One of the things we’ve been doing recently is visiting some of the organisations that The Readings Foundation has supported. Since 2012 the Foundation has sponsored the Wheeler Centre Hot Desk Fellowships. Writers are given a desk at the Wheeler Centre and a small stipend; it’s a great initiative from this exciting cultural organisation. We met up with some of last year’s alumni and heard about their projects. Kyoko’s House by Yukio Mishima had never been translated into English and Louis Bravos was given a fellowship to embark upon this project. Since beginning his fellowship, Rajith Savanadasa has almost completed the first draft of his novel, Moonstone Revisited, about a family in Sri Lanka. Fellow alumna Jennifer Down’s novel, Our Magic Hour, will be published by Text in 2016.

Another organisation we are proud to work with, the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre, invited a group of us to visit their main centre in Footscray. Founded in 2001 by Kon Karapanagiotidis, the ASRC is now Australia’s largest organisation providing a range of services to asylum seekers and refugees. These include providing food, groceries and material support; medical, legal, and business advice; housing placement; education programs; and, perhaps most importantly, a sympathetic and friendly ear. The ASRC currently supports over 1,000 members in many different ways without federal government funding, relying on donors and the efforts of over 950 volunteers. The Readings Foundation grant is going towards a schools program to engage with school children on the issues around asylum seeking with the aim of preventing the demonisation of refugees.

Find out how to donate to the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre

The centre is housed in a large commercial building and is spread over two vast floors. Volunteers and members have created a vibrant, open and welcoming space and our little group was immediately impressed by how comfortable it felt – one of us even commented, ‘Everyone’s so nice!’. On the day of our visit, people were ‘shopping’ in the small store staffed by volunteers, members were engaged in conversations with staff and other members were looking at computers, talking or finding some respite from what must, at times, seem a very hostile world. Every day around 200 meals are served to members and staff and when we arrived, just before lunch, the space was full of delicious aromas. We were delighted to partake in a meal after our tour!

Find some photos of our tour

In non-Foundation news, I’m pretty excited that two Readings booksellers have books out this month; A.S. Patric’s first novel about the immigrant experience, Black Rock White City, has been getting very positive advance reviews and Gabrielle Williams’ young adult novel The Guy, The Girl, The Artist and His Ex gives the disappearance of Picasso’s ‘Weeping Woman’ from the NGV a special twist.

I get to meet some interesting people in my job, and last month I met Nigel Newton, the founder and CEO of Bloomsbury. Bloomsbury is famous for publishing J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books. Originally from San Francisco, Newton went on to study literature at Cambridge and then drifted into working for various UK publishers. The plan for Bloomsbury came while he was on paternity leave after the birth of his first child – ‘When I wasn’t changing nappies I had this time to work on a business plan.’ Eight years later that child, and the editorial director of Bloomsbury’s children’s division at the time, Barry Cunningham, urged Nigel to sign up a book about wizards that had been rejected by almost every other publisher in town. Thanks to Nigel’s vision and Harry Potter, Bloomsbury is now one of the world’s great independent publishers and four years ago set up an Australian division, which is doing ‘very well indeed’. When I saw Nigel, it was clear that he is excited by The World Without Us by Australian author Mireille Juchau, which will come out in August here in Australia and will then be released overseas in early 2016. His enthusiasm was contagious – we’re looking forward to the book’s release now too!

Mark Rubbo