Wednesday, 18 July 2012

Crime 2012 releases: What's being reviewed?

Last weekend the tally of reviews for newly released literary works was posted on this blog, and the question was posed whether "genre" books should have been included. The response from speculative fiction authors on Twitter was a resounding, "Yes!" Of course "genre" books should be included.
But which genres? And what do we mean by "literary" anyway?

The question is timely because, as author P.A. O'Reilly tweeted yesterday, new prizes - including  The Stella Prize - are more open to "judging the work, not the 'genre'." So how do we identify the literary?
 
According to O'Reilly, literary books "reward a second reading with another layer of meaning". Author Claire Corbett goes further: "A literary book doesn't give you what you demand but what you never knew you wanted." Quality writing has subtext, according to Corbett, including non-fiction; too much writing has no subtext, she says, because such craft takes time.

Is it all a matter of craft and layers of meaning? Or are some genres more likely to be considered literary than others?

Clearly some Speculative Fiction titles have no trouble attracting the attention of major literary awards - Corbett's 2011 release, When We Have Wings, for one, was shortlisted for the Barbara Jefferis award, while Meg Mundell's Black Glass was Highly Commended by the judges of the same award.

But what of other genres, such as crime?

When crime writer Peter Temple won the 2010 Miles Franklin Award for his crime novel Truth, an expectation was set up that well-crafted crime novels would attract the attention of literary judges. Last year's inclusion of Kirsten Tranter's psychological suspense novel, The Legacy, and this year's inclusion of Virginia Duigan's The Precipice on the Miles Franklin longlists appear to support this view. Yet PM Newton's 2010 - in my opinion, equally brilliant - The Old School, didn't make the grade. Was it perhaps - being a detective novel - considered too generic?

Which crime novels released in 2012 - including detective, paranormal, YA, historical fiction, crime-romance and nonfiction titles - deserve to be considered "literary" in your view? 

Crime: 2012 releases

The following books released in 2012* and reviewed for the AWW challenge between January and June this year have been divided into subgenres:
  • general/thriller/psychological suspense
  • historical fiction 
  • crime/romance (sometimes referred to as "romantic suspense")
  • crime/paranormal
  • YA/Children's and 
  • True Crime.
*Disclaimer: The release dates on publishers' website don't always accurately reflect the year when the book was first published. If there are any errors, please let me know. EL


Tally: 18 books, 25 reviewers, 43 reviews, 10 publishers.

Publishers: Penguin: 4 books, 10 reviews; Random House: 3 book 7 reviews; ClanDestine Press: 3 books, 3 reviews; HarperCollins: 2 books, 5 reviews; Hachette: 1 book 6 reviews; Pan MacMillan: 1 book, 4 reviews; Pantera Press: 1 book, 3 reviews; Black Opal: 1 book, 1 review; EgmontUSA: 1 book, 1 review; Walker Books: 1 book, 1 review.

General/Thriller/Psychological Suspense

Historical Fiction
Romance
Paranormal
YA/Children's

True Crime

Short Stories
~ ~ ~

Guest author reviews

Of the above authors, Jaye Ford, Katherine Howell, YA Erskine and Helene Young have all reviewed for the challenge (that's why the covers of their recent releases are featured here).

Helene has written multiple reviews, including:
Do you think any of the above books deserves to be regarded as "literary"? Do you know of any other crime books released this year that haven't been reviewed for the challenge so far?

Other crime titles (some not reviewed during January-June period of tally):
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Saturday, 14 July 2012

Literary works 2012 - what's being reviewed?

What contribution has the AWW challenge made to the reviewing books of literary merit published recently by women writers in Australia?

2012 releases(links to reviews/reviewers posted between January and June on second line)
Tally: 8 books reviewed, 17 reviewers, 23 reviews, 6 publishers

Publishers: Random House: 2 books, 7 reviews; HarperCollins: 1 book, 6 reviews; Pan Macmillan: 1 book, 3 reviews; Allen & Unwin: 1 book, 2 reviews; Text: 1 book, 1 review; UQP: 1 book, 1 review; Spinifex Press: 1 book, 1 review.

The above books were defined as "literary", either by their reviewers or the publishers.

How do you define the term "literary"? Should nonfiction books of literary merit be included, such as Jane Gleeson-White's creative nonfiction history, Double Entry: How the merchants of Venice created modern finance?

Published by Allen & Unwin; reviewed for AWW by historian Yvonne Perkins.

Or True North, by Brenda Niall (Text 2012), the story of Mary and Elizabeth Durack, also reviewed by Yvonne Perkins?

How about Speculative Fiction books like Margo Lanagan's Seahearts and Kate Forsyth's Historical Speculative Fiction novel for adults, Bittergreens - should these be included under the label of "literary"? (If the latter are included, the tally of reviews increases considerably: Lanagan: 9 reviews; Forsyth: 7.)
Are there other - broadened defined - "literary" books by Australian women published in 2012 that aren't on the above list?

Added suggestions via comments and Twitter:
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Thursday, 5 July 2012

Are we letting them down? Indigenous women writers

To coincide with NAIDOC Week, ANZ Lit-Lovers blog is hosting Indigenous Literature Week. This post is the Australian Women Writers Challenge contribution.

Swallow The AirThis year's NAIDOC theme is "They dared to challenge: Spirit of the Tent Embassy: 40 years on." The theme "celebrates the champions who lived to renew the spirit of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples through the establishment of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in 1972. Forty years ago, the embassy became a powerful symbol of unity. Its founders instilled pride, advanced equality and educated the country on the rights of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. To move forward, we must acknowledge our forbearers, learn from their experiences and ask ourselves… what have their sacrifices meant for me and my family today?" (From NAIDOC Week website)

The sacrifice and struggles of generations of Indigenous activist have helped to create a growing community of Indigenous writers, including many talented women. But are these women achieving the recognition they, and their communities, deserve?

In January, an unpublished Indigenous writer from Katoomba, NSW, helped to launch the Australian Women Writers 2012 Challenge. On Australia Day the AWW blog celebrated by publishing an essay by Dr June Perkins on Indigenous Australian women's writing. Now that the challenge has reached the halfway point, it's a good time to assess whether it is helping to raise the profile of Indigenous Australian women writers.

This week, I went back over all the reviews that have been posted for the challenge and added a label of the genre to the Mr Linky box entries. I hesitated when I came across a book by an Indigenous author. Should I put "Indig" next to the link? Or would such labelling ghettoise these writers, when the strength of their writing and the interest generated by their chosen subject should be enough to attract attention? (It's the same question I faced when mounting a challenge dedicated to championing women writers.) Also, what if I missed a particular author who may identify as Indigenous but whose background is not known to me or made obvious in the review?

In the end, I didn't add the extra label: the 80-character limit for Mr Linky entries decided the issue. Instead, as a contribution to Indigenous Literature Week, I've listed below as many links to reviews of books by Indigenous writers that I recognised. (If I've missed any, please let me know and I'll add them.) From this list, we can judge how the challenge has fared so far in addressing the issue of recognising and promoting work by Indigenous women.

The result?

Books by Indigenous women reviewed for AWW challenge Jan-Jun, 2012 (alphabetical):
* Inadvertently left off original post.
Collected:

Southerly 71:2 (Literary Journal) Reviewed by Phillip A. Ellis: Special issue for Indigenous Writers

To put these results in perspective: so far, of over 900 reviews, only eight ten books by Indigenous/Aboriginal Australian women have been reviewed for the AWW challenge, representing the work of only five seven authors. Among 366 participants signed up for the challenge, only 10 12 reviewers have chosen to review work by Indigenous writers. Of these reviewers, at least two are non-Australian, M D Brady (US) and Ann-Marie (Sweden). Of the 13 15 reviews listed above, six were written by these two non-Australian bloggers.

Why so few reviews of books by Indigenous women?

In her Australia Day post, Dr June Perkins discussed a number of prominent Indigenous Australian women writers (read more here). At the end of Dr Perkins' essay was a list of Dr Anita Heiss selected "top 10" reads. They were:
    Butterfly Song
  1. Butterfly Song by Terri Janke (2005) ~ Young Adult
  2. Bitin’ Back by Vivienne Cleven (2001) ~ Contemporary/Humour
  3. Too Flash by Melissa Lucashenko (2002)
  4. Carpentaria by Alexis Wright ~ Literary
  5. Swallow The Air by Tara June Winch (2006)
  6. Every Secret Thing by Marie Munkara (2009) ~ Contemporary
  7. Purple Threads by Jeanine Leane (2011) ~ Short Stories
  8. Watershed by Fabienne Bayet-Charlton (2005)
  9. Legacy by Larissa Behrendt (2009) ~ Contemporary
  10. The Boundary by Nicole Watson (2011) ~ Crime
Of these, only Miles Franklin award-winner, Alexis Wright, and Dr Heiss herself have had books reviewed for the challenge.

What about the others?

One possibility for the lack of reviews is the date of release. At a cursory glance, many of the books reviewed for the challenge appear to be new releases, reviewed by established book bloggers. (This, incidentally, begs the question as to whether these books would have been reviewed in any case, with or without the challenge, but that's for another day.) Perhaps there has been a scarcity of books published by Indigenous women this year? Participants in the challenge might already have reviewed some of the above books in previous years (e.g. Whispering Gums' March 2011 review of Marie Mukara's Every Secret Thing and review of Carpentaria). Without further research along these lines, it's difficult to say.

Another possibility is that the preference for popular or "genre" books exhibited by challenge participants - something the list of "genre" alongside the books reviewed has helped to identify - may be working against Indigenous authors. There could be a perception that Indigenous women writers, apart from Dr Heiss, don't write "popular"-style books. If so, is this perception justified? At least a couple of books challenge such a view. As an avid reader of crime, I've long been looking forward to reading Nicole Watson's The Boundary, which I've heard is a great read. (If the library queue doesn't shorten soon, I might have to buy myself a copy.) So why has Watson's book not received the attention of other 2011 releases such as, say, debut author PM Newton's The Old School (reviewed five times) or Sulari Gentill's A Few Right Thinking Men (twice) or any number of novels by Kerry Greenwood (eleven reviews)?

Could we be letting our Indigenous women writers down? If so, there's time to rectify the matter. The challenge has another six months to run.

BitinAs a start, if you have read or reviewed any book by an Indigenous Australian woman - even if it wasn't read for the AWW challenge - perhaps you could leave a comment below? Or if you can recommend any books not listed here, please do. (I'd love to know if any Indigenous authors are writing Fantasy, SciFi or Speculative Fiction.) Alternatively, please join Lisa Hill and others at ANZ LitLovers blog for Indigenous Literature Week, even if it's only to read and comment on their reviews.

If you do decide to read an Indigenous author and the above books don't appeal, check out Anita Heiss's 100 Black Books Challenge, or Yvonne Perkins' compilation of Indigenous Australian Histories and Biographies for inspiration.

Let's add another dimension to the challenge and see whether, by the end of 2012, all the books above have at least one review.

 

From comments:
Readers' recommendations:
Don't Take Your Love to Town - Ruby Langford Ginibi (Memoir)
Interrogation of Ashala Wolf - Ambelin Kwaymullina (Book 1 of SF/Psych Thriller series)
Is that You, Ruthie? - Ruth Hegarty (Memoir)
Am I Black Enough For You? - Anita Heiss (Memoir) 
Black Chicks Talking - Leah Purcell (reviewed by Heidi Reads) 
Grace Beside Me - Sue McPherson (reviewed by Emma) Debut YA novel

Other finds:
An Aboriginal Mother Tells of the Old (Penguin 1984) - Elsie Roughsey; edited by Paul Memmott and Robyn Horsman 

More reviews:
Every Secret Thing - Marie Munkara (Heidi Reads) 
Bitin' Back - Vivienne Cleven (Heidi Reads)
Skin Painting - Elizabeth Hodgson (Heidi Reads) ~ "Poetry as memoir"
Swallow the Air - Tara June Winch (Heidi Reads)
Love Poems and other Revolutionary Actions - Bobbi (Roberta) Sykes (Heidi Reads)
My Bundjalung People by Ruby Langford Ginibi (reviewed by M D Brady) 





Other authors:
Fiona Doyle
If you're a GoodReads user, you can find a list of the above books on a special GoodReads AWW challenge group page (care of Shelleyrae of Book'd Out blog).
 


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Saturday, 30 June 2012

"Strong female personalities": Poet's Cottage by Josephine Pennicott


After a long break battling a computer virus and unreliable internet connections, this blog is finally able to post another review. Today's guest blogger is novelist Elisabeth Storrs. She chose to review Josephine Pennicott's Poet's Cottage. 

Elisabeth Storrs writes:

If you ever have doubts as to whether ghosts exist, then you should visit Tasmania. With its convict and colonial past there are buildings a plenty where phantoms reside. Poet’s Cottage by Josephine Pennicott is set in one such haunted dwelling - a house whose walls hide the clues to solving a crime committed decades ago.
Sadie and her daughter, Betty, leave Sydney for the small seaside village of Pencubbitt in Tasmania. Sadie has inherited Poet’s Cottage where her grandmother, Pearl Tatlow, was brutally murdered in 1936. Pearl was a ‘free spirit’ whose bohemian behaviour constantly challenged the morals and sensitivities of her neighbours. Acclaimed as an author of children’s books whose characters themselves have dark undertones, Pearl was charismatic, promiscuous, vicious and on the verge of madness.
The novel swings between the current day and the year of the murder. Sadie leaves behind the trauma of a divorce and the recent death of her mother, Marguerite, to write a book about her famous ancestor. Soon she is trying to uncover both the mystery of Pearl’s character and her demise. Sadie’s views are coloured by the fondness of Marguerite’s memories for her mother while Thomasina, Pearl’s other daughter, tells a different story of physical and mental abuse. Sadie learns more about the circumstances leading up to her grandmother’s death through a manuscript written by Birdie, one of Pearl’s friends. However the reliability of this account is thrown into question given Birdie’s relationship with Pearl’s husband.  
Poet’s Cottage is a story with strong female personalities but the house itself has its own character too. Its aspect is charming but a visceral foreboding pervades it which gives the story a gothic feel. At times I found the accumulation of ghost stories concerning both the house and the village to be overplayed, particularly when coupled with the presence of a sinister cloaked woman. Pennicott is skilful, though, in drawing the reader through the maze of various versions of Pearl while building up the undeniable presence of the dead woman’s spirit as the threads of the mystery are unravelled.
There is another spectre that looms over Sadie and Betty – that of insanity. Birdie tells how the temperamental Pearl’s mood would swing between elation, obsessiveness and despair. There is also evidence of a deeper history of mental illness in the family. While Pennicott hints of this legacy, she never fully develops Sadie’s fear that she might not only have inherited Pearl’s beauty and writing talent, but also her madness. Nor does she fully explore Sadie's apprehension that seeds of instability might have been sewn in her teenage daughter as well. And while Thomasina’s tortured childhood is vividly depicted, I would have liked to know a little more about Marguerite, the favoured child.
Poet’s Cottage is an accomplished, engrossing novel with fine language and powerful descriptions of the small town inhabitants of Pencubbit in both past and modern times. Most of all, in creating the damaged and damaging Pearl, the author has created a character so compelling and complex that the image of her lingers just as surely as the strains of music from her gramophone drifted through Poet’s Cottage both before and after her death.

Details: 
Publisher: Pan Macmillan Australia
Released: 20 March 2012
ISBN: 9781743345535

Currently available for the following AWW participating ebook stores for $14.99: Avid Reader, Readings
 
Elisabeth Storrs is the author of The Wedding Shroud, the first book in a trilogy set in early Roman times. She was inspired to write the novel after seeing a C6th BCE sarcophagus depicting a man and wife in a tender embrace. Discovering the story behind the couple led her to the mystical Etruscan civilisation and the inspiration for her story.

Elisabeth lives in Sydney with her husband and two sons. She blogs at http://elisabethstorrs.blogspot.com.au/.

The Wedding Shroud was published in Australia/NZ by Murdoch Books and is available as an ebook worldwide, including at the following AWW participating e-bookstores (currently listed for $9.99): Pages and Pages Booksellers, Shearers, The Book Shuttle, Fosters Little Bookshop, Abbeys, Better Read Than Dead, The Avid Reader, Readings, Australian Online Bookshop. The sequel is due to be published in 2012/13.
 
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Thursday, 31 May 2012

Creative nonfiction - Ashley Hay's Gum: The Story of Eucalypts & their Champions

One of the few male participants in the AWW challenge, Mark Web, yesterday posted an interesting blog about his participation in the challenge. In his post, "In which I become less impressed with my AWWC achievements", Mark notes that, while completing the challenge and achieving his goal of reading and reviewing ten books by women, he gained the impression that he was reading a majority of women writers this year, but his actual tally for reading came out at, roughly, 50/50. His experience demonstrates just how insidious and tenacious unconscious gender bias can be.

As part of my task hosting the AWW challenge, I have approached numerous men of my acquaintance over the past six months or more, including a current editor of a kids literary magazine, a high school English teacher, an ex-book seller, the owner of a writing school, a journalist and a psychologist, a geologist and an ex-judge. Of these, only the latter two expressed any interest in reading and reviewing a book written by a woman for this blog; both, it may be significant to add, are retired and have elected to review nonfiction. The others all had good excuses, none of which, they claimed, had anything to do with gender bias. One did say, though, quite unselfconsciously, that he just wasn't that interested in books written by women.

Today's guest reviewer is author Dr John Martyn. He has elected to review Ashley Hay's 2002 nonfiction title, Gum: The Story of Eucalypts and Their Champions (Duffy & Snellgrove, 2002).

Martyn writes:
 
GumThis highly readable book ought to become a classic. While its core theme is the eucalyptus tree in all its diverse forms, more-especially it's about the people who explored, studied, named, championed, painted and caricatured Eucalyptus and its sister genera, and it even extends to those who propagated and sold the trees in Australia and spread them around the globe. It covers a large spread of Australia's post-colonial history from an intriguing and novel angle.

For example, one chapter follows the life of Ferdinand Von Mueller (or "Baron Blue Gum" as he was known) the young German pharmacist and amateur botanist who became a champion of the eucalyptus tree. He established the National Herbarium of Victoria and in 1857 became the first director of Melbourne's Royal Botanic Gardens. The book also cameos the amazing journeys of Major Thomas Mitchell who accurately surveyed vast tracts of a eucalypt-mantled landscape through which there were almost no roads (and certainly no maps, mobile phones or GPS's to navigate by!). And in which it was often impossible to see the next-nearest hill or ridge-line through a never-ending frieze of forest trees.

These people, and others of their eras, worked amongst a flora that was largely alien to them, across a landscape that was virtually unknown to westerners, whilst also trying to sustain their family relationships at home during long absences in the bush. So as well as covering the establishment of the systematics of a vast and complex flora, the author highlights the ups and downs of their family lives, their interpersonal relationships, their personality quirks and also their inevitable struggles with the bureaucracies and politicians of their day.

The author also reaches into the artistic realm of the eucalypt, which was the subject of many of the magical paintings of artists like Hans Heysen and also the evocative cartoon drawings of May Gibb. Train driver and passionate eucalypt lover Stan Kelly faithfully recorded more than 600 species as watercolours, which have been published in two volumes; he desperately wanted to paint them all except that the botanists were working faster than he was in describing and defining new species, and he had to admit defeat. And the research on this beautiful and sometimes bizarre tree continues – there are decades, probably centuries of study still to be done but, in the meantime, please read this book!

Dr John Martyn was born in Cornwall and came to Australia in 1970 after mapping in the Rift Valley of Kenya for his PhD in geology. Although he has lived in Sydney since 1979, much of his fieldwork as a minerals exploration geologist over the last 30 years has been in Western Australia. He is the author of a number of nonfiction titles, including Field Guide to the Bushland of the Lane Cove Valley and Sydney's Natural World. 



The Body in the Clouds Note: Ashely Hay's 2010 novel, The Body in the Clouds (Allen & Unwin 2010) has been received to great acclaim.
Hay is also the author of a number of nonfiction titles, including The Secret: The Strange Marriage of Annabelle Milbanke & Lord Byron (2000), Herbarium (2004), and Museum: The Macleays, Their Collections, and the Search for Order (2007).

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Wednesday, 16 May 2012

Susanna de Vries' Royal Mistresses of the House of Hanover-Windsor: reviewed by Hazel Edwards

Susanna de Vries is well known for her championing of Australian women in history. Today's guest reviewer, National Year of Reading Ambassador Hazel Edwards, has chosen to review de Vries' new nonfiction title, Royal Mistresses of the House of Hanover-Windsor: Secrets, Scandals and Betrayals. 

‘Every arranged marriage provides a vacancy for a mistress.’ Translation of an old French proverb.

The UK marriage of Prince William and Kate seems a love match.  Charles’ marriage with Diana was arranged.  His ancestors (Hanover to Windsor name change during wartime to remove the apparent Germanic link) married Protestant, European aristocracy for love-less, political reasons, and then kept multiple mistresses.

Former royal marriages were political and religious property arrangements involving land, big dowries, titles and the need for healthy, legitimate male heirs.  The trade of Royal Mistress was precarious, but recognised with temporary prestige and social acceptance.  Thus many of the mistresses sought to accumulate jewels and money before falling from favour and being replaced by a younger model.

In the confusion of titles and names, de Vries tells a readable story, clarifying the roles and contexts. The various, former ‘Princes’ (plural) of Wales seemed to suffer from over- indulgence, lack of a job and the need for the constant attention of a mother-lover mistress who would tolerate gambling, drinking, over-eating and provide all kinds of entertainment to relieve boredom.

Catering for the whims of royalty was a short-term occupation: with easy falls from favour. Hard to say ‘no’ to an all powerful, potential ruler who could ostracise you into poverty, or make your fortune, by providing access to him.

Because the mistresses were so reliant on financial handouts, usually in the form of jewellery, they seemed mercenary, but didn’t have many other options.  Even if they were personable and intelligent, (as well as beautiful and accommodating) they were rarely independent financially. And if a child had to be supported, as in the case of Perdita Robinson who originally had paid work as an actor, and was forced by Prince George of Wales to give up her career, she still lost out on the promised house he was going to gift her. Others had multiple illegitimate children to aristocratic lovers and since DNA testing was not used then, the parent was problematic. Some claimed to be Royal bastards. And others were.

The dilemma was that gambling princes ran up big debts against their eventual gaining of the throne, and had to marry Protestant princesses with big dowries, despite being fond of their mistresses. Religion was an important variable, but money was greater.

Being a mistress appeared to be a trade. But with no trade union. So, many mistresses spent up quickly, on clothes and fashionable property while they could.

Today’s readers will be more familiar with the relationship of Mrs Wallis Simpson and Edward, or Camilla and Prince Charles, both of which are interesting chapters with new content.

However, some of the lesser known, married mistresses appeared to have a genuine fondness for their prince and tried to keep him healthier and doing some actual kingly business.  Many retiring husbands appeared to benefit financially or politically from their wife becoming the royal mistress. Winston Churchill’s mother Lady Jennie Churchill, and the heiress, Daisy, Countess of Warwick who in later life created worthwhile occupations for herself, make fascinating reading. Alice Keppel became the love of Edward's life and the great grandmother of Mrs Camilla Parker Bowles, now Duchess of Cornwall. Camilla's story and that of her Aussie rival, Lady Dale Tryon are included.

Edward V11 (later Duke of Windsor) was a sad case having suffered an attack of mumps that ensured he remained physically and mentally immature and obsessively dependent upon manipulative Mrs Simpson.

The ‘Royal Mistresses’ title will attract readers, as will the subtitle of ‘Secrets, Scandal and Betrayals’ but de Vries' ‘readability’ in portraying well researched history in an accessible fashion for the general reader, make all her books the kind that avid readers share.

De Vries is especially good at placing her characters in context. The endnotes are well documented and the index works, and the photos indicate the beauty of some of the mistresses. But I found it hard to be sympathetic to the expensive mistress lifestyle and aristocratic spending when the general population was struggling, and this included tenants providing the income from the Prince of Wales' estates. I preferred reading about the heroic women in de Vries' other histories of significant working women during wartime and pioneering times.
Mini Purple Hazel .jpgAs well as being a well-known children's writer, Hazel Edwards is the author of Writing a Non Boring Family History. She has also contributed to the Aussie Heroes series with Sir Edward ‘Weary Dunlop’ and Professor Fred Hollows.

de Vries, Susanna, Royal Mistresses of the House of Hanover-Windsor: Secrets, Scandals and Betrayals ($34.95) ISBN: 978-0-9806216-2-1, First Published 2012

Other books by Susanna de Vries:

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Tuesday, 8 May 2012

A reviewer's perspective & Meg Mundell's Black Glass: Annabel Smith


Author Annabel Smith gives her perspective on reading and reviewing books by Australian women, including Barbara Jefferis Award shortlisted novel Black Glass by Meg Mundell. Mundell's book was also recently shortlisted for The Australian Science Fiction Foundation's Norma K Hemming Award which recognises "excellence in the exploration of themes of race, gender, sexuality, class and disability."

The shortlist includes the following outstanding AWW novels: 
  • Bell, A.A. Hindsight
  • Douglass, Sara. The Devil's Diadem
  • Falconer, Kim. Road to the Soul
  • Goodman, Alison. Eona
  • Hannett, Lisa L. Bluegrass Symphony
  • Isle, Sue. Nightsiders
  • Mundell, Meg. Black Glass
  • Roberts, Tansy Rayner. The Shattered City

Annabel Smith writes:
Almost a decade ago I saw David Malouf read from his collection of short stories Dream Stuff at the Victorian State Library. During question time, someone asked Malouf if he had read Ulysses. Malouf had already responded to several idiotic questions during this session and this one had me squirming in my seat. But Malouf replied graciously that he had, and waited, along with everyone else, to see where this might lead. “I just can’t get to grips with it!” the questioner blurted out, confessionally. “Can you give me some advice?” Malouf’s advice was that life was short, and if a book wasn’t speaking to you, you should move onto one that did.

This is advice that I have always followed as a reader. When asked to write a review of the year in Australian fiction for Westerly, I decided, after some thought to apply that same practice to my reviewing. A book review is understood to be subjective. However, I believe a good review strives for objectivity wherever possible, or at least admits to its limits in that regard. As a writer, I’ve been on the receiving end of reviews that have seemed unfair; one in particular, where it was clear to me that the reviewer had read only the first section of my novel, and that his review did not represent my work as a whole, and was not therefore a balanced review. I believe struggling though a book that I don’t connect with is guaranteed to result in a review that is resentful and therefore perhaps unfair to the book in question.  Books I dislike or am unmoved by are not necessarily bad, they are just not for me.

One of the reasons I undertook the Westerly fiction review was because I knew I was guilty of cultural cringe when it came to Australian fiction, and I thought being forced to read more of it would give me an opportunity to adjust my perspective. And I did read some fantastic Australian books published in the last twelve months.  Only a handful of those, however, were by women writers so when I came across the Australian Women Writers Reading and Reviewing Challenge I saw it as a good opportunity to acquaint myself with more great writing by Australian Women Writers.

The books I’ve read and reviewed (on Goodreads) so far are:
Sarah Thornhill by Kate Grenville
When We Have Wings by Claire Corbett
Inherited (Short Stories) by Amanda Curtin
Shooting the Fox (Short Stories) by Marion Halligan
The Courier’s New Bicycle by Kim Westwood
A Common Loss by Kristen Tranter
Black Glass by Meg Mundell

The books I want to read are:
Five Bells by Gail Jones
Dog Boy by Eva Hornung
What the Dead Said by DJ Daniels
One Man Zeitgeist: Dave Eggers, Publishing and Publicity by Caroline D. Hamilton
Too Close to Home by Georgia Blain
Gone by Jennifer Mills
Above and Below by Stephanie Campisi
My Sister Chaos by Lara Fergus

Here is my review of Black Glass by Meg Mundell:

Meg Mundell’s debut novel Black Glass is the story of two sisters and their search for each other in a city of the not-too-distant future. The black glass of the title is the glass of surveillance. Those who inhabit the city’s various zones are not only watched but manipulated by technicians who subtly influence behaviour through the use of scents, sounds and lighting at a subliminal level. The text includes email exchanges, transcripts of conversations and internet search results, adding to the sense that in this brave new world nothing is private.

The novel is richly detailed, containing brief, beautiful descriptions and surprising metaphors. Mundell’s dialogue is one of the novel’s great strengths - witty, pacey and authentic, it positively crackles with energy and renders the characters perfectly.

A former journalist and government advisor, Mundell conveys a great deal of cynicism about the relationship between the media and the government. At one point, one of the characters reflects on how the media relies on “an endless supply of human folly and greed, criminality, bad luck and exploitation.” And this is exactly what Mundell serves up in her exciting debut: a blackly funny, sinister and gritty exploration of marginalisation.

AnnabelSmith’s first novel, A New Map of the Universe, was published by UWA Publishing in 2005 and shortlisted for the WA Premier’s Prize for Fiction. She has had short fiction published in Westerly and Southerly, been a writer-in-residence at Katherine Susannah Prichard Writers’ Centre and holds a PhD in writing from Edith Cowan University. Her second novel, Whisky Charlie Foxtrot will be published by Fremantle Press in November 2012.




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