Spineless Wonders

An independent Sydney-based publisher of short Australian stories from single stories to novellas as well as single-author collections and anthologies. Spineless Wonders hosts The Carmel Bird Award for short fiction and The joanne burns Microlit Award for microfiction and prose poems.

Author Q&A with Susan McCreery for Thurs. 8pm AEST - please leave your Qs here

We'll be chatting with the author of Loopholes, Susan McCreery, here on Thursday night. Loopholes is a collection of microfiction - many less than half a page in length - so it will be great chance to hone in on this short short form. Plus Loopholes has just been nominated for The Most Underrated Book Award which will be announced next week at The Wheeler Centre in Melbourne. So this will also be a good chance to chat with an emerging author about her writing journey and how she feels about the attention her book is receiving. I'm leaving a couple of questions below to kick off the evening's discussion. Feel free to leave your questions below too.

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I am still curious about the process Susan. How did the rich variety of subjects come to you – given that you set yourself a goal of writing a story each week for a year? Did you need prompts, or did the characters and situations arise spontaneously. How did you finesse these little gems?

I think the key is that I wrote a piece a day and could take lots of risks. And the fact that only 67 made the cut from 365 shows there were a LOT of duds! I'm not a planner. I usually find the story by writing. On the other hand there were definitely days when that was difficult. Sometimes I open a favourite writer and pick a phrase and start from there. Or write about what's in front of me (e.g. the cat). And of course I've said this before, but Account was a transcription of a news broadcast! Tweaked slightly.

There were definitely a couple of stories where I wondered if you'd witnessed a brief exchange in a cafe, or seen someone sitting by themselves at a restaurant table, and then imagined the scenario around them.

I'm trying to think, Mark. I don't think so. Or rather – maybe I had in the past and they were in my subconscious. I don't think I witnessed and then wrote about it immediately. There was one story that was a real exchange, but I won't mention it! Got me in trouble.

OMG Susan - a story a day. It's funny that I misremembered your feat as a story per week. At my glacial pace even one per week seems incredibly ambitious! ;)

Yep. Nine. Better go all, as I have yet to eat dinner, and I'm starving. Lovely to 'see' you all ... And thanks Susan for your candour and graciousness. Hope to see you (and other Spineless Wonders peeps here tonight) for real sometime soon.

Marjorie, I can't think which was the hardest right now. Although maybe one that took a lot of work was Rear Window. I still don't think many readers know that's based on the Hitchcock movie. But doesn't seem to matter. Are we saying goodnight now? Been lovely chatting with you all! And thanks for reading!

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