Contemporary Fiction
Thea Astley The Multiple Effects of Rainshadow (Penguin Aus). On an Aboriginal island reserve in 1930, a white woman dies in childbirth, and her husband goes on a shotgun and dynamite rampage. The novel traces the effects over the years on eight characters who witnessed the violent events, ultimately exploring the brutality and racism in Australian life. Murray Bail Eucalyptus (Harvill UK). This beautifully written novel has a fairytale-like plot: NSW farmer, Holland, has planted nearly every type of eucalyptus tree on his land. When his extraordinarily beautiful daughter Ellen is old enough to marry, he sets up a challenge for her legion of potential suitors, to name each tree. John Birmingham The Tasmanian Babes Fiasco (Duffy & Snelgrove Aus). This hilarious cult classic, about flat-share hell in contemporary Brisbane, is Birmingham's first novel, and a follow up to He Died With A Felafel In His Hand (Duffy & Snelgrove Aus), a collection of squalid and very funny tales emerging from experiences with the 89 people who the dissolute author had the misfortune of sharing house with in the 1980s. Anson Cameron Tin Toys (Picador Aus). The Aboriginal "Stolen Generation" issue explored through the tale of Hunter Carolyn, an unintentional artist who can change skin colour at will. Peter Carey Bliss (Faber & Faber UK; Random US; University of Queensland Press Aus). Carey's first and best novel is the story of a Sydney ad executive who drops out to New Age New South Wales. Other novels by Carey to look out for include the Booker Prize-winning Oscar and Lucinda (Faber & Faber UK; HarperCollins US; UQP Aus), and his new opus The True History of the Kelly Gang (UQP Aus). Also worth a read are his bizarre short stories, The Fat Man in History (Faber & Faber UK; UQP Aus), with which he launched his career. Peter Corris The Empty Beach (Unwin UK, Aus). Australia's answer to Raymond Chandler. Corris's hard-boiled novel is set in a glittering but seedy Sydney, where a soft-centred private eye investigates murder and exploitation in an old people's home. Robert Drewe The Savage Crows (Picador Aus). This first novel, from one of Australia's best writers, is among his most powerful. A writer, whose own life is falling apart in a cockroach-ridden contemporary Sydney, sets out to discover the grim truth behind Tasmania's "final solution". Delia Falconer The Service of Clouds (Picador Aus). Poetically written novel set in 1907 in the Blue Mountains outside Sydney. Narrator, pharmacy assistant Eureka Jones falls in love with Harry Kitchings, "a man who takes pictures of clouds". Richard Flanagan Death of a River Guide and The Sound of One Hand Clapping (both Picador Aus). Thoughtful writings about landscape, place, migration and the significance of history in these two novels, both set in Tasmania. In Death of a River Guide , the novel's narrator, Aljaz Cosini, goes over his life and that of his family and forebears as he lies drowning. His second novel, The Sound of One Hand Clapping , follows 38-year-old Sonya Buloh as she returns to Tasmania to confront her alcoholic father and her past. David Foster Moonlite (Pan UK o/p; Viking Penguin US o/p; Vintage Aus). Amusing social satire set in the Australian goldfields in the nineteenth century. Also look out for his postmodernist The Glade Within the Grove (Random House Aus), about an eccentric postman who discovers an unpublished manuscript. Helen Garner Postcards from Surfers (Bloomsbury UK; Penguin Aus). Recommended short stories by one of Australia's finest women writers. Her first novel, Monkey Grip (McPhee Gribble Aus), is a classic 1970s tale of obsession, love and heroin in inner-city Melbourne. Kate Grenville Lillian's Story (Picador UK; Harcourt Brace & Co US; Allen & Unwin Aus). The tragicomic tale of Lillian Singer is loosely based on the life of Bea Miles, the eccentric, Shakespeare-spouting, taxi-hijacking Sydney bag lady. Janette Turner Hospital Oyster (Virago UK; Knopf, Vintage Aus). Disquieting novel set in the literally off the map, opal-mining, one-pub Queensland town of Inner Maroo, whose inhabitants are either rough-as-guts mining people, or religious fundamentalists. David Ireland City of Women (Penguin Aus). Ireland creates weird visions of Sydney and here the setting is a futuristic, violent place from which men have been banished. Also keep an eye peeled for his first novel, The Glass Canoe (Penguin Aus, o/p), and Archimedes and the Seagle (Penguin UK, Aus), the latter a delightful philosophical discussion between a dog and a bird as they roam The Domain and Woolloomooloo. Linda Jaivin Eat Me (Chatto UK; Broadway BDD US; Text Publishing Aus). A successful first novel billed as an "erotic feast"; opens with a memorable fruit-squeezing scene (and this is only the shopping) as three trendy Sydney women (fashion editor, academic and writer) swap stories of sexual exploits. Elizabeth Jolley Woman in a Lampshade (Penguin UK o/p, Aus). This is an excellent collection of short stories to introduce you to Jolley's original and quirky work, which thrives on black humour. The Sugar Mother (Penguin Aus) examines what happens to a faithful husband when his wife goes on sabbatical and a young woman and her mother turn up on his doorstep demanding shelter. Douglas Kennedy The Dead Heart (Abacus UK). A best-selling comic thriller recently made into a film; an itinerant American journalist gets abducted by man-eating hillbillies in Outback Australia. Julia Leigh Hunting (Penguin Aus). Intriguing first novel about the re-discovery and subsequent hunt of the Tasmanian tiger; a bit obvious in places - a faceless biotech company after thylacine DNA plays the bad guy - but nicely written. David Malouf The Conversations at Curlow Creek (Vintage UK; Pantheon US; Random Aus). One of Australia's most important contemporary writers charts the developing relationship between two Irishmen the night before a hanging; one is the officer appointed to supervise the execution and the other the outlaw facing his death. Also look for Malouf's new Dream Stuff (Chatto & Windus Aus), a collection of short stories which far outshines much of his output over the last decade. Christos Tsiolkas Loaded (Random House Aus). A gritty debut novel set in suburban Melbourne: caught between the traditional Greek world of his family and his emerging gay identity, 19-year-old Ari is unemployed and self-destructing in his milieu of drugs, clubs and anonymous sex. The 1998 film Head On was based on the novel. Tim Winton Cloudstreet (Picador UK; Graywolf US; Penguin Aus). A wonderful, faintly magical saga about the mixed fortunes of two families who end up sharing a house in postwar Perth.
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