News

Vale Alan Hopgood AM and Kevin Walsh.

Golvan Arts is sad to acknowledge the death of two clients in the past six months: Alan Hopgood and Kevin Walsh.

Alan Hopgood (1934 - 2022) who died in March, was a legend of Ausralian film, TV and theatre who worked as an actor, script writer and theatre producer. See our featured web page about him here. Also see this wonderful Australian Writers Guild (AWG) tribute to him and his work by Judith Colquhoun. Golvan Arts was honoured to be involved in licencing rights to perform some of Alan's plays in Hong Kong and Canada. 

Kevin Walsh (1957- 2022) who died in June worked as a garden designer and consultant, planning and advising on gardens throughout Victoria. He also wrote in periodicals and newpapers, lectured and presented on radio on sustainable gardening. Kevin was described by some as 'Australia's leading waterwise gardening expert'. Golvan Arts was honoured ot be involved in the publication of his books on water-wise plants and gardening. See our featured web page about him here. Also see a tribute to Kevin from the Horticultural Media Association

It was an absolute pleasure and honour to work with these two wonderful men.

 

 

Congratulations to Alan Sunderland whose children's book SIX SECONDS, set at the time of the 1989 Newcastle Earthquake, was voted one of the 3 favourite books of the year by the students at Balmoral High School. He enjoyed presenting at the school in Brisbane during book week celebrations in August 2022. 9781743838235

Alan's book on journalism THE TEN RULES OF REPORTING, will be published in November this year.

Congratulations also to Vicki Bennett whose latest children's book, THE PROMISE, which highlights the bravery of Paupa New Gunea nurse Maiogaru Taulebona in WWII, was launched at the 80th Anniversary celebrations of the Battle of Milne Bay. Two copies of the book were presented to descendants of nurse Maiogaru Taulebona by Chief of Airforce,  Air Marshal Robert Chipman, AM, CSC. Five hundred copies of the book have been donated to schools in the region. Also, an exhibition of the book's pages has been set up in the local library.

 

 

Paul Valent’s Heart of Violence has been sold to Australian Scholarly Publishing and will be published in February 2020.

Aidan Prewett’s Woodstock at Fifty has been sold to North American Publisher Political Animal/Crows Nest. Publication date is August 2019.

Janine Fraser's picture storybook Sarah's Two Nativities will be published by Walker Books in September 2019. Illustrated by Helene Magisson, this story is a  celebration of Christmas with a multicultural family. 

It's been a tough two years with the COVID19 pandemic resulting in many deaths, awful illness for some and nasty long term effects for others, as well as lock downs in many places. We've also had a terrible fire season in Australia in the summer of 2019/20. Golvan Arts is based in Melbourne, Australia, the city with the most days of lock down in the world! People have continued reading and writing and our clients have been busy trying to promote their published work and creating new work.

Aidan Prewett’s Woodstock at Fifty was published in August 2019 and was followed by two further books in 2020  To Know John Lennon: An Intimate Portrait from His Friends, Colleagues and Family and Our Jimmi: An Intimate Portrait of Jimi Hendrix through Interviews with Friends and Colleagues.

Janine Fraser's picture storybook Sarah's Two Nativities was published by Walker Books in September 2019. Illustrated by Helene Magisson, this story is a celebration of Christmas with a multicultural family. 

Paul Valent’s Heart of Violence was published in February 2020.

 Gerald Murnane will be launching two books on 28 February 2019. The books are A Season on Earth, published by Text, and Green Shadows and Other Poems published by Giramondo.

 

Border Districts cover for web 1   Gerald Murnane's novel Border Districts won the Prime Minister's Literary Awards in December 2018.

 

 

 

 

Robyn Bavati won the 2018 WAYRBA (West Australian Young Readers Book Awards) in the Older Readers Category for Within These Walls. 

Little stowaway coverVicki Bennett's The Little Stowaway's first print run in March 2018 has already sold out and has recently had a second printing.

 

 

The Real-Life Salon, written by Doris Brett and Kerry Cue will be published in May, 2019 by Pan Macmillan in Australia

Murnane Collected coverIn June 2018 Gerald Murnane was shorlisted for the Miles Franklin Literary award for his novel Border Districts. The winner will be announced August 26 2018.

Gerald Murnane’s Collected Short Fiction was published in April, and includes works out of print for decades. Border Districts, Murnane's final new work of fiction, was released in November.

Both Border Districts and Collected Short Fiction were also released in the US in April by Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

100Wolf150 Jane Lyons' book 100% Wolf will be adapted for the big screen as an animated feature film. Screen Australia, together with Screenwest and Create NSW, are investing in the production.

AMillionWindowsGerald Murnane's new book A Million Windows was published by Giramondo in June 2014. This new work focuses on the importance of trust, and the possibility of betrayal, in storytelling as in life. It tests the relationship established between author and reader, and on occasions of intimacy, between child and parent, boyfriend and girlfriend, husband and wife.

'A Million Windows is also something of a pattern book, as works such as Vacher's came to be known. In its pages a narrator attempts to rescue small human markers from the broader landscape of a lifetime's accumulated memory. He is a metaphysical gumshoe, tracking images across the years: recurrences that might yield some meaning to the perceiving self.
~ GEORDIE WILLIAMSON, The Australian

The French rights for Gerald Murnane's novels Barley Patch and Tamarisk Row have been sold toBuchet/Castel (a subsidiary of Libella). More information to come.

Barley Patch, published in 2009 by Giramondo, was Murnane's first new work of fiction for fourteen years. It has since been published in the USA by Dalkey Archive Press (2011) and in Sweden (2012) as Korntappa. The book begins with the question, Must I write? What follows is a remarkable account of the images that have appeard in the author's mind during a career of over thirty years as a reader and writer. Murnane creates an enchanting chronicle of the world in his mind through the stories he weaves around these images. His first book, Tamarisk Row, was described in Nation Review as the best novel to have appeared in Australia for many years.

Robyn Bavati’s second novel, Pirouette is to be published by Flux in the USA this November and by Penguin Books in Australia this January.

The film rights have been secured for Gordon Reece’s international bestseller MICE by a new Australian production company. See information from the press release below!

Southern Light Alliance is the new production venture from acclaimed producer Timothy White (TWO HANDS, THE BOYS ARE BACK) of Southern Light Films and former film publicity and marketing specialist Anna Vincent. The partnership was formed earlier this year and aims to develop Australian projects and international co-productions. SLA is based at the Adelaide Studios, South Australia, where Vincent resides... The first coup for SLA is their successful bid for the rights to the novel, MICE by British author Gordon Reece, partnering with Julie Ryan (RED DOG, TEN CANOES) of Cyan Films.

Bronwyn Bancroft’s RememRememberingLionsville smbering Lionsville will be published by Allen & Unwin in February 2013. It is a beautifully illustrated biographical book based on her family history and the family's connection to country.

Come with me to my family's old house in Lionsville. It's full of memories. It's a special place. Uncle Pat calls it a secret place. We played in that old tin cubby, swam in the creek with the catfish, and fell asleep to the ribbip of frogs at night. And around the red cedar table we listened to the old people's stories. We learned a lot that way.