Presented by MARION, Between the Lines (BTL) is a book group for writers with an active practice. Over the course of six (6), monthly sessions running from February to July 2024, prominent authors who are experienced facilitators will lead participants through a series of conversations about books on a carefully curated list. The focus will be on authorial technique, achievement and literary context, rather than subjective opinions on whether or not the book is ‘good’ or ‘bad’.

Each session will include ample time for questions, and participants will be encouraged to consider how reading that month’s text could influence their own work.

In 2024 there will be a combined fiction/nonfiction stream. The sessions will be held from 2PM-4PM on Saturdays. All sessions will be held in person at Harry Hartog ANU. 

This is the seventh iteration of Between The Lines, after a pause in 2023. The program has been refined annually based on participant feedback. We are delighted to present BTL in person once again!

DATE

BOOK

THEME

FACILITATOR

Saturday 24 February

2 - 4pm

Melissa Lucashenko

Edenglassie

Fiction

Nigel Featherstone

Saturday 23 March
2 - 4pm

Anna Funder

Wifedom

Nonfiction

Helen Ennis

Saturday 20 April
2 - 4pm

Saturday 25 May
2 - 4pm

Patti Smith

Year of the Monkey

Nonfiction

Helen Ennis

Saturday 22 June
2 - 4pm

Ocean Vuong

On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous

Fiction

Nigel Featherstone

Saturday 27 July
2 - 4pm

Marion Halligan

Words for Lucy

Nonfiction

Helen Ennis

Helen Ennis brings a literary approach to writing nonfiction and specialises in biography, especially of women artists, and writing on photography. She was originally trained as a curator and has also had a career as an educator in art history. She writes monographs, essays and reviews and has published widely. Her major publications include Reveries: Photography and Mortality (2007) and Photography and Australia (2007). Her biography Margaret Michaelis: Love, loss and photography won the Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for Nonfiction in 2006. Her most recent book, Olive Cotton: A life in photography (2019), was awarded the Nonfiction prizes in the Queensland Literary Awards (2020) and the Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature (2021) and the 2020 Magarey Medal for Biography. Helen is currently working on a biography of Australian photographer Max Dupain. She is Emerita Professor, ANU School of Art and Design.

Nigel Featherstone’s latest work is My Heart is a Little Wild Thing, published in 2022 by Ultimo Press , an imprint of Hardie Grant Publishing. The novel has been described as ‘Poignant and ultimately hopeful’ (Delia Falconer), and ‘Sublime – a must-read of Australian literature’ (Holden Sheppard). His war novel, Bodies of Men, was published by Hachette Australia in 2019 and longlisted for the 2020 ARA Historical Novel Prize, and shortlisted for the 2020 ACT Book of the Year and the 2019 Queensland Literary Awards. Nigel is also the author of three novellas published by Blemish Books; the second, I’m Ready Now, was short-listed for the 2013 ACT Book of the Year. Nigel was the librettist for The Weight of Light, a contemporary song-cycle commissioned by the Hume Conservatorium and had its world premiere at The Street Theatre in Canberra in 2018; it received a Canberra Critics Circle Award.

He is currently writing a new work for the stage, which is being developed by The Street Theatre. Nigel is a longstanding freelancer for various news outlets, including Guardian Australia, Sydney Morning Herald, Canberra Times, and Chicago Quarterly Review. His short fiction has appeared in numerous literary journals, such as Meanjin, Review of Australian Fiction, and Overland. Nigel has been awarded residencies at Varuna, Bundanon, UNSW Canberra (Australian Defence Force Academy), and Byron Writers Festival. In 2022, Nigel was selected as the ACT Artist of the Year. He is represented by Gaby Naher, Left Bank Literary, Sydney.