of satirical sci-fi novel ‘Turncoat’, which parodies the experiences of Māori public servants and was longlisted for the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction at the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards 2024. He is also the author of young adult series ‘The Watchers Trilogy’, and various short stories and essays.

Rebooting life after COVID has lead June Ball to re-explore a passion for screenwriting. In preparation, June participated in various programs including among others, “Screenwriting” by AFTRS, “How to Read a Film” by British Film Distributors Association, “Horror Webinar” by Robert McKee, and was accepted into “Originate” – Stage 1, by FilmVic. June studying with a screenwriting mentor from Access Arts Victoria. June has had both fiction and non-fiction published. June’s current screenplay is a quarter finalist in the ScreenCraft Feature Competition 2024.

Renay is a self-described Blak of all trades. Proudly disabled, Biripi / Dunghutti woman, Renay is a visual artist, writer, disability and gender justice advocate.

Alison J Barton is a Wiradjuri poet widely published in Australian and international journals. In 2023 she won several fellowships with the Australian National Writer’s House (Varuna House) and her poetry was recognised in numerous prizes. In both 2022 and 2023, Alison’s work appeared in Best of Australian Poems. She was the inaugural winner of the 2023 University of Cambridge First Nations Writer-in-Residence Fellowship, and took up a two-month writing residency in 2024 with SomoS Arts (Berlin, Germany). Her first full-length collection of poetry, Not Telling, will be published in August with Puncher & Wattmann.

Margarita Bassova is an emerging sound artist, writer, and head of the music-arts-culture publication Verve Zine.

Margarita’s writing is primarily rooted in music journalism, having written for international and local publications from Resident Advisor to Ransom Note, long-form pieces on Earmilk, Headthreads and beyond. In 2023 she was awarded Creative Australia’s Music Writers’ Travel Bursary to write about Australian music talent overseas, allowing her to document festivals in Singapore and Bali.

In 2022, Margarita released Verve’s first print edition, showcasing world-class local talent and with an accompanying “thoughts” zine.

Farah Beaini is a poet and performer interested in exploring stories of identity and belonging in an age of constant movement. Liquid and lyrical, her work blends mediums with transcending stories that tackle difficult conversations within the community. She has featured at major events and festivals, and her poems have also been broadcast on radio stations (ABC, PBS 106.7 FM, 3ZZZ, SBS Radio).

Mandy Beaumont’s debut novel The Furies was long-listed for the prestigious Stella Prize and shortlisted for the MUD Literary Prize and the Queensland Literary Awards. Her collection of short stories, Wild, Fearless Chests, was shortlisted for the Richell Prize and the Dorothy Hewett Award. Stories from the collection also won the MOTH International Short Story Prize and were shortlisted for other notable awards. She holds a PhD and a Masters in creative writing and is a regular feature writer and book reviewer for The Big Issue. Her new crime novel, The Thrill of It, will be out in 2025.

j. taylor bell is from Texas and is currently a PhD candidate at Monash University. His first poetry collection is titled HELLO CRUEL WORLD (Wendy’s Subway, 2022). Drop in anytime and wave hello @disco_steww.

Thea grew-up in rural Australia, developing her love of reading and writing from a young age. As a young adult, she left for the city, where she had her first brush with kink and fell in love with a world that balanced devotion and discipline.
She currently enjoys life in Sydney with her cat.

Maria Birch-Morunga is a Maori/Pakeha podcast host, facilitator and visual artist. Based in Melbourne, Maria’s practice includes fabric art, collage and co-creating Being Biracial podcast. Alongside Kate Robinson, Maria is part of the current cohort of Museums Victoria’s Culturemakers. The pair created Threads, an immersive digital film that is currently exhibited at Melbourne Museum. Maria has previously curated and hosted events at Footscray Community Arts, MPavillion, The Channel at the Arts Centre Melbourne and The Round.

Elizabeth Bourke (she/her) is a young writer living on unceded Dharawal land. Her writing tangles nature, technology and queerness. Her work has been featured in Fremantle Press’ 2023 queer anthology ‘An Unexpected Party’, as well as Island, Voiceworks and Verandah. She was a finalist in The Age/Sydney Morning Herald 2023 Young Essayist Prize and highly commended for Express Media’s 2022 Catalyse Nonfiction Prize. She has appeared at the Emerging Writers’ Festival and National Young Writers’ Festival.

Maile Bowen is a writer, artist, and embodiment teacher based in Walyalup on Noongar Country. Her work explores the relationship to place and culture, influenced by her kanaka maoli heritage. Water and land are central to her work, which also weaves in years of writing on gender and feminism, when she created feminist publication Accidental Discharge, active from 2013-2017.

Katherine Brabon is the author of the novels The Memory Artist, The Shut Ins and Body Friend. Her work has received the Vogel’s Literary Award, a NSW Premier’s Literary Award and the David Harold Tribe Fiction Award. Her third novel Body Friend was shortlisted for the Stella Prize and the ALS Gold Medal. She lives in Naarm/Melbourne.

Katie Brebner Griffin is a freelance writer, artist and disability advocate. She has written for various outlets such as the ABC and Guardian Australia about chronic pain, sexual assault and finding joy in creative practice. Her writing and visual art takes a practical, informative approach to illuminating the complexities of life’s challenges, whilst also exploring the various dimensions of personhood beyond these experiences.

Heidi is a Daingatti woman of mid north coast NSW now residing in Melbourne. When she isn’t working on a theatre production in costume she’s working on her own costumes, having been a cosplayer for over 12 years now. She’s competed in Melbourne, Sydney and New Zealand in her costumes, having had displays at the Melbourne Museum and comic book conventions of her work. Heidi recently took the mantle of Game Master for the all indigenous Dungeons and Dragons Twitch stream, The Gammin Guild. She’s enjoying building her own world and evolving it with her players.

Alisha Brown is a poet and musician born on Kamilaroi land. She won the 2022 Joyce Parkes Women’s Writing Prize, placed second in the 2021 Woorilla Poetry Prize, and was Highly Commended for the 2024 South Coast Writers Centre Poetry Award. She is currently an Editorial Intern for Red Room Poetry. You can find her work in Westerly, Griffith Review, Cordite, the Australian Poetry Anthology, Glassworks, Humana Obscura, and Blue Bottle Journal, among others.

Daniel Browning is an award-winning Bundjalung and Kullilli writer, journalist and radio broadcaster. Currently the ABC’s Editor Indigenous Radio, he also presents The Art Show podcast. Hailed by the judges as “an outstanding contribution to arts journalism”, his first book, Close to the Subject: Selected Works won the Indigenous Writing Prize at the 2024 Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards and was shortlisted for the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards.

Natalie Bühler is an emerging poet, editor and arts administrator originally from Switzerland. She often incorporates her native Swiss German, which does not have a standardised written form, into her writing. Her work has appeared in Cordite, Tint, Blue Bottle Journal, boats against the current, swim press and the Tinted Trails anthology. She is the Program Administrator for Red Room Poetry, a founding editor of The Marrow poetry journal and is currently studying a Master of Creative Writing, Editing and Publishing at the University of Melbourne.

CAINNE @criticalsxxtheory (xe/xim/xyr) is an Afrox agender art worker, body worker and sxx worker born on Lenape Land currently residing on Wurundjeri Land. At Cubby Art Party, Cainne has given birth to “The Law of Beauty” and “De Bussy”. They are one half of disabled dance initiative, Disabled Pole Dancers, and a massage and movement therapist at Yahdy Studio. Their arts practice flows through poetry, prose, self publication, event production, music production, curation and dance. You can read their writing in @MoreThnMelanin, @TheNoncompliant.Artspublication and the first anthology publication from @swnarrativesalon and Cubby Art Parties self titled Arts Magazine.

Celeste Carnegie is a Birrigubba Juru and South Sea Islander woman whose career is shaped by diverse passions, which influence her work in technology, engagement, and inclusion. Her journey into the realm of technology was ignited by her upbringing, which was mainly influenced by her father’s enthusiasm for sci-fi series like Star Trek, Stargate, and Star Wars, which fueled her curiosity and fascination with technology.

Lara Chamas is a Lebanese artist, based in Naarm (Melbourne), fleeing from civil war, her parents migrated to Australia, where she was born. Her practice investigates topics of postcolonial and migrant narratives within the context of her cultural identity. Using narrative and experience documentation, storytelling, transgenerational trauma and memory and tacit knowledge; her research intends to explore links and meeting points between narrative theory, cultural practice, current political and societal tensions, and the body as a political vessel.

mohamed chamas spatializes inner realms, inspirited by the ‘dijital djinni’, a conduit for expression in digital media arts. Defying and responding to the military-entertainment complex, mohamed reenchants cyberspace by drawing on their relation to personal lineage and wider contexts of magickal and divinatory practices in ancient Islamicate regions. This dis/entangles as image, sound, poetry, virtual reality (VR), installation, performance and hybrid-corrupt forms. mohamed has exhibited at Testing Grounds, Seventh Gallery, Trocadero Art Space, Incinerator Gallery and MARS Gallery, with their literary work appearing in Running Dog, Emerging Writers Festival, Co- Magazine, The Lifted Brow, Liminal Magazine and Cordite Poetry Review.

Katy Chan (PhD, Anthropology) is an early-career researcher and writer with her areas of interest in histories of colonialisms and (post)colonial subjectivity formation in Asia. She is the co-founder and co-host of the award-winning community radio show ‘Hong Kongology’ at 3CR 855AM. Currently, Katy is working on a project translating Australian First Nations poetry from English to Cantonese and other disappearing languages.

Kanika is an avid reader, occasional writer, and all around curious person. She started the literary zine known as More than Melanin which publishes writings by POC and Bla(c)k women and LGBTQIA+ people from these communities. The zine is currently on its third issue.

Rijn Collins is an award-winning Melbourne writer with over one hundred short stories published in anthologies and journals, performed at literary festivals, and broadcast on Australian and American radio. Her collection of memoir, ‘Voice’ (Somekind Press, 2021) is based on her love of linguistics and languages, with a focus on Icelandic, Irish and Flemish. Her debut novel, ‘Fed to Red Birds’ (Simon and Schuster, 2023) and was inspired by her writing residency in a tiny Icelandic fishing village near the Arctic Circle. She currently lives in Melbourne with her novelist husband, in a house full of snakeskins and bird bones.

Alicia is a multi-lingual journalist whose work spans written and photographic projects. She spent five years travelling and living abroad, collecting stories and finding something to say. Excited by new places, Alicia uses multimedia storytelling to document the people and spaces she encounters.
Currently based in Castlemaine, Victoria and writing independently across The Blue and SUSSED on Substack.
Alicia is in the process of finishing her first manuscript based on her experiences walking in Australia and abroad. She also hosts a breakfast radio show called Currents, which airs Wednesday mornings from 7am to 10am.

Will Cox is a lutruwita-born, Naarm-based writer and critic. His short fiction has appeared in various journals, and his novella Hyacinth came out in early 2023 to acclaim. He’s a regular arts writer for The Age and he can be heard on RRR’s Primal Screen.

Ange Crawford is a writer, editor and PhD student in media and communications at RMIT. Her contemporary YA novel, How to Be Normal, won the inaugural Walker Books Manuscript Prize and will be released in early 2025, and she also has an essay in the forthcoming UQP anthology of personal essays by Autistic women, trans and gender-diverse writers. She is the current Emerging Writers’ Program coordinator at Seventh Gallery. Apart from writing, editing, and art, she is a fan of cats and synthesisers, and can often be found with an armful of books in a local independent bookstore.

Sharleigh Crittenden is a Wiradjuri writer, researcher and mother living on Wangal country. Her short fiction has been published online by Going Down Swinging, The West Australian and Aniko Press. Her practices centres around complex psycho-emotional experiences and less conventional, more experimental forms of storytelling, including flash, repeating and fragmentary narration.

Nina Culley is a writer, critic, educator and horror enthusiast based in Naarm. Her arts essays and criticisms have been published in Kill Your Darlings, Liminal, Aniko Press, Mascara Review, among others. Nina is also an active arts and theatre contributor for Time Out Magazine, Limelight and Arts Hub. Her work often centres on Asian literature, delving into themes of intersectionality, the weird, and the fringe.

Skye is a queer & neurodivergent Dulgubarra-Yidinji writer living in Naarm. She founded BluSkye Marketing in early 2023 (feeling very clever for coming up with the name) with a vision for an accessible First Nations owned marketing agency. Outside of running BluSkye Marketing, you may find her around Naarm performing yarns that make you laugh, cry and wonder why she’s admitting these things to a live audience.

Emily Dale has just finished a BA in Creative Writing at RMIT and is a copywriter and editor at Small Fish Business Coaching. At this period in her life, she resides in the ever-changing, expressive city of Melbourne/Naarm. She spends a lot of her time when not writing, exploring the city and the expansive land beyond on her trusty (rusty?) Yamaha SR, Percy.

Robyn Doreian is an Australian magazine journalist, educator, and the former editor of Australian metal monthly Hot Metal, and British rock bibles Kerrang! and Metal Hammer. Her plethora of band interviews includes Kurt Cobain, Keith Richards, Patti Smith, Slipknot, Metallica, Megadeth, Tool, Cradle of Filth, Ice-T, Patti Smith, Tori Amos and Amyl and The Sniffers. She is passionate about interviewing and writing about music — heavy metal is her devotion. As the first female editor of Kerrang!, the UK/world’s biggest rock weekly, and also the first female editor of British monthly, Metal Hammer, she remains a pioneer in her field.

Alex writes for television, theatre, audio and fiction. His play Rakali was nominated for Best Theatre at the 2023 Melbourne Fringe, and called “gloriously original” and “deliciously entertaining” by critics after a sold out season. He wrote, directed and acted in seven-part audio drama “Hovering”, produced by Clea Frost and released in November 2023. He writes across many genres, including horror, thriller and comedy, often using an element of magic realism or supernatural to transform an everyday situation into something complex. He brings his experience as a queer person growing up in a small town in Tasmania into his work.

Catherine Dunn is an emerging artist whose practice includes poetry in both Auslan and English as well as theatre performance.

As a bilingual person, her art practice is inspired by the expression of human experience through language which can be both empowering and disenfranchising.

Performance highlights include presenting a panel discussion at Clin d’Oeil in Reims, France for an international Deaf arts festival, a Warehouse Residency at Arts House in 2022 presenting “More Than Words Can Say” and performing “Home Sweet Home” at Melbourne Fringe Festival 2021.

Michael Earp is a non-binary writer and bookseller living in Naarm (Melbourne, Australia), the editor of Everything Under the Moon, Kindred, Out-Side and co-edited Avast! Pirate Stories From Transgender Authors with Alison Evans. They have a teaching degree and a Masters in children’s literature and have worked between bookselling and publishing for over twenty years as a children’s literature specialist. Their role managing The Little Bookroom saw them named ABA Bookseller of the year. Their writing has also appeared in Archer, The Age, PopMatters, The Victorian Writer, Aurealis as well as the anthologies Borderlands and Underdog.

Joshua Edward is the Co-Founder and Editor of Fine Art at independent publisher no more poetry, Vice-Chair of Blindside Gallery, Director of Design at ModaMorphosis, and Head of Graphic Design & Publishing at Fashion’s Alchemists. A sculptor with formal studies at the Victorian College of the Arts, Joshua graduated in 2018 and has exhibited broadly within Australia and internationally.

Astrid Edwards is a bibliophile and literary critic. She hosts The Garret: Writing and Publishing and has interviewed more than 250 of Australia’s most prominent writers and publishers. She regularly moderates literary events and judges literary prizes, and is the Chair of Judges for the 2025 Stella Prize.
As a PhD Candidate at the University of Melbourne she explores environmental responsibility in publishing during the climate crisis. In 2023 she was one of Creative Australia’s inaugural Creative Climate Fellows.

Vahideh Eisaei, is an Iranian-Australian storyteller, a Qanun player and a composer. Evolving into a storyteller, she blends poetry, spoken words, and music to reconstruct classical poetry with contemporary nuances. Vahideh’s work delves into the narratives, elements and motifs embedded in Persian music and poetry, crafting compositions and text that resonate with her experiences as a migrant woman in a new land. Most recently, she wrote, composed and performed in Love’s Universe is Inside You, directed by Michael Kantor, at the Melbourne Recital Centre and Aranya Festival In China.

Sam Elkin is a writer, community lawyer and author of Detachable Penis: A Queer Legal Saga. He co-hosts the Triple R radio show Queer View Mirror and is the 2024 City of Melbourne Boyd Garret writer in residence.

Photo credit: Marlo W

Julie R. Enszer, PhD, is the author of five poetry collections, including The Pinko Commie Dyke with illustrations by Isabel Paul (Indolent Books, 2024), and editor of OutWrite: The Speeches that Shaped LGBTQ Literary Culture, Fire-Rimmed Eden: Selected Poems by Lynn Lonidier, The Complete Works of Pat Parker, and Sister Love: The Letters of Audre Lorde and Pat Parker 1974-1989. Enszer publishes Sinister Wisdom, a multicultural lesbian literary and art journal. More at www.JulieREnszer.com.

Anneliz Marie Erese is a Filipino writer of prose and poetry. Her works have appeared in Going Down Swinging, The Saturday Paper, Cordite Poetry Review, Meanjin and Island Online, among others. In 2022, she won the Deborah Cass Prize for Writing. She was also a 2023 Scholar at the Faber Writing Academy and a recipient of the Hot Desk Fellowship. Most recently, she was a Resident Writer at the Vermont Studio Center where she was at work on her first novel. She lives and works in unceded Wurundjeri land.

Gabrielle has a PhD in Creative Writing. This year she has put out her fourth collection of poetry through Collective Effort Press. Venus Without Furs. This is a feminist rewriting of Venus in Furs. She has been published in numerous anthologies including The Penguin Anthology of Australian Poetry. She has performed her poetry at La Mama, The Bowery in New York and The Edinburgh Fringe Festival. She has also performed her work at The Evil Woman conference in Vienna and Prague.

Latoyah Forsyth is an impact-driven and creative thinker, maker and leader in the arts, culture and creative industries. She is Head of Marketing and Visitor Experience at Melbourne Recital Centre, Chairperson of the Board at Emerging Writers’ Festival and a Board Director at Music Victoria. Latoyah has graduated from renowned leadership programs at Melbourne Business School and London Business School and channels her multifaceted skills into harnessing the power of the arts, culture, literary and creative industries to create positive value, impact and change for the community.

Genevieve Fry is a multi-instrumentalist and composer based in Naarm. Interested in exploratory music drawing inspiration from the natural world, their soundscapes encourage an inward journey touching on deep time, memory and sense of place. In both solo and collaborative contexts across the experimental, contemporary, and improvisation scenes, Genevieve layers textures of harp, recorder, synthesizer and voice.

Genevieve is the co-founder of Eastmint artist run studios, label and performance space which focuses on presenting and supporting music that promotes deep listening from a diverse range of artists across all genres.

Tigest Girma is an Ethiopian writer based in Melbourne, Australia. After graduating with a Bachelor of Education, she splits her time between writing and teaching. Passionate about exploring East African characters and myths, her work weaves Black stories with the dark and fantastical. In her free time, she can be found rewatching her comfort shows where the villain gets the girl. She invites you to visit her at tigestgirma.com or tiktok.com/tigestgirma. Immortal Dark is her debut novel.

Irma Gold is an award-winning author and editor. Her debut novel, The Breaking, won the Writing NSW Varuna Fellowship and the Canberra Critics Circle Award, and was shortlisted for the ACT Notable Award for Fiction. Her short fiction has been widely published in literary journals, and her acclaimed collection is Two Steps Forward. Her next novel is forthcoming in 2025. Irma is also the author of five children’s books, and is the founder and co-host of the writing podcast, Secrets from the Green Room. She works full time as a freelance editor for individual authors and a range of publishers.

Dominic Gordon is from Melbourne. His work has appeared in Meanjin, The Suburban Review and other literary journals. In 2018 Dominic was awarded the competitive Berry Street Fellowship, at the State Library Victoria, where he began work on what would become his first book, Excitable Boy: Essays on Risk. Since the 2024 release of his book, he has appeared on numerous ABC radio segments, his most recent was on Conversations with Richard Fidler. He lives with his partner and young son. And is currently working on a new collection of essays.

Dr David Gould worked as a teacher and counsellor in schools and universities in Australia, France, and Japan. He then became Manager of the Committee for Melbourne’s business leadership program. In 2020 he completed his PhD and in 2023 his book ‘Survivors and Thrivers. Male Homosexual Lives in Postwar Australia’ was published. His current research is on Australian Rules Football and homophobia. David is co-founder of Bare Elements Entertainment company. He also founded and is President of Carlton Pride, the official LBGTI+ supporter group of the Carlton Football Club. David has assisted a Rohingya refugee family for the past decade.

Sophia Gracias is a designer and artist who creates zines centered around the themes of self-care and inspiration. For many years, she has produced artwork as a form of self-care, using painting and collage to express herself. Her practice aims to explore the origins of inspiration for both herself and other creatives, especially in a world saturated with constant sources of #inspo.

Madison Griffiths is an author, artist and producer. Her debut book Tissue (Ultimo Press) was released in 2023, and is a boldly poetic meditation on abortion and what it has the power to represent. She is the co-producer of Tender, a podcast that tracks the journey of individuals as they decide to leave an abusive relationship. In 2022, she was awarded the Walkley Foundation Our Watch Award for Excellence in Reporting on Violence Against Women, alongside co-producer, Beth Atkinson-Quinton. Her work largely centres around the lived experiences of women, especially those whose realities are shrouded in stigma, opposition and rebellion.

Sophie Hamley has worked as a bookseller, editor, writer, content producer and web producer. She was a literary agent at Cameron’s Management from 2006 until 2014 and is a past President of the Australian Literary Agents’ Association. She is now a non-fiction publisher at Hachette Australia, publishing in a range of genres including biography, true crime, history, memoir, politics and science.

Lamisse Hamouda (she/her) is a writer, youth worker and theatre performer who lives on the unceded lands of Meanjin (Brisbane). Her writings have been published in various publications including Arts of the Working Class, Diversity Arts Australia, SBS Life and Jdeed Magazine, and her poetry was included in the anthology, Arab, Australia, Other: Stories on Race and Identity. Lamisse has run writing workshops with Marion Writes (ACT), Logan City Council (QLD) and Ferien vom Krieg (Germany).

Bridget Ying Harilaou is a mixed-race, agender freelance writer living on Wurundjeri land. They write extensively about politics and race. You can find more of their work in Archer Magazine Issue #17, The Age and SBS Voices or on Instagram @bridget.ying

Jenny Hedley is a neurodivergent writer, digital artist, critic, Writeability mentor and PhD candidate whose work appears in Cordite, Crawlspace, Diagram, Overland, Rabbit, The Suburban Review, TEXT, Westerly and the anthology Admissions: Voices in Mental Health. She lives on unceded Boon Wurrung land with her son.

Virginia Helzainka is a Co-Founder of Unspoken – Bali Poetry Slam, an initiative that conducts workshops and poetry slams every couple of months throughout the year. This endeavor collaborates closely with Bali’s local art, theater, and youth communities. In 2017, she authored the poetry book entitled Cocktail, Waves & Archer published under Mahima Institute Indonesia.

Elena Hogan is an emerging writer and artist working on unceded Wurundjeri land. Since 2021, Elena has dedicated herself to her debut novel, Everything Before Gia, a family saga, queer mystery and social commentary on transgender rights. She has been published by Farrago, Voiceworks, the Emerging Writers Festival and Regional Arts Australia.

Dan Hogan (they/them) is the author of Secret Third Thing, which won the Mary Gilmore Award, the Five Islands Prize and was named one of the ‘best 25 Australian books of 2023’ by The Guardian. Dan’s poetry has been recognised by the Peter Porter Poetry Prize, Judith Wright Poetry Prize, and Val Vallis Award, among others. Dan runs DIY publisher Subbed In and edits the working-class literary journal Industrial Estate.

Hasib Hourani is a Lebanese-Palestinian writer, editor, arts worker and educator living on unceded Wangal Country. His debut book, ‘rock flight’ will be released in September 2024.

William Huang (he/him) is a writer and musician currently living in Naarm/Melbourne. He has interned for Portside Review, participated in Express Media Toolkits and has participated in the NGA’s Digital Young Writers’ Residency. William is interested in the avant-garde communities of days gone past, as well as critical theories and the emergence of new forms of utopian ideals. He is also interested in minority languages, as well as language learning more broadly.

Troy Hunter is an adult and YA crime fiction writer whose short stories have appeared in a variety of publications and journals. He lives in Melbourne and works as a marketing and communications consultant. ‘Gus and the Missing Boy’ is Troy Hunter’s first novel.

Adalya Nash Hussein is a writer and editor. Her work has appeared in Meanjin, Overland, Voiceworks, The Lifted Brow, Ibis House, Going Down Swinging and others. It has also been shortlisted for the KYD Creative Non-Fiction Essay Prize and the Scribe Nonfiction Prize. She has been a CA-SRB Emerging Critic, an Emerging Writers’ Festival Melbourne Recital Centre Writer in Residence, and Wheeler Centre Hot Desk Fellow. She has edited for Voiceworks, Liminal and The Lifted Brow, and currently sits as Managing Editor of Australian Poetry and the Victorian Writer.

Darcy Hytt is a palawa storyteller and arts worker living on Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung Country. They explore relationality, futurity, power, and knowledge within contexts of queerness, disability justice, and Blak liberation.

Ronia Ibrahim is a writer, artist and designer based in Naarm, originally from Aotearoa. Her work explores diasporic modes of storyteling. Her poetry and non fiction are featured across Australian and New Zealand publications, including Australian Poetry Journal, Cordite, SAARI Collective, Overland, Minarets, Starling and The Pantograph Punch. She is a 2024 Wheeler Centre Hot Desk Fellow, where she is currently working on her debut poetry collection. She is co author of Moon Musings, an onging faith-poetry zine project.

Courtney Jaye is a writer of Ngarrindjeri and Malaysian descent. She grew up all around Australia and is currently living on Kaurna country. She had her first memoir published in Roots: Home Is Where The Heart Is, placed in the Top 30 for the SBS Emerging Writers Competition 2020, was one of the 2024 recipient of the InReview x ArtsSA First Nations arts writing mentorship and has written for Kill Your Darlings and InReview.

Rae Johnston is a Wiradjuri woman who was born and raised on Darug & Gundungurra Country in the Blue Mountains of NSW. Rae plays Wilga Guulany in The Gammin Guild, an all-Indigenous Dungeons and Dragons group infusing Aboriginal storytelling with role-playing games. A multi-award-winning broadcast journalist with a focus on the geekier side of life, she was the first Science & Technology Editor for NITV at SBS, and currently travels the country as a host on NITV’s Going Places with Ernie Dingo, and ABC’s Back Roads. Rae serves on the boards of the Telstra Foundation and Swinburne University of Technology.

Saanjana Kapoor is a recent Bachelor of Arts graduate from the University of Melbourne. Her writing has been published in Voiceworks, Island, Cordite, Meanjin, and more. She is currently a participant in Express Media’s Toolkits: Fiction, and a recipient of a New Colombo Plan Scholarship by the Australian Government.

Tiia Kelly is a critic and essayist based in Naarm. Her work can be found in Meanjin, Kill Your Darlings, Australian Book Review, Overland, Senses of Cinema, and elsewhere. She is a commissioning editor for the film publication Rough Cut.

Josh Kemp is an author of Australian gothic and crime fiction. His debut novel, Banjawarn, was the winner of the 2021 Dorothy Hewett Award, the 2022 Ned Kelly Award for Best Debut Crime Fiction and the 2023 Western Australian Premier’s Prize for Best Emerging Writer. Jasper Cliff is his second novel. He lives in the Sout West of WA but finds himself drawn, over and over again, to the red dirt of the state’s north.

Dechen is an emerging screenwriter with a background in philosophy and visual art. They are currently based in Naarm/ Melbourne and Central Java. They are working on their first feature script, “Brother, I’m Between Shadows”. Dechen loves minestrone and YMO.

Josh King is a musician and poet based in Berrin/ Mount Gambier, South Australia. He has participated in several projects with Writers SA, Mount Gambier Fringe, and is one half of the electronic music group Sexy As Shit.

KRIS KNEEN is the award-winning author of fiction, poetry and non-fiction including An Uncertain Grace which was shortlisted for the Stella Prize, Wintering, shortlisted for the Davitt award and three QPLA awards, and The Three Burials of Lotty Kneen which was shortlisted for two QPLA awards and the Margarey Medal. Their poetry collection Eating My Grandmother won the Thomas Shapcott Prize. Their latest book Fat Girl Dancing was shortlisted for the Victorian Premier’s Literary Award. They have written and directed broadcast television documentaries and were the Copyright Agency Ltd Non-fiction Fellow in 2020.

Jessica Knight is a writer based in Naarm. Her memoir was published by Ultimo Press in 2024. It’s entitled Strange Little Girl.

Maggie is a young queer writer of Gamilaroi and settler ancestry with Ngunnawal kinship ties. She makes her home on Ngunnawal dhawura, studying law and going to parties. Her work is a natural byproduct of her navigation of relationships with Country, memory, and women.

Raghav Lakshman is a Naarm based artist specializing in experimental bass and glitch music, Braek’s left-field broken beat compositions are painstakingly crafted through reconstructed modular synth patches, samplers and analogue oscillations. The end result a complex microcosm of glitch heavy alien sonics defying genres and pushing boundaries of electronic process and composition.

Brodie Lancaster is an essayist, author and critic. Her writing has been published in the New York Times, Rolling Stone, the Guardian, Pitchfork, Bon Appetit, Vogue and The Age, among others. She was the founding editor of the feminist film zine Filmme Fatales. Brodie co-hosts the weekly podcast See Also, and is the author of the 2017 memoir No Way! Okay, Fine.

Sophie Lane is a Sydney based artist and illustrator working on Gadigal and Wangal land. In taking a fragmented approach to personal narratives, her drawing and painting practice considers the intimate subjectivity of autobiographical storytelling. Landscapes of connection, solitude, mundanity, chronic illness, desire and gendered experience are broken up with visual and anecdotal negative space into which other possible understandings can be imagined. This process of disrupting traditional narrative structures allows the artist to offer up an introspective body of work; the hesitant vulnerability of a story only partially told.

Jamie Marina Lau is a novelist and the author of ‘Pink Mountain on Locust Island’ and ‘Gunk Baby’. She was awarded the Melbourne Prize for Literature’s Readings Residency Award and Sydney Morning Herald’s Best Young Australian Novelist. In 2022 Lau was selected to be a Fall resident and the Australian representative at the Iowa International Writers Program.

Mackenzie Lee is a queer First Nations poet. With Gulumerridjin (Larrakia), Wardaman, and Karajarri ancestry, mixed with Chinese, Japanese, Filipino, and Anglo-Australian heritage, they are a creative whose ties to culture, country, and saltwater connects them to their storyteller ancestors. Lee writes a variety of poems in response and reaction to the world around them.

Deborah Lee-Talbot is a professional historian. She is fascinated with places like archives and libraries. Her time in these historic places locates and illuminates stories about a wide range of women. After this research time Deborah seeks opportunities for community engagement, be it by creating presentations or digital content. In 2023 she completed research at the State Library of New South Wales as CH Currey Fellow. The project was ‘Archives of the Archivist: Phyllis Mander-Jones and the Keeping of Australian-Pacific records, 1896-1957’. She received a National Library of Australia Summer Scholarship in 2022 to analyse the Australian Joint Copying Project.

Quinton Li (they/them) is an award-winning non-binary author of spiritual, queer, and evocative narratives that represent underrepresented identities. They are the author of Tell Me How It Ends, and Chrysalis and Requiem, and the editor and curator of Devout: An Anthology of Angels. Their poetry can be found with Panorame Press, Messy Misfits Club and Iris Youth Magazine.

kiara lindsay is a poet living and working on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung people. her debut collection ‘a portrait of me running as fast as the plant is growing’ is out now through no more poetry.

Frank Lord is a writer, poet, artist, and editor living at the bottom of the world. They have had three books of poetry published—Seventy-Seven Tales From Urban Psychosis (2016), A Day in the Life (2017), and SCHLOCK!!! (2024)—and they are a regular contributor to the experimental magazine Unusual Work by Collective Effort Press. Their artwork and concrete poetry have been shortlisted and exhibited across Australia in dive bars, expensive galleries and holy holy government buildings. They have seen the future and they are afraid.

Lychee Lui is a writer, editor, and occasional award-winning interviewer who works in Sydney. Their work has appeared in Tharunka, Blitz, Newsworthy, and Plinky Plonky. They currently coordinate UNSWeetened, a student literary journal, at UNSW.

Phoebe Lupton is an Anglo-Celtic/Sinhalese writer, arts worker and access consultant, based in Canberra/Ngunnawal and Ngambri lands.

If you are not sure how to say Anke’s name, it rhymes with the German word for thank you – ‘Danke’. Anke was born in Germany and illustrates stories, poems, and events, using sand and an ‘old-school’ overhead projector. Her sand-work has been seen at spoken word poetry events including at Trades Hall and Federation Square. She currently co-runs monthly poetry events in Dandenong (Perc.U.lations) and Northcote (RadioLaria) and writes poetry and lyrics. Anke has previously worked across Australia as a performer, facilitator and artist, with Theatro Oneiron and Crossroad Arts. She regularly performs in the neo-folk duo ‘Awkward Strangers’.

N. J. Madden is a Naarm/Melbourne-based author and teacher. Madden worked a countless string of odd jobs from house-painting to retail to bookselling, before studying literature, history and education at university. His literary studies focused on eco-criticism, which heavily influences his writing. Madden’s debut novel, Laughing River, was shortlisted for the Unpublished Manuscript Award at the Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards 2024.

Haneen Mahmood Martin is a Kuala Lumpur -born, Malay-Saudi multi-arts programmer, producer, writer, and artist based in Narrm/Melbourne. She creates and seeks art that highlights the everyday rituals that make life meaningful, the precarity of memory as a means of holding knowledge, and the connection and understanding that sharing food can bring – creating a space for our ordinary stories in the archives.

Seth Malacari is an LGBTQIA+ author and editor. His first book, An Unexpected Party (Fremantle Press, 2023), was shortlisted for the 2023 Aurealis Award for best anthology. Their work has appeared in Emergence: SBS Emerging Writers Anthology, Ourselves: 100 Micro Memoirs, and Underdog: LoveOzYA Short Stories. He is one of the judges for the 2024 City of Fremantle Hungerford Award.

Victoria Manifold is a writer and trade union worker from County Durham, now living on Gadigal land.
She has been shortlisted for The White Review Short Story Prize twice, was a runner up in the 2019 Berlin Writing Prize, shortlisted for the 2021 Desperate Literature Prize and a runner-up in the 2022 Mslexia Short Story Prize. Her novel-in-progress, The Election of the Mayor, was shortlisted for the 2023 Richell Prize and longlisted for the 2023 Mslexia Novel Prize. In 2024 Wendy Erskine and Yan Ge selected her as the winner of the Short Fiction International Short Story Prize.

Dorcas Maphakela is a multidisciplinary creative combining writing, visual arts and holistic well-being advocacy in her practice. She is a South African-born Mopedi woman. She studied Fine Arts at the University of Johannesburg and holds a Master of Arts in Writing from Swinburne University of Technology. Dorcas is also a TV presenter, public speaker and founder and producer of the Antenna Award-winning OZ AFRICAN TV (OATV). She is the co-founder of Yo CiTY, a platform that champions the culturally diverse experience through Art & music. Her work was acknowledged with a Media Award from the Victorian Multicultural Commission.

Kirk Marshall is a Brisbane-born writer, teacher, fundraiser, and hellraiser living in Melbourne, Australia. He has written for more than eighty publications, both in Australia and overseas, including “Award-Winning Australian Writing”, “Island”, “Wet Ink”, “Going Down Swinging”, “Voiceworks”, “Verandah”, “visible ink”, “fourW”, and “The Grapple Annual”. Most recently, a chapter from his hillbilly apocalypse novel secured a nomination for The Pushcart Prize. Kirk’s date with fame and defamation arose when he authored the “Stranger Things” / “Round the Twist” mashup meme in 2016, before it was subsequently cannibalised by Netflix. He writes for dollars and dinosaurs at Museums Victoria.

Chloe Mayne is a poet whose work moves in the realms of mothering, decoloniality and ecology. She is writing a creative doctorate at the University of the Sunshine Coast, and is a current recipient of the Marten Bequest for poetry. As a descendant of the Trawlwoolway people of north-east Tasmania, connection to place and exploration of identity are important roots of her expression.

Laura McPhee-Browne writes on Wurundjeri land, and has published two novels, CHERRY BEACH and LITTLE PLUM, with a third, LACEY, on the way.

Josephine Mead is a settler visual artist/writer/curator living and working on Wurundjeri Country. Her multidisciplinary practice investigates personal notions of support. Her recent work has considered sound and language, queer-love and the body as a site of discursive practice.

Ari is a proud Kuku Yalanji and Nangu multidisciplinary artist with a strong focus in poetry and fashion design. The subject matter they focus on is the ways Love Studies coincide with Country, exploring these relationships in the experiences of Black Queer Peoples.

Selina Moir-Wilson is a writer, editor and comics artist. They are the editor of Voiceworks and a co-editor of Layabout. Their work has appeared or is forthcoming in Voiceworks, The Big Issue, Going Down Swinging and others. They are a 2023 SEVENTH Gallery emerging writer in residence and were a 2022 Toolkits: Graphic Narratives participant.

moirra. is a Yorta Yorta, Boon Wurrung and Jewish transsexual artist, writer and poet living on Wurundjeri Country. Xer work focuses on Blak Queerness and Queer Blakness.

Nicole Jia Moore is a writer living in Naarm (Melbourne) and completing her masters of clinical psychology. Her poetry and non-fic has appeared in Meanjin, Rabbit, Cordite Poetry review, and Best of Australian Poems 2022 among others.

John Morrissey is a Kalkadoon writer living in Melbourne. His debut collection of stories, Firelight, was published in 2023.

Cienan Muir is a big time nerd, bigger time advocate for creating Blak spaces. He plays Leo in the All-Indigenous D&D group, the Gammin Guild.

Olivia Muscat has written for ABC Everyday, Arts Hub, Kill Your darlings and The Saturday Paper, among others, and for several notable anthologies. She is currently writing for theatre, recently completing a development through Darebin Arts Speakeasy, and her show ‘Is Anyone Even Watching’ has been awarded a place in the Arts House Develops program and a spot in the 2025 season. She was awarded fellowships by The Wheeler Centre and Varuna to work on her middle grade novel, which was shortlisted for the Text Prize 2024, and her first picture book is set for publication with Scribble in 2025.

Previously awarded the 30 Under 30 LGBTIQ+ Leaders in Australia, Goddess Naavikaran is a Naarm based change maker and storyteller, community workshop facilitator, futurist Pop musician and DJ, stage and production manager, and theatre producer. Naavikaran’s debut EP, CHIQ DISCOTHEQ is now out on all streaming platforms and is an ode to trans joy.

Joan Nestle is an 84 year old fem lesbian, co-founder of the Lesbian Herstory Archives in Brooklyn, NY, (1974-) author and editor of ten books on lesbian, queer culture and literature. She is also a board member of Sinister Wisdom.

Mia Nie is a Chinese-Australian comic artist, essayist, illustrator, zine-maker, award-nominated ex-poet and resident arts industry party girl based in Naarm (Melbourne). She was recently published in the anthology Avast! Pirate Stories from Transgender Authors from Fremantle Press, and works as creative producer at Express Media.

Karlie Alinta Noon is an astronomer, science communicator and award winning author from the Kamilaroi Nation. Karlie uses her extensive experience in science communication and media to advocate for the importance of Indigenous stewerdship in astronomy and space practices.

Genevieve Novak is a writer from Naarm/Melbourne. She writes contemporary fiction, columns for The Age, and just-okay author biographies. She loves croissants. She hates being called Gen. Her novels, No Hard Feelings (2022) and Crushing (2023) are published by HarperCollins.

Ava Nunan (she/her) lives and writes on unceded Wurundjeri land. She is completing her Bachelor of Arts at the University of Melbourne, where she double-majors in creative writing and cultural studies. Ava’s previous work can be found in Voiceworks, Born Writers Award, Verve, Demure, and others.

Emma Osborne is a queer writer and poet from Naarm. Their writing has appeared in Uncanny Magazine, Nightmare Magazine, Apex Magazine, Pseudopod, PodCastle, the Year’s Best Australian Fantasy and Horror, WASTELANDS III edited by John Joseph Adams and HOMETOWN HAUNTS, edited by Poppy Nwosu. Emma is a graduate of the 2016 Clarion West Writers Workshop. They are an Aurealis Award and Australian Shadows award finalist. Their novella THE BEAST YOU’VE MADE OF ME is forthcoming at Interstellar Flight Press. Emma lives in Narrm with their girlfriend and many cats.

Renée Otmar (Distinguished Editor – IPEd, PhD) is a professional editor living on Wadawarrung country. Her experiences spans fiction and creative non-fiction genres, including biography and life writing. Renée writes and produces life stories, teaches, coaches and mentors writers and editors.
Renée’s publications include a family memoir, In Cold Blood: The murder of baby Jordan (New Africa Books, 2007), Editing for Sensitivity, Diversity and Inclusion: A guide for professional editors (Cambridge University Press, 2023) and 2 forthcoming guides on writing/editing trauma narratives (August 2024). Her paper, “Trauma in Publishing” was released in June 2024 in Publishing Research Quarterly.

Mariwakiterangi Paekau (She/They) (Tainui, Waikato, Maniapoto, Kahungunu ki Heretaunga) is a multidisciplinary artist.
She is currently halfway through her Te Reo Māori me ōna tikanga degree at Te Wānanga o Raukawa. Her primary work is poetry, one of her poems was displayed in Auckland for Pride (2022). She has been on the Rangatahi panel for Verb Writers Festival (2022, 2023) and was one of the Micro residents for Verb (2023). You can find her poetry on her Instagram @mariwakiterangi

Roumina Parsa is an Iranian Australian writer based in Melbourne (Naarm). She was shortlisted for the 2022 Catalyse Nonfiction Prize and her work has previously featured in Liminal and Farrago. She recently self-published a zine of personal essays, Here I Am.

Audrey Payne is the Melbourne food and drink editor for Broadsheet. She previously worked in the editorial team at Cherry Bombe, a New York-based media company celebrating women in and around the food world, where she remains an editor-at-large. Prior to Cherry Bombe Audrey worked in audience development at Lorne Michaels’ online digital comedy publication and production arm Above Average. She has contributed to Hetty Liu McKinnon’s Peddler Journal and wine publication Veraison. Audrey holds a Bachelor of Science from New York University, where she majored in business with concentrations in finance and econometrics.

Jasper Peach (they/them) is a trans, non-binary and disabled writer, speaker and parent. They are passionate about equitable access and inclusion, focused on the dismantling of misplaced shame via storytelling.

Connor Phipps (they/them) is studying a Bachelor of Arts majoring in Creative Writing at UNSW Sydney. Their interests include short story form, narrative theory and postcolonial literature. They are passionate about storytelling, particularly those we tell ourselves and each other about who we are.

Ruby-Rose Pivet-Marsh is a writer, producer and arts worker living and creating on unceded Wurundjeri land. Ruby is currently the Artistic Director and co-CEO of Emerging Writers’ Festival and is a co-founder of the Latinx arts collective, Yo Soy.

Shannon May Powell is a poet and artist whose work poses gestures of longing towards new possibilities of gender, sexuality and identity. Their work featured at the EWF, Berlin Feminist Film Festival and NY Art Book Fair. They’re a hot desk fellow at the Wheeler Centre and art director at Blindside gallery. In 2022 they published their poetry book, ‘Can we rest tonight in the amnesia of pleasure,’ with No More Poetry. Much of their work was developed at VARDA residency, California and Pocoapocco residency,Mexico where their poetry practice began mutating into ephemeral mediums of performance art.

Stephanie Powell is a poet based in Naarm / Melbourne. Her forthcoming collection, Small Acts, will be published in late 2024 by Liquid Amber Press. Her book, Gentle Creatures, was published by Vagabond Press in 2023. Her poetry has been translated into Braille and published widely. She is the winner of the 2024 Ada Cambridge Poetry Prize.

Jordan Prosser is an award-winning screenwriter and filmmaker from Victoria. His short story ‘Eleuterio Cabrera’s Beautiful Game’ won the Peter Carey Short Story Award in 2022 and was published in Meanjin. ‘Big Time’ is his first novel.

Ale Prunotto is a white, trans and autistic writer living on unceded Wurundjeri land. They mostly write creative nonfiction that explores embodiment, movement, urban landscapes, gender, play and risk. Their current work-in-progress is a book about experiences of women and gender minorities who do parkour.

Anna Quercia-Thomas is a queer Hispanic American writer and academic currently based in Western Australia. She writes poetry and speculative fiction about found family, queer romance, and connection in dark times. Her work is featured in New Words Press, SWAMP Journal, Overland, and an upcoming edition of Westerly. She is the third place winner of the 2023 International Proverse Poetry Prize

Madeleine Rebbechi is a writer based in Naarm/Melbourne. She has written music and arts reviews, radio scripts and media kits, but her true love is fiction. In 2022 she was highly commended in the Moth Short Story Prize, and in 2023 her story ‘Dip’ was published in the Kill Your Darlings anthology New Australian Fiction. She was awarded runner up in the 2023 Overland Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize, and is the 2024 recipient of the ASA/Varuna Ray Koppe Fellowship for Young Writers. She is currently working on a short story collection.

Martyn Reyes is a writer and artist from Sydney. His creative non-fiction, fiction and criticism can be found in the Liminal Review of Books, the Sydney Review of Books, Debris Magazine and more. He is currently working on his first book-length project.

Raeden Richardson was raised in Melbourne and graduated the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. His work has been supported by the Australia Council for the Arts, the Ian Potter Cultural Trust and the American Australian Association. He has been an artist-in-residence at La Napoule Art Foundation and Yaddo. His writing has appeared in Griffith Review, Kill Your Darlings, The Age, Strangely Enough and New Australian Fiction. His debut novel, The Degenerates, is forthcoming in September 2024.

Izzy Roberts-Orr is a poet and arts worker based on Wurundjeri Country in regional Victoria. Her debut collection, Raw Salt (Vagabond, 2024) was the recipient of a Marten Bequest Scholarship, Wheeler Centre Hot Desk Fellowship and longlisted for the Colorado Prize for Poetry. She is Creative Producer for Red Room Poetry.

Autumn Royal creates drama, poetry and criticism on unceded Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung land. Autumn is an arts worker, sessional academic and the interviews editor at Cordite Poetry Review. Her poetry collection The Drama Student was shortlisted for the 2023 Queensland Premier’s Judith Wright Calanthe Award.

Dr Samah Sabawi a Palestinian Australian playwright, author and poet. She received Green Room Award for Best Writing for her critically acclaimed play THEM and was shortlisted for the Victorian Premiere Literary Awards and the Nick Enright Prize. Sabawi’s Tales of a City by the Sea was staged over 100 times around the world winning two Drama Victoria Awards for Best Production and Best Publication. Sabawi co-edited Double Exposure winner of the Patrick O’Neill Award and co-authored I remember my name, winner of the Palestine Book Award. Sabawi’s debut novel Cactus Pear for My Beloved will be published September 2024.

Sara M. Saleh is a writer, human rights lawyer, and the daughter of Palestinian, Lebanese and Egyptian migrants. Her writing has been published widely in English and Arabic. In 2021, Sara made history as the first poet to win both the Peter Porter and Judith Wright Poetry Prizes. Sara’s debut novel, Songs for the Dead and the Living (Affirm Press, 2023) was shortlisted for a NSW Premier’s Literary Award. Her debut poetry collection, The Flirtation of Girls (UQP, 2023), was shortlisted for the 2024 ALS Gold Medal, the ALS Mary Gilmore Award and won the 2023 Anne Elder Award.

Melanie Saward is a proud Bigambul and Wakka Wakka woman. She is a writer, editor, and academic based in Tulmur (Ipswich), Queensland. Her debut novel Burn was published by Affirm Press in 2023 and her first romantic comedy novel, Love Unleashed, will be published by Penguin Random House in August 2024.

Kurnia Gusti Sawiji, hailing from Bojong Nangka, Tangerang, Banten, describes himself as a writer, teacher and perpetual learner. He spends his time writing novels, short stories, formulas, teaching modules, exam questions, and many other things. Some of his essays and short stories have found their way into both print and online platforms such as Mojok, Suara Merdeka, and Kompas.

Saman Shad is a writer, editor, journalist and teller of stories. Her writing credits span mediums, including radio scriptwriting for the BBC in the UK and the ABC in Australia, and playwriting, with works commissioned by theatres in London and Sydney. She is a regular writer for several publications, including The Guardian, Sydney Morning Herald and SBS. She has also worked on screen projects. Her debut novel The Matchmaker is out now published through Penguin Australia.

When you hear the words Levin Shillam you might think of great sprawling deserts and tumbleweeds drifting past. But in actual fact, Levin Shillam is one of those writing people… or an aspiring one. He likes to write comedy and absurdism, in the forms of audio drama, poetry, short fiction and the occasional stage play. In 2023, he was part of Regional Arts Australia’s writing program, Regional Scribes, and was published in their book, You Together. As of today, he studies at the University of Newcastle and is working on an audio drama miniseries.

Orlando Silver (he/they) is a nonbinary transmasc writer exploring queer embodiment and desire. He is the author of the plays “Soft Daddy” (2024) and “Escape Velocity” (2003). He has two self published books, “Soft Fruit” (2022) and “Relent” (2023), both of which explore trans masc erotica. He is the editor of the kink anthology “I Write the Body” (published by Kith Books). His new anthology “Take it Outside” is due for publication in November 2024. Orlando lives and works on Dharug and Gundungurra countries.

Hollen Singleton is a writer and editor, and teaches at RMIT and the University of Melbourne. They live in Sunshine, Naarm. You can find the first chapter of their novel manuscript in Meanjin Winter 2024.

2024 LAMBDA LITERARY AWARD FINALIST

Mx. Sly (they/them) is a non-binary writer, performer, arts producer, and flight attendant. Originally from Tiohtià:ke (Montreal, Canada) and now based in Naarm, they pursue contentment through incessant meal planning, doing Yoga with Adriene, making love like a beast, and making out in Melbourne’s laneways. Their first memoir, TRANSLAND: Consent, Kink & Pleasure, is a finalist for a 2024 Lambda Literary Award in the Transgender Non-Fiction category. When Sly isn’t in the sky, they run the arts collective Tender Container, which is developing Canada’s first all–trans and non-binary performance anthology for Playwrights Canada Press.

Aisling Smith is a Naarm/Melbourne-based writer. She won the Richell Prize for Emerging Writers in 2020. Her debut novel, After the Rain, was published by Hachette Australia in 2023 and was longlisted for the Australian Literature Society Gold Medal.

Aurelia St Clair is a Naarm-based comedian, writer, podcaster and content creator. You might have seen them on your TikTok FYP, your local Savers or on stage at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. Aurelia received a fellowship at the Wheeler Centre in 2021 and won a silver award in the 2022 Australian Podcast Awards as a co-host of PopGays.

Em Starr (she/her) is an Australian horror writer, whose work has appeared or is forthcoming, in numerous publications, including Midnight Echo Vol 18, Fear of Clowns: A Horror Anthology, and Spawn 2: More Weird Horror Tales About Pregnancy, Birth and Babies. She lives in Melbourne, on Boon Wurrung land, with one husband and two naughty dogs, Nikko and Franco (aka Dick-Dack and Fron Bon Jovi). She is currently writing her debut novel, a surf horror set in 1990s Australia. Em is a proud member of the Horror Writers Association, and Australasian Horror Writers Association.

Harry Steedman is an aspiring cinematographer currently looking for experience in the Film and TV industry. Harry is extremely eager to further develop skills and practice through a variety roles in the industry. Harry graduated with a Bachelor of Film and Television from JMC Academy in 2022, has a great attention to detail, flexibility and is willing to put in the hours to get the job done.

Liz Sutherland (they/them) lives on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation. They are the COO of a nonprofit organisation, the Treasurer of the Board of Overland, and is studying a Master of Arts (Writing and Literature) at Deakin University. Liz was a finalist in the Pearl Prize 2024, Frontier Poetry’s 2023 Ekphrastic Poetry Prize, and the 2023 OutStanding LGBTQIA+ Short Story Awards. Their writing has appeared in Mascara Review, StylusLit, Swamp Magazine, Left Brain Media, ScratchThat Magazine, Say It Out Loud, at Q-Lit festivals, and more.

Yasmin Tambiah, of Sinhalese and Tamil descent, grew up in Sri Lanka. Trained as a European medievalist, she subsequently researched sexuality and law in postcolonial states, and gender and militarization. Currently working in research management in Australia, Yasmin has also lived in the USA, with stints in Trinidad, India, England and Spain. Her award-winning creative writing has appeared in ‘Nethra’, ‘Conditions’, ‘Sinister Wisdom’ and ‘ZineWest’, and in ‘The Vintage Book of International Lesbian Fiction’ (1999); ‘Celebrating Sri Lankan Women’s English Writing: 1948-2000’ (2002); and ‘Out of Sri Lanka: Tamil, Sinhala and English poetry from Sri Lanka and its diasporas’ (2023).

Cher Tan is an essayist and critic. Her work has appeared in the Sydney Review of Books, Hyperallergic, Catapult, The Age, Disclaimer Journal, Cordite Poetry Review and Overland, amongst many others. She is an editor at Liminal and the reviews editor at Meanjin. Peripathetic: Notes on (Un)belonging is her debut book. She lives and works on unceded Wurundjeri land.

Samuel Te Kani is a queer Ngapuhi writer from New Zealand. He writes critically about art and cinema. His first short story collection Please, Call Me Jesus (2021) is mostly erotic sci fi. He recently pivoted to film, attending a Netflix funded directors intensive in 2023, mentored by Dame Jane Campion. He intends to make sexy/horrendous films from here on out. He is currently working on a novel.

Darla Tejada is a long time reader and emerging writer based in Naarm. She is currently undertaking graduate studies in English and her favourite activities include reading obscure queer fiction and taking long aimless walks. You can read her works in publications like Archer, More than Melanin and KYD.

Phoebe Thorburn is an autistic emerging writer & recipe developer living on unceded Boon Wurrung Country. Their writing explores food, comfort, connection, mental health & living in a world designed for neurotypical minds and able bodies. They are a Toolkits non-fiction (2023) & fiction (2024) alumni. Their work was shortlisted for Stringybark’s Erotic Short Story Prize (2023) and has been published by Frankie Magazine & ABC Everyday.

Isabella Trimboli is a writer based in Melbourne. Her writing has appeared in The Nation, Los Angeles Review of Books, New Left Review and HEAT.

Thabani Tshuma is a multi-award-winning Zimbabwean writer and performance poet. His work can be found in publications such as Dichotomi magazine, Cordite Poetry Review, CUBBY ART, and ABC ArtWorks’ SLAMMED segment. Thabani is co-curator of Thin Red Lines and his debut collection, ‘The Gospel of Unmade Creation’, released in 2023 through Recent Work Press.

Esther Tuddenham is a vibrant person who loves the arts. Esther’s passions are Music, Poetry and Photography.

Oliver Twist is a writer and actor. He has toured Australia with his critically acclaimed shows Jali and Griot, and appeared on SBS and the ABC. As a comic, he has been chosen to open for the best national and international acts. He has been lauded as a talent both by critics and by audiences, gaining him award nominations for his work. For more writing by Oliver, visit https://substack.com/@oliveretwist

Sam van Zweden runs A Plus is a safe and celebratory space for fat folks. With fashion markets running throughout the year and community events ensuring fat voices are part of the conversation, A Plus believes that fashion is for all people, and fat rights are human rights.

daniel ward is a poet and musician. they are the editor of ‘no more poetry’, an independent publisher of poetry books and art magazines. their second and most recent poetry collection is titled ‘eternal delight paralysis’.

Emily White is a writer and performer from Boorloo/Perth, living in Naarm/Melbourne. Motivated by conflicting desires to make people laugh and make people horny, their work primarily straddles the realms of comedy and erotica. They are also interested in the Australian Gothic and what this genre can offer queer stories. Emily has previously won the Rachel Funari prize for fiction and is the creator of Sap – a queer erotica zine. They make zines, write stories, and perform in their queer comedy coven, The Titwitchez.

Panda Wong is a poet and editor who lives and works on unceded Wurundjeri land. Her first chapbook, angel wings dumpster fire, and her first EP, salmon cannon me into the abyss, were released in mid-2022. She co-edited Best of Australian Poems 2023. She is also half of music/poetry project lotus threads with musician Hannah Wu.

Jackson Wood is the Editor-in-Chief of No Typewriters / No Talking. Frustrated with writing groups in general and typewriters in particular, Jackson started NT/NT with the help of Tempo Rubato to bring writers together in a low key way in post-pandemic Naarm / Melbourne. Born in Aotearoa New Zealand, you can now find him lurking around Brunswick and writing for publications like Webworm.

Laura Elizabeth Woollett is the author of a short story collection, The Love of a Bad Man (2016), and three novels, Beautiful Revolutionary (2018), The Newcomer (2021), and West Girls (2023). Her work has been shortlisted and long-listed for awards, including the 2024 Stella Prize. Laura was the City of Melbourne’s 2020 Boyd Garret writer-in-residence, a 2020-22 Marten Bequest scholar for prose, and will be a 2025 writer-in-residence at the Keesing Studio in Paris.

Karen Wyld is an author of Martu descent living on the coast south of Adelaide. They’ve written novels, children’s non-fiction, short stories, narrative non-fiction, and poetry. And co-edited The Rocks Remain: Blak Poetry and Story. Karen is the recipient of the 2024 SA Literary Fellowship (First Nations).

Cassandra is an award-winning Cypriot-Australian writer. Her play Hush Hush was a finalist for the New Play Award and longlisted for Theatre 503’s International Award. She’s a winner of the Ultimo Prize, and published in Everything, All At Once by Ultimo Press. She was commissioned for Paines Plough Theatre’s Come To Where I Am: Australia. Her latest work, The 13th Month, premiered at Flight Path Theatre in Sydney this year to critical acclaim. Other staged works: The Marvellous Life of Carlo Gatti, Loose Teeth (shortlisted for Max Afford Award 2016), The Last Journalist on Earth, Limerence, 44 Degrees, Like Breathing.

Jess Zanoni is a writer and musician, and the current Program Coordinator of the Emerging Writers’ Festival. She is the singer and bassist of alt-rock band Arbes, whose debut record Counterways is set for release on 1 November. She also makes music under her solo alias, Za Noon. Her writing has appeared in The Age, Cordite Poetry Review, Voiceworks, The Victorian Writer, Beat Magazine and sick leave.

Xiaole Zhan (they/them) is a Chinese-New Zealand writer and composer based in Naarm. They are the recipient of the 2024 Kat Muscat Fellowship and a 2024 Wheeler Centre Hot Desk Fellowship. They were the winner of the 2023 Kill Your Darlings Non-Fiction Prize for their essay-memoir ‘Think An Empty Room, Moonly With Phoneglow’ about growing up in a Pākehā-Chinese family, as well as the winner of the 2023 Landfall Young Writers Essay Competition for their essay ‘Muscle Memory’ exploring music and the body. As a composer, Zhan was the 2024 New North Emerging Artist.

Maggie Zhou is a 25-year-old Melbourne-based freelance writer, content creator and the co-host of the Culture Club podcast. She has written for publications such as The Guardian, ABC, The Age, ELLE and Marie Claire, and previously worked at Refinery29 and Fashion Journal.

More artists are coming to this event soon…