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From the wacky and wonderful world of Cristy Burne, ‘Beneath the Trees‘ is a wilderness adventure story like no other. In this activity, kids can join Cam and Sophie on their quest for survival in Eungella National Park in Queensland. Cristy’s make your own mega-leech and paper bag platypus are sure to get the stories […]

Australian animals are unique and interesting in so many ways. Sadly, many are endangered, yet people know little about them. Here are some interesting facts about the animals that appear in my picture book Where Do the Stars Go? I hope these lists give you lots to talk about when you read my book. Brushtail […]

Chosen as Apple’s Book of the Month in April, one reviewer described Brigid’s book, A Year of Loving Kindness to Myself, and Other Essays, as ‘an exquisitely unembellished Zen lesson in the art of attention’. As Brigid explains below, cultivating that attention can be a key source of inspiration for students in creative writing. Lists […]

This book didn’t start life as a book. It began as therapeutic journaling to deal with the trauma that re-emerged when the man who violently attacked me in my workplace was, some twenty-five years later, arrested and charged with brutal rape and murder. When Bradley Robert Edwards was arrested in 2016 for a series of […]

He’s over there! I recently finished reading How to End a Story, Helen Garner’s third volume of her edited diaries. I read it as my daughter was studying Monkey Grip for her VCE. In a captivating February session at the Perth Festival Writers Weekend, Garner told interviewer Gillian O’Shaughnessy that some reviewers complained that Monkey […]

Born in 1927, Gladys Milroy was taken to the Parkerville Orphanage at two years old and spent the next 14 years separated from her mother, Daisy. Gladys say, ‘I think the thing is about growing up in an orphanage is that you live in a story all the time because that’s the way you survive.’

Three Fremantle Press titles are in the running for major awards and another has been highly commended, plus the life’s work of a Fremantle Press writer has been remembered and recognised. Stellarphant is shortlisted for the 2022 Children’s Book Council of Australia’s Picture Book of the Year and the 2021 Aurealis Award for Best Children’s […]

Ethics of Representation panellist Rashida Murphy.

nlimited Futures: Visionary, Speculative Blak and Black Fiction is now available and we’re over the moon for all the contributors, editors, designers and publishers involved. A week past the release, we asked editors Rafeif Ismail and Ellen van Neerven to reflect on the journey thus far.

Kyle Hughes-Odgers captures children’s attention and gets their imagination racing in his new board book, Everything You Want to See. Spark kids creativity by asking them what they imagine an alien or monster looking like and getting them to create their own in these fun activity sheets.

Activity Sheet

'Create your own alien'

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Twelve Fremantle Press writers have been shortlisted in the 2021 WA Premier’s Book Awards across four categories. In the emerging writers category, the novels Eye of a Rook by Josephine Taylor and Locust Summer by David Allan-Petale, and the poetry collection Vociferate by Emily Sun, made the shortlist. In The Premier’s Prize for Writing for […]

Michael Burrows joins fellow debut writers Diana Reid and Ella Baxter as this year’s Sydney Morning Herald Best Young Australian Novelists. As reported in SMH’s Spectrum, the judges felt the three novelists stood out from the many other entrants for their ‘strong narrative voices, memorable characters and sharp writing – they’ll make you laugh, cry […]

The amazing Helen Milroy returns to the podcast chair for her first interview of 2022. Helen chats to the co-creator of Stars in Their Eyes, Aśka. You’ll love hearing about Aśka’s journey from high flying physicist to high flying visual storyteller – what a leap of faith! She chats about her unique collaboration with Jessica […]

Sharron Booth had been working on her novel The Silence of Water years before it was shortlisted for the City of Fremantle Hungerford Award in 2020. In this post she shares a deep dive into the research techniques she learned along the way.

Katie Stewart, author of three books for younger readers, knows that goal-setting isn’t an innate ability, but a skill to be learned. In this blog post, she shares how and why teaching kids to set goals at a young age is an important step towards building confidence and resilience.   

David Allan-Petale is in the running to win a prestigious ALS Gold Medal for his debut novel Locust Summer. Awarded annually for an outstanding literary work in the preceding calendar year, the winner receives a gold medal from the Association for the Study of Australian Literature. David’s book, which was also shortlisted for the Australian/Vogel’s […]

Surrounded by books and authors at the gorgeous Fremantle Arts Centre, the Perth Festival’s Writers Weekend kicked off with the much anticipated ‘The Business of Being a Writer’ event. Emerging authors spent several hours hearing from industry professionals on topics from marketing tips to building your profile to business advice for those just starting out. […]

The Light series by Dianne Wolfer and illustrated by Brian Simmonds includes The Last Light Horse, In the Lamplight, Light Horse Boy and Lighthouse Girl. These four books each look at some of the historical figures who played a part in World War I and are suitable for children to read as they learn about […]

Activity Sheet

'The Light series activity sheets'

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Fremantle Library has stacked their shelves with an extensive new collection of books published by local Fremantle press writers. The library in the Walyalup Civic Centre has made more than 300 titles available for loan. The Fremantle Press collection includes both fiction and non-fiction, ranging from crime and historical novels to autobiographies, art and culture […]

‘The Business of Being a Writer’ added another topic to its list of panel discussions this year: ‘In the Writers’ Room’. Moderated by Holden Sheppard, whose 2018 YA novel, Invisible Boys, is currently being adapted for television, the panel featured documentary filmmaker Victoria Midwinter-Pitt, director and screenwriter Ben Young and writer-director Maziar Lahooti. Victoria started […]

Kyle Hughes-Odgers is the creator of a new board book Everything You Want to See. The artist and father takes us through how he gets his ideas and the collaborative process of translating them onto the page. Everything You Want to See started as an idea in March 2020 at the start of the pandemic. […]

To celebrate the release of our new crime titles – Blood & Ink by Brett Adams, The Cast Aways of Harewood Hall by Karen Herbert, The Gallerist by Michael Levitt, The Ghost of Gracie Flynn by Joanna Morrison, The Ballroom Murder by Leigh Straw and After the Flood by Dave Warner – we’ve got a […]

The Perth Festival Writers Weekend provided West Australian readers and writers with the opportunity to hear from a diverse range of authors, creators and professionals in the industry. I attended the Fremantle Press event ‘The Business of Being a Writer’ on a lovely Friday afternoon at the Fremantle Arts Centre. With the ever-evolving nature of […]

The Sawdust House is my third historical novel, following on from The Coves in 2018. I’m normally a crime fiction novelist, but my crime novels have an historical element too, with most of them set in 1970s and 1980s Perth and Fremantle. All of the novels require a fair bit of research, but it’s research […]