Stella Day Out Ballarat - Writing about the future

Join 2024 Stella longlisted author Kate Midlenhall, as she has an exciting conversation about her recent novel The Hummingbird Effect. This conversation will be moderated by Van Badham.

Kate Mildenhall is an author, writing teacher and podcaster. Her debut novel SKYLARKING was longlisted for Debut Fiction in The Indie Book Awards 2017 and the 2017 Voss Literary Award. Her second novel, THE MOTHER FAULT was longlisted for the 2021 ABIA General Fiction Book of the Year and shortlisted for the 2021 Aurealis Science Fiction Novel of the Year. Her latest novel is THE HUMMINGBIRD EFFECT (2023), shortlisted for the ABIA Literary Fiction Book of the Year and longlisted for the Stella Prize and the Indie Book Awards Fiction, 2024. For the past six years Kate has co-hosted The First Time podcast. She is currently undertaking a PhD in creative process at RMIT University and working on her fourth novel. In October she will release her first picture book TO STIR WITH LOVE, illustrated by Jess Racklyeft. Kate lives on Wurundjeri lands in Hurstbridge with her partner and two children.

Van Badham is an internationally award-winning writer, theatremaker and occasional broadcaster. She is a featured columnist for The Guardian and has also written for The New York Times, Bloomberg, The Telegraph (UK) and The Age. She was a Walkley finalist for her non-fiction book debut, 2021’s best-selling QAnon And On: A Short and Shocking History of Internet Conspiracy Cults and she was the first Australian to win Britain’s Harold Hobson prize for theatre criticism. As a commentator she’s appeared numerous times for the ABC’s Q And A and The Drum shows, for The Project on Ten, on Politics HQ for Sky and the Today Show on Channel 9, and regularly for ABC radio, while as a writer of radio drama she’s been broadcast both by the ABC and BBC. Presently, she co-hosts the award winning news/politics podcast The Week on Wednesday, which has had more than a million downloads as of August, 2023. Van is currently writing a second non-fiction book for Hardie Grant as well as being under commission for new work at Melbourne Theatre Company and developing episodic television with Jungle Entertainment in Sydney. Her new musical The Questions co-created with composer Richard Wise premieres this year at STCSA.

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

Ballaarat Mechanics' Institute, 117-119 Sturt Street, Ballarat Central, Australia