IN MORE DETAIL…
“Born in England in 1950, family moved to Lusaka, Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia) in 1955 then up to Kitwe on the Copperbelt in 1961. I was given a wonderful childhood and the privilege of growing up in an amazing and beautiful place, surrounded by hard-working, dedicated and kind people. Although I travelled between Zambia and UK for 7 years, I eventually left home to come to Australia when my heart was very sore, in 1975.
I met and married a bronzed Aussie, had two beautiful children then spent 17 years bringing them up on my own. My true love – the man who hurt my heart in Zambia, contacted me in 2002 after finding my name on the net. He scooped me up and flew me to live in Midleton, Cork, Ireland for 14 months. It worked! We’ve now been married for 15 years and all my dreams have come true.”
Frances lives on the Sunset Coast of Australia and writes for page, stage and screen. She is very proud to be a member of the WA writing community. Her writing for children, film and poetry have been awarded and produced on film, performed on stage or published in newspapers, magazines, books and on the net.
Her first 16mm film was a documentary about the 1st community folk club in Kalamunda entitled ‘Some Folks Folk’. She wrote, produced and directed the film, mentored by the crew from Friends Film Productions. Where to watch videos etc: Books etc…
In the early 80’s Frances and a cinematographer, Peter Aquilina formed Sphinx Productions, a small film/video production company. Their first production ‘Shattered Windows’ written, directed and produced by Frances won the FTI Young Filmmaker’s Cinematography Award for Peter.
Frances later went on to work for Mid-Western Television initially as Secretary to the Managing Director Mike Dorsey (‘Daddy’ from ‘No 96’) but once the boss knew of her film background, was in the studio doing the news, ads and eventually also presenting on-air each day at 5pm reading ‘Community Diary’.
In the early 90’s Frances wrote a children’s book called ‘The Swimming Pool People’ which won the Fellowship of Australian Writers of WA inaugural Furphy Award for the ‘Best Unpublished Children’s Story’ in 1994.
1992 – 1996 Northern Youth Theatre was born because her daughter wanted to be involved in theatre. Although New Endeavour Theatre Group Frances helped establish and directed for didn’t encourage teenagers, her daughter appeared in a few productions and put the adults to shame. But her heart was in production, so Frances started Northern Youth (12-25) Theatre which staged productions every 3 months written, produced and directed by members, guided by Frances as Artistic Director.
After spending 14 glorious months dining on poetry and storytelling in Ireland with Midleton Writers and Munster Literature Centre in Cork, Frances was encouraged to publish her first book of poetry Hidden Capacity – a poet’s journey with an introduction by Prof. Glen Phillips, in 2003.
As a passionate supporter of those who write, when she returned to Australia Frances initiated and was the usual host/facilitator of Poets Corner @ Pages Cafe monthly events between 2005 & 2008. More than 80 new & established poets generously gave their time to share their words with the public in the State Library Cafe. To thank them, Frances published a limited-edition chapbook of their poems; Pages Cafe ’05.
A film of her script from her original short story ‘Love You Mum’ was produced by students in South Australia in 2006 and won or was nominated for more than 30 awards in Australia, Canada and America.
Many of her poems have been published in various anthologies, magazines and on the net but a favourite is My Life As A Sari which appeared in Indigo, available from Fremantle Press who also interviewed Frances about the poem.
“I self-published my children’s story ‘Santa’s Swim’ which I wrote and illustrated, to take to the Avon Valley Festival in 2012. Although a featured guest screenwriter, I also took along two of my poetry books ‘Love’ and ‘Rail Tales’ to sell after my talk, with some poetry postcards.”
In retirement Frances is no longer available for workshops, talks, festivals etc… but still participates on-line in workshops. In 2014 and 2015, she was a paid-up participant of the 12 x 12 Julie Hedlund Challenge of 12 picture books in 12 months and thoroughly enjoyed it. She managed to write many ideas and expand on some, even send off a few to US agents for them to consider.
“THEN along came my grandchildren who are now my focus. Although I still write occasionally and fully intend to illustrate and publish more children’s books, the little ones are delightfully distracting.”
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