Moya Costello
Writer
Books
Kites in Jakarta
(complimentary download)
Small Ecstasies
(complimentary download)
pressed specimens:
Prose Poems from the Medicinal Plant Herbarium,
Southern Cross University
(2022 1st edition, Beir Bua Press)
Launch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIeKwlZkxLk
pressed specimens:
Prose Poems from the Medicinal Plant Herbarium,
Southern Cross University
(2023 2nd edition,
Short Odds Publications)
Moya Costello has five books – two of short creative prose (Kites in Jakarta, Sea Cruise Books and Small Ecstasies, UQP), two short novels (The Office as a Boat, Brandl & Schlesinger and Harriet Chandler, Short Odds Publications), one collection of prose poems (pressed specimens, 1st edition Beir Bua Press; 2nd edition Short Odds Publications) – and many pieces individually published in scholarly and literary journals, and anthologies. She has been awarded writing grants and fellowships by government departments and literary organisations. She has been a guest at many writers’ festivals, read her work at various venues, been as writer-in-residence at Monash University, and judged many literary competitions. She is an adjunct lecturer with the Faculty of Business, Law and Arts, Southern Cross University. See also an academic publication site; a general wine quaffing blog, and a local wine drinking blog.
Bio
In the Media
Don Anderson, The National Times on Kites in Jakarta: 'In the dominant drab landscape of Australian realistic writing, these volumes come like a fresh breath of wind. A southerly buster.'
John Hanrahan, The Age
on Small Ecstasies: 'There is wit, irony and comedy in the writing, but also an assured seriousness and high intelligence.'
Katherine England,
The Advertiser
on The Office as a Boat: 'The writing is beautifully clear and visually precise.'
On Twitter, from Akin
Akinwumi: 'Currently reading this wondrous novella [The Office as a Boat] by Australian avant-garde writer @moya_costello. It's so striking at the sentence level and recalls Joy Williams and Kathryn Davis in the way it treads the line between realism and the surreal.'
Nicholas Jose, Sydney Review of Books and The Australian Face: Essays from the Sydney Review of Books on Harriet Chandler: 'This bold, uncompromising author …. this brilliant, beautiful book.'
In Sydney Review of Books by Catriona Menzies-Pike: 'an incarnation of avant-garde and experimental writing'.
Was mentioned in Shanghai Daily.
In Rochford Street Review by Anna Couani
Andrew Paul Wood, NZ Listener on 'Of Ants and Black Cockatoos' in Scorchers: 'Costello's prose is richly poetic, unforced.'
On Twitter, academics, editors and writers of my Overland review of Bail's He.: Emmett Stinson, 'fantastic and fascinating piece'; Susan Lever, 'This is terrific. All your deep knowledge of Bail behind it.'; Jonathon Dunk: 'This essay is a striking study in/performance of the border between entanglement, intimacy and complicity in Australian literary history'.
First review of pressed specimens 2022, in Buzz by Mab Jones.
Mark Roberts in Rochford Street Review on pressed specimens.
Cassandra Atherton, Professor of Writing and Literature, said of pressed specimens in a Facebook/Meta discussion:
Events & News 2023-2024
EVENTS
2023
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Read at Deloraine, British Hotel, at a regular monthly reading in Feb and March.
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Also read at Devonport Playhouse in an open mic
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A guest reader at Seasonal Poets, a curated reading, in Hobart Feb.
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Read open mic in poetry about place at Rant Arts, Devonport, Tasmania.
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Read at Liquid Amber Press online open mic.
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In online reading for Beir Bua poets July 2023. A two-hour reading. I appear at 42.50- 46.39.
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Guest reader at Deloraine, Tasmania, heats for national poetry slam.
2024
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April. Reading from online launch of Remnant: Anthology of Microlit (Spineless Wonders) April
NEWS
2023
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Review of Imants Tillers' Credo in autumn no 335 2023 Art Monthly Australasia.
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pressed specimens was Highly Commended in the Anne Elder Poetry Award.
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'Hedone' published in Spineless Wonders anthology Play, as a finalist in the joanne burns Microlit Award 2023.
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Nominated by Beir Bua Press for a Pushcart Prize.
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Finalist in the 2024 joanne burns Microlit Award from Spineless Wonders. Work to appear in the anthology Remnant in 2024.
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'little jokes that nobody but me will understand''. In The Saltbush Review issue 4 2023. Riffing on Murray Bail's claim about inserting jokes into his writing.
2024
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'Stained' published in Remnant: an anthology of microlit edited by Cassandra Atherton, published by Spineless Wonders. See under Events 2024, April ,for my reading.
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'Stained' has been chosen as a microfiction for a Smartfone film-maker for SF3 2024.
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Mentioned by Anna Couani in her chapter 'Before whom shall the drama be enacted?' in Antigone KEFALA New Australian Modernities, about the Sydney Women Writers' Workshop. Downloadable.
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Review of Murray Bail's Eucalyptus opera in The Conversation.
Contact
For inquiries, please contact Moya Costello
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