Cirrus@Austlit

'In her book The Cost of Living, British writer Deborah Levy says: “To strip the wallpaper off the fairytale of The Family House in which the comfort and happiness of men and children has been the priority is to find behind it an unthanked, unloved, neglected, exhausted woman.” Creative writing academic Kylie Mirmohamadi’s debut novel, Diving, Falling, tells the story of a novelist, Leila Whittaker, recently widowed when her husband died, Ken Black, an art-world giant whose sought-after abstract masterpieces sell in the millions. Behind their fairytale life, Ken is a philanderer with a volatile temper, embodying the tortured genius trope. Leila says of her late husband: “Ken Black never enjoyed an unshadowed hour. And he would have dismissed as deadly dull the idea of a mind at peace.”' (Introduction)