Resources for writers

So you want to be a writer?

1. Get started

  • Make a start. Some writers set a writing time-limit (e.g. two hours in the morning or at night). Some writers set a writing word-limit (e.g. 500 words every day). Do whatever works for you. The important thing is to develop a regular writing practice.

2. Get company

  • Shut Up and Write with others. One thing I can definitely recommend is writing with peers. I used to run a Shut Up and Write group at UNSW in Sydney. We’d meet every Wednesday for an hour or so. I wrote the first draft of ‘The permanent resident’, the final story in my book The Permanent Resident every Wednesday, at these sessions. This is how I completed that story. It was forced writing time, under pressure to stay focussed because everyone else looked like they were focussed. No checking emails and social media. It was tremendously useful. See this link for how it all started in San Francisco, USA. There are numerous Shut Up & Write groups across the world including in Sydney and Melbourne. I have found Dr Tseen Khoo’s posts about this particularly useful. See this link. There are also writing groups in the virtual world. Look for the hashtag #SUAW on Twitter.
  • Join a Meetup Group, see this link

3. Get reading

Writers come from readers. Read voraciously. Read anything that interests you, in any genre, in any language, and in any media. Also read books about the craft of writing. Here are some suggestions:

  • Craft in the Real World: Rethinking Fiction Writing an Workshopping by Matthew Salesses
  • Meander, Spiral, Explode: Design and Pattern in Narrative by Jane Alison
  • The 21st Century Screenplay, Linda Aronson, Allen & Unwin. See Linda Aronson’s website for amazing writing advice and resources, particularly in relation to structure. http://www.lindaaronson.com
  • The Paris Review Interviews online (can also be bought as a collection)
  • From Mind to Keyboard: Writers from Goa and beyond share stories of how they made it, edited by Sheela Jaywant, Goa 1556, 2016.
  • Telling Tales: Excursions in narrative form, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, 2016
  • The Writer’s Room: Conversations about writing, Charlotte Wood, Allen & Unwin, 2016
  • The Good Story: Exchanges on truth, fiction and psychotherapy, J.M. Coetzee & Arabella Kurtz, Harville Secker, 2015
  • Steering the Craft: A 21st Century Guide to Sailing the Sea of Story, Ursula K. Le Guin, Mariner Books, 2015
  • Cracking the Spine: Ten short Australian stories and how they were written, Edited by Julie Chevalier & Bronwyn Mehan, Spineless Wonders 2014
  • Psychology for Screenwriters: Building conflict in your script, William Indick, Michael Wiese Productions, 2004
  • remembered rapture: the writer at work, bell hooks, Holt, 1999.
  • Making Stories: How ten Australian novels were written, Sue Woolfe & Kate Grenville, Allen & Unwin, 1993
  • A Passion for Narrative: A guide for writing fiction, Jack Hodgins, McClelland & Stewart, 1993
  • The Writing Book: A workbook for fiction writers, Kate Grenville, Allen & Unwin, 1990
  • Writing Down The Bones: Freeing the writer within, Natalie Goldberg, Shambhala, 1986
  • Writing Your Life: A Journey of Discovery, Patti Miller, Allen & Unwin, 2001 (1994)
  • The Memoir Book, Patti Miller, Allen & Unwin, 2007

4. Get/ build community

Be an active literary citizen by supporting other writers, attending their events, amplifying their work on social media, reviewing their work, buying their books. Connect with writing communities around you. Here are some suggestions:

In Australia

Across the world

  • Sangam House outside Bangalore, India
  • Caferati, across India including regular writing groups and open mic events
  • Goa Writers’ Group, Goa, India
  • Cove Park, Scotland

5. Get feedback

Getting feedback on your work is an important part of developing your craft as a writer. Some writers rely on friends or writing groups to provide this feedback. Some writers rely on professional help. Here are some organisations that offer feedback services online. Click through the links for information about online courses, feedback clinics and pricing.

6. Get help with editing

Once you have written a draft that you are happy with, it can be useful to engage the services of a professional editor, especially if you are unsure about grammar, tense, punctuation, and structure. Here are some ways to engage an editor:

7. Get a mentor

It can be useful to engage the services of a writing coach or mentor who will be able to provide feedback on aspects of writing craft such as Point of View, Character, Structure etc. Here are some organisations that offer mentoring programs and services. Please check individual websites for eligibility criteria and fees.:

8. Get informed

Here are some wonderful literary resources on the web to help inform your writing practice.

9. Get listening

Here is a list of wonderful podcasts focussing on books, writers and writing

10. Get published

Once you have a polished story, and are ready to send it out into the world, there are a range of literary journals that may consider your work for publication. Here are some of them. Please check each journal’s guidelines for details about the kind of writing they accept.

So you want to write other people’s stories?

Protocols for using First Nations Cultural & Intellectual Property in the Arts: https://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/programs-and-resources/Protocols-for-using-First-Nations-Cultural-and-Intellectual-Property-in-the-Arts/

Respectful Storytelling Practices, a resource written by the team at Terri Janke and Company for the Australian Society of Authors: https://www.asauthors.org/news/asa-launches-essential-new-resource-more-than-words

On telling other people’s stories

  1. ‘What happens when you tell somebody else’s story?’ An essay by Alexis Wright, Meanjin, Summer 2016
  2. ’30 years after Mabo, what do Australia’s battler stories – and their evasions – say about who we are?’ An essay by Jeanine Leane in The Conversation, published on July 22, 2022 https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-30-years-after-mabo-what-do-australias-battler-stories-and-their-evasions-say-about-who-we-are-187110‘
  3. ‘On Whiteness and The Racial Imaginary’ by Claudia Rankine and Beth Loffreda, 2015, https://lithub.com/on-whiteness-and-the-racial-imaginary/
  4. ‘Want to write the great Australian novel? You need to engage with Indigenous Australia first’ by Anita Heiss, 28 April 2021 https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/apr/28/want-to-write-the-great-australian-novel-you-need-to-engage-with-indigenous-australia-first
  5. Finding Eliza: Power and Colonial Storytelling by Larissa Behrendt: https://www.uqp.com.au/books/finding-eliza-power-and-colonial-storytelling
  6. ‘Larissa Behrendt on Finding Eliza’, The Garret podcast: https://readingaustralia.com.au/books/the-garret-finding-eliza/
  7. ‘The Responsible Writer’ by Angela Savage: https://writersvictoria.org.au/writing-life/on-writing/the-responsible-writer
  8. ‘Who gets to write what?’ by Kaitlyn Greenidge: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/25/opinion/sunday/who-gets-to-write-what.html
  9. Hari Kunzru, Kamila Shamsie, Aminatta Forna, Nikesh Shukla and others provide comments on cultural appropriation and telling other people’s stories: Whose life is it anyway? Novelists have their say on cultural appropriation