Meet Fiona Wilkes, shortlisted for the 2024 City of Fremantle Hungerford Award
In this podcast Fiona Wilkes, who, unusually, doesn’t have a writing mentor, isn’t doing a creative writing degree and isn’t a member of a writing group, talks about how she wanted to challenge depictions of queer stories.
Fiona says, ‘Honestly, part of the drive to write this novel was a dissatisfaction at the way queer stories, particularly those that touch on queer tragedy, are offered to readers, especially those who are queer themselves. So often, as queer readers, the literature that we consume (often, it must be said, written by non-LGBTQIA+ authors) tells us that the only way to live a queer life is to struggle and barely (if at all) survive the tragedies of a queer life. I wanted to show that, although there are aspects of living a queer life that are difficult, sad, or, yes, completely tragic, there is also room for intense joy, love and friendship.’
Tune in on your favourite podcast app to hear a reading from the manuscript and to find out what fiction publisher Georgia Richter thought of I Remember Everything.
Show notes
About Fiona
Fiona Wilkes is a current PhD candidate at The University of Western Australia, specialising in English & Literary Studies. Her creative work has been published, or is forthcoming, in a range of local, national and international publications, including Westerly Magazine, Coffin Bell Journal, The Elevation Review, LEON Literary Review and Lily Poetry Review. She was a featured writer at the 2022 National Young Writers Festival. She was nominated for the Pushcart Prize in 2023. She was shortlisted for the 2023 Jacob Zilber Prize for Short Fiction, and was highly commended for the 2023 Katharine Susannah Prichard Short Fiction Prize. I Remember Everything is her first novel.
Follow Fiona’s Hungerford journey on Instagram @fi_wilkes
About the hosts
Georgia Richter has an MA (Creative Writing) from the University of Western Australia and is an IPEd Accredited Editor. She has taught creative writing, professional writing and editing at the universities of Melbourne and Western Australia, as well as at Curtin University. Georgia joined Fremantle Press in 2008 as the fiction, narrative non-fiction and poetry publisher.
Books by Georgia Richter, Fremantle Press publisher
How to be an Author: The Business of Being a Writer in Australia
Claire Miller is the Head of Sales and Marketing at Fremantle Press where she produces the Fremantle Press podcast and oversees the City of Fremantle Hungerford Award.
About the award
Anticipation Peaks as Four Writers Contend for the City of Fremantle Hungerford Award
Proudly sponsored by the City of Fremantle, Fremantle Press and the Centre for Stories, Western Australia’s most prestigious award for an unpublished work of adult fiction, narrative non-fiction or young adult fiction by an unpublished writer offers a cash prize of $15,000, a publishing contract with Fremantle Press and a fellowship at the Centre for Stories. In 2024, the City of Fremantle Hungerford Award will celebrate its 33rd year.
Music: ‘Letter to a Daughter of St George’, from the Meat Lunch EP: Songs from Floaters. Written by Alan Fyfe. Performed by Trevor Bentley (guitar and vocals – @trevormb) and Chris Parkinson (harmonica). Produced by Blake Carnaby of Nuglife studios with impresario work by Benjamin P. Newton.
Producer: Claire Miller
Mastered and edited by: Aidan d’Adhemar
