Author's note: This novel was originally inspired by the lives of Zina Rachevsky, Lama Zopa Rinpoche and Lama Yeshe, and the monastry they founded just out of Bodanath in the erly 1970s, Kopan Monastery.
However while the lives of my characters, Lama Gyatsho and lama Dorje Rinpoche, have echoes of the extraordinary lives of Lama Thubten Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche, and their teachings - either read or attended - inspired the voice of those characters, my fictional characters; my fictional characters are just that: fictional. Similarly, while Anna Davidoff's final years have moments that are similar to some of those in the final years of Zina Rachevsky, she is a fictional and invented character. All other characters in this novel are entirely fictional.
'Jo Case talks to influential writers, publishers and critics about that often frustrating definition of 'Australia' literature.' (Editor's abstract)
Ashton discusses narrative technique and the notion of family in Tsiolkas's The Slap, Cunningham's Bird, Flanagan's Wanting, Leigh's Disquiet, and Lohrey's Vertigo. The review spends most time on The Slap, and Ashton argues that the novel's focus on family should be seen not as a flight from politics, but as 'a flight to the politics of the middle-class family' (93).
'Jo Case talks to influential writers, publishers and critics about that often frustrating definition of 'Australia' literature.' (Editor's abstract)
