Chris Baty, the Willy Lit festival and student successes

Hugh Deacon, Lucia Nardo and Denise Hughes 

at the after-celebrations of the Williamstown Literary Soiree

(where the Ada Cambridge Awards were announced)

Well, it's been frantically busy in PWE this last week. We had the fantastic Chris Baty, originator of NaNoWriMo -- Mr Motivator, I reckon he should be called -- in to speak to a combined Story Structure and Novel 2 class, and then the Willy Lit Festival. I feel as if I'm coming off the Melbourne Writers' Festival or a good speculative fiction convention -- wanting to sit down and write, write, write. I hope you're all feeling the same!

Watch this space for student reviews of the different events...

Congratulations to our students who did well at the Lit Fest: Lucia Nardo and Hugh Deacon for being shortlisted in the Ada Cambridge, and Lucia for winning a commendation, and Denise Hughes for being shortlisted in the Seagulls Poetry Prize. Hugh, Denise and Marlene Gorman also all gave spirited readings in the People's Choice Awards for Fiction, and Megan Green and Louise Crossley read in the People's Choice Awards for Poetry. (I didn't hear their readings so can't comment on them, but did hear Denise, Marlene and Hugh! Well done, all of you, for participating.) Margaret McCarthy, one of our teachers, actually won the poetry section, so congratulations to her.

I also believe Lucia Nardo led a fantastic session on working out who you are as a writer. Students who attended this workshop were raving about it -- and I know it would've been great because we had Lucia do a session for us PWE teachers earlier this year. Lots of fun and insightful, and we have the colourful result pasted to the office wall (just in case you've wandered through and wondered what that collage is.)

Happy writing, everyone!

Tracey Rolfe