I started my recent post on Shelley Burr's crime novel Ripper with a statement that crime novels are often written in series and that I am not a big series fan. Ripper looked at the start to be a standalone novel, but a few chapters in the protagonist from her first novel Wake appears. From … Continue reading Monday musings on Australian literature: Series or standalone?
Genre fiction
Monday musings on Australian literature: Genre Worlds
While reading the GenreCon 2017 twitter feed, which resulted in last week's Monday Musings, I came across the twitter handle @PopFicDoctors. Intrigued, I checked them out and discovered they are behind a research project and manage the website Genre Worlds: Australian Popular Fiction in the Twenty-first Century. The project is being funded by an ARC … Continue reading Monday musings on Australian literature: Genre Worlds
Angela Meyer (ed), The great unknown (Review)
The great unknown is a mind-bending collection of short stories which explores, as editor Angela Meyer says, "the unknown, the mysterious, or even just the slightly off." I was, in fact, expecting more horror, thriller even, which are genres that don't really interest me, but this collection is not that. There are some truly scary scenes … Continue reading Angela Meyer (ed), The great unknown (Review)
Monday musings on Australian literature: GenreCon
I returned from seven weeks of gallivanting abroad to several emails* about something called GenreCon, which will take place next week from October 11 to 13 at the State Library of Queensland. I hadn't heard of this before, which is probably not surprising as it seems to be a new event. As you've probably guessed … Continue reading Monday musings on Australian literature: GenreCon
What is literary fiction? A personal manifesto!
I was pottering around the Internet last night, as you do, and found myself on a State Library of Victoria page titled Novels: Finding Literary Reviews and Criticism - and there I saw this definition of Literary Novel: Literary fiction focuses on the subjects of the narrative to create introspective, in-depth studies of complex characters. … Continue reading What is literary fiction? A personal manifesto!
Whispering Gums 