For what it’s worth, given I’ve not read any of them, here is the Stella Prize shortlist. The announcement I received via email this morning describes it as comprising:
a diverse mix, featuring novels, memoir and an essay collection. Three of these works are by debut authors, showcasing fresh voices in Australian literature.
To summarise from my longlist announcement, this year’s judges are writer, literary critic, Artistic Director of the Canberra Writers Festival and this year’s chair, BeeJay Silcox; Filipino-Australian poet, performer, arts producer, and advocate, Eleanor Jackson; First Nations award-winning poet and arts board member, Cheryl Leavy; noveslist, occasional critic and full-time dad, Bram Presser; and writer and historian, Dr Yves Rees.
The shortlist
Here is the list, in alphabetical order by author, with brief comments from the judges (found on the Stella website’s page for each book, linked on the title):
Katherine Brabon, Body friend (novel): “a novel of experiential heft and eloquence, which gives shape to the complexities of chronic pain”
Emily O’Grady, Feast (novel) (Kate’s review): “told from the perspectives of three connected women, Feast reminds us not so much to be wary of unreliable narrators, but of the deep subjectivity of moral value.”
Hayley Singer, Abandon every hope (essays): “experimental and jostling in its use of poetic, lyric, academic and reflective writing styles, this book grapples with the industrial meat complex”
So four novels, and two works of nonfiction. No poetry on this year’s shortlist. I have added a couple of reviews from my blogger friends, including Bill’s for Praiseworthy (which was also included in my Longlist post). Kate, as you will have seen, has managed to read two of them since the announcement. I am certainly interested in some of these.
PS: Darn it, I copied my longlist post and then edited the title incorrectly so it was published as “Stella Prize 2023 Longlist” not “Stella Prize 2024 Shortlist!! Shows how distracted I am.
Today’s post is not especially Australian, but it was published in Australian newspapers as a recommended list of “masterpieces” or classics for Australians to read. It is in that sense that I am posting it in my Monday Musings series!
The list was published in 1910, with the heading “Best novels: A short list of masterpieces of fiction”. It explains that “an American paper offers the following as an excellent though, of course, limited list of the best books for one to read”. The interesting thing is that the books are categorised. See what you think.
It was replicated in many newspapers but the one I used for this post, because it needed little editing (as I recollect), is from Victoria’s Elmore Standard of 12 February (accessed 10 July 2023).
The list
I have value added with the author’s name, as this – curiously – was not included. Sure, most people probably knew the authors of these classics, but that’s not the point. The authors deserve recognition! I’ve also added first publication date, for interest.
The best historical novel: Ivanhoe (Sir Walter Scott, 1820)
The best dramatic novel: The Count of Monte Cristo (Alexandre Dumas, 1844-46 serialised)
The best domestic novel: The Vicar of Wakefield (Oliver Goldsmith, 1766)
The best marine novel: Mr. Midshipman Easy (Frederick Marryat, 1836)
The best country-life novel: Adam Bede (George Eliot, 1859)
The best military novel: Charles O’Malley (Charles James Lever, 1841)
The best religious novel: Ben Hur (Lew Wallace, 1880)
The best political novel: Lothair (Benjamin Disraeli, 1870)
The best novel written for a purpose: Uncle Tom’s Cabin (Harriet Beecher Stowe, 1852)
The best imaginative novel: She (H. Rider Haggard, 1887)
The best pathetic novel: The Old Curiosity Shop (Charles Dickens, 1840-41 serialised)
The best humorous novel: The Pickwick Papers (Charles Dickens, 1836-37 serialised)
The best Irish novel: Handy Andy (Samuel Lover, 1841)
The best Scotch novel: The Heart of Midlothian (Sir Walter Scott, 1818)
The best English novel: Vanity Fair (William Makepeace Thackeray, 1848)
The best American novel: The Scarlet Letter (Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1850)
The best sensational novel: The Woman in White (Wilkie Collins, 1859)
The best of all: Vanity Fair (William Makepeace Thackeray, 1848)
Don’t you just love these categories?
I’ve read some of these authors, but only a few of these particular books. Some I had to check who the authors were, like the author of Handy Andy. It is a male dominated list, though we do have George Eliot and Harriet Beecher Stowe, but what about Jane Austen! Ok, I’ll leave it there because my point is not to reconsider the list but share it as one reflection of the times, and what some American paper, apparently thought (though we don’t really know the provenance of the list).
All thoughts on any aspects of this list are welcome.
As has happened in the past, this week’s Monday Musings has been gazumped by the announcement this evening of the Stella Prize longlist. I attended the online streamed announcement from the Adelaide Festival Writers Week
As I say every year, I don’t do well at having read the Stella Prize longlist at the time of its announcement. In recent years the most I’ve read has been two (in 2019). This year, like the last two years I’ve read none, but a couple are on my TBR! Is the a start?
This year’s judges include one from last year, and some newbies, keeping the panel fresh as in Stella’s commitment: writer, literary critic, Artistic Director of the Canberra Writers Festival and this year’s chair, BeeJay Silcox; Filipino-Australian poet, performer, arts producer, and advocate, Eleanor Jackson; First Nations award-winning poet and arts board member, Cheryl Leavy; noveslist, occasional critic and full-time dad, Bram Presser; and writer and historian, Dr Yves Rees.
The longlist
Here is the list, in alphabetical order by author, not the order in which they were presented, and with a few scrabbled notes I made as I listened to the list being read out.
Katia Ariel, The swift dark tide (memoir)
Stephanie Bishop, The anniversary (novel): “genre fiction at is very best … as clever as it is delicious” (kimbofo’s review)
Katherine Brabon, Body friend (novel)
Ali Cobby Eckermann, She is the earth (verse novel)
Melissa Lucashenko, Edenglassie (novel): “triumph of characterisation … gives truth to state sanctioned violence” (Brona’s review)
Kate Mildenhall, The hummingbird effect (novel): “speculative fiction at its finest” tackling the issues of our age (Brona’s review)
Emily O’Grady, Feast (novel): “country house novel … be wary of deep subjectivity of moral value”
Sanya Rushdi, translated by Arunava Sinha, Hospital (novel): “unflinching and insightful work of autofiction”
Hayley Singer, Abandon every hope (essays): “no moral shrillness here”
Laura Elizabeth Woollett, West girls (novel): “a novel of sad girls that is the antithesis of sad girl novels”
Alexis Wright, Praiseworthy (novel) (Bill’s second post): genre-buster, “fierce and gloriously funny – part manifesto, part indictment”
The panel discussion that followed the announcement was wonderfully engaging, with the judges (sans Bram Presser who was home looking after his kids), exploring the individual works, and looking at the “conversations between the books”, that is the ways the books intersected with each other in subject matter and form. They talked about how many of the books critique systems of power wielded over others, how many embodied the idea of the body, how climate change is addressed in different ways, and more. It was too much to capture and listen to at the same time. They talked about form, and how some books were true to form and were great because of that, while in others form was wildly broken (like Alexis Wright’s Praiseworthy). The books, they said, are powerful but without sentiment, asking instead for “the dignity of witness”. They are not hectoring, and many are deeply funny.
I am not going to say anything about the selection, because the Stella is such a wonderfully diverse prize that aims to encompass a wide range of forms and styles. There will always be choices we question. But, I will just say, because I can, that I’d love to have seen Carmel Bird’s Love letter to Lola(my review) recognised, because as they spoke about the books they read, I felt that Bird’s collection has the energy, the wit, the heart, and the awareness of “the issues of our age” that their selected books apparently also have. Did they even read it, I wonder?
Opening the session, Beejay Silcox said that the “heartbeat of Australian writing is here” and it’s damning that our writers cannot make a living from their craft. Amen to that.
You can write a different future and dream the culture forward. (end of the Panel discussion)
Over the last twelve months or so, The Conversation has published occasional articles titled “My favourite fictional character“. In each article the writer names a character and justifies their choice.
As far as I can tell, there have been six so far, and most have chosen non-Australian characters. The choosers and their choices have been:
Carol Lefevre, whose Murmurations I’ve reviewed: Ivy Eckdorf in William Trevor’s O’Neill’s Hotel (1969), for her “crazed, compelling voice”.
Edwina Preston, whose Bad art mother I’ve reviewed: Judy in Ethel Turner’s Seven little Australians (1894), who was “wild … equipped to conquer the world, but not to survive it”.
Melanie Saward: Queenie in Candice Carty-Williams’ Queenie (2019), who is “complex, funny, broken, fun”.
Jane Gleeson-White, whose book, Australian classics: 50 great writers and their celebrated works, is in my reference collection: Lyra in Philip Pullman’s Northern lights (1995) AND (she cheekily chose two) Lila Cerullo in Elena Ferrante’s My brilliant friend (2011), for being “half-wild, ‘too much’ heroines”.
Amy Walters, who was a blogger in the New Territory program: Esme Lennox in Maggie O’Farrell’s The vanishing act of Esme Lennox (2006), who “refuses to be the ‘perfect victim’ – even in an asylum”.
Alexander Howard: John Le Carré’s George Smiley (first appeared, 1961), who is “unattractive, overweight, a terrible dresser – and a better spy than James Bond”
If you are interested in their justifications, you can find all the articles at the link in my opening paragraph. I note that to date only Preston has chosen an Australian character. Also, her character is the only one from a bona fide classic, which surprised me a little. So far, there have been five female choosers to one male, and their choices have matched their genders. Telling?
Meanwhile, I’ll share a few (yes, I’m allowing myself a few) of my favourite Australian fictional characters. It’s a challenge not just because it’s always hard to choose favourites, or because “favourite” is a slippery concept, but because favourite characters don’t necessarily come from favourite books. Most do, but, for example, a longtime favourite novel of mine is Voss, but I wouldn’t say the characters were favourites.
I’m giving you my favourites in six random categories:
Favourite childhood character: Ethel Turner’s Judy in Seven little Australians. I’m with Edwina Preston. How could any red-blooded Australian girl not want to be the brave, warm-hearted, rebellious Judy.
Favourite First Nations character: Bobby Wabalanginy in Kim Scott’s That deadman dance (my review). While not the only voice in the book, young Nyoongar boy Bobby is our guide, and he fulfils that role with wit, intelligence and honesty. But I have others, like the flawed Kerry in Melissa Lucashenko’s Too much lip (my post) and the motherly Odette in Tony Birch’s The white girl (my post).
Favourite older character: Kathleen in Thea Astley’s Coda (my post). Being a woman of a certain age, I’m interested in women traversing the closing decades of their lives. There are more around in our literature than you might think, and I’ve liked many of them, but Kathleen is a favourite because she’s a memorable, wily, acerbic, old woman, a self-styled “feral-grandmother”, who is not ready to be, as she says, “corpsed”. She knows the “four ages of women: bimbo, breeder, babysitter, burden” and she’s doing her darnedest to rise above it. I’m not really like her, but that doesn’t mean I can’t love her.
Favourite nice guy: Russell Bass in Trevor Shearston’s Hare fur (my review). OK, I admit it. I’m a sucker for “nice guys”, in fiction as well as in life. I’m not one of those (see below) who find nice guys boring or unbelievable. Fiction is full of unpleasant men, or, if not that, of dull, dithery, helpless, “dun-coloured” (to quote Patrick White) men. But there are good men too, like Will the doctor in Eleanor Limprecht’s The coast (my post). I’m going with Russell Bass, however, because of how, with humanity, he navigates the tricky human, legal and moral territory of supporting kids who are hiding from welfare authorities.
Favourite villain: Father Pearse in John Clanchy’s In whom we trust (my review). What makes a villain a favourite? Their villainy? Their redemptive qualities? Or, that they are only villainous because of their circumstances? For me, certainly not their villainy. I was never one of those girls who liked “the bad boys”, though “favourite” doesn’t necessarily mean “like” does it? Grenouille in Patrick Süskind’s Perfume could be a favourite character because he is pure villainy perfectly rendered, but I don’t like him. Father Pearse is not the worst character in Clanchy’s book, so is perhaps not, literally, a “villain”, but he is a weak man whose cowardice impacts the the children in his charge, until he is confronted.
Favourite independent woman (in a nod to Bill): Sybylla in Miles Franklin’s My brilliant career, of course. Like Ethel Turner’s Judy, she’s impossible to go past. She set the standard. But I must also give a nod to two femocrats, Cassie Armstrong in Sara Dowse’s West block (my review) and Edith Campbell Berry in Frank Moorhouse’s Edith trilogy. I’ve only read and reviewed the third, Cold light, since blogging, but she has energy and force that might land her in trouble at times but she keeps on going.
So, an eclectic lot, really, and I’ve sidestepped – because I can – the challenge of choosing ONE favourite character, but I hope I’ve got you thinking.
Would you care to share one or two favourite characters (and, if you are Australian, I’d really love to hear your Australian ones!)
This year we start with my first Monday Musings post appearing on Tuesday! This is due to conflicting new year traditions – my Blogging Highlights post on 1 January, and my first Monday Musings being New Releases for the coming year. When 1 January is a Monday, I’m in trouble! I could have left this until next Monday, but I already have a post that’s been waiting to go, and I don’t want it to wait any longer, so Tuesday it is!
As before, I have drawn from the Sydney Morning Herald, where Jane Sullivan and the team has again done a wonderful job of surveying publishers large and small. This year, I have also used The Guardian’s list put together by Canberra Writers Festival director, Beejay Silcox. As always, I have also sussed out a few of my own! Also, this is Monday musings on Australian literature post, so my focus is Australian authors in areas of interest or relevance to me. This means I’ve not included non-Australian writers, nor all the Australian nonfiction. To see those, click on the SMH link.
Now, there are many ways to do this sort of list. Kim (Reading Matters) has posted a list of new releases by publication month, but, as is my wont, I’ve arranged mine by author, under some broad form headings.
Links on the authors’ names are to my posts on those authors.
Fiction
As always, not every book listed last year, ended up being published that year so a couple appear here again. And, also as always, I have read a very small number from last year’s list, but a few more are on my TBR and will be read this year. Here’s this year’s selection:
SMH lists many books under Crimes and Thrillers, but this is not my area of expertise or major interest, so, do check SMH’s link if you are interested. I will, though, bring a few to your attention: .
Steven Carroll, Death of a foreign gentleman (April, HarperCollins): a new genre for Carroll
Sulari Gentill, The mystery writer (Ultimo, March)
Louise Milligan, Pheasants nest (March, Allen & Unwin): her first foray into fiction
Most of the sources I checked identified Debut Australian fiction and I think it’s useful to separate them out, so we don’t all wonder why the names don’t seem familiar:
Sharlene Allsopp, The great undoing (February, Ultimo): First Nations author
Katherine Allum, The skeleton house (June, Fremantle): Fogarty Literary Award winner
Susanna Begbie, The deed (May, Hachette): Richell Prize winner
Amy Brown, My brilliant sister (January or February, Scribner/Simon & Schuster): adult novel debut
Amanda Creely, Nameless (March, UWA): Dorothy Hewett Award shortlist
Belinda Cranston, The changing room (May, Transit Lounge)
Georgia Blain, We all lived in Bondi then (January, Scribe): posthumous
Ceridwen Dovey, Only the astronauts (July, PRH)
John Richards, The Gorgon flower (April, UQP)
Mykaela Saunders, Always will be (March, UQP): First Nations author
Ouyang Yu, The white cockatoo flowers: Stories (April, Transit Lounge)
Non-fiction
The newspapers include a wide range – and a large number – of new non-fiction books, and I found more in my own research, so I’m sharing a few that particularly caught my eye. Click the newspaper links for more.
Life-writing (very loosely defined, and selected to those focused mainly on the arts and activism)
Wayne Bergmann with Madelaine Dickie, Some people want to shoot me (March, Fremantle): First Nations memoir, focusing on native title
Brooke Bland, Gulp, swallow: Essays on change (November, Upswell): memoir-in-essays “about family and friends, life and mortality, memory and forgetting”
Hermina Burns, Barbara Tucker: The art of being (February, MUP)
Samantha Faulkner (ed.), Growing up Torres Strait Islander in Australia (August, Black Inc)
Peter Goldsworthy, The Cancer Finishing School (March, PRH): “shares lessons from his incurable cancer diagnosis”
Jeremy Hill and Ronald Millar, No singing in gum trees: The honest life of Max Martin (no date, Wakefield Press)
Robert Manne, untitled political memoir (December, Black Inc)
Brenda Niall, Joan Lindsay: The hidden life of the woman who wrote Picnic at Hanging Rock (October, Text)
Brigitta Olubas and Susan Wyndham (ed), Shirley Hazzard and Elizabeth Harrower: The letters (May, NewSouth)
Bruce Pascoe and Lyn Harwood, Black duck: A year at Yumburra (April, Thames & Hudson): First Nations memoir, about life on their farm
James Bradley, Deep water (April, PRH): eco-literature
Clint Bracknell and Kylie Bracknell, Shakespeare on the Noongar stage: Language revival and Hecate (May, Upswell): on Macbeth in Nyoongar language
Santilla Chingaipe, Black convicts: How slavery shaped colonised Australia (August, Scribner): examines the First Fleet, investigating the place of people of African descent in colonial Australia.
Simon Cleary, Everything is water (June, UQP): eco-literature
Anne Coombs, Our familiars: The meaning of animals in our lives (August, Upswell): “meditation on the awe-inspiring responsibility we take on with other living creatures”
Helen Garner, untitled nonfiction (July, Text): inspired by time spent with a grandson’s football team
Amy McQuire, Black witness: The power of Indigenous media (June, UQP)
Jasmin McGaughey and The Poets Voice (ed.), Words to sing the world alive (November, UQP): “leading writers discuss their favourite First Nations words”
Amy Remeikis, The truth about nice (July, Hachette): on “the politics of civility – and its pernicious myths”
Clare Wright, The Yirrkala Bark Petition (October, Text): third in her Democracy trilogy
Poetry
Finally, for poetry lovers, I’ve sussed out a few more than were listed by the two newspapers, but even then haven’t listed them all. Poetry in Australian is flourishing, it seems:
Robert Adamson, Birds and fish: Life on the Hawkesbury (February, Upswell): posthumous
Alison Barton, Not telling (no date, Puncher & Wattmann): First Nations
With the year’s end, we come to annual highlights posts – my reading highlights post which I like to do on December 31, and my blogging highlights one on January 1. I do my Reading Highlights on the last day of the year, so I will have read (even if not reviewed) all the books I’m going to read in the year. I call it “highlights” because, as many of you will know, I don’t do a list of “best” or even, really, “favourite” books. Instead, I try to capture a picture of what my reading year looked like. I also include literary highlights, that is, reading-related activities which enhance my reading interests and knowledge.
Literary highlights
I got to a few literary events over the year, though by no means all I would have liked to. I was disappointed, though, to not get to any of this year’s Sydney Writers Festival: Live and Local events, partly because of my busy-ness but partly because I didn’t realise until too late that our usual venue had changed this year and I couldn’t seem to make the new multiple venues work in with my commitments.
As I’ve said before, I don’t have specific reading goals, just some “rules of thumb”. These include reading women writers, reading more First Nations authors, reading some non-anglo literature, and reducing the TBR pile. In recent years, I haven’t made major inroads into any of these but … here’s the thing …
Last year I foreshadowed that this year could be a tricky one with our major downsizing project (along with regular trips to Melbourne) – and so it turned out to be. Decluttering and preparing our house for sale took until July, with our house being sold in mid-August. This was followed by a long settlement which saw us having to maintain the house and garden until early November. It’s been a truly long haul, but we got there. It’s just as well I love short stories because they are ideal for busy, distracted times, and as it turned out, they ended up forming a much larger percentage of my reading diet this year. And, a goodly proportion of that ended up being stories by First Nations authors. Not only did I read more First Nations authors than usual but I read more diversely I read several First Nations American authors, and I read some First Nations Australian speculative fiction – all in short story form.
Each year I present my highlights a bit differently, choosing approaches that I hope will capture the flavour and breadth my reading year. Here are this year’s observations which I hope might entertain, and maybe even enlighten, you. I start by focusing on works/writers/writing, and end with characters (mostly):
Great finds: A three-way tie between two (older) American works and one (more contemporary) French novel – African-American writer Gwendolyn Brooks’ wonderfully warm but pointed novella Maud Martha; American writer Susan Glaspell’s short story, “A jury of her peers”; and French Nobel prize-winner Patrick Modiano’s novel, Sundays in August.
Dearest to a librarian’s heart: Anthony Doerr’s Cloud cuckoo land made the librarians in my reading group cheer (as would “Special collections” in Rebecca Campbell’s Arboreaility, had they read it. Review to come, but here is Bill’s)
Most surprising speculative fiction: A bit of a misnomer because, almost by definition, speculative fiction is surprising, but the first work I read this year, Ambelin Kwaymullina’s short story, “Fifteen days on Mars“, was not only a great read but surprised me by being my most successful post written this year.
Most mystifying book: JD Vance’s Hillbilly elegy. How can someone with such a story end up aligning with you-know-who?
Truthtellers of the year: Many writers increased my understanding and thinking about First Nations’ issues this year but I’ll share two, First Nations Australian writer Debra Dank in We come with this place, and my (non-Indigenous) brother Ian Terry with his book and exhibition Uninnocent landscapes.
Weirdest voices: I love writers who can pull off writing from unusual or surprising perspectives, and I read two experts this year, both through their short story collections – Carmel Bird’s Love letter to Lola, and Chris Flynn’s Here be Leviathans. I love how these writers can use fresh voices to grapple with meaningful-to-me issues, including but not limited to climate change and the ecology.
Strongest women: There were many women in my reading diet this year who managed to steer a way through the patriarchal societies they found themselves in, but I’ll name three standouts, Briseis in Pat Barker’s retelling The women of Troy, Lucrezia de’ Medici in Maggie O’Farrell’s The marriage portrait, and Elizabeth Zott in Bonnie Garmus’ Lessons in chemistry.
Most challenged mother: Parenting is hard, so who am I to criticise, but patriarchy can make the lives of mothers particularly hard. There were several challenged mothers in my reading this year, such as Frankie’s mother in Rebecca Burton’s Ravenous girls, but the one who struggled most was poor Veda Grey in Edwina Preston’s Bad art mother.
Sweetest man: Most men are decent, and Ned in Robbie Arnott’s Limberlost, is one such, but there were some close runners-up, including Will in Eleanor Limprecht’s The coast.
Most clueless man: Cathal in Claire Keegan’s short story “So late in the day“.
Best neighbours: The quiet women in Susan Glaspell’s above-mentioned story mentioned have to be the winners here, but runners up are the neighbours in Holly Throsby’s Clarke. Gossipy yes, but when the chips are down they are there for you.
Most interesting sportspeople: The Tucson basketballers in Jack D. Forbes’ story “Only approved Indians can play made in USA” showed up their northern opponents by being able to speak their own language, but young pedestrian-cum-jockey, Johnny, in Robert Drewe’s Nimblefoot captured my heart.
Best trees: There is a beautiful old cottonwood tree in Leslie Marmon Silko’s story “The man to send rain clouds“, which took me back to my days America’s southwest, and Tasmania’s gorgeous huon pine features in Robbie Arnott’s Limberlost, but the trees that brought home humanity’s impact on the land won me over – in Ian Terry’s Uninnocent landscapes (colonialism), and Rebecca Campbell’s Arboreality (climate change)
Each of these books … is a door, a gateway to another place and time. (Anthony Doerr, Cloud Cuckoo Land, p. 216)
These are just some of 2023’s highlights in a very strange but, because of that, quite wonderful year of reading … I’m just sorry I can’t list them all.
Some stats …
I don’t read to achieve specific stats but, as I’ve already mentioned, I do have some reading preferences which I like to track. However, this year was so whacky in terms of those preferences, that I’m not even going to bother sharing them, except to reiterate two big positives to come out of the whackiness:
I read more short stories and novellas than usual (and I usually read a good number): over 60% of this year’s reading (as individual stories, collections, anthologies, and linked short stories)
I read more First Nations writers than usual (largely because I read several short stories by First Nations American writers): 30%
Sometimes strange years have silver linings.
Tomorrow, I will post my blogging highlights.
Meanwhile, a huge thanks to all of you who read my posts, engage in discussion, recommend more books and, most importantly, keep me on my toes. Our little community is special, to me! I wish you all an excellent 2024, and thank you so much for hanging in this year.
What were your 2023 reading or literary highlights?
Over recent years, I’ve shared favourite Aussie reads of the year from various sources, with the specific sources varying a little from time to time. This year, a significant source – The Sydney Morning Herald/The Age – is unavailable to me as it is behind a paywall, and at this time of year I just don’t have the time to go to the library to access the paper. I have no problem with paywalling. We should pay for journalism, and I do. Just not these ones. (But, I am disappointed as they invite writers to identify their favourites and I always enjoy seeing their choices. I wish I could just buy an article.)
However, I still have other sources: ABC RN’s panel, Australian Book Review, The Australian Financial Review, The Conversation and Readings bookshop’s Ten Best Australian fiction. The picks range widely, with different “pickers” use different criteria, making this more of a serendipitous than an authoritative list. As always, I’m only including their Aussie choices. Do check the links if you’d like to see complete choices.
Last year, I noted that five of the “favourite” novels and short story collections were on my TBR, and this year I read four of those: Robbie Arnott’s Limberlost, Robert Drewe’s Nimblefoot, Kevin Brophy’s The lion in love, and Chris Flynn’s Here be Leviathans. This must be a record for me.
Novels
Graham Akhurst, Borderland(Heidi Norman; Tony Hughes-D’Aeth; Tony Birch )
Tony Birch, Women and children (“poignant novel about strong women, family, and the loss of innocence…”, Readings; Claire Nicholls; Kate Evans)
Stephanie Bishop, The anniversary (“a tense and superb literary novel”, Readings; “addictive”, Carol Lefevre) (Kimbofo’s review)
Shankari Chandran, Chai time at Cinnamon Gardens (Jason Steger) (on my TBR)
JM Coetzee, The Pole and other stories (Cassie McCullagh; Geordie Williamson)
Trent Dalton, Lola in the mirror(Hannah Wootton)
Briohny Doyle, Why we are here (Tony Birch)
Nicholas Jose, The idealist (“sophisticated and artfully restrained espionage thriller, Tony Hughes-d’Aeth) (Lisa’s review)
Simone Lazaroo, Between water and the night sky (Julienne van Loon)
Amanda Lohrey, The conversation (Felicity Plunkett) (Lisa’s review)
Melissa Lucashenko, Edenglassie (“a tour de force”, Readings; Kate Evans; Jennifer Mills) (on my TBR – see my conversation post)
Laura Jean Mackay, Gunflower (“McKay’s prose both illuminates and psychedelically reimagines our world”, Readings)
Angela O’Keeffe, The sitter (“execution and reading experience are second to none”, Readings) (Lisa’s review)
Matthew Reilly, Mr Einstein’s secretary (Jason Steger)
Sara M Saleh, Songs for the dead and living (Jason Steger)
Gretchen Shirm, The crying room (James Bradley) (Lisa’s review)
Amy Taylor, Search history (“witty and insightful novel of our times”, Readings) (Kimbofo’s review)
Lucy Treloar, Days of innocence and wonder (Kate Evans)
Christos Tsiolkas, The in-between (changed her mind about the author, Beejay Silcox; “captivating novel by a writer in top form which has already won over new readers and old fans alike”, Readings; Jason Steger; Kate Evans) (Kimbofo’s review)
Pip Williams, The bookbinder of Jericho (Readings; Jason Steger) (Lisa’s review)
Charlotte Wood, Stone yard devotional (Kate Evans; “the haunting grammar of its title, the restrained artistry of its structure, and the elusive way that it explores modes of memory, grief, and regret”, Kerryn Goldsworthy; James Bradley) (Lisa’s review)
Alexis Wright, Praiseworthy (Tony Hughes-d’Aeth; “resists political simplifications”, Paul Giles; Philip Mead; “magnificent work of politics and imagination”, Jennifer Mills; “epic, addled, visionary examination of the contemporary implications of those foundational crimes”, Geordie Williamson) (Bill’s second post which includes a link to his first)
Jessica Zhan Mei Yu, But the girl(“astute and witty coming-of-age novel”, Readings)
In a little shout out to our friends across the ditch – in new Zealand: Eleanor Catton’s Birnam Wood was chosen by AFR’s Hannah Wootton and ABC’s Claire Nicholls, and Pip Adams’ Audition by ABR’s Jennifer Mills and Emma Shortis.
Short stories
John Morrissey, Firelight(“already widely considered the first instalment in a [First Nations] career to watch”, Readings)
Poetry
Dan Hogan, Secret third thing (“a wildly inventive wordsmith whose work is as playful as it is political”, Yves Rees)
Kathryn Lomer, AfterLife (Glyn Davis)
Alan Wearne, Near believing (John Hawke)
Nonfiction
Dean Ashenden, Telling Tennant’s story (Peter Mares)
Ryan Cropp, Donald Horne: A life in the lucky country (Patrick Mullins; Glyn Davis; Mark McKenna)
Graeme Davison, My Grandfather’s Clock: Four centuries of a British-Australian family (Bain Attwood; Penny Russell)
Sarah Firth, Eventually everything connects: Eight essays on uncertainty (Jen Webb)
Hannah Forsyth, Virtue capitalists: The rise and fall of the professional class in the Anglophone world, 1870–2008(Penny Russell; Marilyn Lake)
Kate Fullagar, Bennelong & Phillip: A history unravelled (“an inventive structure and humanistic care”, Patrick Mullins; Frank Bongiorno; Mark McKenna)
Anna Funder, Wifedom (Jason Steger; Lisa Murray; Frances Wilson) (on my TBR)
Richard Flanagan, Question 7 (Claire Nicholls; Jason Steger; Cassie McCullagh; “meditation on the mutability of family, place, the past, is imbued with wistful nostalgia, one that resonates deeply”, Des Cowley) (on my TBR)
Richard King, Here Be Monsters: Is technology reducing our humanity?(James Ley)
Catherine Lumby, Frank Moorhouse: A life (Glyn Davis; Mark McKenna) (Lisa’s review)
Maggie MacKellar, Graft: Motherhood, family and a year on the land (Anna Clark)
Kim Mahood, Wandering with intent (Peter Mares)
David Marr, Killing for country: A family story (Geordie Williamson; Frank Bongiorno; Glyn Davis; Kieran Pender; Brenda Walker; Mark McKenna)
Walter Marsh, Young Rupert: The making of the Murdoch empire(Patrick Mullins)
Thomas Mayo, The Voice to Parliament handbook (Glyn Davis)
Gemma Nisbet, The things we livewith: Essays on uncertainty (Lynette Russell)
Brigitta Olubas, Shirley Hazzard: A writing life (“one of the finest literary biographies published in Australia”, Peter Rose)
Noah Riseman, Transgender Australia: A history since 1900 (Yves Rees)
Alexandra Roginski, Science and power in the nineteenth-century Tasman world: Popular phrenology in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand (“rich, enthralling account”, Penny Russell)
Heather Rose, Nothing bad ever happens here (Tristan Banck) (on my TBR – see my conversation post)
Alecia Simmonds, Courting: An intimate history of love and the law (“uniting zest for narrative with immense research and hard-hitting analysis”, Penny Russell)
Ellen van Neerven, Personal score: Sport, culture, identity (“unique, poetic memoir and meditation on gender, sexuality, identity, and sport”, Kieran Pender)
Chris Wallace, Political lives (Tom McIlroy)
Sally Young, Media monsters: The transformation of Australia’s newspaper empires (Frank Bongiorno)
Finally …
It’s interesting to see what books feature most. Popularity doesn’t equal quality, but it does provides a guide to the books that attracted the most attention in the year. Last year I noted that one of 2021’s most frequent mentions had won the 2022 Miles Franklin. In 2022, the two most frequently mentioned books were Robbie Arnott’s Limberlost and Jessica Au’s Cold enough for snow. Neither won the Miles Franklin, but both won significant awards during 2023 including the Prime Minister’s (Fiction) Literary Award for Jessica Au.
This year’s most mentioned books are fewer this year because that paywall issue significantly reduced significantly my “haul” but we still have some (and all are well-established authors):
Fiction
Alexis Wright’s Praiseworthy (5 picks)
Christos Tsiolkas’ The in-between (4 picks)
Graham Akhurst’s Borderland, Tony Birch’s Women and children, Melissa Lucashenko’s Edenglassie, and Charlotte Wood’s Stone yard devotional (3 picks)
Nonfiction
Did you notice two books in this section were subtitled, “essays on uncertainty”? I’m intrigued.
David Marr’s Killing for country (6 picks)
Richard Flanagan’s Question 7 (4 picks)
Ryan Cropp’s Donald Horne, Kate Fullagar’s Bennelong & Phillip, and Anna Funder’s Wifedom (3 picks)
An advantage of lists like this is discovering new books. I was excited to read about First Nations Kalkadoon writer John Morrissey’s Firelight, because it’s short stories and because the Kalkadoons were the first First Nations people I knew (back in the 1960s). Gemma Nisbet’s The things we livewith: Essays on uncertainty has also caught my eye.
Besides the books which are already on my TBR, and hence known to me, there are others I had heard about and that interest me. David Marr’s Killing for country feels a bit close to home, but worth reading, as I too have “skin in the game”, as my brother calls it. The literary biographies I missed this year, including Olubas’s Shirley Hazzard and Lumby’s Frank Moorhouse, are also in my sights. And there are several First Nations books here, besides the Morrissey and Lucashenko, that I am keen to read. Birch and Ellen van Neerven, for example.
I could go on because, you know, readers love talking about books we’d like to read, but I also know when it’s time to stop and pass the baton on …
POSTSCRIPT: The day I posted this The Guardian Australia, as kimbofo shared in the comments, published their Top 25, which more or less reinforces these but adds some books not here, including one I’ve read, Rebecca Burton’s Ravenous girls (my review)!
Thoughts, anyone – on this or lists from your neck of the wood?
As I’ve done for a few years now, I am sharing my reading group’s top picks of 2022. This is, after all, the season of lists, but also, I know that some people, besides me, enjoy hearing about other reading groups.
I’ll start, though, by sharing what we read in the order we read them (with links on titles to my reviews):
This year’s schedule was reasonably diverse but with some differences from last year. Our overriding interest is Australian women writers, but not exclusively. And, in fact, this year we read fewer Australian women than is often the case, just Preston, Dank, Au and Throsby. We also, somehow, didn’t read a classic which we try to do each year. However, like last year, we read a translated novel (from France) and a First Nations work. We read five non-Australian books, same as last year; one work of nonfiction (versus two last year); and four by male authors (one more than last year). The status and condition of women’s lives featured particularly strongly in this year’s fiction – with Maggie O’Farrell, Bonnie Gamus, Edwina Preston, Pat Barker and Holly Throsby putting the challenges women face front and centre.
The winners …
This year all of our twelve active members voted, meaning the maximum a book could get was 12 votes, and that there were 36 votes all up. The rules were the same. We had to name our three favourite works, and all were given equal weighting. This year like two of the last three years, we had a runaway winner, with second and third spots being close:
The marriage portrait by Maggie O’Farrell (8 votes)
Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr and Limberlost by Robbie Arnott (5 votes each)
Lessons in chemistry by Bonnie Garmus and We come with this place by Debra Dank (4 votes each)
Very creditable highly commendeds, sharing three votes each were Bad art mother by Edwina Preston and Jessica Au’s Cold enough for snow.
As for my three picks, I’ll start by saying that I found it really tough, though I managed to identify six reasonably easily. Those six were the books by Doerr, Arnott, Preston, Dank, Au and Modiano. No, not O’Farrell, much as I also enjoyed that book. It’s been a very good year. My final three were Robbie Arnott’s Limberlost, Debra Dank’s We come with this place, and Patrick Modiano’s Sundays in August.
At the big reveal last night, some in the group asked me why The marriage portrait wasn’t in my list of tops. I said, off-hand, that it was because it was “just historical fiction”, but that’s not exactly it. As I quickly qualified, I didn’t mean by this that it is typical genre historical fiction, because it’s not, though it does have elements of the historical romance trajectory. No, it’s because it wears its heart on its sleeve. You may not know exactly how it’s going to end, but you know pretty much from the start what it’s about, what the author’s intentions are. I enjoyed it immensely. It’s an engrossing and moving read, but the fiction that earns top billing for me is fiction that has me wondering from the start what it’s all about, fiction that through language, tone, and/or structure challenges my brain to engage with the author and go on a journey with them. Modiano’s and Au’s books, in particular, were like this. This sort of writing can be nerve-wracking because I can worry I’m missing the point. But, it’s the sort of writing that excites me.
[In the end I narrowed my choices down to Arnott because his ability to convey with such brevity a full, complex, oh-so human life was breathtaking; to Dank because among other things her generous truth-telling has helped me better articulate, to myself and to others, my understanding of First Nations connection to country; to Modiano, because, well, I’ve explained that already.]
Selected comments
Not everyone included comments with their picks, and not all books received comments, but here is some of what members said about the top picks:
The marriage portrait: Commenters used descriptions like “lush”, “descriptive”, and mentioned the relevance of its themes, particularly regarding the vulnerability of young women.
Cloud Cuckoo Land: Comments included “intelligent”, “immersive”, “huge in scope”, “fabulous for its sweep”, “complex”, with a couple enjoying how Doerr created connections between the stories and different eras.
Limberlost: Commenters mentioned the quality of its writing, and its evocation of the Tasmanian landscape.
Lessons in chemistry: A dog lover in the group loved the dog Six Thirty’s role, and the humour.
We come with this place: Commenters loved the generosity of its truth-telling, its explanation of the relationship between story and place to understand country, and found it “deeply moving”.
And, a bonus again
Since 2019, a good friend (from my library school days over 45 years ago (and who lives just outside Canberra) sent me her reading group’s schedule for the year (in the order they read them):
My focus here, though, is another activity of theirs, their Prime Minister’s Summer Reading List, which they have published annually since 2009. This list, as they wrote on the inaugural 2009 list, comprises “books and articles that the Prime Minister, or any Australian interested in public debate, will find both stimulating and cracking good reads”.
As I wrote in last year’s post, the Institute’s then chief executive, Danielle Wood, said they aimed
to pick books that have something interesting, original, or thought-provoking to say on issues that are relevant to the Australian policy landscape. The books don’t have to be by local writers or about Australia … but they do have to address issues that have relevance in an Australian policy context.
I managed to read, after the event, two of last year’s list, Debra Dank’s We come with this place (my review) and Jessica Au’s Cold enough for snow (my review). Dank’s is an obvious choice, but I love they they also chose something quietly, and perhaps even enigmatically, reflective about life and change in Au’s book.
Here is the 2023 list in their order, with a small excerpt from their reasoning:
Anna Funder, Wifedom: Mrs Orwell’s invisible life (on my reading group’s 2024 schedule, Brona’s review): “People don’t become invisible by accident … a powerful case study of the hidden lives of wives whose contributions are downplayed or entirely disregarded”
Ellen van Neerven, Personal score: “highlights the disproportionate impact of a changing climate on Indigenous people, the importance to Aboriginal health of story and being heard, and the complexity of gender and belonging, on and off the field. A new and transformative piece of sports writing … an essential read for anyone wanting to better understand sport, community, and power on sovereign land”.
Mark Considine, The careless state: Reforming Australia’s social services: “Australia’s social services are doing a bad job of looking after people … impressively summarises the problems, explains how we got here, and shows that what may seem like separate problems have many shared roots”.
Micheline Lee, Lifeboat: Disability, humanity, and the NDIS (Quarterly Essay 91, September 23): “describes how the NDIS’s disempowering, confusing, and bureaucratic processes have worn out the trust of people with disability and their families … [yet] there is a warming tone of optimism running through Lee’s analysis”.
Jennifer Pahlka, Recoding America: Why government is failing in the digital age and how we can do better: “Technology is the front door to many government services … But too often, the design of online services is an afterthought, and users are left to grapple with lengthy, confusing, and duplicative processes … [and] bad design can entrench inequalities … “a compelling call to arms for better design and delivery of government services”.
Henry Dimbleby and Jemima Lewis, Ravenous: How to get ourselves and our planet into shape: “explores the complex machinations of modern food systems … details how our food choices are influenced by the industries that make our food, and the environment that surrounds us … shows how our decisions about what foods to put in our shopping baskets are subtly but constantly influenced by a vast food system. The consequences are rarely good for us, our health, or our planet”.
So, one biography, one part memoir-history-poetry, an essay, and three specific-issue-focused non-fiction works, with four by Australians, one by an American, and one from the UK. It’s good to see a First Nations author here again, and to see important issues – like disability, the challenges of the digital age, and modern food systems – front and centre in the Institute’s thinking.
I would, of course, love to see a greater recognition of the value of fiction to addressing “issues that have relevance in the Australian policy context”. Fiction has been included in the past, but not often. I wrote a little about some of their choices last year. We don’t know whether the relevant prime minister reads the suggestions, but some thoughtful or provocative fiction might be better summer reading for our poor top politician needing some break?
I could suggest Chris Flynn’s short story collection, Here be Leviathans (my review), and Carmel Bird’s Love letter to Lola (my review), to fill that bill. Short stories are perfect for busy people, and these two collections are entertaining but also offer some real meat in terms of thinking about various issues confronting humanity, including the environment and environmental destruction. Also Tony Burke made a good point about Paddy O’Reilly’s Other houses (Lisa’s review) which was shortlisted for this year’s Prime Minister’s literary awards and which is about a group of people we rarely read about, cleaners. Surely a book about the working life, that is, the battlers, the people whom journalists and politicians this year have constantly pointed out are “doing it tough”. Fiction about such lives would be perfect for our PM.
This last week I have become aware, via two different paths, of the Henry Mayer Book Prize. I feel I’ve seen it referenced before, but it hasn’t fully registered. I certainly haven’t written about it before, so, now’s the time.
I’ll start by introducing the person for whom the prize is named, Henry Mayer (1919-1991). He has a well-detailed entry in the Australian Dictionary of Biography, but in a nutshell, he was – surprise, surprise – a professor of politics. German-born, he moved with his father to Nice, France, in 1934 after Hitler had become Chancellor in 1933. From there he went to Switzerland, and thence England, where, after the war started, he was identified as an “enemy alien”. He was among the group of over 2,500 enemy aliens transported on the infamous Dunera from Liverpool to Australia, became an academic, and was a foundation member of the Australasian Political Studies Association (APSA). ADB characterises him as having “wide reading, love of argument, and disdain for sacred cows”.
Now, to the award. Offered by APSA, the Henry Mayer Book Prize is a biennial prize is for “the best book on Australian politics (including political history) published during the previous two years”. It is funded by income generated by the APSA endowment established, in 2009, by the Henry Mayer Trust. The prize is $1000.
To add a little more detail to the criteria, the current website for the prize (linked above) says that book can be “published by a university or commercial publisher (in Australia or overseas)” and that preference is “given to a monograph that focuses on one or more of Mayer’s special interests: the media, political parties or Indigenous affairs”.
The prize, says the same website, judges by a panel which is chaired by a member of the APSA Executive, and will “consist of at least three judges (including the chair), of which at least one will be a woman”. (Interestingly, there’s no similar qualification that “at least one will be a man”. That rather presumes that male judges are a given?)
The reason this prize came to my attention this week was because:
On Tuesday, I attended the second Rod Wallace Memorial Lecture, held by the Friends of the National Film and Sound Archive. Our lecturer was Jenny Hocking, whose book, The Palace letters: The Queen, the Governor-General and the plot to dismiss Whitlam, was highly commended for the 2021 award.
On Friday, I attended the announcement of the 2023 ACT Book of the Year Award (my post), and the winning book, Frank Bongiorno’s Dreamers and schemers: A political history of Australia, also won the 2023 Henry Mayer Book Prize.
I love it when serendipity strikes like this.
Henry Mayer Book Prize winners to date
2023: Frank Bongiorno, Dreamers and schemers: A political history of Australia, Black Inc, 2022.
2021: Sally Young, Paper emperors: The rise of Australia’s newspaper empires, UNSW Press, 2019.
2019: Paul Strangio, Paul ‘T Hart & James Walter, The pivot of power: Australian Prime Ministers and political leadership, 1949–2016, Melbourne University Press, 2017.
2017: Sarah Ferguson and Patricia Drum, The killing season uncut, Melbourne University Press, 2016.
2015: Stephen Mills, The professionals: Strategy, money and the rise of the political campaigner in Australia, Black Inc, 2014.
2013: Paul Strangio, Neither power nor glory: 100 years of political Labor in Victoria, 1856 – 1956, Melbourne University Press, 2012.
2011: James Walter, What were they thinking? The politics of ideas in Australia, UNSW Press, 2010.
2009: Sarah Maddison, Black politics: Inside the complexity of Aboriginal political culture, Allen & Unwin, 2008 AND David McKnight, Beyond Right and Left: New politics and the Culture Wars, Allen & Unwin, 2007.
Since 2016, the prize has been alternated with the Crisp Prize, which is offered for a similar topic but with a different qualification -“the best scholarly book on political science by an early or mid-career researcher“, which they define as someone who has graduated with a PhD within the previous 10 years.
How many more specialist book awards are there out there?
Whispering Gums 