It was only following a misguided spell in a German girl band that Elisa finally settled on a career in journalism a decade ago.

After post-grad study at the University of South Australia, she moved to Brisbane where she spent her first weeks in newspapers covering the sports round, rapidly learning there is, in fact, no such thing as a handball in rugby.

A stint in magazines and feature writing followed before she returned to Adelaide to work first as an entertainment reporter and then as health and family reporter for a weekend newspaper.

She vacillates between hoping desperately for a resurgence in the popularity of the written word, and terror that, one day, her boys will read exactly what she has been writing about them.

Elisa's website: elisablack.com.au