Perth Words… exploring possibilities.

Are you finding the ending of your picture book story to be a little ho-hum? Or, is everything wrapped up a little too neat and tidy? One of the strongest ways to end a picture book is to surprise a reader. Kids love a surprise ending (and adults do, too). When a book takes you where you didn’t expect to go, that makes the trip all the more exciting and fun. When done well, an unpredictable twist can turn a good book into a classic and is often what makes repeated re-readings a pleasure. In subsequent readings, the reader enjoys being in the know and re-reading a book when you know what’s coming can be enjoyable in its own right too. I’ve always been a big fan of plot twists in books and movies of any genre for as long as I can remember. When I wrote my latest picture…

A couple of days ago a girl called Maddie contacted me because she’s writing a research project on the topic of whether female characters in books are perceived more negatively than male characters. She wanted an author’s opinion and had a few questions for me, questions which I thought were really interesting to think about and answer, which is why I’ve decided to dedicate a whole blog post to this topic.

A lot of what she asked me isn’t something I’ve ever deliberately thought about before, but it’s interesting because I’ve had so many people contact me to say how much they love the fact that my main character, Alex, is so strong but also realistically flawed. It’s almost like there’s a craving in readers to experience ‘girl power’ like never before, but with characters they can also relate to.

Because of this, my publishers have been jumping on the #LikeAGirl hashtag…

CAROL GORDONEKSTER: First of all, congratulations, Kristen! That’s quite an undertaking to buy a small press. Since my second book, Ruth the Sleuth and the Messy Room was published by Character Publishing on its debut list, I, for one, am thrilled that you took over. Many small presses go out of business. So to find out you bought the company and are ready to lead with passion and enthusiasm is great news. Can you tell us about how you ended up becoming the new owner of Character Publishing?KRISTEN NECAISE: This is a fun story and is very much about being in the right place at the right time. Jerusha Bosarge’s daughter and my son are in the same class together at school and we happened to be at a classmate’s birthday party at the end of the school year. We were talking, and I mentioned that I…

“What is man without the beasts? If all the beasts were gone, man would die from a great loneliness of spirit. For whatever happens to the beasts, soon happens to man. All things are connected” -Chief Seattle

Here’s issue 3 of the special volume of Review of Australian Fiction, edited by Laurie Steed, that features writers from Western Australia. This issue presents a story by one of Western Australia’s most celebrated novelists, Brenda Walker, paired with emerging writer Maria Papas—and two fascinating, and unsettling, stories they are.

Brenda Walker’s story, ‘Mouse’, begins with a singular voice that leads us into a small hell:

Inside the building next to the car park there is a flight of stairs that leads to the floor where the mice live. If you want to work with mice you must put on special clothing, heavy white plastic boots, gloves and a mask. You must walk through a sequence of doors, you must not carry bacteria from the outside world with you. This is to protect the mice from contamination. The mice live in translucent boxes. Their eyes are pink bubbles…