Brisbane Writers Festival kicks off this week! Excitement! It's always a super fun festival, and there's been a recent swing towards embracing young adult, fantasy and geekery which is, well, pretty great. My picks for it are below!
THURSDAY 4 SEPTEMBER
Story+
Story+ is a two day intensive on digital narratives and book futures and this year is both totally free (woot!) and features writers, transmedia producers, interaction designers, games developers and publishers.
20 Pages in 20 Minutes
This is always a good one for any writer starting to think about pitching. The calibre of industry professionals this year is pretty awesome too, with literary agents, Catherine Drayton and Sophie Hamley, and editors, Kate Cuthbert (Harlequin) and Jordan Bass (McSweeney's) up for reading.
FRIDAY 5 SEPTEMBER
Madness, Melancholia and Creativity
I've always been pretty interested in the romanticising of mental illness, addiction and depression when it comes to creative practice, so I'm really stoked to see a panel on it at BWF! Particularly one featuring David Malouf, Kate Richards and the lovely, Ellen van Neerven.
This World and the Next
Isobelle Carmody! Laini Taylor! Trent Jamieson! Talking fantasy and world building, two of my favourite things.
Literary Vaudeville Show
I mean, the name kind of says it all.
SATURDAY 6 SEPTEMBER
Unnatural Creatures
Monsters and horror and fantasy and real creatures and imagined ones! This one's ticking most of my boxes.
Designing Storyworlds
This workshop looks really interesting. Covering transmedia, creativity and cross platform narrative with UK-based Mike Jones, will take participants through telling a story across multiple mediums.
Cause of Death
I mean, what's not to love about the convergence point of science and crime fiction?
Scum & Villainy
Bad guys panel!
SUNDAY 7 SEPTEMBER
Where's My Jetpack?
I'm a big fan of science fiction, even if I don't read as much of it as I used to, and to have some of Australia's better spec fic writers discussing the form and the biggest tropes of the genre will be pretty darn great.
Broken Monsters
I inhaled Lauren Beukes' novel, The Shining Girls, earlier this year and am pretty stoked for her newest work, Broken Monsters, meaning this in-conversation is a must.
Well Played: The Story of Games
One of the best parts of last year's festival was it's Well Drawn strand, a series of talks and panels on graphic novels. The festival is echoing that this year with Well Played, a strand on writing for games. It's big draw is Jeffrey Yohalem, writer for Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood and Child of Light, and he'll be front and centre in this panel discussion.
Meet McSweeney's
McSweeney's has become a bit of an institution as far as publishing goes, so it's exciting to have them out again for this year's festival. For anyone writing short fiction, this is a must.
Laws of Magic
If I'm a big fan of science fiction, I'm an even bigger one of fantasy, particularly in the works of Laini Taylor and magical realism. This panel will be covering bringing magic and fantasy into the real world and magical systems which basically is the best.
Vixens, Victims & Femme Fatales
This one looks SO COOL. Not only does it have the super awesome Meg Vann chairing, but it has P.M. Newton, Tara Moss AND Yrsa Siguroardottir talking about women's roles in crime which is basically everything I want in a panel.
Glitter & Dust
As always, close the festival with the Glitter and Dust free for all. This was one of the most fun things about last year's festival, and I think it's going to be pretty darn awesome again. Check it out.
And that's about it for me. There's about a gazillion other things at this year's festival though, so you should totally check out the full program here.
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