Lovers of books and storytelling will be pleased to hear the Australian Short Story Festival has added Perth to its annual schedule.
Now in its sixth year, celebrates the art and craft of the short story form.
Riding high on the increasing popularity of the short form, the national festival, shared with Adelaide and Melbourne, will be held at Fremantle Arts Centre from October 28th to 30th for three days of workshops, panel discussions, book launches, readings, children’s storytelling and live music.
Opening night on Friday, October 28th will celebrate song as a special short story form, featuring some of WA’s finest singer-songwriters.
Playwright David Milroy with music legend Lucky Oceans, writers Barry Divola and Jane Cornes with her duo Jane and The Rain, and Little Lord Street Band will share their song-writing inspirations and perform their songs live.
The festival will bring together 24 national and international authors passionate about writing short stories.
The program features international authors Sheila Armstrong and Allen C Jones.
Hailing from the northwest of Ireland, Sheila has created a deeply unsettling debut collection, How to Gut a Fish. Allen comes from Norway via the USA; his stories are razor-sharp and often confronting.
A great line-up of writers from around Australia, from diverse backgrounds and cultures, will discuss their inspirations, provocations and the subtleties of their craft.
Among them are award-winning Indigenous writer Ellen van Neerven from Queensland. The poet’s book Throat was the big winner at the 2021 NSW Premier’s Literary Awards.
Melbourne author Sean O’Beirne with his darkly funny collection A Couple of Things Before the End, Carol Lefevre from Adelaide who will launch her new collection The Tower, and Tasmanian Ben Walter, whose chilling stories will keep you awake at night.
Joining the interstate authors are a wide representation of WA writers, including internationally acclaimed short story writer and poet John Kinsella, and two exponents of the popular art of flash fiction, Susan Midalia, author of the recently published Miniatures, and Gillian O’Shaughnessy, former radio host and now an award-winning writer.
Other much-loved WA writers include Elizabeth Tan, author of the prize-winning collection Smart Ovens for Lonely People, Amanda Curtin, Rashida Murphy and Laurie Steed.
On Saturday night, October 29th, local publishing house Night Parrott Press will celebrate the release of its third fabulous anthology of flash fiction by WA writers.
The festival closes on Sunday afternoon with a panel on The Best Australian Yarn, which has attracted over 5,000 entries in its first year. Judges of this exciting short story competition discuss the judging process and what makes for an unforgettable short story.
All bookings through TryBooking.
OIP Staff
You can support our work by subscribing to our Patreon
or contributing to our GoFundMe campaign.
