Mena Calthorpe's novel The dyehouse was, as I wrote in a post last year, Text Publishing's choice for its 100th Text Classic, which surely says something about its quality or worth, wouldn't you think? And yet, as Lisa (ANZLitLovers) pointed out in her post, it is not mentioned in recent books discussing the history of Australian literature, … Continue reading Mena Calthorpe, The dyehouse (Review)
Review
David Carlin and Francesca Rendle-Short (eds), The near and the far: New stories from the Asia-Pacific region (Review)
Anthologies, almost by definition, have a unifying theme, something that explains their existence. There are the "best of" type, as in best of a year or of a genre, for example. There are those drawn from a prize, such as The trouble with flying, and other stories (my review) from the Margaret River Short Story competition. And of course there … Continue reading David Carlin and Francesca Rendle-Short (eds), The near and the far: New stories from the Asia-Pacific region (Review)
Graham Greene, Travels with my aunt (Review)
Every year, my reading group aims to do at least one classic - usually something from the nineteenth century - but this year someone suggested Graham Greene. Yes, we all responded, why not? But which one? For reasons I don't recollect, Travels with my aunt was suggested and given none of us had a burning desire to … Continue reading Graham Greene, Travels with my aunt (Review)
Carson McCullers, The great eaters of Georgia (Review)
Regular readers of my Library of America (LOA) Story of the Week posts will probably guess why I've chosen to write about this story: it's by an appealing American writer and it's about food. However, it's quite different from the other food stories. Firstly, while it's called "the great eaters" it's more of a little memoir essay … Continue reading Carson McCullers, The great eaters of Georgia (Review)
Northanger Abbey musings (1)
My Jane Austen group is reading Northanger Abbey - again - because this year is the 200th anniversary of its publication. However, I did write about the novel when we did it in 2015, so what to do? Well, the thing is that every time I read Austen something else pops into my mind to think about … Continue reading Northanger Abbey musings (1)
Kate Chopin, Fedora (Review)
Time methinks for another Library of America (LOA) Story of the Week, particularly since one of their recent offerings was one of my favourite American authors, Kate Chopin. "Fedora" is the sixth story by Chopin I've discussed here, and is probably the shortest, more of a "sketch". In fact its original title was apparently "“The Falling in Love … Continue reading Kate Chopin, Fedora (Review)
William Lane, The salamanders (Review)
William Lane's latest novel, The salamanders, is a book that keeps you thinking from beginning to end. As I started it, I was thinking of it as a cross between Julian Davies' Crow mellow (my review), a satirical novel about a house party for artists and their patrons, and Emily Bitto's The strays (my review) about an … Continue reading William Lane, The salamanders (Review)
Maria Katsonis and Lee Kofman (eds), Rebellious daughters (Review)
To rebel or not to rebel, that is the question. At least, it's the question that interested memoirists Maria Katsonis and Lee Kofman who, having written their own stories about "conservative upbringings and subsequent rebellions", wanted to discover what other women could reveal about that "universal life experience", the rebellion against parents. This book, Rebellious daughters, is, obviously, … Continue reading Maria Katsonis and Lee Kofman (eds), Rebellious daughters (Review)
Jane Fletcher Geniesse, Passionate nomad: The life of Freya Stark (Review)
My reading group came to read Jane Fletcher Geniesse's biography, Passionate nomad: The life of Freya Stark, by a somewhat circuitous route - and it started with my blog. One of our members had read my Monday Musings post on 19th century travellers, and suggested that we read a 19th century travel writer. Somehow, as … Continue reading Jane Fletcher Geniesse, Passionate nomad: The life of Freya Stark (Review)
Louisa Atkinson, A voice from the country: January (Review)
Louisa Atkinson, as I wrote in a post a few years ago, was a pioneer Australian writer. She was a significant botanist, our first Australian-born woman novelist, and the first Australian woman to have a long-running column in a major newspaper. It was a natural history series titled A Voice from the Country which ran in The Sydney Morning Herald for … Continue reading Louisa Atkinson, A voice from the country: January (Review)
