image of person or book cover 7508532431224581626.jpg
Image courtesy of publisher's website.
y separately published work icon Beam of Light : Stories selected work   short story  
  • Author:agent John Kinsella http://www.poetrylibrary.edu.au/poets/kinsella-john
Issue Details: First known date: 2024... 2024 Beam of Light : Stories
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'Shifts in tone, setting and narration create a sense of the uncanny in Beam of Light, Kinsella’s haunting collection of stories.

'A man is disturbed by the sight of a familiar dining table and chairs atop an impending bonfire of bulldozed trees, a girl finds a fox skeleton and feels compelled to protect its spirit by dispersing its bones over the valley, a couple are invited to dinner by Christians new to town –an occasion that quickly turns heavy and strange, two men awkwardly meet again when their daughters attend the same ballet class, and a man and woman struggle to balance the threats of addiction and poverty with the joys and hopes of a new baby.

'Stories range in location from Ireland to Germany to Greece to the Australian countryside – threatened by catastrophic heat, land clearing, housing estates and strip malls – and Kinsella’s characters, so often on the edge, sear the consciousness.' (Publication summary)

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • Yarraville, Footscray - Maribyrnong area, Melbourne - West, Melbourne, Victoria,: Transit Lounge , 2024 .
      image of person or book cover 7508532431224581626.jpg
      Image courtesy of publisher's website.
      Extent: 272p.
      Note/s:
      • Published 1 September 2024
      ISBN: 9781923023161

Works about this Work

Misfits of the Wheatbelt : John Kinsella as an Impressionist Maria Takolander , 2024 single work review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , October no. 469 2024; (p. 28)

— Review of Beam of Light : Stories John Kinsella , 2024 selected work short story
'John Kinsella may well be Australia’s most prolific author – of poetry, fiction, short fiction, non-fiction. His extensive body of work is renowned for its obsessive concern, its fixation even, with a single place: the Western Australian wheatbelt,  where Kinsella has spent most of his life. While psychoanalysis has fallen out of favour, Kinsella’s regionalism has the character of a repetition compulsion, a syndrome Freud related to unresolved trauma. In fact, what often underlies Kinsella’s repeated envisioning of the wheatbelt is the unresolved trauma of colonialism, as the land and all who rely on it – people but also animals and plants – suffer from the impacts of modernity. In this new short-story collection, Beam of Light, colonial ecocide provides the background for almost every story. At the foreground is a misfit, a figure certainly not unrelated to the colonial condition.' 

 (Introduction)

Book Review : Beam of Light, John Kinsella Erich Mayer , 2024 single work review
— Appears in: ArtsHub , September 2024;

— Review of Beam of Light : Stories John Kinsella , 2024 selected work short story

'John Kinsella creates characters who are intensely, recognisably human in his collection of short stories.'

‘Destined to Be a Classic’ : The Best Australian Books Out in September Walter Marsh , Steph Harmon , Jack Callil , Yvonne C Lam , Sian Cain , 2024 single work column
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 2 September 2024;

— Review of The First Friend Malcolm Knox , 2024 single work novel ; Translations Jumaana Abdu , 2024 single work novel ; Diving, Falling Kylie Mirmohamadi , 2024 single work novel ; Jilya : How One Indigenous Woman from the Pilbara Transformed Psychology Tracy Westerman , 2024 single work autobiography ; Vortex Rodney Hall , 2024 single work novel ; The Degenerates Raeden Richardson , 2024 single work novel ; Beam of Light : Stories John Kinsella , 2024 selected work short story ; Sassafras Rebecca Huntley , 2024 single work autobiography
John Kinsella : Beam of Light Carmel Bird , 2024 single work review
— Appears in: The Saturday Paper , 31 August - 6 September 2024;

— Review of Beam of Light : Stories John Kinsella , 2024 selected work short story

'The first sentence in this powerful collection of short stories ends with the words “uneasy, restless” – a signature of what is to come. John Kinsella is a poet at the top of his game. His fiction reveals a further flowering of his imagination, sending the reader back into the narrative to search for solace.' 

John Kinsella : Beam of Light Carmel Bird , 2024 single work review
— Appears in: The Saturday Paper , 31 August - 6 September 2024;

— Review of Beam of Light : Stories John Kinsella , 2024 selected work short story

'The first sentence in this powerful collection of short stories ends with the words “uneasy, restless” – a signature of what is to come. John Kinsella is a poet at the top of his game. His fiction reveals a further flowering of his imagination, sending the reader back into the narrative to search for solace.' 

‘Destined to Be a Classic’ : The Best Australian Books Out in September Walter Marsh , Steph Harmon , Jack Callil , Yvonne C Lam , Sian Cain , 2024 single work column
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 2 September 2024;

— Review of The First Friend Malcolm Knox , 2024 single work novel ; Translations Jumaana Abdu , 2024 single work novel ; Diving, Falling Kylie Mirmohamadi , 2024 single work novel ; Jilya : How One Indigenous Woman from the Pilbara Transformed Psychology Tracy Westerman , 2024 single work autobiography ; Vortex Rodney Hall , 2024 single work novel ; The Degenerates Raeden Richardson , 2024 single work novel ; Beam of Light : Stories John Kinsella , 2024 selected work short story ; Sassafras Rebecca Huntley , 2024 single work autobiography
Book Review : Beam of Light, John Kinsella Erich Mayer , 2024 single work review
— Appears in: ArtsHub , September 2024;

— Review of Beam of Light : Stories John Kinsella , 2024 selected work short story

'John Kinsella creates characters who are intensely, recognisably human in his collection of short stories.'

Misfits of the Wheatbelt : John Kinsella as an Impressionist Maria Takolander , 2024 single work review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , October no. 469 2024; (p. 28)

— Review of Beam of Light : Stories John Kinsella , 2024 selected work short story
'John Kinsella may well be Australia’s most prolific author – of poetry, fiction, short fiction, non-fiction. His extensive body of work is renowned for its obsessive concern, its fixation even, with a single place: the Western Australian wheatbelt,  where Kinsella has spent most of his life. While psychoanalysis has fallen out of favour, Kinsella’s regionalism has the character of a repetition compulsion, a syndrome Freud related to unresolved trauma. In fact, what often underlies Kinsella’s repeated envisioning of the wheatbelt is the unresolved trauma of colonialism, as the land and all who rely on it – people but also animals and plants – suffer from the impacts of modernity. In this new short-story collection, Beam of Light, colonial ecocide provides the background for almost every story. At the foreground is a misfit, a figure certainly not unrelated to the colonial condition.' 

 (Introduction)

Last amended 29 Apr 2024 13:23:31
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