Elwood Writers reflects on a year of milestones

Every Second Tuesday (Rightword Enterprises) 2020

Elwood Writers recently had its last meeting of the year: last Tuesday, 9 December — coincidentally five years to the day since our anthology Every Second Tuesday was launched by Lee Kofman at Readings. Half a decade’s worth of water has passed under the literary bridge since that glittering night. And how quickly the stream has flowed. Happy fifth birthday, Every Second Tuesday.

But let’s look back at the year just gone. A busy year, 2025, and one of some notable firsts and lasts.

Our first ever writing retreat occurred in February, at beautiful Daylesford and Hepburn Springs in Victoria’s spa country, on the land of the Dja Dja Wurrung people. This was very much a week of intense focus, and we loved it so much that we followed up with a second retreat in July!

We were invited to judge the 2025 American Writers Review literary contest, with its theme “Buyers’ Remorse”. And we were blown away by the quality of work submitted.

We turned 18 in June. Yes, Elwood Writers has been around for an entire generation. Was there cake? You bet there was!

In October, we recorded our twelfth edition of Cover to Cover for Vision Australia Radio. ‘Stories of Change and Place’ was broadcast on Friday 14 November, repeated Sunday 16 November. Check out the podcast if you didn’t catch the original airing.

Which brings us back to Tuesday 9 December, and our last fortnightly meeting of the year. Nothing remarkable there. Except this was Barry’s last formal meeting. After co-founding Elwood Writers with Jennifer Bryce in 2007, Barry is bidding a fond farewell to the group. Everything must change, it’s often said. Very best of luck to you, Barry. We’ll miss you in too many ways to name. Thank you so much for your camaraderie and invaluable contributions over the years. We can’t begin to say how much we appreciate the work you’ve put into this website — now I guess we’ll finally have to start reading the operating manual.

But, Barry’s not getting away quite that easily — he’ll remain ‘on the books’ as an Honorary Member of Elwood Writers. And who knows, there might be a radio collaboration in the works for the not-too-distant future.

So we begin to cast our thoughts towards 2026: a new chapter for all of us. What lies in store for this changed writing group, we wonder. Whatever happens, we think it’ll be well worth reading about. So make sure to keep watching this space.

Don’t forget to follow/subscribe if you haven’t already. Please give us a ‘like’ by clicking the button below — it helps us out and keeps us connected with you. We do like to keep in touch.

Wishing everyone a peaceful festive season. All the best for 2026.

Extended Deadline for American Writers Review Contest: Submit Now!

Regretting that you didn’t enter this year’s American Writers Review literary contest? Or that you didn’t quite make the deadline? Well, we have some good news: If you’ve visited the San Fedele Press submissions page recently you’ll have noticed that the deadline for contest entries has been extended to August 7. That’s right – there’s still time to send off that poem, short story, non-fiction, or dramatic monologue, photograph, or artwork. In short, written work and imagery is invited. Full details are available in our July blog post, linked here. Or if you want to head straight to the submissions page, do that by clicking here.

Contest deadline: 11:59 PM on August 7 (US Eastern Time)

This year’s competition judges are Margaret and Barry, on behalf of Elwood Writers. The theme: Buyers’ Remorse. Interpret that any way you wish.

Happy writing, and good luck!

Elwood Writers at 18

This month, Elwood Writers has turned 18 years old. What does this mean? That we’re now of age? Adult? What were we up till now? In any case, we’ll say ‘Happy Birthday’ to ourselves, quietly and without fanfare, before the month slips gently into July, before we stride fully into our 19th year.

And coming up in July, news of our second writing retreat.

Stay tuned …

Elwood Writers is judging the AWR Contest 2025 | Theme: Buyers’ Remorse

Elwood Writers has been invited to judge this year’s American Writers Review (San Fedele Press) literary contest – we’re delighted to be on board. The theme is:

Buyers’ Remorse
It seemed like such a good idea…. But now?
American Writers Review

Submissions are now open and close on August 1, 2025. Please click here to read the guidelines carefully before submitting. There’s a cash prize involved for the overall winner.

The anthology is simultaneously accepting regular submissions – the window for this closes a month later, on September 1, 2025. Again, please familiarise yourself with the guidelines before submitting your work. See here for details.

Editor Donna Ferrara is seeking contributions in a wide range of categories, including visual art and photography – and, for the first time, drama/monologues.

For our new issue, we are seeking written work and imagery that springs from the moment when the best-laid schemes have turned to dust. The crash can be obvious, subtle, even not yet realized. The piece’s point of view could be disappointed or triumphant or oblivious. The moment of remorse could be immediate, in the future, or long in the past.
American Writers Review

We’ve established a very productive relationship with San Fedele Press over the years, with our fiction, memoir and poetry appearing in a variety of their publications. International literary connections such as this are so important, and well worth nurturing, especially in these troubled times.

If you decide to enter the contest, and we hope you do, we look forward to receiving your work.

Best of luck!

Tell Me a Story

When I was a child, our mother used to read to my younger brother and me. By the time she had three more sons, she’d run out of steam; probably driven hoarse by my begging for more. There’s something magic about listening to a story that never loses favour. That’s why Tim McQueen’s program Cover to Cover (CTC) on Vision Australia Radio is a gift to his audience.

In October, Elwood Writers recorded our work for a CTC literary broadcast: Helen read her poetry and haiku, Barry his fiction noir, and I, a personal essay.

My story ‘Tommy’ is about a childhood friend who left Melbourne for London in the early seventies. His artistic dreams took him around the world before he settled back in England. His sudden death this year sparked memories for me of what he called our ‘naïve’ youth.

I worked on the memoir piece with the unstinting support of fellow Elwood Writers. When the opportunity came to record our work for an episode of Cover to Cover, I grabbed it with gusto. We have read almost annually for the program, but this time – perhaps because it was a ‘writers’ choice’ theme – I set about rehearsing properly. I practised by our local river, recording the story over and over while waiting for the birds and wood spirits to offer their free opinions. For me, parrots represent good omens, and a rare call from the lofty kookaburra can verge on the mystical.

Cover to Cover is popular with long haul drivers who may tire of the news cycle. Knowing there’d be listener scrutiny for our pieces sharpened my resolve to create flow and purpose in a way that simply leaving the words on the page might not have.

By the time of recording, I was as ready as I’d ever be. When the program aired, I returned to the river to listen and walk. I could hear in my voice unnecessary pauses, and a lisp I thought I’d left behind in childhood. But all in all, the reading – guided by Tommy’s effervescent spirit – made for a peaceful way to farewell my friend. Nothing one does will bring a person back, but shaping and chronicling days we had together can help.

Barry and Helen are masterful story tellers and literary performers. Now I’m a convert to the spoken word and an advocate for live readings being a part of a writer’s arsenal. I can’t recommend it highly enough. Consider it the gift of story to both listener and reader. Oh, and to writer too.

Elwood Writers: New Year, New Adventures Ahead

Happy New Year from Elwood Writers.

That sentence counts as January’s post – we’re feeling a bit lazy. No, just kidding. But January has always been a month off for the group. It’s a chance to gather our thoughts in readiness for what promises to be a dynamic twelve months ahead. The diary already looks busy, holding such delights as a writing retreat and planning a new radio gig. Perhaps there will even be a fresh look for the website. If you want to hear more, you’ll have to stay tuned.

Please subscribe if you haven’t already by clicking the button at the end of this post – it’s free, and you’ll be notified of new posts as they drop. You can, if you prefer, turn off those notifications. But we don’t blog too often, sometimes just once a month, so you’ll never be inundated.

If you’re already subscribed, thank you.

You can easily share our despatches if you know of anybody else who might be interested in the content. Sharing buttons appear at the bottom of every blog post.

That’s it for now, a sweet and simple message, no tags. Let’s ease in to 2025 nice and gently.

Best wishes,

Cover to Cover | Episode 548| 25 October 2024

Here’s the podcast of last week’s episode of Vision Australia Radio’s Cover to Cover, a special edition of the weekly literary program featuring the work of Elwood Writers:

Elwood Writers presents: The Writers’ Choice

‘Elwood Writers Presents: The Writers’ Choice’ features memoir by Margaret, fiction by Barry, and poetry by Helen – all read by the writers themselves.

This episode can also be found over on Spotify, or wherever you choose to get your podcasts. If you’d rather access the recording via a sound file, we’ve got that covered – just click here.

Don’t forget, one of the best ways of supporting our work is to give it your time. So sit back, relax and enjoy being transported by our stories.

Happy listening!

Coming soon: Elwood Writers on Cover to Cover

Stories on your radio

from barryleethompson.com

I was enjoying a Marie biscuit and strong lungo yesterday morning when a new blog post from Barry’s website popped into the Elwood Writers mailbox. In the post – linked over there👉– Barry writes about an upcoming episode of Vision Australia Radio’s weekly literary program Cover to Cover, featuring the work of Elwood Writers. We don’t yet have a broadcast date for the program, but it’ll be sometime after the material goes to Cover to Cover‘s producer/presenter Tim McQueen in early October.

Elwood Writers has been contributing stories to Cover to Cover since 2015, featuring in roughly one special episode each year. Our first program, appropriately titled ‘Starting Over’, was broadcast in episode 38 of Cover to Cover on 11 January 2015. If you fancy a bit of a blast from the past, you can listen to that or any of the episodes featuring our work by clicking here. We’re always grateful for the invaluable support of Tim and the Cover to Cover team, and everyone at Vision Australia Radio.

Until my coffee break was pleasantly interrupted by the happy ping of that email notification yesterday, October had felt a long, long way away. And now? Well it’s closing in, but is still six weeks away – and I remember the six-week school holidays used to go on and on and on. We’ll be sure to provide more info about the radio program between now and October. To stay in the loop, make sure you’re subscribed – it’s free, and means you’ll never miss any content.

Every Second Tuesday: an update

The second half of 2024 got off to a flying start for the Elwood Writers blog yesterday with a fascinating new post from Helen, all about the power of the spoken word.

And the momentum continues today with this update on the Elwood Writers anthology Every Second Tuesday. We recently decided, for administrative reasons, to close our account with IngramSpark, the printers and distributors of the anthology. It takes 45 days for the closure to fully take effect, so the title is slowly being withdrawn, bit by bit, and by the end of July Every Second Tuesday will no longer be available from the usual channels. For now, it can still be purchased print-on-demand or as an e-book from some platforms (click here to view an example), but this is unlikely to be the case for much longer. The situation might even have changed by the time you finish reading this post!

If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you might be familiar with the voyage of Every Second Tuesday. Having discussed it for many months, Elwood Writers started to put an anthology together in early 2019, working on structural edits of the pieces in the second half of that year. In early 2020, Barry copy-edited the manuscript – when finished, he declared that no one would ever find a single typographical error in the entire anthology! So far, no one has challenged his bold claim. We’re forever grateful to David Grigg at Rightword Enterprises for his tireless and patient collaboration on designing and publishing the book, and creating a beautiful finished product. Lee Kofman launched the anthology in a glittering online Q&A event hosted by Melbourne bookseller Readings in December 2020. In the same month, the ever-supportive Tim McQueen of Vision Australia Radio generously dedicated an entire episode of Cover to Cover to the anthology. Other radio appearances included an interview on 3CR’s Published…Or Not, and readings on 94.9 MAINfm’s The Quiet Carriage. There have been many other events along the way, too many to list in this brief post, as well as wonderful reviews, a panoply of supportive readers and booksellers, and plenty of warm glows. And one of the best things is that we distributed or sold our entire print run, which means we’ve never had to remainder or pulp a single copy.

None of this means that Every Second Tuesday is disappearing. Far from it. The anthology will continue to grace the shelves of many public libraries in Australia (and maybe even beyond), as well as the shelves of any bookstores that might still be holding stock – although most of the bookstores we supplied sold out very quickly.

The upshot of this quick (ish) update is that if you’re late to the party or you’ve been here forever and still don’t have a copy of Every Second Tuesday, then you’ll need to act quickly if you’d like to get your hands on it because opportunities to buy the book are dwindling. We hear it’s a very good book, so you won’t regret it. The clock is ticking …

Happy reading,

P.S. If you miss the boat, or you end up kicking yourself at the end of July because you didn’t get hold of a copy, then there is a small chance that all may not be completely lost – but more on that later.

Chamber Poets celebrates its 100th event

Victoria’s Macedon Ranges longest-running spoken word event, Chamber Poets, is marking it’s 100th occasion with some of Australia’s finest poets reading their work this Saturday June 8th. Held from 1- 4 pm at the Woodend RSL this promises to be a wonderful afternoon of poetry performance. With entertainment from resident band Black Forest Smoke, plus an open mic section, food and an open bar, what better way to celebrate this much-loved monthly gathering of wordsmiths. Convenor and published poet Myron Lysenko created Chamber Poets in 2013. Poets of all stripes, from first timers to the acclaimed, have since embraced the warm and inclusive event. Helen is excited to be going along and will be reporting back to Elwood Writers on how the festivities play out. We can’t wait to hear!