University of Newcastle book fair aiming for 2023 return

BY OLIVIA DILLON

The Friends of the University of Newcastle are calling on the community to clean out their bookshelves in preparation for the 2023 book fair.

After a two-year COVID-induced hiatus, they are hoping the book fair will return mid-next year.

The Friends are accepting donations of books, CDs, records, DVDs and magazines on Tuesdays between 9am and midday, in the Bowman building at Callaghan Campus. 

Book Fair Convenor Lesley Gent, said any donations from the community will be greatly appreciated. 

"We sort them into categories," she said. "We have 50 categories and we take everything you can think of." 

"We have 28 volunteers who come and sort and pack every week and they haven't been able to do anything for two years so they're very excited." 

Ms Gent also said funds raised from the sales are used to support students across a range of disciplines at the University of Newcastle. 

"We have 10 student scholarships and all the money goes to that. We are all volunteers so we don't get paid. All the money we make goes to scholarships."

Further information including the location of the Bowman Building can be found on the Friends of the University of Newcastle website.

Donations for the Friends of the University of Newcastle Book Fair are now open. 

Newcastle Writers Festival Returns to the Region

BY OLIVIA DILLON

Hunter readers and writers were pleased to see the return of the Newcastle Writer's Festival over the weekend. 

It was the first time the three-day festival has been able to physically go ahead since 2019, as the pandemic saw the 2020 event held online, and last year's cancelled altogether. 

Festival director Rosemarie Milsom was relieved to see the festival finally go ahead, given its long hiatus.

"I've been running a festival for three years, we just haven't been able to have a festival," Ms Milsom said.

"It's so extraordinary to finally be doing what we love doing, to have writers here from all around Australia, and to have audiences filling the venues and buying books."

This year's program boasted over 70 events with almost 120 writers, and saw over 5000 attendees across the three days. 

The program included an hour-long interview, hosted by Ms Milsom, with Trent Dalton, author of bestselling books Love Stories and Boy Swallows Universe. 

Ms Milsom said the talk centered on "love in all its forms", and coined "love" as the unofficial theme of the festival. 

"We've all been impacted by COVID in some way. It has had a ripple effect across every aspect of our lives," she said. 

"There was a lot of emotion among the audiences; I saw a few people cry in sessions and a lot of people got teary. I think there was a sense that we were all feeling quite vulnerable and sensitive after the last couple of years". 

The unofficial theme was able to be fully realised in response to the festival's call for book donations for libraries and schools in Lismore. 

They ended up with 200 boxes of books.

Ms Milsom is now calling on anyone who is able to help transport the donations, to get in contact with the Newcastle Writer's Festival team.

Image: Newcastle Writer's Festival website