Recently I had begun writing reviews for a film publication called The Sound View. The latest review I finished was one I was proud of, despite the fact that I was worried due to the film being political. Politics is not one of my topics of interest, in film or otherwise.

After writing my review I questioned my rating, but only for a brief second. This was not because I didn't like the film – story wise it was strong – but I thought the cinematography and the set-up of some shots could have been more creative. Personally, I know how hard it is to make your first feature film on a budget, so I try to be fair. Unless a film is off-putting visually, I won't comment on the visual aesthetic.

I hit 'send' on my email, letting my review go out to Dan, the CEO, so he could forward it to the editors.

A few hours later a reply came back from Dan. The review was excellently written, but he wondered why I rated the film 'recommended' instead of 'highly recommended’, since my review was so positive. Honestly, I thought some of the shots were a bit boring, the sets bland – I wrote this in my reply email. In my opinion, the filmmakers could have experimented with more interesting shots, and dressed the white walls and improved the lighting. But in the review I wrote nothing about the filmmaking technicalities, I focused only on the story.

Our email thread grew. In the end, I saw things from his point of view. We came to an agreement – the story is much more important than the visual elements. If you have a badly written character or a story that is not engaging, it's more inexcusable than having a badly dressed set or a boring shot.

Novelist confesses: It’s probably all about me.

One of my early readers – let’s call him Dave…although his real name is Dave – made an astute comment about the novel I have just had published. Having known me for several years it was plain to him that the fictional world of the book was a stylised and more narratively concise version of the somewhat messier realm I normally inhabit.

“I also smiled at the many conversations that echoed discussions we have shared about your life observations and philosophies, and of course the colourful mix of autobiographical traits scattered across various characters.”

There are many artists who cringe when asked if their work is autobiographical but, as a novelist, I feel compelled to confess that my fiction feeds directly, sometimes brutally, on the plot points and psychodramas of self. But it doesn’t end there. I also feast on the blood and gore of friends, family and random strangers. In fact, anyone and everyone who veers too close.

Write about what you know. Isn’t that what they say? Little wonder The Last Summer of Hair is suffused with detail drawn from my own experience, and from my observations of those unlucky enough to fall within the cannibalising orbit of my literary appetite. Dave will not be the only one of my friends to detect unerringly familiar motifs in the book’s 292 self-referential pages. Indeed, some of those closest to me will wonder if it’s them I was writing about. (Truth is, it often was.)

To begin I would like to inform readers that my words and thoughts flow solely from an inner place of reflection. This piece is written by me, a privileged white, approaching forty female with European ancestry. I am a writer and filmmaker who is currently working on a personal journey towards educating myself on African American history and the representation of minorities in film. Some of the topics I have been reading, watching and listening to over the last month have included police brutality against minorities in America, how American history is built on a foundation of oppressed black slaves, and how white feminism has and continues to exclude women of colour.

I felt compelled to write this article during the beginning of recent protests occurring around various states in and around the USA, after countless unjust deaths of black men and women at the hands of white American police officers. I can’t identify to my core with the African American community as I have not lived my life as a person of colour. I will never understand how it feels to have to make calculated daily choices based around my safety due to the colour of my skin, but it doesn't mean that I don't feel angry, sad and frustrated when hearing of the unwarranted deaths of George Floyd and the many who have come before and likely will follow.

For me, though far removed, the protests brought up a lot of memories of my past and made me think about how much American Black culture I consumed as a child and a teenager through watching American movies and music performed and written by African American artists. It also made me realise that despite all that consuming in my youth, as an adult I did not know much at all what a truthful representation of African American culture was, what the culture was built on or what it stemmed from.

With this miseducation and ignorance in mind, I want to talk about how I personally consumed and then perceived African American culture as a white woman growing up in Australia. Also, I want to share with fellow white artists reading this ways in which we can take responsibility for what perceptions are put out there and how we can change the narrative through storytelling.

Personally, my introduction to African American culture started through music. Growing up in my pre-teens I listened to my parent’s record collection religiously, and that is when I fell in love with the sounds of Motown. I would listen to Marvin Gaye, Chuck Berry, Ray Charles, Otis Redding, Tina Turner, The Supremes, and more. Jimi Hendrix was my favourite.