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Jennifer Down cements her status as a leading light of Australian literary fiction in this heart-rending and intimate saga of one woman’s turbulent life
Audrey, Katy and Adam have been friends since high school—a decade of sneaky cigarettes, drunken misadventures on Melbourne backstreets, heart-to-hearts, in-jokes. But now Katy has gone. And without her, Audrey is thrown off balance: everything she thought she knew, everything she believed was true, is bent out of shape. Audrey’s family—her neurotic mother, her wayward teenage brother, her uptight suburban sister—are likely to fall apart. Her boyfriend, Nick, tries to hold their relationship together. And Audrey, caught in the middle, needs to find a reason to keep going when everything around her suddenly seems wrong. Evocative and exquisitely written, Our Magic Hour is a story of l...
‘With precise and beautiful prose, the short stories in Jennifer Down’s Pulse Points carry an emotional clarity and intensity that is truly impressive.’ Books+Publishing The characters in Jennifer Down’s Pulse Points live in small dusty towns, glittering exotic cities and slow droll suburbs; they are mourners, survivors and perpetrators. In the award-winning ‘Aokigahara’, a young woman travels to the sea of trees in Japan to say goodbye. In ‘Coarsegold’, a woman conducts an illicit affair while her recovering girlfriend works the overnight motel shift in the middle of nowhere. In ‘Dogs’, Foggo runs an unruly gang of bored, cruel boys with a scent for fresh meat. In ‘Pre...
Struggling with the demands of her job, distant husband, spoiled daughter and Alzheimer's patient father, Allison becomes addicted to painkillers and lands in rehab, where amid fellow inpatients she confronts incompatible recovery techniques, barely trained counselors and her own denial.
In 1906, sixteen-year-old Mattie, determined to attend college and be a writer against the wishes of her father and fiance, takes a job at a summer inn where she discovers the truth about the death of a guest. Based on a true story.
National Bestseller “A funny, sad, nasty little gem of a novel.”—Jay McInerney In bestselling author Jennifer Belle’s debut novel, Going Down, Belle introduces readers to Bennington Bloom, a coed working her way through college. As a call girl. With a sharp eye for satire and a keen comic sense, Belle chronicles nineteen-year-old Bennington’s high-pressure adventures. Stuck with an ulcer, a father who loves his dog like a daughter, a shrink who is hard of hearing, and New York University tuition to worry about, she's working overtime to keep it all together and doing what she can to survive. Spending the night in an abandoned hotel pool, punching pushy old women on the subway, Bennington is at an all-time low, and things are only going down from there. A witty take on making it in the city, Going Down showcases Jennifer Belle’s unerring gift for capturing the absurdities of day-to-day life. Funny and intelligent with an endearingly skewed take on life, Belle is the real thing.
From the revered Australian skincare company Aesop, a debut volume presenting its rigorous passion for creating superlative products and their considered approach to design. Since the founding of Aesop in 1987, its stores, products, and culture have been the expression of a complex, holistic set of carefully considered codes and principles. For the very first time within a book, the enigmatic brand documents the singular vision from which it was borne and the company customs that have allowed it to flourish. The volume includes recollections of the early formative days of Dennis Paphitis's hair salon and the first Melbourne store, tracing how and when Aesop's distinct approach to retail hosp...
WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE FOR FICTION NEW YORK TIMES TOP 10 BOOKS OF 2010 Jennifer Egan's spellbinding novel circles the lives of Bennie Salazar, an ageing former punk rocker and record executive, and Sasha, the troubled young woman he employs. We first meet Sasha in her mid-thirties, on her therapist's couch in New York City, confronting her longstanding compulsion to steal. We meet Bennie at the melancholy nadir of his adult life - divorced, struggling to connect with his nine-year-old son, listening to a washed-up band in the basement of a suburban house. Although Bennie and Sasha never discover each other's pasts, the reader does, in intimate detail, along with the secret lives of a host of other characters whose paths intersect with theirs, over many years, in many places. With music pulsing on every page, this is a startling, exhilarating novel of self-destruction and redemption. Breathtaking work from one of our boldest writers. 'Irresistible. Fiction of the highest quality' Sunday Times 'Egan's precise, calm underwater prose is a persistent pleasure' Daily Telegraph 'Stories that defy narrative convention' Financial Times 'A must-read' Sunday Times
A riveting YA novel about beauty, youth and the terrible power of malicious words. There are a lot of rumours about Alice Franklin, and it’s stopped mattering whether they’re true. It all started at a party when Alice supposedly was with two guys in one night. But when one of those guys died in a car crash, the rumours exploded into serious allegations that his death was Alice’s fault. Now the one friend Alice has in her suffocating small town may be the only other person who knows the truth – but he’s too afraid to admit it.
Told from a child's point of view, explains the causes of Down syndrome and describes the things people with the condition can do, and the ways in which they, just like other people, may need help.