My Top Five ... with Suzy Wilson
Suzy Wilson opened Riverbend Books in Bulimba in 1998. It has since become one of Australia’s leading independent bookstores, winning the Queensland Bookshop of the Year eight times. Suzy also started the Indigenous Literary Foundation in 2004. She’s been named a Local Hero in the Australia Day Awards, and last year she won the Johnno Prize, which recognises the contribution of an exceptional individual or group to Queensland writers and writing. There’s also a great interview with her on Lithub, in which she confesses to almost killing Maisy the Mouse.
If the choice of authors at the Festival has you overwhelmed, get started with Suzy’s Top 5 picks for this year:
- With a brand new memoir called The Hate Race, Maxine Beneba Clarke is going to be one of the most popular Festival guests this year. All her Word Play sessions are sold out, but you can still catch her in conversation with Melissa Lucashenko.
- Yassmin Abdel-Magied talks about being a young, Muslim, and female in Australia today in her memoir Yassmin’s Story at Word Play. (And she’s also in the BWF Great Debate and panel sessions on diversity in the media and Australia's love of sport.)
- Barry Jones reflects on the music and literature that has played a significant role in his life in Words and Lyrics
- Andrew McMillen delves into the fascinating world of donating your body to science in Skeleton School
- Fans of crime fiction and true crime writing will want to explore our fascination with murder and detective stories with Kate Kyriacou, Mark Tedeschi and Emily Maguire in Crime and Curiosity