Crip Stories: An anthology of disabled writers

Name: Crip Stories: An anthology of disabled writers
Start: 2026-09-05T18:00:00+10:00
End: 2026-09-05T18:00:00+10:00
Location: Upstairs at Gleebooks

About

6pm for 6.30pm Saturday 5 September

Laura Pettenuzzo, Michelle Cahill & Kerri Shying in conversation

The word crip was once used to discriminate. Today, it is reclaimed and celebrated.

Crip Stories is a gathering of vibrant and diverse experiences from disabled people. Bringing together memoir, essays and poetry, these writers explore creativity, care, rage and refusal. Together, they offer a celebration of disability pride and community.

Contributors include Irina Frolova, Sharleigh Crittenden, Sandra Collins, Angela Costi, Hannah Hall, Carly Findlay, Julie Dickson, Marina Sano, Mario Licón Cabrera, Kerri Shying, TextaQueen, CB Mako, Hem Sid Chandran, Ari Spanos, Franklyn Hudson, Skye Cusack, Carly-Jay Metcalfe, Judith Huang, Ariel Riveros, Akii Ngo, Arty Owens, Ethan Patrick, Paris Rosemont, Katie Hansord, Sam Hamad, Pat Gia Han Bui, Ann Nguyen, BS Windon, Misbah Wolf, Priya Gore Johnson, Mona Zahra Attamimi, Rosie Putland, Jenny Hedley, J Marahuyo, Laura Pettenuzzo, Joey Harper.

Laura Pettenuzzo (she/her) is a disabled writer, speaker and accessible communications professional living on Wurundjeri land. Her work explores disability pride, systemic and internalised ableism as well as the power of self-acceptance. Her reviews, memoir and opinion pieces have been published in places such as Griffith Review, Archer Magazine, Meanjin and The Age.

Michelle Cahill (she/they) is a poet and novelist of Indian heritage. She was the 2023 Hedberg Writer in Residence at the University of Tasmania. Her short story collection, Letter to Pessoa was awarded the NSW Premier’s Literary Award for New Writing. Daisy & Woolf was longlisted in the ALS Gold Medal and the Voss Literary Prize. She has been shortlisted in the ABR Elizabeth Jolley Prize, the ABR Peter Porter Poetry Prize and received the KWS Hilary Mantel International Short Story Prize. Cahill is the artistic director of Mascara.

Kerri Shying (they/them) Kerri Shying is a poet of Wiradjuri and Chinese family, publishing across many journals and anthologies. They are the author of a bilingual pocketbook of poems, sing out when you want me (2017), Elevensies (2018) and Knitting Mangrove Roots (2019), as well as their current collection Know Your Country (2021), through Puncher & Wattmann. They are one of the editors of the anthology Raging Grace: Australian writers speak out on disability, published by Puncher & Wattmann, 2024, and one of five Australian poets featured in the international anthology Versus Versus: 100 Poems by deaf, diabled and neurodivergent poets, Bloodaxe Books, 2025. Kerri has been convener and mentor at Write Up/WU, a free arts/writing group for people living with disability, for eight years. They live with disability in Newcastle, NSW, with their famous dog Max Spangly.