About Me
I always knew that I wanted to be a writer and used to read out loud to my brother before I knew my ABC’s, inventing stories to go along with the pictures in the picture books. The day my brother learnt to read and caught me out was the darkest day of my childhood, and as payback I gave him a special haircut by hacking his fringe.
After finishing high school I bypassed university, with the vague idea that life experience is what made a person a writer. I embarked on a series of dreary office jobs to pay the bills. Realising that I was ambitious I commenced a shorthand course with the view of furthering my ‘career’ only to discover that I hated it.
I completed the course and after graduating I burnt my shorthand certificate and relegated the experience to the darkest corners of my mind, but it led to an epiphany of sorts. If I could complete a course that I hated so much, and do so well at it, what would happen if I studied something I had a passion for?
In 2000 I commenced the Diploma of Arts in Professional Writing and Editing at the Council of Adult Education where I learnt the practical skills of becoming a professional writer. After an abandoned attempt at a romance novel I went back to the advice to write what you know. And so The Good Daughter was created.
I share a few similarities with Sabiha, the protagonist of The Good Daughter. We are both of a Bosnian background, both live in St Albans—a suburb in Melbourne’s Western Suburbs, and both have mothers who are Bi-Polar sufferers. Unlike Sabiha, I lived overseas in Bosnia for four years as a child and am in touch with my cultural roots and can speak Bosnian.
After living in Sydney for four years, where I completed a Bachelor of Arts when I realised administration jobs had only so much appeal, I decided to move back to Melbourne. Realising you can take the girl out of the Western Suburbs, but can’t take the Western Suburbs out of the girl I bought a house in St Albans, around the corner from the house my parents live and where I grew up. I share my new home with my husband, daughter and three cats.
I am currently writing a sequel to The Good Daughter, funded by Arts Victoria.
To learn more about my creative processes read this whohub on-line interview or listen to this radio interview on ABC Radio National Life Matters program.
See my other interviews on my media page
My Bosnian page:
