Mike writes and teaches. In the middle of the Venn there’s creativity, stories, learning and of course, kids. What he likes best about both is the hope they bring about where things are going. 

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He writes for both young people and adults, with work published in places like Voyage YA Literary Journal, Archer Magazine, The Victorian Writer, Storyberries, and in anthologies like Lockdown Number One and the Newcastle Short Story Award 2021. His short stories have been shortlisted for a bunch of competitions, including the Chalk Circle, Alice Sinclair, Fellowship of Australian Writers, and Hometown Haunts.

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Mike’s got a couple of books in the works...

Red Rocket is a tween space opera about a crew of orphan misfits who become the galaxy’s great hope—it was shortlisted for Penguin Random House’s 2021 Write It Fellowship and the 2020 Wells Festival of Literature Book for Children award.

Then there’s Parent Strike, a middle grade underdog tale about a third-grade cooking whiz who saves his school from starving.

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Growing up, Mike wished he could find kids like him in the books he read. Now, he writes under the #ownvoices banner, passionate about helping queer young readers see themselves reflected in stories.

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In the classroom, he’s always walking the line between helping kids take charge of the world’s big issues and just letting them be kids. Writing helps him wrestle with that balance.​

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Some other experiences that have coloured his lived and written world include projecting 3D IMAX films in Piccadilly Square, driving up Australia’s guts in a run-down Kombi, furnishing fancy folks’ homes in fabric, getting hitched in pre-marriage-equality Taipei and shaping stuff out of lumps of clay.