In this fascinating book, Alice Pung writes about one of her deep influences - the much-loved and hugely successful John Marsden.
Alice writes- 'I keep coming back to John Marsden. What makes him so fascinating to me is that as a young adult writer, he comes at it with a whole philosophy of what it means to be a teenager - it is embedded in his two schools, but also his early experiences with mental illness and hospitalisation. It brings interesting questions for an author of YA fiction - how much darkness is allowed, before you are considered a obad influenceo?'
Offering a personal take, Alice Pung entertains and enlightens. This is a book to cherish about writers and writing.
In the Writers on Writers series, leading writers reflect on another Australian writer who has inspired and fascinated them. Provocative, crisp and written from a practitioner's perspective, the series starts a fresh conversation between past and present, and writer and reader. It sheds light on the craft of writing, and introduces some intriguing and talented authors and their work.
Published by Black Inc. in association with the University of Melbourne and State Library Victoria.
About the Author
Alice Pung is a writer, editor, teacher and lawyer based in Melbourne. Born a month after her Chinese parents fled from Cambodia to Australia as asylum seekers from Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge Regime, Alice has used her shared family's experiences to write stories that captivate all readers.
She has won numerous awards including the 2007 Newcomer of the Year Award in the Australia Book Industry Awards for her first book Unpolished Gem. Her next book Her Father's Daughter won the Western Australia Premier's Book Award for Non Fiction, and it was also shortlisted for the Premier's Literary Awards in Victoria and New South Wales, and nominated also in the Queensland Literary Awards.
Laurinda, Alice's first novel, was published in 2014 and was one of Readings' Top 100 bestselling books for the year. She is writing four books around the character Marly for Penguin's Our Australian Girl series.
Alice's writing has appeared in many notable publications including the Monthly, the Age, Meanjin, Best Australian Stories and Best Australian Essays.
Alice edited Growing Up Asian in Australia, a collection of personal accounts, essays, short stories and poetry which is currently a set text for the VCE English context on Identity and Belonging.
Alice lives with her husband at Janet Clarke Hall at the University of Melbourne, where she is currently the Artist in Residence.
