northern rivers independent press


Co-editor Miica Balint’s scheduling for the Byron Writers Fest

We are lucky enough to be accredited reviewers for this years writers festival, and figured this could be a timely moment for our readers to get to know us a little, as our interests will undoubtedly be clear in our festival scheduling and coverage.

I grew up in the Kimberley surrounded by Indigenous and Torres-Straight Islander mob, and I suspect I will spend most of my life working towards environmental action through Indigenous agency.

I have an educational background in communication (journalism focused) and community development (indigenous agency and environmental action focused). I am art-enthused, most at ease in the bush, and have been edging towards starting a magazine for most of my adult life. Though it was only when I stopped living on small boats and exploring new places that I met Kate. The magazine needed Kate. 

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Conservation and Ecological Repair: Butterfly Highways. 

An ocean flooded with topsoil and toxic agricultural run-off, ecological despair, and a number of animal-related occurrences have had me thinking of conservation recently. Possibly, truly, I have been thinking of conservation my whole life. Likely, astutely, I am only just learning how to write about it. 

I can distill these recent occurrences into three explorations of conservation in our region, so that is what I’ll do. A column of sorts. 

[Read..] Recently published by Miica Balint.




Co-editor Kate Middeleer’s scheduling for the Byron Writers Fest

I’ve spent years trying to build a story like Toni Morrison. Get to the point like Murakami.

Failed imitation feels a lot like isolation.

It wasn’t until Didion admitted to being ‘neurotically inarticulate’, Zadie Smith critiqued the validity of love, Waller-Bridge wrote a character so uniquely flawed, that I felt in company. I wondered if my seat at the table could be born through shared experience, and an expository eye, over commas and cadence. 

The most important thing other writers have given me is the silent permission to offer beautiful and ugly words, and to own them. 

I am honored to attend this year’s Byron Writer’s Festival, with so many skilled facilitators. And am thrilled to be doing so alongside my co-editor Miica, a writer and friend from whom I derive endless inspiration, and a lot of my nerve.


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Too Precious






Yesterday afternoon was a deluge of on-and-off showers, with enough sunshine overhead that the drops fell like knife-blades to the earth. Closer to the window the branch of a fig tree fought the weight of rain in pulsing rhythm.

I lay with my feet up and a blanket over my bare knees and googled the term ‘immobilizing freeze response’.

[Read..] Recently published by Kate Middeleer. 



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