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Short But Not Sweet

11 Oct
BOOK

ABOUT THE SHOW

Mariana Enríquez, Alex Cothren, Ingrid Horrocks & Gillian Hagenus in conversation with Terri-Jane Dow

A haunted pokie machine. A vengeful dress. A neighbour who knows too much. A series of choices that reverberate across centuries. In these deliciously subversive and striking short story collections, desire, rebellion and anxiety illuminate the contours of our lives and remake reality in the most unexpected and narratively satisfying of ways.

PART OF BRISBANE WRITERS FESTIVAL

White logo with a bold geometric shape on the left and the text Brisbane Writers Festival in large, white, sans-serif letters on a black background.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Mariana Enríquez was born in Argentina in 1973. She is the author of the novel Our Share of Night and the collections of short fiction, Things We Lost in Fire, A Sunny Place for Shady People and The Dangers of Smoking in Bed. Her most recent book is the travelogue Somebody Is Walking on Your Grave.

Yellow book cover with black silhouettes of crosses in tall grass. Title reads: Somebody Is Walking On Your Grave: My Cemetery Journeys. Author: Mariana Enriquez. The background fades from orange to yellow.

Alex Cothren is a lecturer in creative writing at Flinders University, on Kaurna Yerta. He has won the Carmel Bird, Griffith Review Emerging Voices and Peter Carey awards for short fiction. His story collection, Playing Nice Was Getting Me Nowhere, is out through Pink Shorts Press.

Book cover with Playing Nice Was Getting Me Nowhere in bold blue letters, a crushed soda can illustration, and side texts: Satires vertically on the left, Alex Cothren on the right, and a quote about Black Mirror.

Ingrid Horrocks is the author of the memoir Where We Swim, a literary history, Women Wanderers and the Writing of Mobility, and two collections of poetry. Her writing has appeared in Lithub, The Ninth Letter, The Sydney Review of Books, The Spinoff, Landfall, and the Guardian. She completed a PhD at Princeton and teaches for the Faber Writing Academy. In 2024, Ingrid was the Creative NZ Writer in Residence at Te Herenga Waka – Victoria University of Wellington, and in 2025 she was an International Exchange resident at Varuna National Writers House. All Her Lives was the winner of the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction at the 2026 Ockham New Zealand Book Awards. Ingrid lives in Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington, with her partner and twin daughters. All Her Lives is her first book of fiction.

Book cover for All Her Lives: Nine Stories by Ingrid Horrocks features an illustrated woman in a white shirt and green tie, sitting in a grassy field with a pastel background.

Gillian Hagenus is a writer and researcher living and working in Meanjin, Brisbane. Gillian specialises in (obsesses over) Australian Suburban Gothic fiction and is a current PhD candidate at the University of Queensland. Her debut short story collection Common Places was published in 2026 by UQP.

A green garden hose sprays water in circular patterns on grass. The book title COMMON PLACES and author Gillian Hagenus are displayed, along with a sticker that reads literary awards winner.

Terri-Jane Dow is the owner of independent bookshop, Cursive Knives. From London, she’s a regular columnist at Mslexia and a writer with bylines in The Saturday Paper, The Skinny, AnOther, and Evening Standard, and is co-manager of Florence Welch’s book club, Between Two Books.

BOOK

PERFORMANCE DATES & TIMES

Sun 11 Oct 2026
11:00AM

VENUE

Fairfax Studio

TICKETS

Adult
$29.90*
Concession
$25*
*$7.20 transaction fee applies to all ticket purchases

DURATION

60 minutes

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Suitable for all ages

18 months and under free on the knee; all other ages must hold a valid ticket

ACCESSIBILITY

  • wheelchair_accessible

Accessiblity Information at Brisbane Powerhouse

Presented by Brisbane Writers Festival in partnership with Brisbane Powerhouse

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Mariana Enríquez was born in Argentina in 1973. She is the author of the novel Our Share of Night and the collections of short fiction, Things We Lost in Fire, A Sunny Place for Shady People and The Dangers of Smoking in Bed. Her most recent book is the travelogue Somebody Is Walking on Your Grave.

Yellow book cover with black silhouettes of crosses in tall grass. Title reads: Somebody Is Walking On Your Grave: My Cemetery Journeys. Author: Mariana Enriquez. The background fades from orange to yellow.

Alex Cothren is a lecturer in creative writing at Flinders University, on Kaurna Yerta. He has won the Carmel Bird, Griffith Review Emerging Voices and Peter Carey awards for short fiction. His story collection, Playing Nice Was Getting Me Nowhere, is out through Pink Shorts Press.

Book cover with Playing Nice Was Getting Me Nowhere in bold blue letters, a crushed soda can illustration, and side texts: Satires vertically on the left, Alex Cothren on the right, and a quote about Black Mirror.

Ingrid Horrocks is the author of the memoir Where We Swim, a literary history, Women Wanderers and the Writing of Mobility, and two collections of poetry. Her writing has appeared in Lithub, The Ninth Letter, The Sydney Review of Books, The Spinoff, Landfall, and the Guardian. She completed a PhD at Princeton and teaches for the Faber Writing Academy. In 2024, Ingrid was the Creative NZ Writer in Residence at Te Herenga Waka – Victoria University of Wellington, and in 2025 she was an International Exchange resident at Varuna National Writers House. All Her Lives was the winner of the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction at the 2026 Ockham New Zealand Book Awards. Ingrid lives in Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington, with her partner and twin daughters. All Her Lives is her first book of fiction.

Book cover for All Her Lives: Nine Stories by Ingrid Horrocks features an illustrated woman in a white shirt and green tie, sitting in a grassy field with a pastel background.

Gillian Hagenus is a writer and researcher living and working in Meanjin, Brisbane. Gillian specialises in (obsesses over) Australian Suburban Gothic fiction and is a current PhD candidate at the University of Queensland. Her debut short story collection Common Places was published in 2026 by UQP.

A green garden hose sprays water in circular patterns on grass. The book title COMMON PLACES and author Gillian Hagenus are displayed, along with a sticker that reads literary awards winner.

Terri-Jane Dow is the owner of independent bookshop, Cursive Knives. From London, she’s a regular columnist at Mslexia and a writer with bylines in The Saturday Paper, The Skinny, AnOther, and Evening Standard, and is co-manager of Florence Welch’s book club, Between Two Books.