Cirrus@Austlit

'While most of the characters you'll meet in these pages are far from perfect, and, with all their anxieties, foibles and frailties, a world away from being heroic, they are recognisably human. What they lack in polish or perfection they more than abundantly make up for in inconspicuous generosity and modesty, much too often under-appreciated for the ramifications these quieter graces have on those around them. This is a collection of stories of varying tonalities, spanning an emotional range comprising anything from the gentle 'My Uncle Dom' to the light and playful 'Reversal', the humorous and, at times, outrageously farcical 'Dimblewit' to the absurd, even grotesque 'The Bookworm', and again, the dark and disturbing 'The Visitation'. Two pieces among this collection of seven stories, 'Artist' and 'A Brass Razoo', present us with portraits particularly Australian.'  (Publication summary)

'As the title suggests, A Gloomorous Book In Verse is a seriously funny book and should not be left in the possession of unsupervised children. There’s a considerable risk that without the usual parental responsibility to spoil the fun children will not put it down and neglect their choirs and homework. Just as importantly, parents unaccompanied by children will not have anyone sufficiently imaginative to explain how to read the book and it’ll go right over their heads. The publisher takes no responsibility if this book distracts children away from their computer games and induces them to ask a lot of difficult, literate questions parents may not feel adequately equipped to answer'.

'Here you can read how unhappy Ted and Mabel the cow get the better of their insensitive author and Tommy Toucan becomes a hero through an incredible series of accidents. Will he come clean? Meet all the animals of the alphabet and hear what they have to say and much, much more.' (Publication summary)

'Desire in its multifariously limpid and obscure manifestations is one of the salient themes that informs many of the poems in this collection, from the way it is experienced in its recognisably subjective forms as longing, love or intention, to the more challenging notion of its expression as artefact – the objective creations of daily use such as cups, tables, books and money. Consonant with this notion is the way language allies itself with it to make it actual – this book you are holding and its contents being an instance of that – for if our daily artefacts are the echoes of its subterranean making, then surely language as the maker’s first and foremost tool of creative ingenuity, and not just human ingenuity, must be its very flesh.' (Publication summary)