Snake is Kate Jennings’s first novel, first published in 1996 and now reissued – because, quite frankly, it is a brilliant novel written, with sparse effective language. Jennings, firstly, is a poet and her move to writing a novel easily demonstrates her power of lucid imagination. It is the story of a 1950s marriage in outback Australia. Irene realises almost immediately that her marriage to Rex is not what she wants. Together, they attempt to create a life for themselves and their children, bleakly known in the novel only as Girlie and Boy. As the years pass, Irene’s contempt for Rex and his quiet ways grows into pure hatred. The title, ‘Snake’, conjures up this insidious marriage ending with a strike of venom ...

The novel is divided into four parts, allowing the two main protagonists their own voice, although it is the judicious separation of the chapters that creates a rising tension. Each chapter has its own title and with these headings, Jennings’s power as a poet can also be realised. (Each title contributes a separate layer to the story.) With the same approach, the landscape described reflects the growing desolation of the relationship. It is Irene’s rage at the dryness of the land and the muted emotions of her terribly loyal but ineffective husband that in the end drive this story to its final tragedy. Reminiscent of Lawson’s The Drover’s Wife, yet also a depiction, perhaps, of why Jennings herself left Australia (she now lives in New York). Like Irene, I’m sure she thought there were adventures to be had away from this ‘sunburnt country.’ Snake is not a sweet tale, but one of aching loss for all those involved. This short novel is, without doubt, one of the most carefully crafted and evocative tales to emerge in the last 20 years of Australian fiction.

Chris Gordon is events coordinator of Readings Carlton.