Fiction
Set in an imminent Tasmanian ghost town, B. Michael Radburn’s first novel departs from his previous work as a horror short story writer. This murder mystery unfolds in the rural town of Glorys Crossing, which is being consumed by a hydropower dam, and which all but the most stubborn townsfolk are leaving to make a life elsewhere. Told through the eyes of ...
In 1967, eleven schoolgirls and their teacher take a field trip to the public gardens in Sydney. There, Miss Renshaw and her young charges meet the teacher’s friend and possible paramour – a gardener and a poet. The charismatic Morgan takes them to a nearby wet, low-roofed cave, ostensibly to see some sacred Dreamtime paintings. The girls are both giddy and alarmed at this unauthorised excu ...
Yellowcake by Margo Lanagan & The Wilful Eye: Tales from the Tower, Volume I edited by Isobelle Carmody and Nan McNab
The ten tales in Margo Lanagan’s Yellowcake offer an eclectic glimpse behind the slender veil separating the everyday from the fantastic. The collection is peopled by monstrous gods and godly monsters, by scavengers, drifters, and fascinators. Its landscape incorporates hellish war zones, apocalyptic streetscapes, and haunting carnivals. There is hope and ...
Six people. Five seatbelts. Six teenagers involved in a horrific car crash. But who has died?
... (read more)The latest crop of children’s picture books highlights the ability of this versatile genre to cover everything from the ever-popular animal tale, to sparkling stories about fairies, to introspective contemplations on the meaning of life.
... (read more)Owen Graves, by occupation a house wrecker and by nature a collector, is summoned to the world’s tallest building by the president of Chicago’s First Equitable Insurance Company...
... (read more)From Kafka on, we can trace a line of narratives dealing with alienation in the modern workplace, with forces seen and unseen overwhelming individual volition. S.J. Finn’s first novel makes a humorous contribution to this tradition.
... (read more)Michael Duffy, perhaps best known as a newspaper columnist and contrarian, and co-presenter with Paul Comrie-Thomson ...
... (read more)Black Glass, speculative fiction with a sentimental edge, explores a nation controlled by an intrusive surveillance culture and subliminal social engineering...
... (read more)