Kirsty Jagger

Kirsty Jagger is a journalist by trade. In 2019, she won the inaugural Heyman Mentorship Award, established by acclaimed Australian author Kathryn Heyman, for a writer from a background of social or economic disadvantage.  

Her debut novel, Roseghetto, takes some inspiration from growing up in the housing commission estates of Sydney’s Western Suburbs. 

Roseghetto was published in July 2023, by University of Queensland Press, who recommend it ‘for fans of Douglas Stuart, Sofie Laguna, Emily Maguire, M.J. Hyland and Jennifer Down’. It is an Australian, working-class, coming of age story about overcoming trauma, and breaking the cycle of poverty and violence.  

Roseghetto made the Good Reading Magazine's list of Best Fiction Books for 2023, and The AU Review’s list of Best Books of 2023. 

Jacqueline Kent

Jacqueline Kent is a biographer, book editor, and literary critic who was born in Sydney and grew up there and in Adelaide. A Certain Style, her biography of pioneering book editor Beatrice Davis, won the 2002 National Biography Award and the Nita B. Kibble Award, and was shortlisted for six other prizes. Her memoir Beyond Words was shortlisted for the National Biography Award in 2019. She is the author of The Making of Julia Gillard, the only full biography of Australia’s first and only woman prime minister. Other biographies include An Exacting Heart, the story of pianist and social activist Hephzibah Menuhin, and Vida: A Woman for Our Time, about pioneering Australian suffragist Vida Goldstein. Her most recent book is Bonjour, Mademoiselle! April Ashley and the Pursuit of a Lovely Life, published in September, 2024.

She has written young adult fiction and contributes to Australian Book Review and the Australian Dictionary of Biography. She holds a Doctorate of Creative Arts from the University of Technology, Sydney. 

Alice Pung

Alice Pung OAM is an award-winning writer based in Melbourne. She is the bestselling author of the memoirs Unpolished Gem and Her Father’s Daughter, and the essay collection Close to Home. She is the editor of the anthologies Growing Up Asian in Australia and My First Lesson. Her first novel, Laurinda, won the Ethel Turner Prize at the 2016 NSW Premier’s Literary Awards. One Hundred Days is her most recent novel and was shortlisted for the 2022 Miles Franklin Award. Alice was awarded an Order of Australia Medal for services to literature in 2022. 
 

Kaya Wilson

Kaya Wilson is a writer, tsunami scientist, and lover of all things ocean who somehow finds himself living in Canberra. His non-fiction writing blends essay and memoir to explore universal themes of identity, gender, and origin. Kaya is the author of As Beautiful As Any Other: A Memoir of my Body, listed by The Guardian as one of the best books of 2021. He is currently working on a queer coming of age novel.
 

Nigel Featherstone

Nigel Featherstone is an Australian novelist, playwright, librettist, freelancer, and music maker. His most recent novel, My Heart is a Little Wild Thing, was published in 2022. Nigel's most recent work is The Wreck Event, a 16-song, spokenword-and-music album, created in collaboration with award-winning poets Melinda Smith, Stuart Barnes, and CJ Bowerbird.

Nigel’s war novel, Bodies of Men, was longlisted for the 2020 ARA Historical Novel Prize, shortlisted for the 2020 ACT Book of the Year, shortlisted in the 2019 Queensland Literary Awards, and received a 2019 Canberra Critics Circle Award. His short stories have appeared in numerous literary journals such as the Review of Australian Fiction, Meanjin, Overland, and Island. Nigel also writes for the stage, he wrote the libretto for The Weight of Light, music by James Humberstone, in 2018. As a freelancer, Nigel’s work has appeared in a variety of mastheads and journals, including the Sydney Morning Herald, Guardian Australia, and the Chicago Quarterly Review. He has been supported by artsACT, Create NSW, and Creative Australia. In 2022, Nigel was named the ACT Artist of the Year.