2026 Festival

Speaker Profile

Charlotte Guest

Charlotte Guest is a books industry professional with over ten years' experience across bookselling and publishing. Her poetry, essays and short fiction have been published in national literary journals, and in 2023 she was awarded a PhD in Creative Writing from Deakin University. 

Two To Tango: Can a detective exist without a dependable side-kick?

Thursday April 23
Hotel Sorrento (Cooper Room)
12.00pm / 60 mins

Sarah Bailey, Michael Brissenden and Garry Disher with Charlotte Guest

From Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson to Dalziel and Pascoe, crime fiction is littered with memorable investigative pairings. Our panel discusses why in some cases, two are better than one.


Edge Of My Seat... Creating suspense and surprise in modern fiction

Friday April 24
Ellen Grant Hall
12.00pm / 60 mins

Laura McCluskey, Jock Serong and Anna Snoekstra with Charlotte Guest

How do writers create page-turning suspense for their readers?  And how difficult is it to create tension around The Big Reveal?