CREATIVE CUTS - Outspoken with Kate Holden

In The Ruin of Magic, Kate Holden presents a series of essays meditating on what it means to make ourselves a home in an Australia that is still finding its way amidst old (and, often, avoided) truths. 

A multi-generation Australian herself, she is curious to understand what it means to belong; she writes of her instinctive yearning for a long-ago Europe - engaging in a conversation with many of its most esteemed thinkers and authors from the last century

- and how that plays out against the natural attunement she feels for the Australian landscape. 

Kate is the author of The Winter Road, winner of the 2021 Walkley Book Award and the 2022 NSW Premier’s Award for Nonfiction, as well as two memoirs, In My Skin and The Romantic. Outspoken is delighted to welcome her back to Maleny.

Elegant and whip-smart, this is a work of beauty - a sober yet joyful quest to find home and belonging… Susan Johnson

The evening’s introducing author is Georgia Harper, 

Georgia’s first novel What I Would Do to You won Best Debut Book at the 2025 Davitt

Awards and was shortlisted for Best Crime Fiction Debut at the 2025 Danger Awards. 

Her new novel begins when the central (eponymous) character, Dove, has a violent confrontation with the man next door. In response she paints a sign on the front wall of her Sunshine Coast Hinterland farm: 'What would you do if you had a whole day on earth free of men?'

When tourists and local women answer by recounting their pent-up frustrations, fears and confessions, it strikes a nerve with the local blokes. With nowhere to hide from exposed secrets and shameful legacies, tensions rise, just as the town hits the headlines over a missing teen.

Georgia Harper takes a big swing and hits it out of the park. Dove is character-driven crime that asks deep philosophical questions but refuses to offer simple answers. Ambitious, wry and deftly drawn - I loved it.JP Pomare

Kate Holden will be in conversation with Steven Lang, on Wednesday, June 24, 6 for 6.30pm, tickets $30 and $20 for students. To book, visit: outspokenmaleny.com (Image of Kate Holden by Darren James Photography.)