Aunty Violet Sheridan: ... through our parents. What fascinates me is that every time she writes a new book, she dresses up as a character. So I'm so looking forward to this book launch, and I want to congratulate you.

And I want to acknowledge a few people before I go. I better put me goggles on. I'd like to acknowledge Marie-Louise, Director-General, Kathryn, Director of Reader Services. I stand here in this place where once my Ngunnawal ancestor practised culture, raised their families. I am a proud Ngunnawal woman, as I carry my ancestors in spirit, walking into the future, teaching the next generations about the oldest culture in the world, my culture, the Ngunnawal Aboriginal culture. I'd like to pay my respects to my elders past, present and emerging, and extend that respect to our First Nations people here this evening. But I'd also like to acknowledge the non-Indigenous, as well as the many cultures here this evening as well.

In keeping in the general spirit of friendship and reconciliation, it gives me great pleasure once again to welcome you to the land of the Ngunnawal people. And on behalf of my family and the other Ngunnawal families, I say welcome.

But you ain't going to get rid of me that quick, I've got one more thing to say. You know the failure from the referendum last year and how First Nations peoples hearts are still broken. We're still healing. So on the 29th of November this year at Stage 88, Commonwealth Park, you're all invited, because I'm putting a concert on, and it's called Rocking for Reconciliation, but also against racism. So it's a free event. All you need to do is bring yourself, bring your family, bring a picnic lunch and a picnic blanket, and let's rock on for 2025. Thank yous all so much. Enjoy the evening.

Dr Marie-Louise Ayres: I'll be there. Yuma, good evening, everyone. A very warm welcome to the National Library of Australia and for this book launch event for 'Red Dust Running' by Anita Heiss. I'm Marie-Louise Ayres and it's my privilege to be Director-General of the Library. To begin, I would like to thank Aunty Vi for providing the Welcome to Country tonight, as she has done so beautifully on many occasions in this place.

I also acknowledge First Australians as the traditional owners and custodians of this land and give my respect to elders, past and present and through them to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

We are really, really aware that we undertake our work for the nation on the lands of the Ngunnawal peoples. And I especially acknowledge their custodianship of land, culture, art, story, and language on this land on which we're meeting tonight.

Now we're very lucky to be joined by Dr Anita Heiss to celebrate her latest book, 'Red Dust Running'. Aunty Vi has talked about Anita's lovely costume and I have to say, I'm feeling distinctly underdressed tonight.

Anita Heiss: It's not a costume. I dress like this every day.

Dr Marie-Louise Ayres: There you go. All right. But it's just wonderful and it's a bit of brightness in our world, actually. Anita is an internationally published award-winning author and editor of more than 20 books. She's a proud member of the Wiradjuri Nation of Central New South Wales, an ambassador for the Indigenous Literacy Foundation, an organisation that we feel very closely aligned to here at the Library, and the GO Foundation, and she's Professor of Communications at the University of Queensland. Anita is also the Publisher at Large of Bundyi, I hope I've got that correct, Bundyi, Bundyi, an imprint of Simon & Schuster cultivating First Nations talent. And facilitating this discussion tonight is Kathryn Favelle, our beloved Director of Reader Services here at the Library. So please join me in welcoming Anita and Kathryn. And Anita is going to lead us off.

Anita Heiss: [Speaking in language] for that introduction. [Speaking in language]. Good evening, everybody, I said probably with a terrible Aussie accent and may or may not be roused on for my pronunciation by Aunty Elaine later, but I attempted to say: Good evening, my name's Anita Heiss and I have Wiradjuri belonging from Erambie and Brungle missions. I'm a Williams. I honour my own Wiradjuri elders, Aunty Elaine and Aunty Vi, thank you for that beautiful Welcome to Country, and my old people, my ancestors, and my own country because that's where my spirit comes from, where my spirit will rest and my purpose in life every day comes from as well. And I pay my respects to the first storytellers of this place, the Ngunnawal peoples. And "yindyamarra" is my favourite word because it means to pay respect, to be honourable, to be polite and to be gentle. And I feel there's a lot of warmth and kindness in this room tonight and I hope that you can embrace the Wiradjuri values that I've attempted to bring to the room and through this book. So, thank you.

Kathryn Favelle: Thank you, Anita, and welcome back to the National Library. And I have to say, I have had the best time reading 'Red Dust Running' and it is a book filled with warmth and kindness and belonging and thinking about how we talk to each other and how we rub up against each other and get along. So congratulations.

Anita Heiss: I was waiting for when you were going to get to the rubbing up against each other. It's in there. It's in there.

Kathryn Favelle: There is a bit, but it's not as spicy as you might think. Welcome back. You've been a great champion of the National Library. It's been a while since we've seen you. I think you were here in 2018 to help us launch 'Sorry Day', which is still selling like hot cakes. So thank you for sprinkling your magic dust over that book. And of course, you come back every seven years or so to participate in our oral history programme seven years on. So we are thrilled to have you back, but especially thrilled to be here celebrating you and your new book-

Anita Heiss: Thank you.

Kathryn Favelle: ... which is lovely. To kick us off, 'Red Dust Running' is your fifth rom-com, but it's been over 10 years since your last, which up until now has been my favourite, 'Paris Dreaming'. What drew you back to the genre?

Anita Heiss: I didn't even realise it was that long, 10 years. So what happened was we were in COVID, I was writing 'Bila Yarrudhanggalangdhuray', the River of Dreams, about the Gundagai flood, and I got a phone call about potentially doing something for Audible, because this book actually came out as an Audible book first. And Audible Australia, Audible wanted to do something. We were in a moment of time, we all know during that time how much anxiety was in the world and people were dying and nobody knew what was, we were in a pandemic and nobody knows what's going on and they wanted to do a series of books that were uplifting. I had always wanted to go to a rodeo. I don't know why. I've been now, I don't need to go to another one, but I always wanted to go to a rodeo. And so I thought, and everything, when I want to do something, whether it's like running in Hawaii or going to a rodeo or going on a cruise, I'm like, "Let's see if I can write this off on tax and turn it into a book."

And so I knocked up a page going, there's going to be this core group of girls that go from Brisbane. I wanted to go to the, is it Mount Isa Rodeo, is the big one, but it's really, I couldn't get there, so I thought I'll do this book. I was quite exhausted from writing 'Bila Yarrudhanggalangdhuray'. So in some ways this book and even this version of this book that's just come out, it's almost the palate cleanser between the serious historical fiction. Not that there's not serious moments in this. But part of me also wants to show always that we are more than the politics as people frame it as we are. Women who have serious friendships, beautiful friendships, I have many of these women in the room today, that we are whole and complete and we have careers and we want companionship, whatever that companionship looks like, just like other women want them. So it was sort of a gift that they gave me and it came out as an Audible audiobook and now it's a tree book.

Kathryn Favelle: We're going to talk a bit about your method writing in a minute, but was there much of a leap from taking it from an audiobook to a traditional soft cover?

Anita Heiss: Well, more than I knew there was. So I wrote the first draught as I would write a normal novel. And so there's these four women and they're talking over each other and having a good time and lots going on, and I submit the novel and I have to rewrite it into the point of view really of just one character, Annabelle, because I was writing them, all the characters lives and journeys in one, which you can do on the page, but when you're in a studio and you've got one narrator, it can be quite confusing. So I did learn that writing for audio is very different, to be conscious of, you've got one narrator, so tell the story through one POV as it were. So that was stressful back at the time, because you hand it in and you want it to be done with, but it was a good learning curve for me also.

Kathryn Favelle: But you haven't gone back to that multiple point of view for this version of it. You've stuck with Annabelle-

Anita Heiss: Yes.

Kathryn Favelle: ... as the narrator. Were you ever tempted to completely pull it apart and go back to that first version?

Anita Heiss: Do more work? No, because there was a light edit done on this by Allanah Hunt who is a fantastic First Nations editor. No, no. And also because I want people, I would like them to be as close as possible for people. Sometimes people listen to the audio while reading the paperback, which is an interesting thing to do as well. No, I never ever thought about that. Ever. Ever. I do not recommend that to anybody. Don Bemrose, writing a novel. Yeah.

Kathryn Favelle: Why do you think rom-coms are having a moment?

Anita Heiss: I think BookTok has a huge place in that because. Has anyone on TikTok looked at BookTok and so forth? So that's where all the rom-coms live and thrive and are highlighted. So I think TikTok has really brought rom-coms into the limelight, but also there's a really strong romance reading community. I'm also a member of Romance Writers Australia and massive online groups and reading groups and so forth. And it's I guess since 'Fifty Shades of Grey', reading romance or reading erotica is not so embarrassing anymore. I've spoken to booksellers who have told me that people have entered their bookshops having never bought a book before, but they went and bought 'Fifty Shades of Grey'. Not that that's romance, but it is writing about relationships and sex and so forth. And there's that.

There's also the happily ever after that romance is meant to deliver. Who doesn't want a happily ever after? I want a happily ever after. And there's the connection that readers can have with characters and wanting to see themselves in the relationships that some of these characters are having. And it's interesting because I'm not really thought of as a romance writer, I don't think, but more of writing in a First Nations genre, which has all those things in there.

But I was in Adelaide last year for the Romance Writers Conference. People paid $40 to come into the expo just to get autographs. How much did you mob pay to come tonight? Just like, you want to buy a book, nothing's for free. No, I was fascinated. People came in with trolleys and suitcases of books of their favourite authors. Now many of those authors aren't traditional publishers. So a traditionally published author is someone who's with Random House or Simon & Schuster and so forth. Many of those authors are self-published, but the readers just care about the story they're reading and they follow these authors. And so I've seen that it's a community.

Romance writers don't get shortlisted in literary awards. They don't even get entered in literary awards. It's a completely different world. And so this community of readers and writers just support each other. And there's a romance reading retreat, and I went to that on the Gold Coast last year as an author. And again, I met readers, not all women, all genders, I met people who had travelled from Western Australia for the weekend on the Gold Coast to meet authors and talk about romance books. So they're readers. I met people from Ballarat. I think I met six women from Ballarat. Some of them didn't even know each other. What's the chance of that? Six women from Ballarat in the Gold Coast to talk about romance reading. And it was extraordinary.

But even these women, people were coming up to me saying, "Oh, I've read 'Bila Yarrudhanggalangdhuray'," but they're at a romance thing. So they're reading across genre, which you don't necessarily find with people who read literary fiction. We have readers in the room and the librarians will know, there's this BS hierarchy where rom-coms are down the bottom of the hierarchy just above Westerns, which nobody writes anymore. And so it's almost seen as it's a dumbing-down. And I think I was criticised originally when I wrote 'Not Meeting Mr Right'. I was criticised for dumbing down my writing, but the people, the reviewers didn't understand that I had a purpose and that was to reach as many women readers as I can about the things that I think all Australians should be thinking about. So yeah, there's sex and shopping and so forth, but there's stuff that matters in there. Sex and shopping matters. There's a hierarchy, but there's other stuff that we know, social justice, that matters as well. And it is possible to marry the both.

Kathryn Favelle: Yeah. We actually have a book stack here at the Library called the Mills and Boon stack. And when you take people to see it, they forget everything else that they have seen on their way through. It's the Mills and Boon stack with all the Mills and Boons and Harlequin romances lined up against a wall.

Anita Heiss: Have you got an Anita stack?

Kathryn Favelle: We could have an Anita stack.

Anita Heiss: [unclear] a chocolate stack.

Kathryn Favelle: Keep writing and we'll have an Anita stack. You talked about your historical fiction and so you did seem to do a bit of a pivot after 'Paris Dreaming'. And we had 'Barbed Wire and Cherry Blossoms' about the Cowra Breakout of 1944. And apologies, I'm about to make a bit of a mess of this, but I'm going to give it a go, 'Bila Yarrudhanggalangdhuray', River of Dreams, about the great flood of Gundagai.

Anita Heiss: Well, I will give you a credit.

Kathryn Favelle: A credit? Okay.

Anita Heiss: But before you go to the next one, let me go to a quick story, because I did a video on the title for Dymocks Booksellers and thought I was this one-take wonder, did this video, put it online. And people are texting me going, "I'm in the car park, practising it." Three days later [unclear] rings me up and I'm driving along Main Street Kangaroo Point. I remember this because I nearly drove off the road, and she said, "Oh, bub, I just saw that video on Facebook. You know you said it wrong?" And I was horrified. And there's a longer story to that and Helen and Kendra in the audience will know that story, but I was horrified. But the point of that was that Helen reminded me that I started learning what should have been my first language at the age of 50. So we're going to make mistakes. And so, okay, I'll give you a distinction because you're just learning now.

Kathryn Favelle: Well, just wait, just wait.

Anita Heiss: Okay. And then the next one.

Kathryn Favelle: And the next one, 'Dirrayawadha'.

Anita Heiss: 'Dirrayawadha'.

Kathryn Favelle: 'Dirrayawadha'.

Anita Heiss: Okay.

Kathryn Favelle: Rise up. But that is a harder one.

Anita Heiss: 'Dirrayawadha', yeah.

Kathryn Favelle: Which was about the Frontier Wars and resistance, resilience and love on the frontier. What triggered that change of direction for you?

Anita Heiss: I don't think it was a conscious, it wasn't like I'm going to move now into writing historical fiction, because I don't really have aspirations to write in any particular culture, not culture, in any particular genre. What happens is I have an idea or I'm inspired by a conversation or an observation, and then the story grows from there. And what happened was I was in, I'd done 'Tiddas' in between there, which is about five women living in Brisbane. And I wrote that book because I love Brisbane and I don't think most people see Brisbane for all it is, and I wanted to write something set up there. But I was in Pearl Harbour and I think 'Tiddas' had come out and I was in Pearl Harbour and I'd been there before, but it was the first time I noticed that most of the tourists at Pearl Harbour are Japanese. And I just found that really fascinating because history, the remembering and recording of history is completely subjective. And so the history of Pearl Harbour is obviously through a very American lens and the history of Hiroshima is through a very Japanese lens, and there are two different ways of looking at that history.

But I'm there and I'm thinking, "I wonder what these Japanese tourists are thinking, watching this very challenging footage." Has anyone been to Pearl Harbour? It's quite challenging to watch, obviously, because it's wartime. And I thought to myself, there was nothing that I had read or seen because there's docos about the Cowra Breakout that actually mentioned that men from Cowra went to war, some never returned. That in 4.5 miles in a straight line from the Prisoner of War camp was around the station, where Aboriginal people were living under the act of protection and policy of assimilation and had less rights than the POWs.

So the Italian soldiers could leave the POW camp. And they went and worked in the market gardens and local people preferred the labour of Italian POWs than to Kooris. And Japanese soldiers were fed rice and fish and so forth, and they had their own hospital on the POW camp, on the base. Whereas my mum was getting rations from the old horse shed, and the hospital was segregated and the cinema was segregated.

And we treated POWs, rightly so, to the letter of the law under the Geneva Convention. But I thought to myself, we're not even in the story. We're not even in the landscape of that military history. So I emailed Laurie Bamblett, who lives in Cowra. I said, "I don't live there, I don't live at Erambie. I don't live there. If you tell me this is a bad idea. I want to use my mum's memories." My mum was alive, my mum was born in 1937 in Erambie and so I want to use her memories. And he basically said, "No one's got the right to say your mum can't tell her own story." So I felt like that gave me some okay to do that. And then the flood story about Yarri and Jacky Jacky.

I wasn't in Gundagai, but I saw it all unfolding in terms of the sculpture that was, what's the word for it, unveiled. And I was thinking, "How is it the whole country doesn't know about this?" Everyone knows about the Dog in the Tuckerbox. I give a book away every time I do an event and someone sings the song 'Along the Road to Gundagai', but how don't they know this? And so that was the inspiration for that. And then in that time I started learning language and I was messaging my publisher saying, "Oh, I want to use this, I want to say this." And then 'Dirrayawadhu' just had the two-month anniversary. So those books are about me making a contribution, because I'm not living on my own country. I have a platform, I have an opportunity, and I work in schools and I see where the lack of knowledge exists, all those gaps in knowledge. So those books are specifically for getting people to learn more about our shared history. I don't know what the question was, but that's the answer you got.

Kathryn Favelle: That's a great answer.

Anita Heiss: Everybody online's gone to bed already, but anyway.

Kathryn Favelle: Whatever the question, that was a great answer. But it does make me want to think about the link, whether there is a through line from the rom-coms through to historical fiction, which is about putting First Nations women and First Nations people back into the stories that they have not been part of.

Anita Heiss: Thank you. That's right, that was part of the question. So it is. There are different purpose, but the goal is to write us into the literary landscape. History wants to write us into the history. I think someone said, one of the reviews or something said about 'Dirrayawadhu' is re-peopling us into the landscape. The rom-coms, originally, when they first came out, they were called chick lit. And the difference between chick lit and rom-coms is, I don't even know if they call anything chick lit now, but the end of the chick lit story, there doesn't have to be happily ever after in terms of romance. That's not the goal. The goal is the journey of the woman, whatever that journey is. Maybe it's career, maybe it's spiritual growth and so forth. It's not, I've got to meet a man or I've got to meet a woman or I've got to meet someone sort of thing. It's about her journey as, whatever her journey is.

And so for me, the process is exactly the same if we're looking at a link. The process is the same. So I write a synopsis, then I do character breakdowns, then I do the research, and then I'm a plotter. There's two types of writers, there's plotters and pantsers. A plotter maps the whole story out, like an essay plan for the book. Who would be a plotter? Anyone a plotter? And pantser, where you just have the big picture? Okay, so I'm a plotter and I can have a book come out one a year and my pantser friends have one every five years. So there's a tip for you. So if you want to, map it out, friends, map it out. And then I write and so forth.
And I think what they have in common is actually telling stories through just my lens. I'm not speaking on behalf of everybody, obviously, but I'm always encouraging people, you don't have to read my books, but be reading books by First Nations peoples, learning about who we are, learning about our shared history through our lenses.

And I've had students say to me, "Oh, you're saying we can't read books about black people by white people." And that is absolutely not, I am not saying that. What I'm saying is, be conscious of the lens that the author has written through. And I always say, if I want to learn about farming, I'm going to buy a book by a farmer, not a book by a stockbroker. So just be conscious of the lens. And for me, I'm always looking for the gaps. Where are the gaps? We want our young kids to be reading, we need to write books that brown kids can see brown kids on. And I want all Australian kids to have diversity in their reading. So that's why sometimes I work in the children's space as well.

Kathryn Favelle: You've led us very beautifully into the next question, which is about your method and how you went about writing 'Red Dust Running', and we have some beautiful things to show you.

Anita Heiss: Oh, I don't know if they're beautiful.

Kathryn Favelle: They are beautiful.

Anita Heiss: So I'm a method writer and that means getting into character, sometimes staying in character. And I can't tell you how much work it is carrying this hat on planes. And I'm sure people think I'm some country, hillbilly girl on a plane for the first time. And I'm like, "I'm a professor, you stay down that side of the plane. Where's the rope, Virgid? Put that rope up." So I thought what I'd do is, so you could see and is there anybody in the room that actually wants to write, is writing a book? Yep, yep. Awesome. Well, hopefully this will help. Some hands at the back. Okay, so getting into character means buying in tax-deductible things that you can wear, right?

Mind you, there's nothing on that slide that I want to re-use. No. So the bling jeans, so I go. This is all in the book. She goes up shopping, everything's material, everything is material. I go shopping, I get the bling jeans for $11, but I'll tell you, they were so comfortable. I kept them for some time after and just wore a shirt that went down over the blings. And the shoes I got in Rocky for four bucks. Bargain. I was looking for red and green for the Rabbitohs Grand Final and I found those, and the bag. This is what I did not wear. Now, I had a Facebook group, I had a little Facebook page for my friends, my "research assistants" who came to the rodeo and things with me. And so they were posting things all the time. What about this outfit or that outfit? If I could wear that, I would wear that. Not the Crocs, but the other outfit.

Kathryn Favelle: Did you see that at the rodeo?

Anita Heiss: No.

Kathryn Favelle: No. Okay.

Anita Heiss: Rodeos aren't like that. Rodeos aren't like that. Now what's going on here? Okay, so the first thing I did is I went to the Professional Bull Riders Association event in Rockhampton. Has anybody been to one of those? A whole new world. It's like another planet and I'm showing these photos because I want to show you. So I'm taking photos. I realised when I was trying to make this, most of the footage I've got is videos, so I could watch the videos so I could hear what the commentators were saying and so forth. I wanted to show, look, I'm drinking beer out of a plastic cup. I don't normally do that. Getting into character. 

On the end there, Naomi. So I have a character, Naomi, it's named after my friend Naomi who lived up that way. I wanted to show you so you can see back inside. It's an inside, it's indoors, this thing, the Bull Riders Association. And so I'm taking, these are the photos of the guys so I can write about what they're wearing and so forth. Extraordinary.

The next day and it happens in the novel as well, in the novel. I'm not Annabelle, but Annabelle and I, as a researcher in character, go to the Capricorn Caves. The first thing they tell us, there's no acknowledgement to country, there's no Darumbal people have been living here for millennia, "It was first discovered in 1881 by Norwegian migrant John Olsen." You think so? And I'm just looking at people and I couldn't believe. So I had to write to Tourism Queensland about that. So there's a conversation around that in the novel where Dusty, he says, "Oh, you're always being political."

Kathryn Favelle: I actually think Tourism Queensland needs to hire you, because.

Anita Heiss: They can't afford me. No. And I put something on Instagram and then everyone's piling on Tourism Queensland, but really? Really? Anyway. So it's the beef capital of Australia, and the bulls and people steal the testicles off the bulls and everything. So in the novel they go and do the selfies. So I did this and then wrote the novels. So I go and did the selfies and do all the things and so forth. But one character is a vegan, so we can deal with, well, no, animal cruelty. She does the whole RSPCA thing, and so there's a bit of banter in there about that. All bases covered.

There's a character in there, and this is true, who does the whole PDF of the girls' weekend away. So we can't see it there, but it had that whole thing. And in this, you've got the whole list of where we're staying, what we're doing, timetable, park run. There were conversation starters for Saturday night. My beautiful friend did this.

And so we go on a girls trip, I go to the Warwick Rodeo and Gold Cup Campdraft. I go a day early and what happens in the novel, it's me, she's upset. I don't know, I was quite old then, 50 something, but even I'm going, "Oh, I don't know. What should I wear?" I'm sitting outside the gate. "What are other women are wearing? Should I change to these boots?" I had boots, I borrowed boots, nearly crushed my toes. That happens in the novel too.

Kathryn Favelle: Boots are a big part of it.

Anita Heiss: The boots are a big part of it. So I go to the Australian Rodeo Heritage Centre. I think it was there that I learned about Lancelot Albert Skuthorp. And so that is the name of the horse, Sir Lancelot, that Dusty rides in the novel. I run around Federation Park. It's a little bit of a, I hope, I'm sure not, I've had two First Nations editors read this book, so I feel like I'm covered. But I'll let you think about Tiddalik and where that goes in the conversation. Run around the park, so she runs around the park, and then I go to the Campdraft by myself.

And because a method writer of tax deductions, I go to the Ariat shop because Ariat's a big thing, and I buy that shirt. And then I take quite a long time to buy my hat, which I have to wear everywhere because it's expensive. And I said, they're trying to sell me these hats, like, "I need something I can wear in Brisbane." Anyway, so do all those things.

Now the idea of these photos is, it's about, I then go back and look at it and, okay, who was in the stands? What are they wearing? What are people doing? Writing about all your senses. What can you see? What can you smell? What can you hear? So I'm going to do all the commentating, and I'm using that in the novel. And so these are my friends, they don't know I've got these photos up here today. And so, I've got a video. So they have these clowns acting and they're telling these jokes, and I'm thinking, "Any minute it's going to turn into some really bad Trump thing." And the jokes are going like lead balloons and we don't know where it's going to go, but then they start singing 'Sweet Caroline'. So we're totally into it. Watch the video back, we're the only people in the stands singing it. So we stick out like city slicking dog balls like you wouldn't believe.

And so we go through the market stalls, so I've got that in the novel. I didn't know this, pearls are a big thing for the women at rodeos. So there's pearls and so forth. So it's a whole road trip. I go a day early, but then people come in my car. There's Ange, Emma and Christine, and we go to the UGG boot lady. I'm not an UGG boot person, but that's in the book. We go to the Big Apple, we go to some Christmas shop, and we go to the border and we do the Queenslander thing.

And then just by chance, and I think I get a whole chapter out of this, I take myself to the Gold Coast to write for five to 10 days at a time. And the weekend I get there, the Groundwater Country Music Festival's on. So I put on my cut-off denim jeans. Too old for those. Anyway. That's the view from my hotel room. And that matters because Dusty's scared of heights and I walk around the markets and that's in there, because she buys Dusty something at the markets and I am doing all the things and I go and listen to some bands and I'm taking notes, and a lot of that appears in the novel. And then I see on the programme Troy Cassar-Daley is performing. So I go to find where the stage is, so where the white chairs are, I go there, find that, "Right, that's where we got to go tonight." Then we go there with another friend, another research friend, and we go there and we watch Troy Cassar-Daley and then, do we do this? Now?

Kathryn Favelle: Let's do this. Yeah.

Anita Heiss: And so this was Kathryn's idea about doing a reading.

Kathryn Favelle: This is one of my favourite bits in the whole book. There are many favourite bits, but this one's special.

Anita Heiss: She picked the cleanest bit in the whole book. What's going on?

Kathryn Favelle: Also, I had to find a bit that didn't give away a plot point.

Anita Heiss: We haven't even told you what the story's about yet, have we, really? It's four friends, they live in Brisbane. It's really a story about female friendship and a cowboy, a hot cowboy. Anyway, so I did this. So this Annabelle is a runner. So the 'Red Dust Running' is that she's known for, their friend's, her cousin, Angel, chastises her for running away from problems and so forth. But she's also physically a runner and she runs a lot in the morning with her neighbour, Michael. Anyway, so she's at the rodeo, a day before the rodeo, and she's out for a run.

"I rise early with the sun. I love walking in a new place and seeing the landscape at dawn. I pull on my active wear and head to the river for a run, passing locals out for morning walks and take in the lush landscape after what appears to be recent rain. I think about my own country back in Wagga Wagga and the Murrumbidgee Bila, laughing to myself about what the locals call the Wagga Beach. I miss my [in language] and the barbecues and catch-ups they often have on the weekends. I don't know when I'll get back down there again, but the aunties and uncles are also asking when I'll be back. It's just such a long trip if I can't get a direct flight. I take a deep breath and close my eyes for a second. Then I look at this landscape that reminds me a little of my own country and I feel a pang of guilt about not going home enough, as much as I want to, as much as I should. I tell myself to make the most of the beauty around me today. My friends and my work are important too. And at least today I can be somewhere that looks a little like my own [in language].

I run for about a kilometre, then slow my pace to stare at the river gums in front of me. I take my earbuds out and walk to one of the trees. I get in as close as I can, wrap my arms around its trunk and hug tightly. 'Leave some love for someone who may need it later,' my late nana, Soni, told me as a child. A lone tear runs down my cheek as I remember when I was at my lowest in Sydney after the scandal broke. Nana was no longer with us by then and I missed her so much during that time. The hardest thing since she passed over has been not being able to yarn with her whenever I want to. I hadn't even been able to find a tree to hug to draw extra love from. As I step back from the gum, I hope the love I leave today will help someone else later."

Kathryn Favelle: That's beautiful, but that piece for me also starts to tease out some of the things that are happening in the book. There is the rodeo and there are some gorgeous men and there's shopping and fabulous places to go. If you're thinking of going to Queensland, here is your itinerary. Just pick up the book and follow in Annabelle/Anita's footsteps. But it also, I think, feels to me like the book is really exploring belonging and longing and country and friendship. And I wonder what you might think about that.

Anita Heiss: Well, there's a few things. So with all those rom-coms, the characters, in 'Tiddas' in particular, the three of the five characters are Wiradjuri, and they're always looking for things in Brisbane that carry them home, whether it's running along the river or Jacaranda trees and so forth. For me though, all of those books are about the strength of sisterhood, the way I see it. And they're about the women that we have in our lives, sisters, biological sisters, friends we call sisters, tiddas and so forth, who love us unconditionally and who we manage to manoeuvre through long-term friendships even when have breakdowns in communication or we don't see each other for long periods of time or we don't always agree on worldviews or personal decisions, but we always have each other's back. And some of those people in the audience this evening have got my back and my front.

And so for me it's about that and it's also about that these women are intelligent and capable and fabulous and flawed, because we're flawed, but articulate. And I want to always showcase Indigenous excellence, because all that other stuff is done quite well by everybody else. And there's First Nations women in the audience tonight who are CEOs, who are running NGOs, who are academics, artists, they work in education, they're policymakers, they're language teachers. And I want to see those women represented on the page.

And even for, I need to say, even so for our men, because one of the first interviews I did for one of my books, the first it was by a gentleman journo, and he said to me, the first thing he said to me is, "Well, you've written men who are actually really nice." And I said, "Well, because I write about the men that I know in my world, the Wiradjuri men or the black men and the non-Indigenous men in my world are respectful and kind and thoughtful. And so it's easy for me to write that."

Again, answering the question I wished you asked. I'm being a politician. I'm not sure. So you're asking about. Oh, on country. And also again, it's about because I don't live on my land. I live up in Magandjin which is Brisbane and in some ways it's easy to live on someone else's country because you don't have to get involved in the politics. It's great.

Kathryn Favelle: There is a bit that Annabelle talks about not being on country. And she talks about having asked her elders if she could leave country to pursue her dreams.

Anita Heiss: Is that the conversation with Dusty?

Kathryn Favelle: It is the conversation with Dusty.

Anita Heiss: Right, because Annabelle's all furious about the caves and wants to talk about that. And Dusty's a cowboy, he doesn't read. He's a very simple man. He has a very hot body. He drinks Coca-Cola for breakfast and has a ciggy for breakfast, and he's at the other end of the spectrum. She's a overachieving, works in the arts, runs a gallery and so forth. And this is what you can use dialogue for, those conversations, he says to her, "Well, it's all well and good for you to be up here making all the noise, but what are you doing down in your own country?" And it really pushes all her buttons, because he's right in a way. And then it's about the lack of opportunities in what she wanted to do with her career. And I know from my own world that my elders are happy for all of us if we're living healthy, happy, productive lives and we're safe, regardless of where we live, as long as we're taking care of ourselves.

And so she says that she wouldn't. And I didn't even know when I moved to Brisbane, if my mother said to me, "I don't want you to go," I wouldn't have gone. And everyone else knew I was going for six weeks and they're going, "What'd your mum say? Have you told your mum yet?" And because I knew that if she said to me, "I don't want you to go," I would've stayed with her. And so in the novel, she says, she spoke to [unclear] from memory, that the elders were okay because it's about her career opportunities also were limited as a curator. There's a curator in the audience this evening that used to be in Brisbane and is now in Canberra, at the National Gallery. And so we are like other people. We have to move for careers and education and companionship as well.

Kathryn Favelle: Dusty is such a beautiful foil for Annabelle and he's gorgeous. He does have a gorgeous body, but.

Anita Heiss: Completely fictional. No, he is.

Kathryn Favelle: So you say.

Anita Heiss: This is the joy of writing fiction. You can write the man you wish you had, you can write the sex you wish you were having. Sorry, Aunt.

Kathryn Favelle: But he also, he and Annabelle have another great conversation, which is around the different ways that you can create change and influence things. And often we think about change being something that you march for and demonstrate against and rail against, but he has a very different perspective on that. And that was one of the things that struck me about the book, that it shows that there are many different ways that you can influence people and influence the world that you live in.

Anita Heiss: I think, Dusty, what we learn is, he's a very deep thinker. So we think, oh, he's just Dusty, the cowboy. The girlfriends have written him off because they already think he's not right for her and so forth. But he's a very deep thinker and, he talks about, he pulls her into line also very gently. "I don't expect you to do anything special for me. Don't change me," sort of thing as well. He doesn't understand though, I don't know if he truly understands the work of his twin brother, Daniel. Is it Daniel?

Kathryn Favelle: Yeah.

Anita Heiss: Is the character's name Daniel?

Kathryn Favelle: Yeah, it's Daniel.

Anita Heiss: Is it Daniel? Daniel Davies. I've written two books since then. Daniel Davies and that he, because his twin brother's an artist, so he's like, a "arty-farty", yada, yada, yada, which is actually offensive to Annabelle who works in the arts. But he's actually a very deep thinker. And I saw that even with my father who was a carpenter and he read Westerns and he didn't read much, because he was working all the time and then he'd go to sleep and get up because he was putting a roof over his five children's head and feeding them and so forth. But now and then he would just say something that told me that he had thought very deeply about whatever the issue was. 

And I think Dusty's that character as well. And it's a reminder not to judge a book by its cover, except this book because it's a beautiful cover. But don't look at a sexy cowboy and think that he's not a deep thinking human being.

Kathryn Favelle: That he's just a sexy cowboy.

Anita Heiss: That he's just a sexy cowboy. Chances are he is. I don't know. I didn't really meet any cowboys.

Kathryn Favelle: Didn't you?

Anita Heiss: So I had to stop the research at some point. Don't want to blur my creative process.

Kathryn Favelle: One of the other things I've noticed, you have a bit of a longing I think for a First Nations art gallery because in 'Manhattan Dreaming' and 'Paris Dreaming', Old Parliament House is remade as a gallery of First Nations art.

Anita Heiss: As it should have been.

Kathryn Favelle: And we have one appearing here in Brisbane. So how's that plan going?

Anita Heiss: So there's a fantastic gallery. It's not that gallery, but I was on the board of the Aboriginal Art Co and it's in Brisbane and I've spent a lot of time there and I've launched a couple of books there. I used to be a communications advisor for the then Australia Council, which is now Creative Australia. So I was working with artists all the time, doing press releases and campaigns and events and so forth. And I'm in art galleries all the time. I think about this, because as writers we go to films, we go to the theatre, we read each other's books, we go to galleries. I very rarely see other artists come to book launches, from other art forms. 

And I know and I buy, I'd like to buy art and I appreciate art and usually, like in 'Manhattan Dreaming' and 'Paris Dreaming', I've mentioned actual artists because I like to promote artists and ask them for permission and, "What artwork would you like me to recommend?" And musicians and so forth. But this time I created Daniel Davies when I went to the art gallery in Warwick and got inspired by some artwork that was there. But I'm interested in the arts. It's what I know.

Kathryn Favelle: And that idea of using your writing to lift other people up comes through very strongly. Troy Cassar-Daley does get quite a few plugs in this book and a beautiful song of his, 'Dream Out Loud', gets a couple of mentions. I'm curious why you picked that song.

Anita Heiss: Well, I don't even think I knew that song before I saw him perform that night. And I've got video footage, it's bad, of my friend and I, everyone's singing, everyone was singing to that song and everyone's standing up. And it's really about these two old fellas, one white fellow, one black fellow, and they talk over the fence and so forth. And I guess for one of a better term, it's almost like a reconciliation song, but it's an uplifting, for me, hopeful song. And I'm a positive glass half full kind of person. I wouldn't get out of bed if I wasn't. And so it's got a beautiful beat, I love listening to it in the car. So it was easy for me to write that into that moment and that song into the story.

Because it's also, like he says in that song, "If you see your brother fall, help him up." But also there's a line in there saying, "If you see your sister." And it's just about loving people and being kind. And I was in Margaret River recently and I interviewed Stan Grant about his new book. And it's called 'Murriyang: Song of Time' and I highly recommend it. It's a beautiful meditation, a reflection on life and land and his father, Uncle Stan, and God. And at the end of the day he's saying, and he said this to hundreds of people, "the only way we can change the world is through love". And I firmly believe that as well. So I feel like that song has love in every line.

Kathryn Favelle: Beautiful. Thank you. Before we hear a little bit more from the book and wrap up, one last question. What are you working on now?

Anita Heiss: Working on, I've just submitted a novel set in Hawaii about three Wiradjuri women in their 50s.

Kathryn Favelle: Oh, I can't wait to see those costumes.

Anita Heiss: Okay. If it would be a bikini. And really, I wrote that because I realised women in their 50s were told the world tells you everything's dried up literally, love, romance, all that sort of thing. And I feel like I am the healthiest and the happiest I've ever been. Three years shy of 60. It's taken that long. And when you get to my age, you realise all the crap that you've worried about needlessly in your 30s and your 40s and it's just like, "Don't worry about that." But I've been to Hawaii a few times and I was there recently again to take a draught over to people. We have so much in common, so it's not chick lit, it's romance, it's commercial women's fiction, but we have so much in common with the Hawaiians in terms of sovereignty and colonisation and so forth. So that's woven through it as well. Obviously there's a couple of really hot, gorgeous Polynesian men. That might be on the cover. You know those Mills and Boon covers with the Fabio and the shirt and whatever? Anyway.

Kathryn Favelle: That will go straight to the Mills and Boon stack.

Anita Heiss: Yes, but I'm also working on a historical novel set in 1927, you will have known of Jimmy Clements and John Noble who walked from Brungle to Canberra for the opening of Parliament House. So working on that, but looking at the love story of my grandparents who got married in 1927 and my grandfather was in Brungle the years before that, and my grandmother was in service and I've got their love letters. And so I want to write their love story, because when Brungle was set up, it was around the same time as the act of protection in New South Wales. So I can draw on that, but that's going to be traumatic, like 'Dirrayawadhu' was traumatic, because I'm going to have to go through my grandmother's welfare file. But that's what we do to help people learn. So that will come out in time for the anniversary in 2027, is the plan.

Kathryn Favelle: That's a lot happening.

Anita Heiss: Unless I meet my Dusty and I ride off into the sunset and never write another book again.

Kathryn Favelle: Thank you. Thank you for your generosity tonight, but let's hear a bit more from 'Red Dust Running'.

Anita Heiss: Okay. So I'm just going to share something from, so we're on the Gold Coast and they're in this fancy-pants hotel and because she's a runner, she wants to go for a run and she wants Dusty to come. He's not having a bar of it. He wants to stay in bed.

"'I'm the fittest man you'll ever meet,' he tells me as he watches me put my running gear on. 'Really?' I scoff. He rattles off his workout regime most days, jumping jacks, lunges, burpees, planks. 'I've got what you women call core strength,' he says with a wink. I can see the ripple of his six-pack from the corner of my eye, remembering my hands and lips over it, running my hands and lips over it many times in the last 48 hours. 'I think everyone calls it core strength, not just women,' I replied, trying to stay focused. 

He sits up, the sheet barely covering his lap, and it's so tempting to just strip off and climb back over him. 'What I do out on Sir Lancelot is as tough and dangerous as Rugby League, but it also requires the finesse of a figure skater.' 'You're sexy when you use fancy words like finesse. Say it again,' I smile. 'And I've got the strongest groin in the land.' He throws the sheet off and stretches his naked body out. It's the most glorious thing I've seen in the male form ever. He waves me over and whispers, 'Come here, my little bull rider. Don't fight it.'"
Do you know this is how Colleen Hoover was made famous, because someone was reading her book on TikTok and that happened. So can you get on TikTok and do this?

"'Come here. Come ride the strongest groin in the land.' I am only human and I can't resist. I tell myself it's okay not to run today, that I burned enough calories, worked enough muscles last night to count as a workout. When we've finally worked out enough, I'm ready to go outside. 'Let's go to the beach and have a dip before it gets too crazy.' Dusty is not keen. 'The beach isn't really my thing, sweetheart.' I'm disappointed.

'But I bought you something special,' I say, rummaging through the drawers and pulling out a plastic bag. I hand it to him with enthusiastic pride. 'I don't need gifts,' he says, 'but thanks.' He opens the bag and his tone changes. 'What the...' He pulls out the Budgy Smugglers with the Koori flag on the bum. I'm sure he thinks they're undies. 'For the beach,' I explain. 'I'm not wearing these to the beach or anywhere,' he responds firmly, holding them up to the light. 'Should we even have the flag on our butts?' Fair question, but I'm disappointed again.

I don't want to make a big deal of it and I'm sure Dusty will not appreciate me being a sook. He can read my face though. He pulls me close to him and explains, 'You're very generous, sweetheart, but I don't wear these Dicksticker things. I hardly even swim. The last time was in the Condamine River when I was a teenager. I don't even own a pair of shorts. Have you seen my wardrobe?'.

I'm willing to acknowledge that it may not have been as thoughtful as it could have been. 'But you can't wear denim and dark shirts to the beach.' I think I've hit a nerve when he tosses the swimwear to the chair near the bed. 'I can wear whatever I want,' he says, dismissively. 'You're never going to make me into a surfer dude.' 'I'm not trying to make you into a surfer dude,' I say, defensively. 'I wore checks and bling jeans for you. I crushed my feet into boots for you.' 'When did I ask you to do any of that?' Dusty asks, exasperated. 'You would've looked beautiful in a potato sack.'"

Oh, someone said that to me once, when I was young.

"I can feel tears threatening. 'I was trying to fit in, show I was interested in what you do, your lifestyle.' Dusty leans back, his hands behind his head, completely calm and it unnerves me. 'You don't have to do any of that for me.' I don't want to fight and I don't want to feel like shit. 'I'm going to the beach. I'll be back in a little while.'

I will not let a beautiful day on the coast be ruined, and by the time the lift reaches the ground floor, I'm close to being re-centred. When I cross the road, the market stalls are setting up for the final day of the music festival and family's arriving for the day at the beach."

So then she watches some nippers and then she says, "I lie back, position my sun hat over my face and doze. 'Sweetheart! Sweetheart!' I think I'm dreaming until Dusty touches me lightly on the arm and I spring upright. 'How long have you been here?' I ask, fixing my sun hat. 'Just a minute. You were snoring.' He chuckles. 'I don't snore.' He laughs again, then stands up. He's wearing his hat, jeans, a navy T-shirt and thongs. At least he didn't wear his boots, I think to myself. When he takes his tee off the side of his lats and the obvious strength in his back takes my breath away. But when he drops his jeans to reveal the cozzies, I want to cry. 'Dusty!' I exclaim. He spins around and his smile mirrors mine. 'I like it when you smile, sweetheart.'

My heart melts with the softness in his voice and he bends down to give me a peck. 'I don't like it when you look upset with me. You don't have a poker face when it comes to disappointment, that's for sure.' 'I'm sorry.' 'Sweetheart, if you can wear boots to give you blisters, then I think I can wear these for a minute. Though there's not much room.' He squirms a bit, adjusting his balls, which makes me snicker. He turns around and looks out to the horizon. And I wonder if he's aware of the bikini-clad women nearby raising their sunglasses and smiling at him. 'Ladies,' he drawls and throws them a wave. He's seen them all right, and he's loving it. 'Don't encourage them,' I scold, amused and a little jealous. 'Harmless fun, sweetheart. Harmless fun,' he says, tipping his hat to another group perving on him as they stroll past. I have to laugh. 'Sit down,' I say, pulling him next to me. 'Everyone knows you're here now.' 'As long as you know I'm here, sweetheart.'"

Kathryn Favelle: Thank you.

Anita Heiss: Thank you.

Dr Marie-Louise Ayres: Thanks very much for a really fun evening, Anita and Kathryn. There were some things said in this theatre tonight that I don't think have been said here before.

Anita Heiss: Well, Kathryn didn't ask me who Charlie was. You can read about that.

Dr Marie-Louise Ayres: Great. And I was actually thinking about this idea, of course, of wanting to make sure that the stories are on all pages and that we make sure that we've got everything covered today. Luke, you were with us today, when we took three new council members down into our stacks and we pointed out the Mills and Boon shelf. There's a reason we do that, because every new council member or visitor to the Library, they will say, "Surely you don't collect Mills and Boon." And we say, "Of course, we do, because we have to collect what people are writing in Australia and we have to collect what people are reading in Australia." So thank you for writing this in Australia, and I think you're going to have a whole lot of people reading in Australia as well. It'd be fantastic.

For those viewers who are watching online, we want to thank you for tuning in from across the nation. And if you want to watch the event again or share with friends and colleagues, just access it through our website or YouTube channel. I meant to say, we've got really good photographic holdings on rodeos and even some bull riding, I think. So we might have to find some of that for you.

Anita Heiss: Oh, I think I'm done. But anyway, you do that.

Dr Marie-Louise Ayres: Before you start your next book, ask us and we can probably get you some good content.

Anita Heiss: Awesome.

Dr Marie-Louise Ayres: And if you've enjoyed this evening, our wonderful Indigenous Engagement team is holding our next event during National Reconciliation Week. So this will be on Tuesday, the 27th of May. Put it in your calendars now. Join us as First Nations leaders from across the national cultural sector, discuss their work with Indigenous, cultural and intellectual property protocols, which is such an important part of our work and are a huge learning opportunity for many people like me who've spent my whole career working in institutions like this. Tickets are available on our website and we hope to welcome you to the Library again soon.

Now, we're now going to move upstairs to the foyer where Anita will be signing copies of Red Dust Running. It's not Dusty doing the signing though? He's not here anywhere?

Anita Heiss: I should have got a cowboy, shouldn't I?

Kathryn Favelle: Tax deduction.

Anita Heiss: Tax deduction.

Dr Marie-Louise Ayres: And of course, if you'd like to purchase a copy, you can of course do so from our bookshop up there in the foyer as well. But again, thank you so much, Anita. Anita's doing more for us tomorrow.

Anita Heiss: And thank you for coming, everybody. Thank you for having me.

Dr Marie-Louise Ayres: And thank you, Kathryn.

Anita Heiss: Thank you, Kathryn. Thank you, that was fun. Thank you for coming.