Australian fiction titles to pick up this month
Praiseworthy by Alexis Wright
In a small town dominated by a haze cloud, which heralds both an ecological catastrophe and a gathering of the ancestors, a crazed visionary seeks out donkeys as the solution to the global climate crisis and the economic dependency of the Aboriginal people. His wife seeks solace from his madness in following the dance of butterflies and scouring the internet to find out how she can seek repatriation for her Aboriginal/Chinese family to China. One of their sons, called Aboriginal Sovereignty, is determined to commit suicide. The other, Tommyhawk, wishes his brother dead so that he can pursue his dream of becoming white and powerful.
Fed to Red Birds by Rijn Collins
Elva loves Iceland for many reasons – the epic landscape of gods and volcanoes, weather that’s the polar opposite of her home in Australia, and the fact that it’s where her mother might have gone back to when she disappeared. Iceland is where Elva’s beloved grandfather – the famous children’s book author – lives in a remote village and where the beings that haunt her imagination reside.
Elva is interested in the odd things people make – Victorian collectibles, old spells, taxidermy, fairy tales. The weird, the wonderful and the sometimes macabre. She’s got a few quirks of her own that she’s (mainly) keeping under control. Except one ...
Once a Stranger by Zoya Patel
Mum was sick. Mum was dying. Laila wanted her to come home. She wasn’t sure which of the two truths was more frightening.
Ayat hasn’t seen or spoken to her sister, Laila, and mother, Khadija, for six years. She has been estranged from her family since she baulked against the arranged marriage of her sister and settled into a relationship deemed haram by Indian Muslim tradition. Living in Melbourne, with Harry, Ayat’s a different person now, living a different life. She is not the woman her mother and sister once knew – so how can she go home? But how can she not?
Resistance by Jacinta Halloran
As a family therapist, Nina is the ultimate listener. Yet this is of little use with her latest clients, the Agostinos, who have been mandated to see her after stealing a car and disappearing into the outback.
For support with the case, Nina meets with a supervising therapist, Erin. What they unearth in their sessions goes beyond the Agostino story into confronting personal territory for Nina. Meanwhile, despite her efforts, the Agostinos remain unwilling to speak-so how can Nina be sure that the two children are safe with their parents?
Funny Ethnics by Shirley Le
Funny Ethnics catapults readers into the sprawling city-within-a-city that is Western Sydney and the world of Sylvia Nguyen: only child of Vietnamese refugee parents, unexceptional student, exceptional self-doubter. It's a place where migrants from across the world converge, and identity is a slippery, ever-shifting beast.
Jumping through snapshots of Sylvia's life - from childhood to something resembling adulthood - this novel is about square pegs and round holes, those who belong and those on the fringes.
One Illuminated Thread by Sally Colin-James
In Judea, a woman yearns to be a mother but is outcast when she cannot bear a child. Against all convention, she takes up the art of glassblowing. A young woman in Renaissance Florence is left penniless by her feckless husband, and has to find a way to support herself and her young son. And in contemporary Australia, an Australian textile conservator, whose grief is destroying her life, is trying to make a fresh start.
These three women each want something that seems unattainable – and it will take all their courage, creativity and determination to achieve it. Each woman knows what she must do. But what these women don’t know is that their stories are inextricably linked.
The Wakes by Dianne Yarwood
This is a story about Clare, Louisa and Chris. And sometimes Paul, and less often, Beth. It is most certainly not about frittatas (a terrible concession), and more to do with lemon tart (a perfect contrast of textures).
It is about what to do when your husband tells you that he doesn't love you anymore. And what to do when your wife leaves you after too many rounds of IVF. It's about helping your new friend with her funeral catering business, and discovering that, sometimes, the most unlikely of pairings are the very, very best. It is about food that is outrageously good and comforting to sad people. And, for once, not being sensible, and throwing away everything you know.
