In March 2011, a group of new writers gathered on the Terrace of Australian publisher Allen & Unwin for the introduction to the first ever Faber Academy at Allen & Unwin 'Writing a Novel' course under the tutelage of award winning authors Kathryn Heyman and James Bradley.

There was, on that night, a sense of thrill and also mystery. Six months later, as the work in this volume testifies, those writers have, to a one, demonstrated commitment, passion, willingness to work, to play, to create, to take risks and to trust.

This anthology records those achievements. The diversity of genre, subject and style in this volume is an eloquent reminder of the fact that despite our contemporary anxiety about the future of books and writing, literature hasn't gone anywhere: there are new and exciting voices emerging all around us, possessed not just of the desire to tell stories but to say something that matters, to articulate something new and important about the world.

Most of the names of the writers whose work appears in this volume are likely to be unfamiliar at present, but there is no doubt many will not remain so. They are: Adrienne Adams, Maralyn Bennett, Geoffrey Burgess, Georgina Crawford, Jami Crittle, Diana Daly, Fred Fink, Sally Gibbons, Deborah Guyon, Emma Harcourt, Rowena Helston, Debra Jopson, Elizabeth Jurman, Catriona Ling, Ann McCutcheon, Lyn McDonald, Kate O'Brien, Mariza O'Keeffe, Jo Riccioni, Jane Riley, Robert Scoble, Jacqueline Stack, Kerry Stephenson, Luke Sullivan, Carolyn Swindell, Brigitte Trenear and Susan Wyndham.