The Best Australian Stories 2015


Book Description

In this wide-ranging collection, there are stories that will surprise, unsettle and beguile readers. Familiar subjects are examined from new perspectives: a teenage girl sneaks into a famous film director's study and steals his diaries; the life of Picasso is reimagined in miniature vignettes. And new life is breathed into the most universal of experiences: birth, death, love and loss. The mother of a girl with hearing difficulties watches her child grow into increasing independence. A young woman makes a poignant voyage to the site of her brothers suicide.




The Best Australian Stories 2016


Book Description

'The paint itself is part of the painting's meaning; the words do not merely tell, but are the story . . .' In The Best Australian Stories 2016, Charlotte Wood, author of The Natural Way of Things (winner of the 2016 Stella Prize, and the 2016 Indie Book of the Year), presents twenty pieces of outstanding short fiction. Featuring the work of exciting new voices alongside stories by established favourites, this is a collection of great diversity. If it has a unifying thread, writes Wood, it might be her own preoccupation with 'the trio of ghosts, monsters and visitations'. Some emerge from the natural world, others from the inner lives of characters contemplating death and its aftermath. Other stories still are playful, experimental or poetic, and celebrate the colours of the human experience. Together they form an anthology of unusual power and resonance, which will surprise and delight in equal measure. Paddy O'reilly * Tegan Bennett Daylight * Gregory Day * Elizabeth Harrower * Ellen Van Neerven * Nasrin Mahoutchi * Jack Latimore * Brian Castro * Georgia Blain * Julie Koh * Trevor Shearston * Fiona Mcfarlane * Jennifer Down * Elizabeth Tan * Michael Mcgirr * Kate Ryan * James Bradley * Michelle Wright * David Brooks * Abigail Ulman




The Oxford Book of Australian Short Stories


Book Description

49 stories ranging over 120 years. Stories reflect life in Australia from the early days of hardship to the recognition of a multicultural society and the new agendas for women's, gay and lesbian, and Aboriginal writing.




The Floating Garden


Book Description

"This ... novel evokes the hardships and the glories of Sydney's past and tells the little-known story of those made homeless to make way for the famous bridge"--Back cover.




The Dangerous Bride


Book Description

What do you do when your husband claims to be madly in love with you, but doesn’t desire you sexually? When your therapist is more interested in opening an online sex-toy shop with your husband than in saving your marriage? Do you try yet another counsellor, get divorced or settle for a sexless marriage? Lee Kofman, rebellious daughter of ultra-orthodox Jews, has always sought her own way. True to her Bohemian dream where love can coexist with sexual freedom, she decided to experiment with an open marriage . . . despite the fact that her previous non-monogamous relationship ended in disaster. Our cultural mores suggest that love without monogamy is impossible, but Lee hoped she could do better the second time round and embarked on a personal exploration to find out whether she could save her marriage while being non-monogamous in an ethical way. For several months she talked to swingers, polyamorists, cross-dressers, suburban families, artists and migrants—in short, to anyone who has ever been involved in an unconventional relationship. Set during Lee's first years in Australia, it is also the story of migration, and an exploration of the eternal conflict between our desire for security, but also for foreign places—in love and elsewhere. The Dangerous Bride tells the story of her quest.




Banjawarn


Book Description

Garreth Hoyle is a true crime writer whose destructive love affair with hallucinogenic drugs has sent him searching for ghosts in the unforgiving mallee desert of Western Australia. Heading north through Kalgoorlie, he attempts to score off old friends from his shearing days on Banjawarn Station. His journey takes an unexpected detour when he discovers an abandoned ten-year-old girl and decides to return her to her estranged father in Leonora, instead of alerting authorities. Together they begin the road trip from hell through the scorched heart of the state’s northern goldfields. Love, friendship and hope are often found in the strangest places, but forgiveness is never simple, and the past lies buried just beneath the blood red topsoil. The only question is whether Hoyle should uncover it, or run as fast as his legs can take him. Banjawarn is an unsettling debut from Josh Kemp, winner of the 2021 Dorothy Hewett Award for an Unpublished Manuscript. Echoing Cormac McCarthy’s haunting border trilogy and narrative vernacular that recalls the sparse lyricism of Randolph Stow and Tim Winton, this is a darkly funny novel that earns its place amongst the stable of Australian gothic fiction.




Either Side of Midnight


Book Description

'Either Side of Midnight is a gripping, gritty thriller with an ingeniously shocking premise and twists and turns you’ll never see coming!' Liane Moriarty, bestselling author of Big Little Lies 'An exceptional new talent' Jane Harper, bestselling author of The Dry 'A complex and hugely original page-turner. Stevenson has officially made my auto-buy-author list.' Christian White, bestselling author of The Nowhere Child How can it be murder when the victim pulled the trigger? At 9.01 pm, TV presenter Sam Midford delivers the monologue for his popular current affairs show Midnight Tonight. He seems nervous and the crew are convinced he’s about to propose to his girlfriend live on air. Instead, he pulls out a gun and shoots himself in the head. Sam’s grief-stricken twin Harry is convinced his brother was murdered. But how can that be, when one million viewers witnessed Sam pull the trigger? Only Jack Quick, a disgraced television producer in the last days of a prison sentence, is desperate enough to take Harry’s money to investigate. But as Jack starts digging, he finds a mystery more complex than he first assumed. And if he’s not careful, he'll find out first-hand that there’s more than one way to kill someone . . . 'The male relationships in Either Side of Midnight are layered in a way that transcends the crime genre. Funny, disturbing and unpredictable.' Jack Heath, bestselling author of Hangman 'Either Side of Midnight, which trips between light and dark, city and country, and twists the reader into knots, is for fans of solid Australian crime authors like Chris Hammer, Christian White and Candice Fox.' Books and Publishing 'A gripping thriller.' Who Weekly 'Stevenson writes solid Australian crime thrillers with a command of psychology and suspense and a dark comic edge. That the series extends its tendrils into satire – it neatly skewers the culture of our television industry – only adds to its appeal.' The Age




A Single Stone


Book Description

In an isolated society, one girl makes a discovery that will change everything — and learns that a single stone, once set in motion, can bring down a mountain. Jena — strong, respected, reliable — is the leader of the line, a job every girl in the village dreams of. Watched over by the Mothers as one of the chosen seven, Jena's years spent denying herself food and wrapping her limbs have paid off. She is small enough to squeeze through the tunnels of the mountain and gather the harvest, risking her life with each mission. No work is more important. This has always been the way of things, even if it isn’t easy. But as her suspicions mount and Jena begins to question the life she’s always known, the cracks in her world become impossible to ignore. Thought-provoking and quietly complex, Meg McKinlay’s novel unfolds into a harshly beautiful tale of belief, survival, and resilience stronger than stone.




Crackenback


Book Description

A thrilling tale of snow-bound crime and suspense from the bestselling author of Charlotte Pass Detective Sergeant Pierce Ryder of the Sydney Homicide Squad is on the hunt for notorious fugitive Gavin Hutton. After months of dead-ends, the breakthrough Ryder has been hoping for leads him back to the New South Wales Snowy Mountains on the trail of the suspected killer. Meanwhile, when an injured man bursts into the remote Thredbo lodge managed by Eva Bell, her first instinct is to protect her daughter, Poppy. The terrifying arrival of Jack Walker turns Eva's world upside down as the consequences of Jack's presence become clear. With a killer on the loose, Jack Walker and Ryder are tangled in the same treacherous web - spun across the perilously beautiful Crackenback Range. 'Full of suspense and mystery, Lee Christine has crafted a novel that is guaranteed to keep the light burning, the wine glass full and the pages turning.' - Blue Wolf Reviews on Charlotte Pass




The Best Australian Essays 2016


Book Description

'The essay creates a place for slow thought on hectic subjects, and that is what the best of this year's crop manage to do.' GEORDIE WILLIAMSON In The Best Australian Essays 2016, Geordie Williamson curates the year's best non-fiction writing from Australia's finest writers. The result is a collection that reads as a wake-up call- from Jo Chandler on the devastating bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef and Richard Flanagan on the Syrian exodus to Kurdish-Iranian journalist Behrouz Boochani's inside account of life on Manus Island. There is also space for Bowie, TV box-sets and Aussie rules. Spanning politics, music, literature, art, ecology, linguistics and more, this anthology showcases the nation's most eloquent and insightful writing. Maggie Mackellar In Sympathy- A Fugue * Ashley Hay The Bus Stop * Rebecca Giggs Whale Fall * Anwen Crawford The Noise Made By People * Melinda Harvey She Thinks She Is The Boss * Mireille Juchau The Most Holy Object in the House * Fiona Wright A World of Bald White Days * Vicki Hastrich Things Seen * Helen Garner This Old Self * Tegan Bennett Daylight Vagina * Jennifer Mills Detroit, I Do Mind * Fiona McGregor The Experience Machine * Michelle de Kretser Like a Thief in the Night * Jo Chandler Grave Barrier Reef * Anna Spargo-Ryan How to Love Football * Peter Goldsworthy Review of Chorale at the Crossing by Peter Porter * Gregory Day Review of John Kinsella's 'Drowning in Wheat' * J.M. Coetzee Introduction to Ford Madox Ford's The Good Soldier * James Bradley David Bowie- Loving the Alien * Galarrwuy Yunupingu Rom Watangu * Richard Flanagan Notes on the Syrian Exodus * Adam Rivett 35,000 Pieces of Converted Culture * Michael Winkler The Great Red Whale * Behrouz Boochani Life on Manus- The Island of the Damned * Martin McKenzie-Murray On Mass Shootings * Guy Rundle On Modern Terrorism * Clive James Play All * Julian Burnside What Sort of Country Are We? * Kim Scott Both Hands Full