Wednesday, 11 September 2019

Some people are beyond a casual "thank you"

Fremantle Press publisher Georgia Richter knocks her writing dream on the head in exchange for a new role as an editor

September 7, 2019
I was going to be a writer when I grew up. That belief forged my identity from the age of six, when I won the Keilor City Library short story competition with a priggish moral tale called ‘The Rabbit Who Loved Smoking’.

As an earnest fourteen-year-old, standing by the Murray River, I had an exciting conversation with a Penguin editor, who told me how I might go about building a writing career (enter short story competitions, build a profile, work towards a novel). The belief sustained me and defined my leisure time as I trod a middling course through an arts law degree at the University of Melbourne, doing far better in the English Department than I ever did in law.