Fearnley, Laurence

IN BRIEF

Laurence Fearnley is a short story writer, novelist and curator. Her short stories have featured in journals and have been broadcast on radio, and she has also curated and written about artists working in the area of craft. In 2003 she was selected as an Antarctic Arts Fellow through the Artists to Antarctica programme, and she has received numerous other awards and grants for her writing. She was the Robert Burns Fellow in 2007.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Fearnley, Laurence (Jura Laurence Fearnley) (1963 - ) is a fiction writer and curator who has written extensively on New Zealand craft artists. She graduated from Victoria University of Wellington in 1997 with an MA awarded with distinction in Creative Writing.

Her first novel, The Sound of Her Body was published in 1998. 'Extraordinarily powerful...' writes Fiona Kidman. '[e]xquisitely realised... Exact, sparing, lovely.' In 2000 Fearnley received a New Work grant from Creative New Zealand and published a second novel, Room (2000), which was shortlisted for the 2001 Montana New Zealand Book Awards.

delphines run (2003) was written in response to Breton separatist activity whilst Fearnley was living in Europe. Delphine, in her early twenties, works as the food trolley girl on the Brest-Paris train. She becomes an unlikely collaborator, or, an innocent player in a series of shocking events...

Butler's Ringlet (Penguin Books, 2004) presents a realistic and often touching portrait of a provincial male world, seldom covered in recent New Zealand fiction. Black and white photos taken by the author appear throughout the book, painting a vivid picture of rural New Zealand life.

Laurence Fearnley was selected as an Antarctic Arts Fellow in the 2003 round of the Artists to Antarctica programme jointly sponsored by Antarctica New Zealand and Creative New Zealand. Degrees of Separation (2006), was written following her Antarctic Fellowship. This novel focuses on themes of love and memory as three travellers return from a summer on the ice.

Edwin + Matilda (2007), the second in Fearnley's southern trilogy, is set in Central Otago and details the relationship between a 62 year-old man, Edwin and 22 year-old woman, Matilda, as Edwin uncovers the story of his mother's death 50 years ago. This book was runner-up in the fiction category of the 2008 Montana Book Awards. It also featured on 'best book' lists in the NZ Listener and Sunday Star Times. Film rights to the novel have also been sold.

Fearnley was the 2007 Robert Burns Fellow. She used her tenure to complete the final book in her trilogy of novels set in Southland and Central Otago. The book, set in Invercargill, is titled 'Mother's Day' and will be published in 2009.

Fearnley is working on a collection of essays relating  to 'tents' and will start work on her novel, 'The hut Builders', set in 1950's Mount Cook in 2009. Short stories by Fearnley are published in Sport and Landfall and several anthologies.

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Media links and clips

• Laurence Fearnley on the Hazard Press site
• Antarctica New Zealand
• Laurence Fearnley on the New Zealand Electronic Text Centre site
• Laurence Fearnley’s Penguin Authors Interview
• Degrees of Separation review in NZ Listener
• Edwin + Matilda review on The Lumiere Reader site

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