Steampunk support network

2023's Varuna-NEWC Fellowship winner talks of his experience... 

​Sometimes people say I'm weird, and I like it when they do. I like odd things. But I really felt like the odd thing when I turned up at The National Writer's House, Varuna, for my week long NEWC Fellowship. 
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It wasn't that I was the lone guy in a group of six. It wasn't that I had driven 8 hours and felt kind of light-headed. It was more the fish-out-of-water type of odd. 
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"...it felt like I fit – maybe because it is a place of writers, built and maintained by people who care."

There was Julietta Boscolo, a director and screenwriter working on a close-to-the-bone piece full of humour and struggle.

Sharon Kernot working on a verse novel and fresh from the release of her beautiful work exploring shame and kindness, Birdy.

Kate Flaherty, an academic deep into her historical fiction piece focusing on a woman pioneer of theatre, Georgia Moore spending the week developing new work while organising the release and publicity of her debut Four Night Stand, and Emma Darragh, who both teaches writing and walks the talk (now having released her mosaic novel Thanks for Having Me, exploring three generations of women in one family, written exquisitely).

Talented people, working on amazing stuff.

​​"Um… steampunk," was my reply at dinner as to what I was working on. "Detective steampunk. With ghosts."

I braced myself for at least polite smiles and perhaps puzzlement. But what I got was enthusiasm. Questions. Interest. Discussions on craft that went on for the week, every evening, from voice to framing structures to cover fonts and beyond.

​It was incredible.

​I was allocated Eleanor Dark's garden studio for my writing. I thought I would be daunted by the surrounds. If not distracted by the World Heritage area at the end of the street, then at least cowed by the photos of Eleanor, by her works and framed letters of thanks and prestige. By the snippets of writing left in the drawers by previous occupants.

But it felt like I fit – maybe because it is a place of writers, built and maintained by people who care. Maybe it was because of the company I had that week.

​I got into the habit very quickly of wandering out to the studio early in the morning and remerging, blinking, for our dinner chats, wondering where the time had went.

Those days that NEWC and Varuna gave me, uninterrupted, were what I was chasing. Those days were what I needed to get into my world, to draft and revise and breathe my characters. ​What I wasn't expecting was the company I mentioned above – the group we formed for that week.

 It was just as valuable as the time. Even though we spent most of each day squirrelled away in our own worlds, that sense of camaraderie that crossed genres and career stage, that shared consideration of what we were attempting – it was gold. 
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The Varuna-NEWC Fellowship gave me that.  I'll always be grateful.