Writers
2017
We are very pleased to have the following authors confirmed for 2017. We are currently accepting interest from all outback writers to attend the 2017 Festival. Please email your details to winton@outbackwritersfestival.com.au.
Pamela Cook
Hachette author, Pamela Cook, is a city girl with a country lifestyle and too many horses. Her rural fiction novels feature feisty women, tangled family relationships and a healthy dose of romance. Her first novel, Blackwattle Lake, was published in 2012 after being selected for the Queensland Writers' Centre/Hachette Manuscript Development Program. Blackwattle Lake was followed by Essie's Way (2013) and Close To Home (2015) and her fourth book, The Crossroads, is due for release in December 2016. An eclectic reader, Pamela also enjoys writing poetry, memoir pieces and literary fiction and is proud to be a Writer Ambassador for Room to Read, a not-for-profit organisation that promotes literacy and gender equality in developing countries. When she's not writing she wastes as much time as possible riding her handsome quarter horse, Morocco.
Annie Seaton
Pan Macmillan author, Annie Seaton is fulfilling her lifelong dream of writing. Her career has spanned the education sector, with the completion of a Masters Degree in Education, and working as a librarian, a high school principal and a university tutor until she took up full-time writing. Described as an 'activist eco-writer' by reviewers, Annie takes a keen interest in writing about environmental issues. Each winter, Annie and her husband leave the beach to roam the remote outback of Australia for story ideas and research.
Short-listed for Romance Writers of Australia (RWA) Romantic Book of the Year 2016.
2016 Short-listed for AusRomToday Book, Author and Cover of the Year,
2015 Best Established Author of the Year in the AusRomTodayReaders' Choice Awards
2014 Australian Author of the Year in the AusRomTodayReaders' Choice Awards
Lori Patrick
Boolarong Press author, Lori Patrick, is an octogenarian who had 80 years' life experience before she published her first, and possibly not her last, book The Publican's Wife - From Milkmaid to Barmaid. An avid reader, Lori set about writing "a few notes" about her life about eight years before her book was published. The project was at first aimed at a limited readership - her two grandchildren - but as she wrote a few words, more started to tumble from her memory. First onto a note pad and eventually her laptop. Before she knew it, Lori had relived her life through memory and amassed 100,000 words. It was at this point she thought she should share this little project with others.
When Lori's not promoting her book, she's meeting up with people from her past who she has reconnected with through the book. Returning to Winton for the Writers’ Festival will be a highlight for Lori who spent many years living in the area. Most notable were her 14 years as "the publican's wife" to husband Barrie at the Blue Heeler Hotel in the small outback town of Kynuna, about 160km northwest of Winton.
Kelsey Neilson
Allen & Unwin author, Kelsey Neilson is the deputy mayor of the remote western Queensland Shire of Boulia, where she lives on a huge cattle station and is a prominent figure in the local rodeo club. Kelsey is outspoken when it comes to fair and equal rights for everyone, especially women and indigenous people, and has been described as 'a caring, devoted mother, wife and community leader and proof that anything is achievable if you want it enough'.
Ivan Rudolph
Boolarong Press author, Ivan Rudolph, was born in Rhodesia [now Zimbabwe] Africa in 1946. He studied Chemistry, Physics and Geology at The University of London and later completed a post graduate degree in Education. Married with four children, he emigrated to Australia in 1985. He taught high school Chemistry and Physics at Toowoomba Grammar School.
He has always enjoyed writing, including magazine articles; however his passion is authoring books. He has published 13 books most of which were biographies.
You Don’t Belong Here was made into a telemovie while John Flynn inspired the production of a musical, In Like Flynn, which was performed in February 2017 at the Arts Centre Gold Coast. Ivan currently live on the Sunshine Coast of Australia enjoying his growing family. There will be more books to come.
Rose Siva
Boolarong Press author, Rose Siva, first became involved in working on dinosaur bones in Queensland in 2008 after attending a talk by David Elliot who had found dinosaurs bones on his property out from Winton. Her work in the area of children’s education, particularly in reading skills development, led her to combine her skill in writing with her decade long interest in dinosaurs. The knowledge of what reading material children find engaging has resulted in a number of children's books about Australian dinosaurs.
Debra O'Halloran
Boolarong Press author and illustrator, Debra O'Halloran, is a mother of four and grandmother of three boys to date. She has lived around the Cecil Plains area, in Queensland for close on 35 years. She has worked as an part-tme Administrator for ten years.
Becoming an author of children’s books has been a surreal experience. It all began from her interest in photography and having a creative mind and wanting to create fairytale images in Photoshop. She advertised for some young models to dress up and become the fairies for me to place into the fairytale scenes. But, she was not happy to just have the images as she added short descriptive stories to the scene too. It was her daughter’s suggestion that led her to create her first book The Fairies' Secret Path.
Debra has published two children's books and has illustrated another which will be published in 2017.
Anne Alloway
Boolarong Press author, Anne Alloway, has focussed on some unusual historical book. "With this Ring" provides an insight into the weddings and fashions in and around Hughenden in central north Queensland. With Roberta Morrison, Anne researched and wrote the story of many outback people who died in the harsh conditions of central Queensland. "Tales from Bush Graves" describes some of the unusual ways in which people lost their lives.
Russell Guy
Russell has published poetry, short stories and articles. He was a breakfast DJ on ABC radio 2JJ Sydney in 1976/77 and on Triplejay FM until 1987. He has written stage, radio and screenplays and produced award-winning recordings.
Russell has authored Dry Crossing and Baptised Among Crocodiles.
Dan Kelly
Dan is the General Manager of Boolarong Press. Boolarong has been publishing great Queensland and Australian stories for over 40 years. It has published over 1,000 titles and has currently over 350 books in print. Boolarong is a sister company to Watson Ferguson & Company which has been printing books since 1868.
Dan has been runnning both businesses for 13 years and has himself been responsible for commissioning books such as Aboriginal Campsites of Greater Brisbane. The Brisbane River Guide, Outback Miners and the republishing of many of Boolarong's favourite books.