Carrie Tiffany was born in West Yorkshire and grew up in Western Australia. She spent her early twenties working as a park ranger in the Red Centre and now lives in Melbourne, where she works as an agricultural journalist.

Carrie's first novel, Everyman's Rules for Scientific Living (2005) was shortlisted for numerous awards including the Orange Prize, the Miles Franklin Literary Award, the Guardian First Book Award and the Commonwealth Writer's Prize, and won the Dobbie Award for Best First Book (2006) and the 2006 Western Australian Premier's Award for Fiction. Mateship with Birds is Carrie's second novel.
 

Growing up, who were some of your favourite authors?
My family was more of a television household than a book household. We migrated from the UK to Australia in the early 1970s. My parents brought a set of leather bound Charles Dickens with us. They arrived in a shipping container wrapped in our winter sheets and smelling of England – of gravy. I was ten or eleven when I started reading them – not reading like an adult – I’d skip large chunks, but I still found them enchanting. By my early twenties I’d developed a serious book habit. When I was working as a park ranger in Central Australia I ordered books from the library in Alice Springs and they arrived by Grey Hound bus. These are a few of my favourite authors: Flaubert, George Eliot, Chekhov, Nabokov, Marquez, Eudora Welty, James Baldwin, William Maxwell, Patrick White, Carver, E.L. Doctorow, Richard Ford, Shirley Hazzard, Marilynne Robinson, Brian Castro, JM Coetzee, Gerald Murnane, David Malouf, Alice Munro…(I could fill several pages…)

How did your passion for the land arise?
When we arrived from the UK we lived on a housing estate in Perth, WA. I was very taken with the nature strip at the front of the house. It was remarkable to me that this new country had so much space every house had a strip of dirt and straggly gum tree in front of it. I developed a childish notion that the nature strips linked up and if you followed them they would take you out to the bush. Spinning out at 18 I left uni and went travelling – I followed the nature strip inland to the bush. 

After starting out life as a park ranger in Central Australia, what led you to pursuing a career as an author?
I’m not sure what prompted me to start writing. I’ve always read a lot. I don’t think there is such a thing as a career as an author. I have a day job and I have my writing too.  The writing is something special that is often frustrating and occasionally thrilling.  I’m not interested in industrial authorship – writing to schedule or publishing just because you are (evidently) a writer. 

Your works have been shortlisted for various awards in the past, including the Miles Franklin Literary Award, the Guardian First Book Award and the Commonwealth Writers Prize. How does this recognition make you feel?
It’s lovely. But when you are sitting at the table struggling with a sentence it doesn’t exist.

What can you tell us about your new book, Mateship with Birds?
I’m not the best person to ask as it is too close to me. I’ve been telling people it is about sex and birdwatching, but that’s a bit glib. I think it’s about love and loneliness and families. It is also about our relationships with animals. I really enjoy writing about animals. This novel features a whippet, a cat, numerous cows and birds and an unfortunate sheep.

What was the inspiration behind Mateship with Birds?
I did some technical freelance writing for the state government a few years ago on biodiversity. The language of biodiversity is really depressing. Landscapes have ‘amenity value,’ rather than beauty. The work was science based and I was struck by how science has removed the ‘subject’ from the landscape. I also stumbled across some lovely books by early Australian nature writers including Alec Chisholm’s Mateship with Birds (1922). In these books there was some honour in being an amateur lover of nature and no hesitation about anthropomorphising animals. Mix this with an interest in sex, some Freud and some Havelock Ellis and the novel was born.

Do you have any quirky habits that appear when you’re writing?
In the winter I get very cold from sitting still. Blankets, furry boots and woolly hats are in order – Mawson making an assault on the polar sentence…

What would you like your readers to take away from Mateship with Birds?
The book is an accumulation of details. An acknowledgement that novels can be small and intimate and still rich in feeling would be lovely.
Do you have any words of advice that you would like to offer to aspiring authors?
It is the writing that matters. Nothing else.

When can your readers expect to see another of your novels?
When I’m happy enough with it to let it go.

Fiona McCallum spent her childhood years on the family cereal and wool farm outside a small town on South Australia's Eyre Peninsula. An avid reader and writer, she decided at the age of nine that she wanted to be the next Enid Blyton!

While studying, she found herself drawn to writing fiction where her keen observation of the human condition and everyday situations could be combined with her love of storytelling.

In 2002 Fiona completed her first manuscript soon made the difficult decision to return to Adelaide to develop a career as a novelist. She now enjoys the sharp contrast between her corporate work and creative writing.

Why did you decide to become an author? Is writing something that you have always been passionate about?
It was just after I’d turned thirty that I discovered that my true passion lay in writing full-length fiction, but I’ve had a love of reading and writing for as long as I can remember. I did declare at the age of nine that I wanted to be the next Enid Blyton! But a career in the arts wasn’t encouraged and the dream got lost for many, many years. It’s been an interesting journey full of twists and turns to get me to where I am now - and one I wouldn’t change for the world.

Growing up, which authors do you believe were the most influential on your writing style?
I’m not sure how much their influence shows in my writing style, but as a child I loved anything by Enid Blyton and then later Catherine Cookson, Agatha Christie, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. 

What would you say has been the greatest inspiration for your writing?
My own life experiences. I’ve been blessed to have enjoyed some interesting moments and contrasts, such as life on the land in rural South Australia and corporate life in inner-city Melbourne and Sydney.

How did it feel to have your first novel, Paycheque, published?
Exciting, but also a huge relief after spending nine years trying to find a publisher for one of my four manuscripts.

What are you hoping that readers take away from your new novel, Nowhere Else?
I hope readers will enjoy Nowhere Else as an entertaining read, and also perhaps be inspired to go on their own journeys of self-discovery to find where their true passions lie. I think life is both too short and too long to be doing a job that doesn’t make you truly happy.

What was the inspiration behind Nowhere Else?
I wanted to pay a small tribute to friends, Peter and Wendy Olsen, who died in the Whyalla Airlines crash in 2000. And beyond that, Nowhere Else is another journey of self-discovery story set in rural Australia. I love the idiosyncrasies of small country towns. After school I wanted to be a farmer with my father but, because I have a brother, there was no point even mentioning it. I think writing about farm life is therapy for my thwarted ambition, and I’m probably going to need it for a while yet!

Did you find that writing your second novel was easier after your first novel was published?
I am finding it more difficult to write lately, but that’s more around finding the time and headspace to focus with all the new demands that come with being published, such as going to speak at bookstores and libraries, as well as the fact that you tend to be dealing with revisions from your editor while trying to write something new.

What have been some of your most memorable experiences as a writer?
My serendipitous moment of finally finding a publisher - it’s a bit of a long story. Since being published, I would have to say one of the most amazing things is getting emails from random people telling me how much they’ve enjoyed my book. It’s just so lovely.

Do you have any quirky writing habits?
Hmm, I’m guessing writing propped up in bed might be considered a little quirky. When I started being serious about my writing I was travelling a little with my now ex-partner. I decided that if I made bed my ‘zone’ for writing I’d be able to get in the ‘zone’ no matter where I was. And, no, I’ve never fallen asleep! Perhaps also considered quirky is that I write by hand - in a particular notebook with a Waterman mechanical pencil. It’s a bit of a pain having to then type everything up, but it’s what works for me (I’ve tried other ways). The good thing is that my first draft turns out more like a third draft with the little bit of tweaking I do while putting it into the computer.

Can we expect another novel in the future?
Absolutely! I’ve got way too much to say! I’d like to get a novel out each year for the next 39 years - that would then make me 80. No pressure!

Sulari Gentill set out to study astrophysics, ended up graduating in law, and later abandoned her legal career to write books instead of contracts. Sulari was shortlisted for Best First Book in our region for the Commonwealth Writers' Prize 2011.

She grows French black truffles on her farm in the foothills of the Snowy Mountains of NSW, which she shares with her young family and several animals... the farm, not the truffles.

She has been writing for a few years, but thinking about it most of her life. She’s pretty sure now that writing is what’s she’s supposed to do. This month, Sulari chats to us about her passion for writing and her fascination for Australian history.

Originally you graduated university with a law degree, so what led you to becoming an author?
Sometimes I think everything, including my law degree, led me to becoming a writer. 

I started at University studying Astrophysics.  As much I quickly realised that I was not meant to be an Astrophysicist, the study of pure mathematics did give me the grounding in logic that is necessary to make a plot, particularly a crime fiction plot, work.  I became involved in amateur theatre and on the stage I learned about dialogue and timing.  Then the law trained me to write quickly and precisely, to weave a story around given facts.   All that was missing was the realisation of what I was really meant to do with that knowledge.  Quite stupidly I thought I was supposed to become a lawyer, and so for several years I did just that.  But always I felt at though I was living someone else’s life – a perfectly nice life – just not mine.

And then one day, during a conversation with an old friend, I had an idea for a story.  I was so excited by the idea that I didn’t stop to worry about whether I could actually write a novel and I just began.  It all seemed to fall into place.  Once I started writing, it was incomprehensible that I would ever stop.

Is writing something that you’ve always been drawn to or did the love develop later in life?
I’ve been drawn to writing for as long as I can remember.  When I was a child and all things seemed possible, I’d think about the books I’d write, the masterpieces I’d paint and the films in which I’d star.  As I got older, of course, I became more realistic and less courageous.  Writing a novel seemed as outrageous an ambition as winning an Academy Award, so I put those dreams away and pursued a sensible profession.  One associated with an income.  For a while I was distracted by contracts and deeds.   I think there were always stories in my head.  At night I would close my eyes and play them out for my own amusement… I just didn’t think that anyone else would be interested.  I still dream my books… it’s just that now I write them down. 

In truth, though I’ve been writing for only four years, I spent all the decades before gathering material.

Your Rowland Sinclair series is set in Sydney during the 1930s. How did you approach the research that was required for writing the series? Did you discover any interesting or unknown facts about Australian history?
Mostly, I research as I write.  My work is story and character driven.  I weave my plot and characters into historical events and, whilst I have fallen in love with the eras in which I write, I am always cognisant that I am not producing an historical textbook.  What I focus on in my research is the details of the era which are needed to colour what my characters are actually doing, seeing, smelling or thinking.  I go looking for those details as and when they come up in my writing...that way, I ensure that I’m not simply inflicting my research on the reader to demonstrate my vast knowledge of plumbing or economics or farming practices in the 1930s.
That being said, I do often just come across an historical figure who is so intriguing that I think “Hmmm… Rowland needs to meet him/her” and  somehow find a way for them to wander into the plot.  Similarly, some historical events and groups are so interesting that I conspire to have Rowland stumble into them.  The glory of writing historical fiction is that I can, through Rowland Sinclair, meet some of the truly amazing, inspiring and often quite mad characters who were out and about in the 1930s.

What inspired you to write a historical crime fiction series?
Initially it was not so much an inspiration as a pragmatic decision.  Writing can be quite an isolating passion.  As a writer you spend a lot of time living in your own head among people that exist only there.  It can be hard on your family, particularly if you have not always been a writer.  My husband, Michael, married a perfectly sane, income-producing, corporate-dressing lawyer.  Suddenly he found himself financially and otherwise attached to a writer who had “work pyjamas” and would talk to herself.  It must have been quite a shock.  The poor man also found himself conscripted as the first editor of my work. 

I realised early on that I wasn’t ever going to stop writing, and I had no immediate plans to get rid of Michael either, so it occurred to me that in order to ensure his continued cooperation, I would need to bring him into this world in my head… I would need write towards him in a way.  Michael is an historian by trade, whose particular expertise is in the extreme right-wing movements of the 1930s in Australia.  And so, not coincidentally, the Rowland Sinclair series is set in that era and against that political backdrop. 

Of course, once I started delving into the thirties, the era captured my imagination and I was away.  But the world of Rowland Sinclair is one which my husband understands and loves and much as I do.  He’s happy to edit my manuscripts, to check my historical facts and have conversations about Rowland Sinclair as if he were a real person.  Having an expert in the era in bed next to you, is also quite handy.  It’s worked out rather well really.

Rowland Sinclair and his cohort are very colourful characters and feel quite genuine. Are they based off any real life inspirations?
Mostly they are a conglomeration of real life inspirations, each having the traits and idiosyncrasies of a number of people I have known.  That being said, Wilfred Sinclair quite closely resembles my husband in manner and attitude.  I have been known to write Wilfred’s dialogue by asking Michael, “What would you say if…?”, and the just typing in his response.  For this reason, I’m often a bit disconcerted if readers express too strong a dislike of Wilfred Sinclair… after all, I married him.

Miles Off Course is the third book in the Rowland Sinclair series. What can readers expect from this latest instalment?
Miles Off Course opens in early 1933.  Rowland Sinclair and his companions are ensconced in the superlative luxury of The Hydro Majestic – Medlow Bath, where Edna is receiving treatment and Rowland is struggling with a new nude model.

And then Harry Simpson vanishes.
 
Croquet and pre-dinner cocktails are abandoned for the High Country of NSW where Rowland hunts for Simpson with a determination that is as mysterious as the disappearance itself.  Stockmen, gangsters and a belligerent writer all gather to the fray, as the investigation becomes embroiled with a much darker conspiracy.

This latest instalment once again follows Rowland and his entourage of bohemians into an extraordinary time in Australian history.   It brings Rowland to the Snowy Mountains, which is my back yard, and drags him into a rural hotbed of abduction, murder and global subterfuge.

Crime plays an integral part of the plotlines within the series. Is it difficult to come up with a storyline that will be interesting and keep the reader guessing until the end? 
I usually start with one event, place or fact (quite often historical) that I find interesting.  Then I just start to write.  Generally, I have no idea “who did it” until I’m at least halfway through the novel.  I figure that if I’m guessing, the reader probably will be too.  So far, I haven’t had any trouble coming up with storylines.  The period between the wars is so rich in controversy, style and insanity that I’m never short of inspiration.

Not giving anything away, but Rowland and the fiery Edna share an interesting relationship. Where do you see their relationship heading in the future?
Realistically, the story arc of Edna and Rowland’s relationship runs parallel to the greater story arc of the entire series.  So much of who they are is defined by what they are to each other.  So much of who Edna is, and why Rowland loves her, is about her independence, her ambition and her refusal to relinquish these things. 

Of course neither has taken a vow of chastity, and I doubt I’ll be able to resist allowing either of them the odd dalliance.  Rowland will continue to be under pressure to settle down and marry an appropriate girl from a good family.  He will continue to resist.  Edna will continue to resist him… for a while at least.

Without giving anything away, Rowland and Edna will have their moments.  Some of these moments will have far-reaching consequences and others will be forgotten by everybody but them.

Along with the familiar faces of Rowland’s faithful friends Milton, Clyde and his brother Wilfred, will we be introduced to any new characters in Miles Off Course? Anyone we should be keeping our eye on?
Harry Simpson. Through him readers may get another insight into the Sinclairs, and into what makes Rowland the man he is.  In truth I didn’t initially intend to carry Harry’s story on to future books, but his voice was so strong and warm that I wanted him to stay.  Quite unexpectedly, he let me in on a dark and guarded secret, the ramifications of which will play out later in the series.

A Few Right Thinking Men was very well received and was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best First Book. What would it mean to you if Miles Off Course received similar accolades?
Without any pretence of nonchalance, I would be ecstatic.  To me, having a book published is like sending your children out into the world.  You know they have to make their own way but you worry.  When people like them, and are kind to them, it gives you the courage to send out the next child.  For each book you have the hope that it will find its own place and friends in the literary world…and, if you’re very lucky, the occasional person that will love it as you do.

So, yes, if Miles Off Course were received as well as A Few Right Thinking Men has been, I would be truly delighted and very grateful.


When can readers expect the next Rowland Sinclair adventure? 
Paving the New Road, which takes Rowland and his inappropriate friends to Germany as Hitler is consolidating power, is the next book in the series, and will be released in August 2012.

Meet Zoran Drvenkar, author of Sorry, a psychological thriller that climbed its way up the German bestseller lists almost instantly and won a spot on Germany's prestigous best crime book list.

What did you want to be at 5, 13 and 20 years of age?

I was mainly struggling with trying to be myself, so I really didn’t think much about being someone else. I started reading at 5 and that’s when the world opened for me. When I was 13, I wrote my first poem. Kitsch met hormones whilst connecting frontally with drama. I loved it and I felt like a genius, almost untouchable. Soon I turned to horror stories and left poems that rhymed behind as soon as I opened my first Bukowski. Other kids open beer bottles, cigarette packs, dirty magazines, I was addicted to books from day one and Bukowski was a nice step in the right direction. From 15 until 22, I was copying everything I read, learning the trade from writers by mimicking them and slowly, very slowly finding my own voice. My head was a melting pot, all the stories i have read were tumbling around in there and something new surfaced on paper.

What prompted you to write your first novel?

There were so many books and ideas and plot twists planted in my brain, that I had to do something - rob a bank, start a cooking class, climb a mountain. I never finished school and hated the time it stole from me as much as I hated the thought to be interested in things you cannot be interested in when you are 12 - like chemistry and mathematics and why a curve does this and that and why worms have their heads next to their asses. After reading every book that came close to me I turned very fast onto the road of writing. I was allowed to think and write and express what I wanted, without limits, without rules. I could bleed out my heart or I could be cruel as hell. It was possible. You can’t say no to that.
The first novel was beautiful trash. It was a fantasy plot, full of naked women and men hunting with swords and bad guys with names like Darkian and Komor. The novel was called WITCHHUNTER and it was written on a typewriter on very thin paper that felt like papyrus. I still have it and the world will never see it.

Where did the inspiration for your novel, Sorry come from?

In the beginning there was a dream. A rather boring one. In the dream I met three friends. We were standing around and no one was very happy with life. Suddenly I had this idea. Why not open an agency that apologizes to people? And why not call it Sorry.
When I woke from this dream it was around 3 in the morning and I was really tired and I thought about the dream and decided it is really not worth thinking about. But as a writer you learn never to dismiss sentences or ideas. If you dismiss them, you can be sure they will hang on in your mind and you will try to grasp them and they will not let you because you already ignored them once. So I took a pen, didn’t turn on the lights, wrote Sorry into the palm of my hand and fell asleep again. That’s how it started.

In what ways was writing this psychological thriller different to your other works?

It wasn’t. For me there is no great difference between a children‘s book or a thriller. The characters are always in front, and sometimes they are just eight years old, a little crazy and hungry for life. And sometimes they are thirty, very crazy and as hungry for life as an alligator. There is no switch in my head seperating how the story is told as I am not writing for an audience and not trying to please a readership. It is very satisfying to move from one genre to the other, telling the stories that bother me and espescially the stories of my characters.

Which writer or writers have kept you hooked throughout their works?

There are so many, I could fill a country and let them make babys and build houses and by the end of the day there still would not be all of them in that country. Their number is growing all the time. When I was young I learned a lot from William Goldman, Stephen King, Kurt Vonnegut and John Irving. Later I fell in love with Mark Helprin, Richard Laymon, Richard Brautigan, Joyce Carol Oates, Evan Hunter/Ed McBain, Charles Bukowski, Lars Saabye Christensen, Hubert Selby, Larry McMurtry, Andrew Vachss, the early Michael Crichton, John Sandford and a hundred more.

When writing, what quirky habit/s do you have?

The only one unusual thing is that I am totally lost in time. The days melt into each other and I am always waiting for snow. The silence outside makes me sigh, the darkness wakes me up. My writing needs a lot of coffee and tea, a lot of movies and music, even more books and there have to be candles - no cats and dogs, no fish looking at me. Just me and life and good friends dropping by and my muse. You can’t  write without a muse. And mine is a star.

How did you feel when Sorry entered the bestseller list almost immediately after release and was placed on the prestigious best of crime list, Krimi-Welt-Bestenliste, in Germany?

I was smiling.

What were the challenges you faced while writing Sorry?

I planned a novel about four friends who have a great idea and turn it into business. It should have been a critical novel about our social life and the way we behave with each other. I knew there was more behind the story, but I didn’t expect it to be so much more. After 150 pages I got scared by the story, as two young characters that were never planned stepped into it. They popped up while I was writing, I let them loose and the story turned on me and I was scared of my own writing. I put the book away for two years, wrote three children‘s books in-between to let the steam out. But a writer has to be loyal to his books and espescially to his characters. So I came back and I turned one winter into a long dark night. I hope I have not to do this again.

What should a new reader expect from Sorry?

Forgiveness.
The reader has to forgive me for the beginning.
So let’s talk to him directly:
Dear Reader, I am a nice guy. I hate torture, I don’t mutilate people to put you on edge and I would never hurt you. I love to scare you, to make you feel uncomfortable, so that you start to doubt reality. I really love this. But honestly - you will never see me being unfair to you, all the way along I will try to gain your trust. And if  you think my novels starts mean and ugly there are some suprises along the way that I really hope will blow your mind. And I can promise you, the further you get into the novel, the more you will understand why I did the mean and ugly act and I am sure you will forgive and understand me.

Rodney Hall is one of Australia’s finest writers. He has won the Miles Franklin Award twice for Just Relations and The Grisly Wife and many of his novels and poems have been published internationally. His acclaimed memoir popeye never told you was published in 2010. He lives in Melbourne. Here he chats to gr about his new collection, Silence.

As a child, you moved from your home in England to start a new life in Australia. How did this experience affect your life and your writing?
We arrived from England when I was 13. But this was not a new idea—all through my childhood it had been the plan. My mother’s determination to return here (her family had had a farm in Kangaroo Valley before the war) was always a powerful factor. Australia became my magic land all through the bombing: it was the place I imagined escaping to. And well before setting foot here my great hobby was collecting information, pictures and stamps about Australia. All but one of my novels are about understanding Australia and Australian history . . . absorbing and embracing this as home.

After starting out life as a musician, actor, painter and writer, what led you to becoming an author?
I knew I would make a life in the arts, the question of which one ended up being decided by chance, really. At 16 I was introduced to John Manifold and his wife Kate. I went to their house on the outskirts of Brisbane, armed with my clarinet, to make music. The moment I stepped into that house I knew my life had changed forever. Although Manifold was an accomplished musician—he introduced me to baroque music, for a start—he was principally a poet and essayist. His encouragement when he offered to read my stories and poems was what set me on the path to becoming a writer.

Having written extensively over your career, what are some of the ways in which you find ideas for your work?
I find my ideas in society and social values, in issues that may arise locally but have wider and deeper implications. I always conceive of my characters in social situations. It’s the interconnections and interactions between people that fascinate me.

Who or what have been some of your greatest inspirations for your writing?
Patrick White changed everything for writers of my generation. Suddenly he set the bar way higher than it had ever been before. Overnight we knew Australia was on the world literary stage and that somehow we had to measure up. Near enough was no longer good enough.

Your latest book, Silence, is a collection of fictions. How did you approach the writing of a number of short stories as opposed to a longer novel?
The 29 short prose fictions that comprise Silence were accumulated over a period of eight years. I wrote individual pieces while engaged on other book projects (Love Without Hope and Popeye never told you). In fact there were 50 of them when I finally called a halt in 2010. I then had the enjoyable task of crafting the sequence—teasing out connections and echoes—and reducing , reducing, reducing till the collection came together as a coherent unit. This coherence is one of ‘feel’ rather than rigid structuring. The decision to settle for two sequences of 14 pieces each with one central piece about God only came to me right at the last minute, really.

What should your readers expect to take away from Silence?
Well, the best I can do is quote a few sentences from the reviews of the book that have begun coming in.

               ‘Silence should be approached with senses attuned to the sounds, images and emotions that are evoked so vividly . . . I came to this book unprepared, and I was completely overwhelmed by the tapestry of its imagery and the echoes of its stillness.’ (Bookseller and Publisher Magazine)

               ‘Silence is the recurring theme: so many different types of silence; sad, spiritual, contemplative, angry, frightened, a silence inspired by awe and more. I particularly loved the dreaming bird, a haunting piece which almost had me in tears.’ (Timeless Books)

               ‘Landscapes and characters are painted with economy and yet with such vivacity that the words will linger in your mind long after you have finished reading.’

(Good Reading Magazine)

Are there any central themes that work to connect the fictions within Silence?
Yes, there are themes. One is that our human qualities and vices play out differently in different people, leading sometimes to heroism, sometimes to cruelty. Another is that silence can be a statement of the conscience or, equally, an admission of cowardice. Another is that history finally catches up with us—even if we think we have got away with something the truth will surface. Above all, you cannot stamp out ideas. Other pieces are comic, such as the satire on so-called intellectual property rights (which is another means by which things of value in our lives are reduced to money and commerce).

Silence contains some famous historical voices. Who are some of these voices and what led you to the decision to write in this style?
As a novelist I am always extending my voice by speaking through my characters. In this book I actually use real voices from the past—by imitation—as a means of reconceiving and enlarging the meanings of my material by imaginging how other writers might have expressed it.

What have been the most rewarding experiences during your time as writer?
The most rewarding experiences have been when people tell me about their experience of my books. This has been particularly encouraging when the enthusiasm has come from major writers whose work I admire—such as Salman Rushdie, Shirley Hazzard, Angela Carter, Robertson Davies and so on. Encouraging, because you never can be quite sure you have achieved what you set out to say until somebody shows you that you have.

Having won the Miles Franklin award twice, you’ve obviously led a very successful career as an author. Looking back on this career, what’s one piece of advice that you’d like to offer to aspiring writers?
Look, I don’t think of writing as a career. It’s what I do. It’s like a vocation. A calling. The money is never the thing—and just as well, because there hasn’t been all that much of it. My advice to young writers is to decide what you value and write about that . . . write as intensely as you can . . . put your whole self into it until you forget you are there at all. Don’t worry your head about whether you will get published until you have finished and made your work as perfect as you can. Literature is not a business—it is the expression of what is deeply true in us that we share with others. And we all have depth. We all have the language. The knack, the techniques, can only be picked up by reading. The greater and more challenging the books we read the better our models are and, hopefully, the better our own writing will be.