Cat Tales

Jan Fook was born and raised in Sydney and discovered the love of dogs at an early age. In addition to pursuing a career as an academic, she has always had dogs in her home life. She has a firm belief that the vital role dogs play in our happiness is yet to be fully recognized. In the future, Jan hopes to be able to combine her two greatest loves, dogs and writing. In the meantime she is Professor of Social Work at La Trobe University, Bendigo and the author/editor of numerous books including: Transforming Social Work Practice; Breakthroughs in Practice; Radical Casework; Professional Expertise; Critical Social Work in Changing Contexts; and The Reflective Researcher.


Renate Klein admits that the joys of dog companionship came to her after establishing herself as a writer and academic. She has been Associate Professor of Women's Studies at Deakin University, Melbourne and the author/editor of numerous well know books includes Test Tube Women; Theories of Women's Studies (with Gloria Bowles); Man-Made Women; Infertility; Radically Speaking (with Diane Bell); Radical Voices; CyberFeminism and a number of other anthologies. She says of herself that she still cares passionately about social justice for women, particularly in the area of reproductive and cyber technologies, but her dog, River makes her laugh and cry much more these days and experience pure joie de vivre.

Susan Hawthorne is the author of six collections of poetry including Bird, The Butterfly Effect, Unsettling the Land, Earth's Breath and Cow. She has worked in the publishing industry for twenty-five years and is also known as an aerialist. Two books, Bird and Earth's Breath have been broadcast on the radio program, Poetica. In 2009 she was an Asialink Literature Resident at the University of Madras, India and she is Adjunct Professor in the Writing Program at James Cook University, Townsville. Her poetry has been published in Best Australian Poems anthologies on several occasions and Earth's Breath was shortlisted for the 2010 Judith Wright Poetry Award.