DANIELLE BINKS is a writer, literary agent and lecturer in Creative Writing at RMIT University who lives on the Mornington Peninsula. Her latest novel, Shakespeare in the Orchard, is a coming-of-age story inspired by true events in Australia in World War I.

We caught up with Danielle to find out what she’s been reading and who she’d invite to dinner.

What are you reading right now, and why?

Otis Ottley and the School in the Sky by Will Kostakis (out in September) because he’s one of my favourite Australian youth-lit authors, and I’m so excited for his middle-grade take on a magic school. He writes with such humour and heart, and I will just read anything and everything that he writes.

What were your favourite books as a child?

There was a 1993 picture book called Toby by Margaret Wild, illustrated by Noela Young – it’s about two young brothers and their tween sister all coming to terms with the infirmity of their beloved dog, Toby, who does eventually pass away at the end of the book. I still have my childhood copy, and it’s a testament to a truly brilliant book that even reading it now, I weep.

Which three books would you recommend to a friend?

Well, here I’d have to recommend three books by authors I also represent as literary agent – just because they’re a tiny extension of me and my career, and how much I love and value Australian youth literature. It’d have to be Tearing Myself Together by Anna Whateley, Our Dark Unravelling by Margot McGovern and Poster Boys by Scott Woodard.

Which books have made you cry or laugh out loud?

Annie and Maeve Are Definitely Not Friends by Olivia Muscat – about two blind girls who are forced into friendship based entirely on them having the same disability. It was such a sweet and funny middle-grade book and felt like a modern-day Hating Alison Ashley by Robin Klein; really great commentary about the ways that people from diverse backgrounds can be treated like a monolith, and these characters trying to find their own identity while appreciating having friends based on common struggles.

If you could experience one book again for the very first time, what would it be?

Sister Heart by Sally Morgan – I can’t believe this book has been around for 10 years already. It felt like a classic as soon as I read it in 2015, and I’m not in the least bit surprised that it’s stood the test of time and is still a celebrated and important verse-novel.

How did you first find your way into writing?

Fan fiction writing from the age of about 15, believe it or not. I am a millennial who did a lot of growing up online, and once I discovered this phenomenon, I was hooked. I was very into writing Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Dawson’s Creek fanfic in particular. All up and across 24 stories, I wrote 391 000 words; I know, because my old fanfiction.net account still exists and I still occasionally get comments left on my pieces. It wasn’t good writing, but it was writing that I loved and would finish – I experimented with short-story and long-form writing, and all of it really stretched my wings and helped me find my voice.

If you were hosting a dinner party, who are six authors (living or dead) you’d love to invite and why?

Shakespeare (obviously, if only to thank him for writing such glorious plays that are still relevant today and helped spark the idea for this latest novel of mine!).

And then to keep with the theme of the Bard I might opt for Maggie O’Farrell (I think she’d also like to delicately thank him for the inspiration behind Hamnet and share her condolences).

David Mitchell (because I love his non-fiction writing, especially his book Unruly – but mostly in the hopes that he’d come dressed as his Shakespeare from the comedy TV series Upstart Crow).

Aussie children’s author R A Spratt (who also has old Willy to thank for her fab novels Romeo v Juliet and Hamlet is Not OK).

British YA author Malorie Blackman (whose novel Noughts & Crosses is inspired by Romeo and Juliet).

Aussie Youth Literature author Mike Lucas (I loved his YA novel Don’t Let Them Leave, but I’d invite him because he and his wife run a bookstore in Adelaide called Shakespeare’s Bookshop – so I reckon he’d also be tickled by the prospect of meeting the Bard himself!)

What first sparked the idea for Shakespeare in the Orchard?

It’s based on the true history of my hometown in Langwarrin, on the Mornington Peninsula in Victoria. There is this great big Flora and Fauna Reserve there now, but it used to be a military training ground and reserve – and was for just under 100 years. And I knew that in that time, it had also been specifically used during World War I to house ‘enemy aliens’ – German civilians who were locked up once war was declared. I dug into the history of this time and found a really fascinating timeline of Langwarrin’s housing of these prisoners of war – and I also unearthed a lot of history about what those prisoners did while they were locked up indefinitely, and it seems that everywhere these ‘enemy aliens’ were housed around Australia, they all participated in the same recreation to kill time – theatre. They put on these elaborate plays and musicals, just to humour themselves and feel a little human during inhumane times.

What drew you to that time and place?

I never thought I’d write a ‘war’ story. I thought there wasn’t much left to unearth about them, that I couldn’t offer a whole lot … and then I dug into this little slice of home front history during World War I, that unfolded on my doorstep. At the same time in the real world, it felt like history was scarily repeating and I could see frightening parallels to the hyper-militarisation and geopolitical communication breakdowns that fanned the flames of World War I. Suddenly, a story about being locked up based on where your parents or grandparents came from because you’ve never been seen as a ‘real citizen’ in the eyes of a militarised nation – though it’s set 112 years ago – seemed closer and more relevant than ever.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Danielle Binks is a writer, literary agent, and lecturer in Creative Writing at RMIT University who lives on the Mornington Peninsula. She is the author of Begin, End, Begin: A #LoveOzYA Anthology, which won the 2018 ABIA Book of the Year for Older Children.

Her young-adult novel The Monster of Her Age, which won the 2022 Indie Young Adult Book of the Year; and Six Summers of Tash and Leopold, which was a CBCA Notable Book of The Year for Younger Readers 2025. Danielle is also teaching Fiction & Young Adult Writing in the Associate Degree of Professional Writing and Editing at RMIT University

Visit Danielle Binks’ website here.

Follow Danielle Binks on Instagram here.

Read more about her books on the publisher’s website.