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Finalist for the 2022 Kirkus Prize for Fiction Shortlisted for the 2022 Miles Franklin Literary Award Shortlisted for the 2023 Rathbones Folio Prize Longlisted for the 2022 Gordon Burn Prize (UK) A profoundly original exploration of racism, misogyny, and ageism—three monsters that plague the world—this novel from a beloved and prize-winning author is made up of two narratives, each told by a South Asian migrant to Australia “When my family emigrated it felt as if we’d been stood on our heads.” Michelle de Kretser’s electrifying take on scary monsters turns the novel upside down, just as migration has upended her characters’ lives. Lili’s family migrated to Australia from Asia...
Tom Loxley is holed up in a cottage in the bush, trying to finish his book on Henry James, when his dog goes missing, trailing a length of orange twine. As Tom searches it becomes clear that he needs to unravel other puzzles in his life and the story shifts between past and present, taking in his parents' mixed-race marriage in India, their arrival in Australia in the 1970s, Tom's own failed marriage, and his current involvement with Nelly Zhang, an artist with her own secrets and mysteries. Longlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2008.
Winner of the Miles Franklin Literary Award Shortlisted for the Stella Prize Longlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award “For a novel concerned with dislocation, there's a lot of grounding humor in The Life to Come. Most of it comes at the expense of Pippa and her ilk, but de Kretser's observations are so spot on, you'll forgive her even as you cringe.”—Amelia Lester, New York Times Book Review Set in Australia, France, and Sri Lanka, The Life to Come is about the stories we tell and don’t tell ourselves as individuals, as societies, and as nations. Driven by a vivid cast of characters, it explores necessary emigration, the art of fiction, and ethnic and class conflict. Pi...
A flamboyant beauty who once partied with the Prince of Wales and who now, in her seventh decade, has "gone native" in a Ceylonese jungle. A proud, Oxford-educated lawyer who unwittingly seals his own professional fate when he dares to solve the sensational Hamilton murder case that has rocked the upper echelons of local society. A young woman who retreats from her family and the world after her infant brother is found suffocated in his crib. These are among the linked lives compellingly portrayed in a novel everywhere hailed for its dazzling grace and savage wit -- a spellbinding tale of family and duty, of legacy and identity, a novel that brilliantly probes the ultimate mystery of what makes us who we are.
In a corner of south-western France, a young rose grower nurtures a private passion to breed an exotic new flower. But the year is 1789, and the world is about to change... The Rose Grower throws a subtle, slanting light on the underside of history, as a young woman and her family are caught up in the bloodthirsty years of the French Revolution. Her private passion is to create a repeat-flowering crimson rose, the first of its kind in Europe. But, as public events in Paris are duplicated in Gascony, her world turns upside down. An American balloonist falls out of the sky and into her life; while Joseph, a young working-class doctor, is also drawn into her orbit, and finds himself fatally torn between reason and desire, revolutionary zeal and unrequited love.
The publication of this book is a literary event. It is Miss Bishop's first volume of verse since Poems, which was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1955. This new collection consists of two parts. Under the general heading "Brazil" are grouped eleven poems including "Manuelzinho," "The Armadillo," "Twelfth Morning, or What You Will," "The Riverman," "Brazil, January 1, 1502" and the title poem. The second section, entitled "Elsewhere," includes others "First Death in Nova Scotia," "Manners," "Sandpiper," "From Trollope's Journal," and "Visits to St. Elizabeths." In addition to the poems there is an extraordinary story of a Nova Scotia childhood, "In the Village." Robert Lowell has re...
Laura Fraser grows up in Sydney, motherless, with a cold, professional father and an artistic bent. Ravi Mendis lives on the other side of the globe -- exploring the seductive new world of the Internet, his father dead, his mother struggling to get by.Their stories alternate throughout Michelle de Kretser's ravishing novel, culminating in unlikely fates for them both, destinies influenced by travel -- voluntary in her case, enforced in his. With money from an inheritance, Laura sets off to see the world, eventually returning to Sydney to work for a publisher of travel guides. There she meets Ravi, now a Sri Lankan political exile who wants only to see a bit of Australia and make a living. Where do these two disparate characters, and an enthralling array of others, truly belong? With her trademark subtlety, wit, and dazzling prose, Michelle de Kretser shows us that, in the 21st century, they belong wherever they want to and can be -- home or away. "It is not really possible to describe, in a short space, the originality and depth of this long and beautifully crafted book." -- A.S. Byatt, The Guardian
On Shirley Hazzard is a vibrant and personal tribute in which the Miles Franklin Award–winning novelist Michelle de Kretser offers a masterclass in writing and reading. She celebrates the precision and musicality of Hazzard’s prose and illuminates the humor and humanity in her work. This exhilarating book is both a brilliant introduction to Hazzard and a gift for her longtime readers. On Shirley Hazzard reveals Michelle de Kretser’s lively intelligence at work and her distinctive wit. This testament to her sustained engagement with Hazzard’s work is, at its core, an appreciation of the significance and joy of good fiction. Receptiveness when reading is a prerequisite for perceptive a...
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Shortlisted for the Penguin Literary Prize Like fireflies to the light, Mona, Benny and Jimmy are drawn into the elegantly wasted orbit of the Crystal Ballroom and the post-punk scene of 80s Melbourne, a world that includes Nick Cave and Dodge, a photographer pushing his art to the edge. With precision and richness Kirsten Krauth hauntingly evokes the power of music to infuse our lives, while diving deep into loss, beauty, innocence and agency. Filled with unforgettable characters, the novel is above all about the shapes that love can take and the many ways we express tenderness throughout a lifetime. As it moves between the Blue Mountains and Melbourne, Sydney and Castlemaine, Almost a Mirror reflects on the healing power of creativity and the everyday sacredness of family and friendship in the face of unexpected tragedy.