Judy Atkinson identifies as a Jiman & Bundjalung woman with Anglo-Celtic and German heritage. She will launch her book Trauma Trails, which looks at violence experienced as generational trauma in Indigenous Australia, at the Festival.
Janis Balodis is best known for The Ghosts Trilogy; his most recent work for the stage is Mr Barbecue and he has been writing and script editing for SBS TV’s upcoming ‘(s)truth’ series on Eat Carpet.
  Caroline Baum is the editor of Good Reading magazine and the Presenter of Talking Books on Optus TV. Caroline contributes to the Sydney Morning Herald and the London Times.
John Baxter lives in Paris. His books include biographies of Woody Allen, Federico Fellini, Luis Bunuel, Stanley Kubrick and Robert De Niro. A memoir, A Pound of Paper will be published in October.
Jean Bedford’s short stories have been widely anthologised and her novels include Sister Kate and Now You See Me as well as three in a series featuring female detective Anna Southwood.
Peter Bishop has been Executive Director of Varuna Writers’ Centre in Katoomba since 1993. He hopes one day to finish a novel himself; meanwhile he has helped many writers to finish theirs.
James Bradley is the author of two novels: Wrack and The Deep Field and a book of poetry, Paper Nautilus. His third novel, The Resurrectionist will be published in 2003.
Inez Brewer is the Writing Program Manager of Varuna - The Writers' House in Katoomba.
Sally Browning is currently the Manager, Development & Finance at the NSW FTO and was responsible for designing and implementing the first Aurora intensive script development program held earlier this year.
Ita Buttrose has been a journalist/editor for Australia’s major media groups. Author of four non-fiction books, including her autobiography, A Passionate Life, she is currently writing the sequel to her first novel What Is Love?
Larry Buttrose is the author of the novels Sweet Sentence and The Maze of the Muse. He is also a poet, playwright and travel writer.
Jennifer Byrne is a journalist and broadcaster who's worked over the years in print, radio and television - and book publishing. She currently hosts and reports on ABC-TV's Foreign Correspondent
\ Vivienne Cleven won the David Unaipon Award for Indigenous authors who have not yet published a book. Bitin back was shortlisted for the 2002 SA Premier's literary award. She is writing her second novel Her Sister's Eye.
Peter Corris is best known for his Cliff Hardy detective stories and for his biography of Dr Fred Hollows. The 25th Cliff Hardy book, Salt and Blood, will be launched at the 2002 Byron Bay Writers Festival.
Bryce Courtenay’s books include The Power Of One, Tandia and the autobiographical April Fools Day. He has been translated into eleven languages and has lectured worldwide. His latest novel is Four Fires.
 

Al Clark produced Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. Other credits include Nineteen Eighty-Four, Gothic, Eye of the Beholder, Siam Sunset and Chopper. He is also the author of two books

Deb Cox is a freelance film and television writer. She has run the Script Office of the Australian Film Commission and was originating writer/producer on three series of SeaChange..

Andrew Daddo is a presenter on TV and now author of a collection of kids’ stories including Sprung &Writing in Wet Cement, in the popular Hot Shots Hodder children's series.
David Dale writes about travel and popular culture. His books include: The Perfect Journey, Essential Places, The 100 Things We Loved About the 20th Century and The 100 Things Everyone Needs To Know About Australia.
Marele Day is author of the best-selling literary novel Lambs of God. Her latest work Mrs Cook: the Real and Imagined Life of the Captain’s Wife will be launched at the Festival.
Robert Dessaix is a writer, literary commentator and broadcaster. His books include the autobiographical A Mother’s Disgrace, collected essays and short stories and the novels Night Letters and Corfu.
Irina Dunn has been the Executive Director of the NSW Writers Centre since December 1992. She is the author of The Writer's Guide : a Companion to Writing for Pleasure or Publication .
Abbas El-Zein’s first novel is Tell the Running Water. He has published essays on migration, war and identity and lectures in environmental science and engineering at the University of Sydney and the American University of Beirut.
  James Fraser is the Publishing Director of Pan Macmillan
Jackie French, author of Hilter’s Daughter, won the Australian Children’s Book Council Book of the Year Award for Younger Readers in 2000 and the equivalent British award in 2002. Her latest book is The White Ship.
  Rai Gaita teaches philosophy in the UK and Australia. His books have been published around the world and include Romulus, My Father, A Common Humanity and most recently The Philosopher’s Dog.
Max Gillies is a star of both stage and screen. In particular he is known for his series of satirical reviews including The Gillies Report. He is currently starring in his own show Your Dreaming, a close collaboration with Guy Rudle.
Stephen Gray won the 2000 Vogel Award for The Artist is a Thief , a detective novel about theft of Aboriginal art. He also lectures in copyright and Indigenous legal issues at Northern Territory University.
  Loubna Haikal was born in Beirut and came to Australia in 1969. Seducing Mr Maclean was her first novel.
  James Griffin is the producer and presenter of Words, ABC’s weekly program about writers, books and ideas.
David Hallett, twice winner of the Poetry Olympics at the Festival of Sydney, has managed Lismore Live Poets and Byron Bay Writers at the Rails for ten years. This year he published Dante’s Café.
Marion Halligan writes fiction and essays. Her latest novel is The Fog Garden, Allen & Unwin, published in paperback April 2002.
Beverley Harper intended to stay in Africa for a year. Instead she stayed 20 years. It is from this continent that she draws inspiration for all her novels.
Irena Hatfield has worked in the visual arts industry as a public art gallery director and art teacher. Her autobiography Irena was published in 2001.
Susan Hawthorne is an aerialist poet as well as the author of a novel The Falling Woman (1992) a collection of poems Bird (1999) and a cultural critique Wild Politics (2002)
  John Hertzberg is a solicitor and mediation specialist. He has recently been appointed to the NSW Workers Compensation Commission as arbitrator and mediator.
Megan Heyward is a new media artist & senior lecturer at UTS. Her experimental narrative work has been widely exhibited. The latest, Of Day, Of Night, was a finalist in the Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature.
Jeff Higgins has been involved in all aspects and levels of publishing and is now Dymocks Sales Manager, Australasia.
Simon Higgins writes crime, SF and action-adventure novels. His bestselling young adult stories are published internationally, with crossover thriller The Stalking Zone just released.
  Barry Hill, poet, novelist and historian, is Poetry Editor for the Australian. He has won prizes for poetry and non-fiction, and his short fiction is widely anthologised. His latest book is The Inland Sea.
Nette Hilton writes literature for children ranging from pre-school to young adults. Her current book, In My Back Yard ,is shortlisted for CBC Book of the Year, 2002.
Donald Horne has written 23 books, chaired the Australia Council, edited the Observer, the Bulletin and Quadrant. He taught at the University of New South Wales for 15 years.
Megan Jacobson won Northern Territory Young Authors of the Year at age eight. She is currently studying Communications/Journalism at Charles Sturt University and has won a Channel Seven Scholarship.
Adib Khan’s first novel Seasonal Adjustments won the Christina Stead Prize for Fiction, his second novel Solitude of Illusions was shortlisted. The Storyteller is his third novel.
  Margo Kingston wrote Off the Rails: the Pauline Hanson Trip. She runs a webdiary and writes a fortnightly column for the SMH. She is currently the Canberra Babylon commentator for Radio National.
Grace Knight is a singer, songwriter and author. She took the Eurogliders to chart topping success in the 80s, and became Australia's number one Jazz Diva in the 90s. Grace's latest album is titled Zeitgeist.
Lau Siew Mei’s first novel, Playing Madame Mao, was short listed for the Christina Stead Prize for fiction in the 2001 NSW Premier’s Literary Awards, and published in Australia, Greece and UK.
David Leser is the author of three books. He is also a Walkley-Award winning journalist. He currently works for the Australian Women's Weekly and the Bulletin.
Tamaso Lonsdale is a local writer of ten teenage novelettes and four books on Australian birds. She will launch her latest book, Brothers-Uncles, Sister-Aunt, at the festival.
Melissa Lucashenko is a Murri woman who writes novels of urban Aboriginal life. She has lived locally with her family for several years, and has numerous unfinished manuscripts stored under her South Golden Beach house.
Mungo MacCallum, political commentator, writer and broadcaster, currently writes for the Byron Shire Echo.. Recent publications are Mungo: the man who laughs, and the Quarterly Essay Girt by Sea.
Kim Mahood is a visual artist and writer who divides his time between his studio in Queanbeyan, part-time teaching at the Canberra School of Art and travelling and working in Central Australia.
Daniel Mason is twenty-one years old and lives on the North Coast of New South Wales. His first novel, Rush , is winner of the 2001 Young Author’s Award.
Mardi McConnochie is the author of several plays and is currently working as a scriptwriter. Coldwater is her first novel.
Roger McDonald is the author of six novels ­ 1915, Slipstream, Rough Wallaby, Water Man, The Slap, Mr Darwin’s Shooter ­ and author of two books of non-fiction - Shearers’ Motel and The Tree in Changing Light..
Craig McGregor’s publications include Don’t Talk to Me About Love and The See-Through Revolver, short stories, essays and several books on Australian society. His Class in Australia (revised edition) has just been published.
Jeff McMullen is an ABC foreign correspondent, Four Corners and Sixty Minutes reporter. He is author of the memoir A Life of Extremes.
Hilary McPhee is author of Other People’s Words.. A former publisher and Chair of the Australian Council she is a columnist for The Age and the inaugural Vice Chancellor’s Fellow at the University of Melbourne.
Drusilla Modjeska’s books include multi-award-winning Poppy, The Orchard and Stravinsky's Lunch. In September Picador will publish Time Pieces, a non-fiction collection of writings from the 1970s to the present.
Mark Mordue is the author of Dastgah: Diary of a Headtrip. He was awarded a 1992 Human Rights Media Award and was founding editor of Australian Style 1992-97.
Di Morrissey has written 12 novels including The Song Master &The Bay. Di is co-executive producer of the film based on her novel Tears of the Moon and is working on her next novel.
Brendan Nichols is an international speaker and author about how people live their unique dreams, bridging a successful life with spiritual fulfilment, offering practical spiritual solutions for the Western world
Mandy Nolan is Byron’s queen of comedy. Teacher, writer and stand-up comic, she will make you squeal like a squeaky wheel on a supermarket trolley.
Mick O’Regan is the presenter of the Media Report program on ABC Radio National. He has worked as a reporter and producer on the ABC’s radio and current affairs program AM .
Ruth Ostrow is weekly columnist in the Australian., has been a journalist and comedy writer, launched the Triple M Sex Show and has published 4 books including Hot & Sweaty and Burning Urges.
Matt Ottley is an author, illustrator and composer. His work has twice been short-listed for the Children’s Book Council of Australia awards, and What Faust Saw is an international best-seller.
Jane Palfreyman is Head of Publishing at Random House.
  Alison Pearl is a freelance writer, author of The Good Gift Guide, and music promoter and publicist for alternative, folk, roots and world groups from Australia and overseas.
Peter Phillips is Sales Director at Pan Macmillan
  Arthur Pike is a novelist whose books include A River to Cross and Dreamtime Beach and Other Times.
Dorothy Porter has published 11 books including her most recent Other Worlds. Her verse novel What a Piece of Work was shortlisted for the Miles Franklin Award &The Monkey’s Mask was released as a feature film in 2001.
  Peter Powditch AM is an Australian artist and teacher. He has taught at the major art schools in Sydney, is represented in all state, provincial & Australian galleries and currently shows with Ray Hughes Gallery, Sydney.
  Nicholas Pullen is a partner with legal firm Holding Redlich. He specialises in all areas of media and publishing law including defamation and pre-publication advice to authors and editors.
Hannie Rayson is the author of ten plays, including Hotel Sorrento, Falling From Grace and Life After George, which recently premiered on the West End in London. Hannie writes a regular column for the Age.
Tohby Riddle is a cartoonist & the author and illustrator of a number of award-winning and internationally published picture books including The Great Escape from City Zoo and The Singing Hat.
Andreea Deciu Ritivoi is a professor in the English department at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh. Her book Yesterday’s Self deals with the state of nostalgia and will be published this year.
Scott Roberts’ first produced screenplay was The American Way, starring Dennis Hopper (1986). He spent the next decade in London and LA. Writing credits from this period include K2 and Shadow of the Cobra. The Hard Word is his first film as both writer and director.
  Ian Robertson is an entertainment lawyer and a Sydney based partner of law firm Holding Redlich. He is also a member of the Australian Broadcasting Authority and a director of Ausfilm.
  Guy Rundle has been a writer for stage and screen for 10 years including Max Gillies Your Dreaming. He has worked as a writer and producer for television comedy, is co-editor of Arena Magazine and writes for major newspapers.
Max Ryan and Cleis Pearce: Cleis has featured at music festivals across Australia. Max’s lyrical poetry is well known to local audiences. Their collaborative CD White Cow will be launched at the Festival.
Alan Saunders is the presenter of ABC Radio National’s The Comfort Zone and a food columnist for Good Living magazine. His first novel, Alanna, was published by Penguin in May.
Rosie Scott has published six novels, collections of poetry, short stories and non- fiction. Her latest novel is Faith Singer
Bob Sessions is Publishing Director of Penguin
Laura Jan Shore is the author of young adult novel, The Sacred Moon Tree and Breathworks. She has offered writing workshops locally and in the US since 1978.

Peter Skrzynecki has published 14 books of poetry and prose. Immigrant Chonicle is a set text on the NSW HSC syllabus. He is a senior lecturer at the University of Western Sydney.

 
Peter Thompson is best known as the film reviewer on Channel Nine’s weekly program Sunday. He is a presenter on Encore movie channel. His novella Winter With Susan was published in 1997.
  Simon Thomsen is editor and publisher of the Northern Rivers Echo. He left the kitchen to review restaurants for the Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide and write about food.
Don Watson writes reviews and essays, films, television and books. The most recent specimens are The Man Who Sued God (film), Rabbit Syndrome (essay) and Recollections of a Bleeding Heart .
Peter Watt has worked variously as a prawn deckhand, builder’s labourer and private investigator. He is now a full time author and his three novels have become bestsellers in Australia and overseas.
  Heather Wearne is Senior Lecturer in Humanities at Southern Cross University where she established a very successful Writing program. Her area of special interest is Auto/biography.
Adele Wessell lectures in EcoCultural History at Southern Cross University. She is presently teaching a subject about the history of food and food in history: Food for Thought.
Robyn Williams is the author of 2007 : A true story waiting to happen.. He has been presenter of the Science Show, Radio National, since 1975.
  Harry Williamson is a graphic designer whose work has a bias towards typography and the visualisation of information - in books, reports, logotypes, signage systems. He has designed some stamps and two Australian currency notes.
Susan Wyndham is a senior writer on books and culture for the Sydney Morning Herald. She was the Herald’s Literary Editor from 1996 to 1999.
Lien Yeomans was born in Hanoi. She has studied, lived and worked in Australia for the last 40 years. She is fascinated by fire, food and the cultural background of ingredients
Arnold Zable is an award winning writer, storyteller and educator. His books include Jewels and Ashes, Cafe Scheherazade, and most recently, 'The Fig Tree.
Markus Zusak is twenty-six and lives in Sydney. His three books, The Underdog, Fighting Ruben Wolfe and When Dogs Cry have been published in America and throughout Europe.




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