In the midst of a fierce and passionate audience response to Heated Rivalry — both the TV show and the book on which it was based — debate raged about who the story was for, and who gets to write the lives of marginalised people. While many celebrated the mainstream success of a queer love story, others questioned whether the heterosexual gaze of its author should factor into the book’s reception; many expressed a wish that books by LGBTQI+ writers could receive the same commercial success.
Enter Josh Silver, Bobuq Sayed and George Kemp, three queer writers who’ve penned complicated stories of love, friendship, sex, community and conflict. Kemp’s Soft Serve is a heart-aching coming-of-age about grief and friendship that takes place in a rural McDonalds as bushfires approach. In No God But Us, Sayed introduces us to a community of dissidents, sex workers, activists, poets, and heretics in Istanbul, where two Afghan men collide delivering a story that is both immigrant family saga and thwarted romance. Finally, with Fruit Fly, an international bestseller, Silver offers us the ultimate protagonist for this moment — a straight female author facing writer’s block who takes drastic steps in the pursuit of the next hit: go gay, go sad and go dark.
Bobuq Sayed is an organizer, theatremaker, and author of the Afghan diaspora. They co-edited the anthology Nothing to Hide: Voices from Trans and Gender Diverse Australia, and they wrote the chapbook of essays A Brief History of Australian Terror, and the novel No God but Us.
Josh Silver is the author of Happy Head, Dead Happy, Trauma Land and Fruit Fly. He trained as an actor and went onto perform in the West End and on Broadway. After deciding to change careers, Josh now works with teenagers as a mental health nurse.
George Kemp's critically acclaimed debut novel Soft Serve was published in February by UQP. George has had a successful career as an actor and his award-winning play Shack has been performed frequently around the country and internationally.
Maeve Marsden is the Creative Director of Varuna, the National Writers’ House and the Blue Mountains Writers’ Festival.
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Tickets to main program events are included in weekend and day passes. Single tickets may be available from September 8, subject to availability.
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This venue is wheelchair accessible, and AUSLAN interpreters are available upon request. Please email hello@bluemountainswritersfestival.com.au if you have any accessibility requests or wish to book an AUSLAN interpreter. More info about accessibility can be found on our Accessibility page.