Hi, I'm Holly.
I'm a professional writer, reader, and daydreamer.
My forthcoming debut novel, THE CENTRE IS RED, is about the haunting power of unspoken stories.
I believe in small acts of kindness, courage, and am an advocate of stories for change.
My forthcoming debut novel, THE CENTRE IS RED, is about the haunting power of unspoken stories.
I believe in small acts of kindness, courage, and am an advocate of stories for change.
Or, the (much) more detailed, third-person story:
HOLLY RINGLAND is an Australian writer who lives between the the moody northwest of England and the tropical colour of her Queensland home. Most recently, her essay Lost Girl of the Never Never was published in UWA Publishing's award-winning Desert Writing: Stories from Country anthology. In February 2015 Holly's essay, Might Be Rainbows, was published in Griffith Review 47: Looking West. Also in February 2015, the first chapter of THE CENTRE IS RED, Holly's forthcoming debut novel, won Griffith Review's 2015 annual writers award, which included a weeklong fellowship at iconic Varuna, the Writers House, Australia's top national writing residency.
Holly is represented by Benython Oldfield (AUS) and Sharon Galant (EU), Founding Co-Directors of Zeitgeist Media Group.
Currently in the final year of her Creative Writing PhD, Holly's thesis explores male-perpetrated violence against women by taking an introspective look at how positive meaning can be drawn from traumatic experience through the creative writing process; how unspoken past trauma can be conjured and transformed, or reformed, through writing fiction.
In 2011 Holly gained her Master of Arts in Creative Writing from the University of Manchester. Whilst in Europe Holly has facilitated creative writing workshops with women inmates in an English prison, lead storytelling discussions with Bulgarian government, university and high school audiences, and held an undergraduate teaching post at England's Lancaster University. From 2011-15 Holly volunteered as co-leader of the International 16, a Manchester-based project, which created space for 16 students from 16 different countries to connect, promote international friendship, cultural diversity, and break down prejudice and ignorance at an individual level through storytelling.
In 2003, after graduating from Griffith University with a BA in Communciations, Holly moved from her coastal Queensland home to remote Northern Territory. Accepting a job with the Australian Federal Government she spent four years in the central Australian desert as Senior Media Officer of Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park. Holly lived in Mutitjulu, the Aboriginal community at the base of Uluru, and worked with global media to ensure Anangu sacred sites were not compromised by commercial image use, filming, or photography. Essentially it was Holly's responsibility to uphold the values of a culture foreign to her and yet fundamentally Australian. Prior to this, Holly, an educated, well-travelled, white, working-class woman from the Gold Coast, had never met an Indigenous Australian. This period Holly spent living in central Australia transformed her life. Between the lines of this white-girl-in-the-outback postcard was the overwhelming reality of the 2007 Northern Territory Intervention - controversial, widely-criticised changes to welfare provision, law enforcement, land tenure and other measures introduced by the Australian federal government under John Howard in 2007 to address allegations of child sexual abuse and neglect in Northern Territory Aboriginal communities - and a mentally, emotionally, and physically violent relationship with a man, which she kept hidden. The peer-reviewed dissertation in which Holly wrote about her desert life for the first time, Nested dolls: 'Inner storytelling' and the creative writing process, was published in the October 2013 volume of TEXT journal.
Holly grew up on the southeast Queensland coast and spent the fledgling years of her life barefoot and wild in her mother's garden. When she was nine Holly's family lived on the road for two years in North America, following national park to national park from north to south of the west coast and across the interior. This experience inspired in Holly what would become a lifelong fascination with different cultures and stories.
To any question ever asked of Holly about growing up, writing has always been the answer.
Every month* I curate adventures, ideas, and curiosities about creativity, delivered straight your Inbox. It's cost-free, spam-free, and worry-free. You can unsubscribe at any time.
*except when I'm writing books
*except when I'm writing books
To sign up enter your email below:
What subscribers say:
"One of the highlights of my month!"
"Read it, loved it!"
"I love it when your newsletter pops up in my account. Always such good stories to get me inspired!"
"Reading your newsletter is a breath of fresh air."
"You have the most beautiful newsletter I have ever received."
"We really love your newsletters." - Mailchimp
"Read it, loved it!"
"I love it when your newsletter pops up in my account. Always such good stories to get me inspired!"
"Reading your newsletter is a breath of fresh air."
"You have the most beautiful newsletter I have ever received."
"We really love your newsletters." - Mailchimp
