Angela Meyer's Blog, page 11

Carmel Bird Award longlist announced

Hello from the heart of the Speyside Scotch whisky trail! I’m working at a guesthouse here for all of September. There are three dogs, and there’s whisky and time to write in the middle of the day. So I’m a pig in shit.

Today I’m excited to announce the longlist for the Carmel Bird Short Fiction Award. I’ve had so much fun reading the submissions (and often been truly spooked or disturbed). I could tell that many of you wrote to the brief, as there was a delightful array of stories in Australi...

EIBF 2013: is psychiatry doing more harm than good? (More brainy stuff.)

A version of this post was previously published on Stoffers

James Davies is the author of Cracked: Why Psychiatry is Doing More Harm Than Good. The main points of his argument, in the talk he gave at the Edinburgh International Book Festival 2013, were:

Psychiatric drugs often do not do what they say they do, they are more ineffectual than the drug companies would have you believe
The link between psychiatry and pharmaceutical companies has become too close, too comfortable
Psychiatry is wrongly...

100 Story Building is about to open!

You may remember last year when I wrote about a new centre for young writers opening in Melbourne called 100 Story Building? Well, the doors are about to officially open!

Located in the heart of Footscray, 100 Story Building will support young writers (6-17years) from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) and marginalised communities ‘to discover andshare their creative voices through storytelling projects’, as they put it.

100 Story Building will be open for workshops, programs and one-...

Aside: write-up of Meg Wolitzer EIBF session

Just found this excellent write-up of the Meg Wolitzer session I chaired at the Edinburgh International Book Festival 2013.

Cheers to Mark West and theGlasgow Review of Books.

EIBF 2013: brainy stuff

A version of this post was first published on the Stoffers blog.

At the Edinburgh International Book Festival I’ve been going along to many sessions about the brain, psychology, mental health and the psych industries. Of HUGE interest to me both generally and in relation to themes in my creative writing.

Oliver James’ new bookOffice Politicshas the author ofAffluenzaandThe Selfish Capitalistturn his gaze to work and ‘the people who make your life hell in the office’, as he put it. James theoris...

‘I’m Holbeck Ghyll’

First published on the Stoffers blog.

You have to allow yourself one indulgence while travelling: one wild night, one big purchase, two nights at a five star hotel… I just had my one indulgence for this trip. And it relates to a 2010 TV series (that was also turned into a film) calledThe Trip, starring Rob Brydon and Steve Coogan.

InThe Trip,Brydon and Coogs play themselves on a restaurant tour of the north of England. Coogs was meant to go with his girlfriend, but she has gone to the US and he...

Travel update

Shakespeare’s Birthplace @ Stratford-upon-Avon

A ‘working holiday’ is kind of how we’re describing it, though it’s hard to explain to strangers the work I’m doing: preparing for a book festival, writing occasional travel blog posts (many of which I can re- or cross-post here), editing an anthology and writing a chapbook. Not to mention the research I want to undertake now that we’re here in Scotland. Luckily we have a bit more space in our AirBnB places in Edinburgh. Hostels and staying with p...