Regional Book Tour – Week 1

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I haven’t blogged for a while because of life, family … you know how the world gets in the way of all those other things you planned to do more of? But I’m back!

I’m on the road touring regional Victoria, NSW and QLD to share my love of books and writing with kids who don’t normally have the opportunity to meet book creators. And hopefully, I’ll inspire them to pick up a book … and maybe create one of their own.

I’ll be dropping in here to share my adventures.

The end of WEEK ONE on the road and more than 800 kilometres travelled. 8 seems to be the number for the week. 80 books sold at the launch of The Girl in the Painting and 8 degrees maximum temperatures most days. Luckily our van Luna is well insulated and very cosy.

The glamorous life of a travelling author this week has included:

  1. Fixing the bathroom door at the caravan park.
  2. Fixing the bathroom door at the caravan park again.
  3. Losing an ear off an elephant (not a real one thankfully) Despite a thorough search, missing ear could not be located. Librarian’s theory that it ended up in the pocket of a four-year-old is certainly possible. Elephant’s eyes to be reglued as well.  A wild day out for this elephant now resting comfortably in soft toy sick bay awaiting new parts.
  4. Fixing the bathroom door at the caravan park again. Okay, so some things just prefer to stay broken. Heading off soon anyway.

The Extra Fun First Week Bits

The fun started with a book launch to end all book launches. Sarah Anthony who did the amazing illustratrions for The Girl in the Painting travelled to Corowa too and we launched our book at the Corowa Federation Museum with over 100 people, many of whom were relatives of Susie Bourne (The Girl in the Painting) (L-R Sarah, me and Mayor Cheryl)

We sold out of books!!! Almost 80 books sold. Sorry to those who missed out. Booktique in Albury and Wangaratta now have new stock. And they can be ordered at any good books store. The Mayor of Federation Council, Cheryl Cook was the official and very enthusiastic launcher. Thanks Cheryl and thanks to all the wonderful volunteers at the museum.

With some of Susie’s relatives in front of Shearing the Rams, the painting that inspired our book, The Girl in the Painting.

Sarah made these amazing sheep coolies for the launch. Cute and delicious!

After the book launch dust settled, we travelled through the mists of the Goulburn Valley (don’t worry I wasn’t driving when I took this photo) and I spent time with a bunch of pre-school and primary school aged story lovers.

It was Hullabaloo mayhem as I shared the incredible and surprising properties of elephant poo with excited 3-5 year-olds in large numbers.

Seeing the impressive abilities of 6 and 7 year-olds to move, dance and stomp like elephants was also a highlight.

I got to share The Girl in the Painting with engaged and curious students in early primary school.

Met wonderful librarians – what an amazing job they do. These regional libraries are so essential to and do so much for their communities.

I have been so lucky this week to spend time with students of all ages in beautiful libraries in Nathalia, Mooroopna, Tatura and Wangaratta. Thanks Emma, Geke (pictured with me above) and Tanya for sharing your amazing spaces with me and being so engaged with books and reading.

Blue sky and sunshine in Nathalia.

Visited wonderful bookstores including Collins Booksellers Shepparton, signed books and chatted with lovely bookstore owners like Joe (pictured above). Love bookstores and the dedicated supportive booklovers who run them.

Saw my books in libraries and in bookstores – so exciting!

Saw painted cows in Shepparton.

Spent time with Grade 5s and 6s excited about creating new stories.

Shared our new book, The Girl in the Painting with dedicated librarian, Tanya who organised event for young storytellers in Wangaratta.

A hectic but amazing week! Gotta go because I’m back on the road soon. More adventures to come. I hope you’ll follow along.

Dee. x



Final Day Onsite – Author-in-residence

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Today was my final day in classrooms, working with the inspiring and creative Year 8 students at Keilor Downs College during my four week author residency.

It’s not the end of the project, though.

Over the next few weeks I’ll be reading and editing their amazing stories and poems to include in our anthology.


Thanks to all the staff and students for making my time in the classroom such an extraordinary experience.


Thanks also to the fabulous Milena and Alison in the library for their wonderful support and enthusiasm throughout this project and for all Milena’s hard work in getting it off the ground.

Working On Our Anthology

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It’s so inspiring to see how the Year 8 students at Keilor Downs College have taken a simple idea and transformed it into an amazing piece of writing over the four week period I’ve been working with them.

Their stories and poetry submissions for our anthology are already coming in and they are fabulous.

So many unique ideas, characters and settings are emerging.

Students have until 20 May to submit their writing pieces, and/or illustrations.

Next step is to edit the pieces and compile them into the anthology.

Everyone whose writing or illustrating is included in the anthology will get a copy of the finished book.

Thanks again to Creative Victoria for the Creative Learning Partnership that is making this all possible and to Kathleen Hodgson who paid us a visit yesterday and experienced the enthusiasm and creativity of the Year 8 students participating in the project.

Author-in-residence Week 4

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I’m entering week 4 of my author-in-residence at Keilor Downs College and seeing so many great stories and writers emerging.

We’re working on finishing the stories and getting them ready to submit.

I’ve been sharing with students, what the editing process is like for an author and encouraging them to consider using more active and specific words to make their writing stronger.


We’re also talking about techniques we use like reading our work aloud or getting someone else to read it to ensure that our ideas make sense and translate to compelling writing on the page.

Year 8 Stories Are Well Underway

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I’m loving seeing the characters and stories develop from the imaginations of the Year 8 students at Keilor Downs College.

There’s an amazing array of settings, characters and themes.


Some stories are set in our current world, others in a future world we can only imagine. For their story settings, students are journeying all over the world in their imaginations to select their story settings.

Once the students have finished their writing pieces, they will be emailed to their class teachers, and I’ll get to read all of them and work with Head of Library, Milena Gates and other staff to collate their amazing stories, poems and illustrated pieces into an anthology.


Thanks to Milena and Alison at the library who are so wonderfully supportive of my residency.

And how fabulous is their library? It even has a Reading Room!

Interviewing Pelé – Year 11

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This week in my author residency I was able to make use of my journalism and web content writing experience, conducting mock interviews with football superstar, the late Pelé, for the Year 11 VM Literacy classes.

The activity was to demonstrate to students how you’d conduct an interview, including what questions to ask.

We talked about how to make the person you are interviewing feel comfortable so that they’ll share more personal, more interesting information with you.

After each interview, I showed students how I would take the information to turn it into a post or news article, taking the most interesting facts and using them to attract readers and encourage them to keep reading.

Making Our Stories More Compelling

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This week our Year 8 Keilor Downs College writers are working on developing the middle and endings of their stories.

I have been sharing with them how I introduced new story events and increased what was at stake for my character Ruben in Beyond Belief to make the middle of the story more compelling.

They are now applying the ‘raising the stakes’ principle to their own stories.

The students have been sharing their story ideas and beginnings with me.

They are developing great characters and stories and I can’t wait to read them.

Thank you to Creative Victoria and The Creative Learning Partnerships programme for making this residency possible.

Creative Learning Partnerships – a State Government Initiative

Book Design and Visual Storytelling

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As part of my author residency at Keilor Downs College, I had a wonderful experience working with Year 12 art students talking about book design, book illustration and how words and pictures work together to tell a story.

We spoke about the journey of a book from idea to publication, how an artist is assigned to a book and the collaborative process.

We spoke about how the way an author and illustrator develop characters are similar but different.

It was agreed that getting to the emotional heart of a character is important when developing them, whether it’s visually or through words.

We spoke about how the body language of a character, their facial expressions and even the colours used by the artist contribute to characterisation and mood.

I shared with them how my colleague, author/illustrator Serena Geddes uses a different method to me when she’s creating her stories and characters. She tends to draw them first then add the words later. There is no right way to tell stories … it’s the voice of the artist that makes each story unique.

We also talked about the cover design for my book, Beyond Belief and I shared how I created the main character of Ruben.

Creative Learning Partnerships – a State Government Initiative

Interview Techniques – Finding Out About People – Year 11

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As part of my author-in-residence at Keilor Downs College, I’ve been sharing my experiences as a journalist with the Year 11 VM Literacy classes.

Their current curriculum involves interviewing someone and creating a post about them, so we chatted about interview techniques and how to find out interesting information from the person you’re interviewing.

We talked about asking open-ended and follow up questions, and asking the easy questions first to make the subject of the interview feel comfortable. Then you can ask the harder questions. The answers to these are often the most interesting … and the ones that blog posts and articles are created from.

Students have also been researching the lives of a famous person of interest to them and we discussed what questions they might ask if they met someone famous.

Creative Learning Partnerships – a State Government Initiative

Young Poets, Story Writers and Future Novellists

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Being author-in-residence at Keilor Downs College continues to be an inspiring and rewarding experience.

Last week the Year 8 students developed some amazing characters inspired by a photo that they chose and we talked about why they selected that particular image as inspiration for their writing pieces.

The characters they have created are many and varied, from people their own age to men and women in their 70s and 80s.

This week we have been working on building a world for their characters to inhabit including forms of transportation, geographical features, and the rules and infrastructure of that world.

Some students are setting their stories in the past, some the present and some the future. Some stories aren’t even on our planet.

It has been great to see students reaching into their imaginations to create these worlds.

Many are keen to take advantage of the opportunity to become published authors in the Year 8 anthology we’re producing.

A number of eager writers have already started their stories. Some are poets, choosing this form to tell their character’s story. Some students are writing journal entries, some are creating short stories and some have the beginnings of a novel.

We can’t wait to read their pieces.

Thanks to Ms Gates and all the amazing library staff and the teachers who are supporting this project.

Thank you also to Creative Victoria and The Creative Learning Partnerships programme for making this residency possible.

Creative Learning Partnerships – a State Government Initiative