Cirrus@Austlit

'The author’s sophomore novel, in which a young woman is propelled on a journey of self-discovery after accidentally leaving her mobile at home, asks interesting questions but pulls its punches'

'The doctor-writer’s account of being diagnosed with, treated for and recovering from myeloma is rich and compelling'

'This ambitious novel, which follows a mother who wakes up in the future without her children, wrestles with complex existential questions'

'The Big Little Lies author imagines what would happen if a mysterious woman on a flight began predicting the deaths of her fellow passengers'

'Navigating on foot, Cleary is guided by histories, traditional owners and some unexpected weather, resulting in a rich account of the natural world.' 

When I've been overtaken, I have stood and watched the water in my porridge simmer away into the air, and then the oats turn black and crackle with dryness, and my ears fill with the smoke alarm's shriek.

'When Adele Dumont is diagnosed with trichotillomania - compulsive hair-pulling - it makes sense of much of her life to date. The seemingly harmless quirk of her late teens, which rapidly developed into almost uncontrollable urges and then into trance-like episodes, is a hallmark of the disease, as is the secrecy with which she guarded her condition from her family, friends, and the world at large.

'The diagnosis also opens up a rich line of inquiry. Where might the origins of this condition be found? How can we distinguish between a nervous habit and a compulsion? And how do we balance the relief of being 'seen' by others with our experience of shame?

'Reminiscent of the writing of Leslie Jamison and Fiona Wright, The Pulling is a fascinating exploration of the inner workings of a mind. In perfectly judged prose, both probing and affecting, Dumont illuminates how easily ritual can slide into obsession, and how close beneath the surface horror and darkness can lie.'(Publication summary)

'From its outset, A Kind of Magic establishes two distinct kinds of language. There’s Spargo-Ryan’s narration, as she recounts meeting with her new therapist: this voice is warm and confiding. The language she employs is vibrant and all her own: she likens her anxiety, for example, to ‘being trapped in jelly and also being allergic to jelly’(6). It’s laden with humour and irony, too: the narrator worries that the thongs she’s worn to the appointment are going to make a bad impression, and what’s more, their slapping sound might disturb the ‘sick people’ in the medical centre; the ‘patients with actual problems’(4). Within this same opening chapter, we’re introduced to a medical lexicon, which Spargo-Ryan informs us she’s become well-versed in: ‘I feel dissociated, I have intrusive thoughts’(6). These two sorts of language indicate two spheres of knowledge: the first, clinical and official; the second, intimate and embodied. The therapist’s PhD in clinical psychology is displayed on the wall; she is a ‘specialist in anxiety and psychosis’(4). But Spargo-Ryan tells us she is ‘also a specialist’ in these conditions, ‘but in the other way, where sometimes they try to kill me’(4).' (Introduction)

'Anyone writing about their childhood must grapple with the intervening gulf of time, and with the strange slipperiness of memory. This is especially so for Shannon Burns, who today lives a stable, contented life in the higher echelons of Australia’s middle class, but whose early years, he now recognises, were chaotic and perilous, peopled by adults who were unreliable, volatile, and sometimes violent. Childhood charts Burns’ upbringing in 1980s suburban Adelaide: he is passed between his mother (his ‘true home’ (88)), his father and stepmother, various relatives, and foster carers. Aged fifteen, he leaves school, escapes his father’s place and finds work in a recycling centre. Despite all this dislocation and instability, and despite Burns’ well-developed talent for forgetting, Childhood doesn’t read as fragmentary or disjointed: rather, the narrative is sculpted so skilfully that it is never less than propulsive.'(Introduction)

'In her 2019 memoir Imperfect, Lee Kofman wrote about the disfiguring scars she sustained as a child, the result of several major surgeries. She describes going to great lengths to conceal these scars as an adult, with her ‘shell of stockings and long dresses’. It is this impulse towards concealment and secrecy that first led me to feel a great (and covert) sense of kinship with Kofman. In my case, it was my own mental illness, and its strange physical manifestations, that I was driven to hide.'(Introduction)   

'‘A thing from the outside was inside her,’ writes Sarah Walker, conjuring one of her earliest memories. The thing in question is an enormous piece of bark, protruding from her kindergarten teacher’s outstretched hand, ‘under the elegant slip of her skin’. The image is carefully chosen, foreshadowing this essay collection’s interest in the intersections between our bodies and the world, and the breaching of these thresholds. Throughout The First Time I Thought I Was Dying the outside world gets in and insides are turned out. Walker’s lesson from that playground accident is that ‘constant vigilance is required’. Just a handful of paragraphs later, she tells us the revised lesson her adult self is trying to learn: ‘be not afraid’. This movement from fearfulness and control towards trust and acceptance is one that reverberates through the collection.' (Introduction)

'Occasionally I go bush with a friend, and as we walk she will—with little apparent effort—take in the lie of the land. When we break to catch our breath, or to check our ankles for leeches, or to fix an undone shoelace, she will have counted how many creeks we’ve crossed, will have noticed how the steep cliffs and undulating valleys correspond to the contours of our map. With a swivel of her head along the ridgeline, she’ll be able to establish roughly where it is we now are. As though thumbing back through the pages of a just-read chapter, she might trace with her finger the passages we’ve covered: ‘that must be that section of blue gums’ or ‘that’s back where that landslide was’ or ‘here’s when we made a turn for the east’. I, meanwhile, might have noticed globules of blood-red resin weeping from the base of a tree, or have been startled by a black cockatoo winging itself across my path and scoured the ground afterwards for its feathers … but I will mostly be oblivious. The overall shape of the land we’re passing through will remain a blur to me.' (Introduction)