In Conversation with Lucy Nelson Wait Here
6pm, Tuesday 22 July
Harry Hartog ANU Campus
University Avenue, Acton, ACT, 2601
A dancer discovers she can never have children – a revelation that pales in comparison to the other ways her body has betrayed her. Two elderly sisters who’ve been inseparable throughout life make a momentous decision. A wet nurse at Coney Island’s infamous ‘Incubator Babies’ sideshow is haunted by the ghost of her own stillborn daughter. A young woman worries about the lack of male role models in her little niece’s life…
For the women in Wait Here, who can’t, don’t or won’t have children, childlessness is a hard-won prize, a freedom, a stain, a joy, a battle, a trifle, a conundrum, a wound, an uneasy comfort on a burning planet.
About Lucy Nelson
Lucy Nelson has been published in Meanjin, Kill Your Darlings, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Big Issue, Southword and elsewhere. She has received the Newcastle Short Story Award, the Writing NSW Varuna Fellowship and the Templeberg Fellowship from Writers Victoria. She lives with her husband on unceded Wodi Wodi and Dharawal Country. Wait Here is her first book.
About Beejay Silcox
Beejay Silcox is a book critic. Her work appears in high-profile publications across three continents and is renowned for its resolute (some might say, foolhardy) honesty. In addition to her writing, Beejay works as a professional reader: she's a literary interviewer, prize judge, festival programmer, editor and educator. And she has stories to tell. Beejay eloped to Las Vegas, escaped from quicksand, and drove to Timbuktu in a car held together with a bra-strap. She once had to be rescued – unironically – from a picnic at Hanging Rock.