writing CV

K. A. Ren Wyld is an author living on the coast south of Adelaide.

Literary awards, fellowships and scholarships

  • Black&Write! Writing Fellowship 2025 (cancelled)
  • Short-listed & highly commended 2024 South Australia Literary Awards Tangkanungku Pintyanthi Fellowship
  • Short-listed 2024 South Australian Literary Awards Barbara Hanrahan Fellowship
  • Recipient 2024 South Australian Literary Fellowship (First Nations)
  • Recipient of a 2023 Neilma Sidney Literary Travel Fund
  • Recipient 2022 Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature Tangkanungku Pintyanthi Fellowship
  • Recipient 2021 SA Writers SA First Nations Writers Fellowship Varuna Residency
  • Recipient 2020 Borderlands First Nations Writing Award for a short story
  • Short-listed 2019 Copyright Agency-Sydney Review of Books Emerging Critics Fellowship.

Book awards

Heroes, Rebels and Innovators
  • Recipient 2022 Honour Book CBCA Book of the Year Eve Pownall Award
  • Long-listed 2022 Australian Book Industry Awards, Book of the Year for Older Children
  • Short-listed 2022 Australian Booksellers Association Booksellers’ Children’s Choice Book of the Year Awards
  • Shortlisted 2022 Speech Pathology Australia Book of the Year Award, 8-10 year olds
Where the Fruit Falls
  • Long-listed 2021 Australian Book Industry Awards, Small Publishers’ Adult Book of the Year
  • Short-listed 2021 Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for Indigenous Writing
  • Recipient 2020 Dorothy Hewett Award for an Unpublished Manuscript
  • Short-listed 2017 Richell Prize for an Unpublished Manuscript
  • Recipient 2018 First Nations Writers Hardcopy Scholarship
When Rosa Came Home

Shortlisted 2015 Readers and Writers Festival People’s Choice Award

Collating and editing collections

  • Guest co-editor Southerly, 80.1 2025
  • Editor Tarnanthi Reflections 2024, Art Gallery of South Australia
  • Co-editor The Rocks Remain: Blak Poetry and Story, 2024, Wakefield Press (with Dominic Guerrera)

Professional development – literature

  • Master Arts (Research), University of Technology Sydney, 2024
  • Varuna Residency 2022
  • Hardcopy Masterclass Program, ACT Writers Centre, 2018
  • Hardcopy Industry Feedback, December 2018
  • Writers SA Writers & Readers in Residence, Ceduna, October 2018

Guest speaker at literary festivals and events

  • Unbroken Resistance, Blak & Bright, Melbourne, 2025
  • In conversation with Micaela Sahhar at Adelaide Uni, 2025
  • Southerly 80.1 Launch, Sydney, 2025
  • Adelaide Writers Week, 2025
  • Emerging Writers’ National Writers Conference, Melbourne, 2024
  • Byron Writers Festival, 2024
  • Adelaide Writers Week, 2024
  • Launch of Tarnanthi Reflections, Adelaide, 2024
  • Historical Novel Society Australasia, Sydney, 2023
  • Penn State University library, USA, 2023
  • Palestine Writes, Philadelphia, USA, 2023
  • Our Words: First Nations Voices, Adelaide Festival Centre, 2023
  • Poetry Reading, Poetry Month, Adelaide, 2023
  • Adelaide Writers Week, March 2023
  • First Nations Speculative Fiction Symposium, Uni of Sydney, 2022
  • Living Landscape Writers Festival, Port Adelaide, April 2022
  • Adelaide Writers Week, 2022
  • Our Words: First Nations Voices, Adelaide Festival Centre, 2021
  • Margaret River Readers & Writers Festival, WA, 2021
  • Context: Winter Writing Festival, Adelaide, 2021
  • Melbourne Writers Festival, 2021
  • Adelaide Writers Week, 2021
  • Context: Winter Writing Festival, Adelaide, 2019
  • Jaipur Adelaide Literature Festival, November 2019

Poetry readings

Unbroken Resistance, Blak & Bright, Melbourne, 2025
Regional Review Poetry Month, online, 2025
Narrative Sabotage, Fine Print at Little Machine, Adelaide, 2025
Tarnanthi Reflections, Adelaide Art Gallery, 2024

Project support, event management, and volunteering

  • Event manager Rivers of Reason: Blak & Arab Writers in Conversation, 2026
  • Event assistant, First Nations Australian Writers Network conference 2022
  • Green Room, Blak & Bright Festival, 2019
  • Event support, First Nations Australian Writers Network conference, 2018
  • Volunteer, Ubud Writers Festival, 2014 (first aid) and 2016 (venue manager)
  • Event support, First Nations Australian Writers Network conferences 2014
  • Volunteer, Ubud Writers Festival, 2014 & 2015

Workshop delivery

  • Teaching Clatter Tongue at Trinity College, Melbourne University, 2024
  • Magic Realism, for Writers SA, 2024
  • Grant Writing for Writers, Writers SA, 2023
  • Magic Realism and Nature In Fiction, Living Landscape Writers Festival, 2022
  • Pathway to Publishing for new writers 45+ years, Writers SA, 2022
  • Grant Writing for Writers, Writers SA, 2021
  • Aboriginal Writers Workshop, PEN Melbourne, Mildura, June 2019
  • StoryWeaving Workshop (writing & basket weaving) for Writers SA, 2018
  • Writing Workshops for children, Indigenous Literacy Foundation, Tiwi Islands, 2017
  • Culturally respectful research and writing skills for non-Indigenous writers, Writers SA, 2014 & 2015

Judging Literary Prizes

  • Nakata Brophy Short Fiction and Poetry Prize for Young Indigenous Writers 2024
  • Judge, HarperCollins 2019 Commercial Fiction Fellowship for First Nations Writers

Grant Assessor/peer

  • Australia Council for the Arts peer (past)
  • Copyright Fund (past)
  • SA Arts (past)
  • Carclew Arts (past)

Mentor

In Review First Nations Mentorship Program 20024 & 2025

Membership

  • First Nations Australia Writers Network
  • SA First Nations Writers Group
  • SA Writers Centre
  • Australian Society of Authors

Other

  • Australia Reads Ambassador 2021-2023
  • Fellow of the SA Governor’s Leadership Foundation, 2011
  • First Nations Australia Writers Network Board, 2014 – 2016