Alan Vaarwerk
Alan Vaarwerk is a former editorial assistant for Readings Monthly
Blog post — 26 Nov 2015
Australian podcasts I got hooked listening to this year
For delicious nuggets of storytelling: Story Club
I’m super jealous of all the cool stuff that goes on at Sydney’s Giant Dwarf Theatre – luckily, podcasts like Story Club help…
Review — 26 Oct 2015
Thirteen Ways of Looking by Colum McCann
In 2014, Colum McCann was assaulted in a one-punch attack in Connecticut. In Thirteen Ways of Looking, the Irish novelist processes this traumatic event through multiple lenses. As McCann…
Blog post — 10 Sep 2015
A look at the winners of Seizure’s Viva La Novella Prize 2015
It’s often difficult for emerging writers, particularly of longer works, to find spaces to showcase their craft – and the same is true for emerging editors, who can find it…
Review — 27 Jul 2015
You Don’t Have to Live Like This by Benjamin Markovits
On a trip back to the US from his dead-end academic posting in Wales, Greg ‘Marny’ Marnier is wooed by an old college friend, tech entrepreneur Robert James, to be…
Review — 26 Aug 2015
Undermajordomo Minor by Patrick deWitt
After a brush with death, the wistful young misfit Lucien Minor decides to embark on a new life, leaving his idyllic dead-end village to take up a post assisting the…
Blog post — 25 Jun 2015
The beginner's guide to Kelly Link
Kelly Link has in the past been described as “the best short story writer out there, in any genre or none”. Over five collections for both YA readers and adults…
Review — 23 Jun 2015
The Seven Good Years by Etgar Keret
Israeli writer Etgar Keret is widely regarded as one of the leading figures in contemporary flash fiction. In The Seven Good Years, the author of The Bus Driver Who…
Review — 27 Apr 2015
Fallen by Rochelle Siemienowicz
From the outset of Fallen, Rochelle Siemienowicz openly acknowledges that while her memoir, which began life as a novel, is a true story, it is first and foremost a…
Review — 22 Mar 2015
The Well by Catherine Chanter
Seeking a new life in the wake of a crisis, Ruth Ardingly and her husband Mark escape to the Welsh countryside, taking up residence on a farm known as The…
Review — 23 Feb 2015
A Man Made Entirely of Bats by Patrick Lenton
The debut collection by writer, playwright and possible mad scientist Patrick Lenton pulls apart icons of 21st-century pop culture and reassembles them in an ungodly mixture of satire, fan fiction…
