Rachel Franks Rachel Franks i(A145454 works by)
Gender: Female
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Works By

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1 The Australian Crime Novel, 1830-1950 Rachel Franks , 2023 single work criticism
— Appears in: The Cambridge History of the Australian Novel 2023;
1 3 y separately published work icon An Uncommon Hangman : The Life and Deaths of Robert ‘Nosey Bob’ Howard Rachel Franks , Sydney : NewSouth Publishing , 2022 23862829 2022 single work biography

'This is the story of Robert Rice Howard (1832–1906), the man known as Nosey Bob. It is also an important chapter in the story of the changing attitudes towards capital punishment in Australia, as the country transformed from generally enthusiastic spectators at executions into campaigners for the abolition of the death penalty. These interconnected stories are told through the men, and the one woman, who met Nosey Bob under the worst possible circumstances between his first employment by the Department of Justice in 1876 and his retirement as the executioner for New South Wales in 1904.

'Once a household name, Nosey Bob was the most infamous public servant in Sydney: a noseless hangman who sparked fear and fascination everywhere he went. Howard has only ever been cast as an extra in someone else’s play, making frightening appearances in a felon’s final scene on the gallows. Here, for the first time, he has taken the lead.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

1 y separately published work icon M/C Journal Regional vol. 22 no. 3 Tully Barnett (editor), Simon Dwyer (editor), Rachel Franks (editor), Jane Mummery (editor), 2019 18599607 2019 periodical issue criticism
1 A Life in the Margins : John Rae and the Early Minute Books of the City of Sydney Rachel Franks , 2018 single work biography
— Appears in: Script and Print , vol. 42 no. 3 2018; (p. 133-146)
'John Rae (1813–1900) was an extraordinarily innovative and talented public servant, author, painter, and photographer. A self-taught artist, he became a well-respected figure in colonial Sydney, Australia, as both an art practitioner and as a teacher. Rae was also highly-regarded as a very competent and levelheaded bureaucrat, and so was an important (and rare) figure in the early halls of Australian politics and power. His capacity as well as his determination to provide clear and strategic leadership were on display when he was appointed Town Clerk for the new City of Sydney in 1843 to act as secretary, administrator, and as chief advisor to the City’s Council. In this role he undertook a vast array of activities including the taking of minutes for all of the Council’s meetings.' (Introduction)
1 Madame Midas (1888) : One of Fergus Hume’s Attempts to Replicate Publishing Glory Rachel Franks , 2018 single work criticism
— Appears in: Journal of Asia-Pacific Pop Culture , vol. 3 no. 2 2018; (p. 303-323)

'The year 2017 marked the eighty-fifth anniversary of the death of Fergusson (Fergus) Wright Hume (1859–1932). Best known for his hugely successful debut novel The Mystery of a Hansom Cab (1886), set in Australia’s Melbourne, Hume went on to write many more works of fiction in the form of novels and short stories. These efforts resulted in a vast array of titles but none that captured the public imagination on a large scale and they are, today, mere curiosities of literary history. The closest that Hume came to replicating the publishing glory of The Mystery of a Hansom Cab was with his Australian-based murder mystery Madame Midas (1888). This article briefly explores Madame Midas and, while noting the story’s modest successes as both a book and a stage play, offers feminist and nationalist-focused rationales for this work’s inability to generate the same levels of excitement that surrounded, and continue to surround, Hume’s first novel.' (Publication abstract) 

1 Making a Meal of It : Food as a Symbol of Degrees of Fiction in the Novels of Arthur Upfield Rachel Franks , Alistair Rolls , 2018 single work criticism
— Appears in: Blood on the Table : Essays on Food in International Crime Fiction 2018; (p. 150-162)

In this chapter 'Rachel Franks and Alistair Rolls investigate food and its role in two of Australian Upfield's Napoleon Bonaparte novels. In particular, they examine food as an important element of storytelling, as well as a signal of indigenous identity, gender relations, ethnicity and class lines. In addition, Franks and Rolls discuss the ways in which food brings literary reflexivity into focus.' (Introduction 10)

1 Collecting the Criminal : Murder and Mayhem in Cultural Institutions Rachel Franks , 2018 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australasian Journal of Popular Culture , 1 March vol. 7 no. 1 2018; (p. 41-58)
1 y separately published work icon The Authorised Theft Papers : Writing, Scholarship, Collaboration The Authorised Theft Papers : Writing, Scholarship, Collaboration : Papers – The Refereed Proceedings Of The 21st Conference Of The Australasian Association Of Writing Programs, 2016 Niloofar Fanaiyan (editor), Rachel Franks (editor), Jessica Seymour (editor), Canberra : The Australasian Association of Writing Programs , 2017 20512298 2017 anthology criticism

'The 21st annual conference of the AAWP invited writers and academics to respond to the idea that, as writers, we are engaging in a type of ‘authorised theft’. Over 100 delegates responded enthusiastically by presenting papers that straddled genres, disciplines, modes of expression, as well as languages and cultures. Panel topics included sociologies of writing, poetry and song, narrative and narrative modes, responses to pain and trauma, digital literature and the online space, memoir/biography and travel writing, identity and voice, oral storytelling and ways of knowing, as well as translation and cross-cultural encounters.'

Source: Introduction.

1 Writing the Death of Joseph Luker: True Crime Reportage in Colonial Sydney Rachel Franks , 2017 single work criticism
— Appears in: TEXT Special Issue Website Series , October no. 45 2017;

'Capital punishment was common practice in the early decades of colonial Australia: the malefactor swinging from the end of a hangman’s noose a well-known sight. Crimes of anti-social behaviour, food and forgery were of central concern to the early colonists, with the criminal act most likely to result in an executioner plying his craft being the stealing of food. The first person hanged in the new colony, for the theft of butter, peas and pork provisions, was young Thomas Barrett, executed one month and one day after the arrival of the First Fleet in New South Wales. Murder quickly followed crimes motivated by greed, hunger, and slovenliness, with punishment for such acts also quickly applied by administrators. Yet, the very brutal murder, in Sydney in August 1803, of Constable Joseph Luker – the first officer of the law to be slain in the pursuit of his duty in Australia – went largely unpunished due to a lack of evidence and a twist of fate. This paper discusses the death of Constable Luker and how his story was written, and offers a brief analysis of the non-death of those considered responsible for such a violent crime in the context of the colony’s punishment systems.'  (Publication abstract)

1 A Criminal Record: Women and Australian True Crime Stories Rachel Franks , 2017 single work essay
— Appears in: The Conversation , 7 November 2017;

'Women have always been central to true crime stories: as victims, perpetrators, readers, and (increasingly) as tellers of these tales. Indeed, these tales, often dismissed as sensationalised violence, offer important opportunities to reflect on crime and crime control.

'Many true crime writers today – including numerous women, working in a once male-dominated market – have been biographers, coroners, detectives, historians, journalists, lawyers, and psychologists. These backgrounds bring a style of storytelling that educates us about, not just merely entertains us with, crime. Importantly, many privilege complex and nuanced storytelling over simplistic stereotypes of women as just 'bad' or just 'good'. (Introduction)

1 Before Alternative Voices : The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser Rachel Franks , 2017 single work criticism
— Appears in: M/C Journal , March vol. 20 no. 1 2017;
'In 1802 George Howe (1769-1821), the recently appointed Government Printer, published Australia’s first book. The following year he established Australia’s first newspaper; an enterprise that ran counter to all the environmental factors of the day, including: 1) issues of logistics and a lack of appropriate equipment and basic materials to produce a regularly issued newspaper; 2) issues resulting from the very close supervision of production and the routine censorship by the Governor; and 3) issues associated with the colony’s primary purposes as a military outpost and as a penal settlement, creating conflicts between very different readerships. ' (Introduction)
1 The Betwixt and Between Simon Dwyer , Rachel Franks , Monica Galassi , Kirsten Thorpe , 2016 single work criticism
— Appears in: TEXT : Special Issue Website Series , no. 34 2016;
1 1 y separately published work icon TEXT : Special Issue Website Series Writing and Illustrating Interdisciplinary Research no. 34 Simon Dwyer (editor), Rachel Franks (editor), Monica Galassi (editor), Kirsten Thorpe (editor), 2016 9787789 2016 periodical issue
1 Learning All the Tricks : Critiquing Crime Fiction in a Creative Writing PhD Rachel Franks , 2016 single work criticism
— Appears in: TEXT Special Issue Website Series , October no. 37 2016;
1 Editorial Jesper Gulddal , Alistair Rolls , Rachel Franks , 2016 single work essay
— Appears in: TEXT Special Issue Website Series , October no. 37 2016;
1 1 y separately published work icon TEXT Special Issue Website Series Crime Fiction: The Creative/Critical Nexus no. 37 October Rachel Franks (editor), Jesper Gulddal (editor), Alistair Rolls (editor), 2016 10428459 2016 periodical issue
1 ‘There’s a Dead Body in My Library’ : Crime Fiction Texts and the History of Libraries Rachel Franks , 2015 single work criticism
— Appears in: The Australian Library Journal , vol. 64 no. 4 2015; (p. 288-300)
'Since the publication of Australia’s first crime novel in 1830, Australians have read crime fiction for entertainment, for the reassurance that wrongdoers will be punished, and to test their deductive skills against those of their favourite sleuth. The novels, short stories and plays within the crime fiction genre that have been produced in Australia between colonial times and the present day also offer opportunities to investigate a particular place or a particular time. Indeed, many crime fiction writers have mastered the art of recreating settings in both rural and metropolitan landscapes. The details provided within these works ultimately reveal a culprit (usually a murderer), yet they also outline the availability of certain products, bus and train timetables, the floor plans of local hotels or world-famous buildings and numerous other particulars, thus providing a rich, if surprising, source of material for the merely curious and the professional researcher. Crime fiction stories set within libraries present a history of the information services profession. This paper demonstrates how crime fiction can provide an important supplement to more traditional historical sources, with a focus on how the genre has documented some of the major changes within libraries over the last 75 years, since 1939.' (Publication abstract)
1 [Review] The Broken Shore Rachel Franks , 2014 single work review
— Appears in: Australasian Journal of Popular Culture , March vol. 3 no. 1 2014; (p. 139-143)

— Review of The Broken Shore Peter Temple , 2005 single work novel
1 Gendering the Genre : Three Australian Women Writers and their Debut Crime Fiction Novels Rachel Franks , 2014 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australasian Journal of Popular Culture , March vol. 3 no. 1 2014; (p. 57-71)
'The creators and consumers of crime fiction have changed dramatically since the genre, established in ancient times to define legal and moral codes and indicate the consequences for breaking those codes, first started to gain widespread popularity as a form of entertainment in the eighteenth century. One of the most significant of these changes can be seen in the slow but steady rise of the female as consumer, creator and character. There are many ways to explore some of the gendered changes within the crime fiction genre, one of which is to examine novels written by women who have chosen female protagonists to tell their stories. Ostensibly quite different texts, Miles Franklin’s Bring the Monkey (1933), June Wright’s Murder in the Telephone Exchange (1948) and Elizabeth Antill’s Death on the Barrier Reef (1952) are three debut crime novels that share some striking similarities. In addition to all three novels featuring female first-person narrators, these stories also tell tales of very violent crimes and contribute to documenting some of the shifts in views on gender, female friendship, marriage and class within what has become the world’s most popular genre.' (Publication abstract)
1 Developing an Appetite for Food in Crime Fiction Rachel Franks , 2013 single work criticism
— Appears in: TEXT Special Issue Website Series , no. 24 2013;
'Food has been receiving an increasing amount of scholarly attention, with researchers exploring every aspect of selection, preparation and consumption and, so too is the idea of food in fiction. In creating stories, from short -run paperbacks to prize-winning novels, writers utilise food to communicate the everyday and to explore more complex concepts such as the class system and cultural diversity. Food also has the capacity to add realism to fiction with many authors putting as much effort into conjuring the smell, taste and texture of food as they do in bringing their characters to life. This article is an investigation of how cookbooks and fictional works are reflections of each other in terms of creativity, function and structure: they tell us stories, provide education and have neat beginnings, middles and ends. In some instances the two forms are so closely entwined that a volume will concurrently share a narrative while providing instruction in the culinary arts. In particular, this article explores the recipes found within crime fiction, a genre that has a long history of focusing on food in a variety of contexts; from the theft of food in the novels of the nineteenth century to the more modern utilisation of various types of food to administer poison. Recent years have also seen some crime fiction writers proffer a central protagonist working within the food industry, drawing connections between the skills that are required for food preparation and those needed to catch a murderer. ' (Author's abstract)
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