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CONTRIBUTORS 2014

 

PIP ADAM

Pip Adam has written a short story collection, Everything We Hoped For, and a novel, I’m Working on a Building. Both are published by Victoria University Press. She facilitates an undergraduate Short Fiction Workshop at the International Institute of Modern Letters and works with Whitireia students who are writing short fiction and novels.

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VERNE BARRETT

Verne Barrett has studied with Whitireia intermittently, completing the first ever fiction writing module done ‘online’ (Fiction I) more years ago than she cares to recall. This was in 2001. The following year she began but did not complete Fiction II, as she was travelling and studying overseas.
In 2013 she had the very great joy of reconnecting with Whitireia and completing Poetry I, and due to an encouragement from excellent tutors (which has made her daring in her ripe middle age), she has never since stopped writing her own sort of poetry.

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JANE BLAIKIE

Jane Blaikie has published poems and short stories in New Zealand and overseas. These three poems are from a series about the Wellington designer, artist and poet Dave Kent, who died in 2013 from the effects of Motor Neuron Disease.

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FRED BUIJN

Fred Buijn is a writer who lives in Tauranga in the Bay of Plenty. He has been writing since he was a teenager but more seriously over the past five years. He is currently a second-year student of the online creative writing programme at Whitireia. He has been published by the New Zealand Poetry Society once in A Fine Line four years ago. He has also been published in several online poetry journals, both in New Zealand and England. He has three poems that have been accepted for publication this year by Blackmail Press.

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RACHEL BUSH

Rachel Bush lives in Nelson, where she has worked as a high school English teacher. Her most recent book of poetry, Nice Pretty Things and Others, was published in 2011 by Victoria University Press.

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MERE CHATER

Mere Chater trained as a nurse at the age of forty-five after working for years in unskilled jobs and raising three daughters. She grew up in Tauranga Moana with a crazy father and a mother who was pretty bonkers as well, so she found writing cathartic from an early age. The story she wrote is based on an anecdote told to her by a kaumātua from Ngāi Tūhoe.

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NAVINA CLEMERSON

Navina Clemerson was born in the United Kingdom and lives in Wellington with her family. She has studied biology, psychology and biblical Hebrew. Her short biography of prominent New Zealand social worker Marjorie Heads, Removing the Stumbling Stone, was published in 2004. She has studied at Whitireia with Renée, Lynn Davidson and Hinemoana Baker. Her translation of a poem by Rosa Aussländer was among the winners of the competition Motherland Word organised by the Goethe Institute and Victoria University in 2011. Her poems have been published in previous editions of 4th Floor.

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LYNN DAVIDSON

Lynn Davidson has published poetry, fiction and essays. Common Land, published by Victoria University Press in 2012, combines poetry and essays. Her novella, The Desert Road, was published in January 2014 by Rosa Mira Books. Lynn has poems in The Best of Best New Zealand Poems, Best of Sport, Big Weather: Poems of Wellington and PN Review. Lynn works as a creative-writing teacher, currently tutoring at Melbourne University, and is working towards a PhD in Creative Writing at Massey University, Wellington. In 2011 Lynn was Visiting Artist at Massey University and in September 2013 she was writing fellow at Hawthornden Castle in Scotland.

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NATASHA DENNERSTEIN

Natasha Dennerstein was born in Melbourne to a family originating from Belarus. She worked as a psychiatric nurse for over twenty years, which gave her an interesting perspective on the human condition. She attended Whitireia in 2009, studying for a Diploma in Creative Writing. In 2011 she completed her MA in Creative Writing at Victoria University in Wellington. Natasha has had poetry published in 4th Floor, Landfall, Snorkel, JAAM, Takahe and several anthologies. She is currently an MFA candidate in Poetry at the Creative Writing department at San Francisco State University. She is currently living in San Francisco.

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HELEN VIVIENNE FLETCHER

Helen Vivienne Fletcher has had four electronic picture books published by FlyingBooks Inc. These have been translated into French, German and Spanish, and are being sold worldwide. She has also won and been shortlisted for several writing competitions, including making the shortlist for the 2008 Joy Cowley Award and the commendations list for the 2010 Aesthetica Creative Works Poetry Competition. In 2012 she was awarded the Wellington Children’s Book Association New Pacific Studios residency. More recently, she has been commissioned to write a play entitled ‘How to Catch a Grim Reaper’ for young adults as part of the 2014 Young and Hungry Playwrights’ Initiative.

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PENNY M. GEDDIS

Penny M. Geddis is a recent graduate of the Whitireia Graduate Diploma in Creative Writing (Novel). Completing her first novel manuscript The Karmic Tangle in 2013 as an integral part of the programme, she won an NZSA mentorship for 2014 and with that is currently working with mentor Mandy Hager to complete her second novel. She is also collaborating with an established author toward a non-fiction work on the history of the Eastern Institute of Technology (EIT) in Hawke’s Bay. Her short film script Overcast is currently a teaching material for the film school there. Her published works include ‘The Plan’, a short story using lists in 4th Floor  2012, and a flash fiction piece ‘Memory Flash’ for the South Island Writers’ Association 2011. The Karmic Tangle is a love story fraught with both environmental skulduggery and wounds that time has most definitely not healed. What happened in the past? What will happen in the future? See how they deal with it all in the present.

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CAROLYN GILLUM

Carolyn Gillum lives in a yellow house on Waiheke Island. She’s recently returned to New Zealand after spending most of her adult life in London. Her article ‘An Unnatural Disaster’ was published in Muse magazine in 2011. She has a BA in Art History and an MSc in Social Policy, and she currently works as an analyst.

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ALISON GLENNY

Alison Glenny has an MA in Creative Writing from Victoria University and taught short fiction and non-fiction online at Whitireia between 2010 and 2012. ‘Mary Shelley attends a performance of Frankenstein’ describes the occasion in 1823 when Mary Shelley saw a stage version of her novel, Frankenstein, performed at the English Opera House; it includes material from her diaries. ‘The Flaneur’ pays homage to the philosopher Walter Benjamin.

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RATA GORDON

Rata Gordon’s poems have appeared in Landfall, Deep South and JAAM, as well as various online blogs including Paula Green’s NZ Poetry Shelf.

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ROB HACK

Of Cook Islands and Canterbury bloodlines, Rob Hack was born in Invercargill and spent six years on Niue as a boy. He writes on a variety of topics, often nostalgic with hopefully some wry humour, when he isn’t keeping the wolverine from the french doors by finding handyman work between Wellington and the Kāpiti coast. He has lived in Paekākāriki for eight years, after three attempts to live over the ditch and four grandchildren in three years has put paid to his peripatetic tendencies.

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TRISH HARRIS

Trish Harris has had work published in the New Zealand Listener, Sport and the School Journal, as well as various anthologies and journals, and broadcast on Radio New Zealand.

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ADRIENNE JANSEN

Adrienne Jansen writes a range of things. Most recently she co-wrote a Moroccan cookbook, edited a children’s book, The Curioseum, and published her third novel, The Score. She teaches short fiction and editing on the Whitireia creative writing programme.

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MICHAEL KEITH

Michael Keith has been working in the writing, editorial and publishing world for several decades. He has been writing poetry for the last decade. He has  previously been published in 4th Floor and the New Zealand Poetry Society’s 2014 anthology.

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HELEN LEHNDORF

Helen Lehndorf is a Manawatu writer. Her poem ‘Wabi-Sabi’ was included in Best New Zealand Poems 2011. Her book The Comforter was selected for the New Zealand Listener’s ‘Best Books of 2012’ list. In 2013 she was Massey University’s Visiting Artist. She has published widely in journals and anthologies. She has participated in several collaborative art/writing projects, including a ‘poetry off the page’ project, ‘KUPU’, with poet Leonel Alvarado in the Palmerston North City Library, and is currently working on ‘Black River’, a collaboration between Manawatu poets and printmakers, inspired by Ralph Hotere’s ‘Black Rainbow’ and commissioned by Te Manawa Museum of Art, Science and History.

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JOHN MCTAVISH

Since 2008 John McTavish has been Bay of Plenty correspondent for New Zealand Classic Car magazine, a pleasant part-time job that provides contrast to his orcharding day job. For the last three years he has edited two regional fruitgrowers’ monthly newsletters.
He has had a non-fiction story ‘Then and Now, Two Women on the Land’ published by Rural Women New Zealand in their Ragwort and Thistle 2012 anthology. One of his non-fiction stories, Ghosts of Remembrance, Hill Farm, Kerikeri, gained merit in the 2011 New Zealand Society of Authors (Bay of Plenty) Tauranga memories collection. During March this year his book of short stories, Closing the Gap and Other Stories, was launched at a function held at Creative Tauranga. He chose to publish this under the pen name John Mack and it is available locally and on Amazon and Kindle. His website www.johnmack.co.nz has further details and excerpts.

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BRANDON MEHRTENS

Brandon Mehrtens is twenty-two years old and lives in Palmerston North. He studied at Freyberg High School until the end of last year. He was allowed extra time for schooling because he is autistic. He also has dyspraxia and epilepsy. These conditions make it difficult for him to function at a normal pace. He is lucky to have the help of his friend Siân, who facilitates his communication. He has a passion for the written word and dreams of one day being a published poet and author. He would like to share with the world his experiences and shed some light on the thoughts, trials and emotions of a clever mind encumbered by a body that doesn’t quite keep up. He put together two collections of his poetry when he was ten and eleven which were illustrated by his classmates. He has had work published online in Blackmail Press, issue 37, October 2014. 

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BILL NELSON

Bill Nelson studied creative writing at Whitireia in 2007. He has a degree in geology and geography. His poems have been published in journals such as Sport, Hue and Cry, Shenandoah and Turbine. He is a co-founder and writer at Upcountry – a journal for the New Zealand outdoors.

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VIVIENNE PLUMB

Vivienne Plumb writes fiction, poetry and drama. She presently holds the 2014 Ursula Bethell writer in residence at the University of Canterbury, and has a Doctor of Creative Arts. Her new collection of short fiction, The Glove Box, was published by Spineless Wonders, Sydney, in 2014.

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MAGGIE RAINEY-SMITH

Maggie Rainey-Smith is a published poet, essayist, novelist, short story and flash fiction writer. Her poem ‘At Katherine’s Bay’ is included in the recent anthology Essential New Zealand Poems published by Random House in 2014. She writes regular book reviews on Beattie’s Book Blog and her own blog is an eclectic mix of literary things, personal things and travelogues.

Maggie Rainey-Smith

her blog

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PRIYARDASHI RANMUTHU

Priyardashi Ranmuthu has been writing for Sri Lankan newspapers since she was a school girl. There was a silent period during the last ten years. Last year she started writing again but has never been published before. She is an early childhood educator in Auckland and writes during her free time.

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RENÉE

Renée, recently awarded the Kingi Ihaka award for contributions to theatre, literature and teaching, has held the Robert Burns Fellowship at Otago University, the Waikato Writing Fellowship at Waikato University and the Randell Cottage Fellowship in Wellington. In 2006 she was awarded ONZM for services to literature. Renée has written eighteen plays, eight novels (including ebooks Too Many Cooks and Once Bitten), five works of non-fiction, the latest Your Life Your Story, and is a closet poet. She has taught and mentored many students at Whitireia, at her Your Life, Your Story workshops on memoir for the Cancer Society, and workshops in the wider community. In 2007 she was a student on the poetry course tutored by poet and novelist Lynn Davidson. In 2012 Renée began a website, Wednesday Busk, where she publishes a chapter of a novel each Wednesday, poems contributed by poets from all over New Zealand and a blog. There is also an archive of interviews with New Zealand writers, Writers Talk. This year Renée is tutoring the novel class at Whitireia.

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JAMES RIDLEY

James Ridley is twenty-two years old. He was born in the Waikato, and has lived in a small lifestyle block outside Raglan all his life. He first started writing in intermediate school when he was dissatisfied with the ending of a book he was reading and thought he could write something better.

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SANDI SARTORELLI

Sandi Sartorelli is a graduate of the Whitireia creative writing programme. She lived in Upper Hutt, New Zealand, all her life until recently when she immigrated to the Cook Islands to live for a year or two. Her work has been published in publications including 4th Floor, Blackmail Press, JAAM, Snorkel and Takahē. You can read more of her poems on her website 

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TRACEY SCHUYT

Tracey Schuyt lives in Wellington. She was an accountant in a previous life and is now enjoying her first year as a creative writing student at Whitireia. She has never published anything before.

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ELIZABETH SMITHER

Elizabeth Smither’s latest publications are The Blue Coat (Auckland University Press, 2013) and Ruby Duby Du, a little suite of poems for her granddaughter, Ruby, with illustrations by Kathryn Madill (Cold Hub Press, 2014).

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SIÂN TORRINGTON

Based in Wellington, New Zealand, Siân Torrington works in drawing, sculpture and installation. Her work investigates the creative process itself, using building as a metaphor for creating personal structures of meaning.

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MERCEDES WEBB-PULLMAN

Mercedes Webb-Pullman graduated from the International Institute of Modern Letters at Victoria University of Wellington with her MA in Creative Writing in 2011. She has been published in Danse Macabre, Turbine, 4th Floor, Swamp, Reconfigurations, The Electronic Bridge, Bone Orchard Poetry, poetryrepairs, Connotations, The Red Room, and books Numeralla Dreaming, After the Danse, Food 4 Thought, Looking for Kerouac, Ono and Bravo Charlie Foxtrot.

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Permanent link to this article: https://4thfloorjournal.co.nz/past-issues/contributors-2014/