Hannah Kent is a rising star in Australia’s literary firmament and the release of Burial Rites last month in Australia, and in the next few months in Britain and the US, is the major reason for her ascent. Literary critic Stephen Romei said Kent’s book was “the most talked about Australian debut novel in years”.
Four years after finding a dead man and a baby washed up on Janus Island off Western Australia Tom Sherbourne sits brooding in prison. A memory flares from his time as the island’s lighthouse keeper and he recalls, “The woomph of the oil vapour igniting into brilliance at the touch of his match. The rainbows
Earlier this year, my story “Shooting Star” was shortlisted by judge Amanda Lohrey for the Carmel Bird Long Story Award and I was pleased to read part of it at the award ceremony in Canberra on March 7. Twelve stories, including mine, will be published in coming months as Amanda Lohrey Selects … a series
In Questions of Travel, Michelle de Kretser’s globe-trotting protagonist, Laura Fraser, stuffs her backpack with literature, boards a flight and later muses over “the feeble wattage she encountered everywhere [that] was opposed to books”. Recently, I lugged de Kretser’s large, hardback version of this outstanding novel through Europe and the UK for five weeks and
At this year’s Sydney Writers’ Festival The Loft contained bookcases, each with colour coordinated books, which the City of Sydney Library offered for free: “Find a book you’d like to own … It’s yours to keep and carry home.” The books themselves bore stickers: “Take me home and read your heart out.” The library obviously
Driving out of a cavernous IKEA car park a couple of months ago I glimpsed a fleeting movement in the shadows. This prompted me to think about abandoned landscapes and I really liked the idea that such “dead space” might contain life known to none other than those inhabiting it. The tale of the three
Perth writer M. L. Stedman’s The Light Between Oceans has been awarded Book of the Year at the 2013 Australian Book Industry Awards (ABIAs). Kate Morton’s The Secret Keeper won General Fiction Book of the Year. Award winners, announced on May 24 at the Four Seasons, Sydney, included: Chain/Franchise Bookseller of the Year 2013: Dymocks
“When you share a book, you’re sharing more than just pages of paper and ink. You’re sharing the opportunity to learn, discover and feel cared for.” The Footpath Library donates near-new and new books to homeless and marginalised people. Its vision is to enrich the quality of life for homeless and disadvantaged people and promote
The Commonwealth Foundation has announced the regional winners for the 2013 Commonwealth Book Prize and Commonwealth Short Story Prize. Regional Winner, Pacific, for the Commonwealth Book Prize is The Last Thread by Michael Sala (Affirm Press). Awarded for best first book, the prize was open to writers who had their first novel (full length work
Three diverse books about “travel” have made me a thoughtful, happy wanderer on the first leg of my trip through Germany, Italy, Spain and Andorra this European spring. I’ve been doing a lot of walking (right now I’m in the Andorran Pyrenees) and, as I also want to focus more on my poetry in coming
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