We’ve been through a feverish few weeks at Faber Writing Academy, reading through over 300 applications for 7 scholarship places, and 77 paid places in our mid-year commencing courses. I’d like to thank our staff and tutors for giving each application the attention it deserved. It is always an equal parts exciting and heart-breaking process. It’s exhilarating to see over 300 imaginative worlds come crashing into our computer screens, worlds each of you care about so deeply. And it’s heart-breaking that we only have 7 free places to help bring those worlds to fully-fledged life. But whether or not you received a full scholarship, partial scholarship, offer of a paid place, or not, I know this is only one moment in what will likely be a multi-year-long love affair between you and your manuscript. If you were lucky enough to receive a full or partial scholarship, then my heartfelt congratulations! Pin our email on the wall, and remember the joy it brought when your draft gets hard to wrangle. If you missed out, please remember how subjective this process is. What matters is that you believe in your project and that you make it what you want to read. Maybe, after a little more wrangling, we’ll be able to see your idea in more clarity when you apply for a scholarship again in February?
If you’d like to continue to work on your idea in the lead up to our February intake, you might like to consider taking Kickstart Your Novel, commencing on August 12, and taught by Emily Maguire and Ilka Tampke. Regardless, we wish you all the best with your writing. It’s bloody hard and important work, imagining a world.
Pip Smith, Manager, Faber Writing Academy
Jessica Elliot
Writing a Creative Nonfiction Book
Jessica Elliot is a human rights lawyer with Pogust Goodhead in London. She holds a Master of Laws from Harvard Law School where she graduated equal first. She was the Judicial Clerk to the Chief Justice of NSW, and has worked as a Solicitor Advocate for the Aboriginal Legal Service in remote NSW, an International Lawyer for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and as a Sessional Academic at the ANU.
Emma Cook
Writing a Crime Novel
Emma Cook is an Australian writer working on her first crime novel. A forensic mental health social worker with qualifications in criminology, social work, and cognitive behavioural therapy, she draws inspiration from her fascination with crime and human behaviour. When not writing, she enjoys coffee and a good book.
Hannah Duffus
Writing a Novel (Daytime) Melbourne
Hannah Duffus is a writer and teacher raised on Kirrae Whurrong country (Terang, Victoria). Her non-fiction has appeared in Island, The Guardian and The Big Issue, and her short fiction was highly commended in the 2026 Nillumbik Prize for Contemporary Writing and the 2026 Ada Cambridge Biographical Prose Prize.
Victor Guan Yi Zhou
Writing a Novel (Daytime) Sydney
Victor Guan Yi Zhou’s novel manuscript was awarded a 2026 Varuna Residential Fellowship. His writing is published in Griffith Review, and forthcoming in Westerly. He has read at the Blue Mountains Writers’ Festival, Sydney Writers’ Festival, and the Biennale of Sydney. His art and nonfiction are elsewhere.
Eva Justine Torkkola
Writing a Novel (Online)
Eva Justine Torkkola is a Ukrainian-Finnish Australian writer and filmmaker based in Melbourne. Her debut novel, Something Has Died in the Forest, grows from her award-nominated short film and is also a Screen Australia-supported feature film in development. Her work explores migration, inherited silence and the interior lives of women at the edges of belonging.
Cathryn Strickland
Writing a Poetry Collection
AWGIE winner and nominee, Cathryn Strickland has worked for over twenty-five years in television as a researcher, script editor and writer. Her credits include Love Child, A Place to Call Home, G.P., All Saints, McLeod’s Daughters and in 2019, the award winning ABC drama, Wakefield. In 2011 Cathryn wrote the libretto for Andrew Ford’s ‘The Musical Child’ which won The Australian Writers’ Guild award for music theatre. Cathryn has co-written (with Sue Smith) a film adaptation of Joan London’s ‘The Golden Age’ which will commence production in 2027. She is currently working as a primary school teacher on Gadigal country.
Klesa Wilson
Writing a Speculative Fiction Novel
Klesa Wilson is a Melbourne-based emerging writer and museum professional with an affinity for ancient history, mythology, and the ways art and stories connect us to the past. When she’s not working or writing, she can usually be found exploring galleries, planning trips, or convincing herself she doesn’t need another hobby.
We would also like to congratulate the recipients of our partial scholarships for underrepresented voices:
Anna Neumann
Benjamin Hoh
Carol Maa
Cigdem Serce
Eartha Davis
Olivia Chung
Tiana Bai