Biography and memoir

Grant & I by Robert Forster

Reviewed by Gerard Elson

As Robert Forster tells it near the end of his affecting, up-tempo memoir, the decision to write Grant & I was not his. The morning after his death by heart attack in 2006, aged 48, the voice of Grant McLennan…

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The Hate Race by Maxine Beneba Clarke

Reviewed by Mark Rubbo

Maxine Beneba Clarke’s father was the first in his family to go university. They were working class, from Tottenham, a suburb of London. He’d shown a talent for mathematics and became an academic; her mother was an actress. They were…

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In The Darkroom by Susan Faludi

Reviewed by Gabrielle Williams

If this book was written as fiction, you’d never believe it because you’d think it was too far-fetched. In 2004, Susan Faludi received an email from her father (whom she hadn’t seen in twenty-five years) telling her that he’d undergone…

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Sex Object by Jessica Valenti

Reviewed by Stella Charls

There is no shortage of strong opinions about Jessica Valenti. A feminist writer, long-time blogger and founder of the site Feministing, Valenti made her career online. The response to her writing – equal parts support from fans and contemptuous vitriol…

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Negroland by Margo Jefferson

Reviewed by Bronte Coates

In this crisp, elegant memoir, Margo Jefferson recounts her experiences growing up within Chicago’s black elite. The memoir takes its title from the name she uses to refer to herself and her peers, a society she describes as, ‘a small…

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Wasted by Elspeth Muir

Reviewed by Bronte Coates

In 2009, Elspeth Muir’s youngest brother, Alexander, went out drinking with friends. That same night, he climbed over the railing of the Story Bridge and jumped 30 metres into the Brisbane River below. His body was pulled out of the…

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Avalanche by Julie Leigh

Reviewed by Annie Condon

Julia Leigh is a fiction writer known for her brilliant, spare prose and eye for detail. Avalanche is a memoir documenting her experience of trying to become pregnant through IVF. Leigh’s opening sentence is a beauty: ‘For a great many…

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In Other Words by Jhumpa Lahiri

Reviewed by Ed Moreno

Indian-American writer Jhumpa Lahiri was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2000 for her first book, Interpreter of Maladies, a collection of short stories. She has since published two novels and another collection of stories, picking up numerous…

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The Odd Woman and the City by Vivian Gornick

Reviewed by Marie Matteson

The Odd Woman and the City is Vivian Gornick’s memoir of her most enduring friendship: her friendship with New York. She starts with her friend Leonard. Every week they meet and walk and talk through the streets of New York…

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The Long Run by Catriona Menzies-Pike

Reviewed by Hilary Simmons

Catriona Menzies-Pike came late to running. Until she turned 30, she was known to friends and family as the person ‘least likely to run around the block’; a gin-addled bookworm who rolled her eyes at runners prancing through the park…

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