Delighted to hear the trumpet Alison, I have linked to Masthead on my blog ( as well as to Theatre Notes and Critic Watch). I enjoy your loquacity and hope you enjoy providing your well-considered and expert opinions for free - not an easy sacrifice to make in Melbourne.

You are perhaps familiar with the efforts of litbloggers in the US to keep the critics in the print media on their toes? one of my favourites, writer Mark Sarvas, does a regular grading job on the Los Angeles Book Review on his blog,The Elegant Variation. Someone has to care about the writing, non?

I'm not crazy about my blog, it's a bit of a mess, but I would like to see more Australians talking online about publishing new fiction, and admire the attention you've brought to theatre criticism in your pieces of cyberspace. Perhaps you could interest a few friends in litblogging?

Why, thanks Genevieve! Like everything on the net, blogging has its light and dark, but it is fascinating to see how commentary of all kinds - political, social, literary, poetic - has taken to blogging in a big way. It's 17th century Grubb St in cyberspace, with all the good and bad of that. Someone I was speaking to recently flagged the idea of making a poetry review blog, so if she does move on that, and I find out, I'll let you know!

Thanks for that - I might email you about a few other issues I hope to cover in my blog, I could do with some advice about Australian writing. I find the US litblogging phenomenon interesting and am not quite sure if it has a place in Australian publishing and writing - I would appreciate a second opinion.