"Wanting to be a writer felt... ludicrous? Presumptuous?" Kathyrn Heyman is a novelist and creative writing tutor – she is the Fiction Director of Faber Writing Academy in Sydney. Here she talks to us about how "instinctive" dialogue takes years to learn, how you don't really "become" a novelist, and how to hatch the "big egg of desire" to write. Find out more about Faber Academy at www.faberacademy.co.uk/courses

Erica Wagner – novelist, creative writing tutor, MAN Booker Prize judge, literary editor – talks to George Miller about her life in writing. Find out more about Faber Academy at www.faberacademy.co.uk/courses

Maria McCann and Elizabeth Speller talk about research, Peter Carey's "Jack Maggs", "Great Expectations", and plenty more besides. Find out more about Faber Academy at www.faberacademy.co.uk/courses

Maggie Gee and Antonia Honeywell discuss creating other worlds, the problems and pleasures of incorporating research, being a debut novelist, being a twelve-time novelist and much more besides. Find out more about Faber Academy at http://www.faberacademy.co.uk/courses

SJ Watson and Faber Academy Fiction Director Richard Skinner talk about point of view, free indirect style, Kazuo Ishiguro, first sentences, and plenty more besides.