The 2022 Miles Franklin longlist

24 May 2022

The 2022 Miles Franklin Literary Award longlist was announced this morning. An annual award, the Miles Franklin recognises outstanding works of Australian fiction.

Grimmish, by Michael Winkler
Seven and a Half, by Christos Tsiolkas
The Performance, by Claire Thomas
One Hundred Days, by Alice Pung
The Airways, by Jennifer Mills
The Dogs, by John Hughes
The Magpie Wing, by Max Easton
Echolalia, by Briohny Doyle
Bodies of Light, by Jennifer Down
Scary Monsters, by Michelle de Kretser
After Story, by Larissa Behrendt
The Other Half of You, by Michael Mohammed Ahmad

Some familiar titles there, some new ones, either way time to update those to-be-read lists. The shortlist will be announced on Thursday 23 June 2022.

2022 Australian Book Industry Awards (ABIAs) shortlist

23 May 2022

The 2022 Australian Book Industry Awards (ABIAs) shortlist has been announced. Sixty-five titles are vying for recognition in thirteen award categories, including audiobook, biography, fiction, non-fiction, children, and literary fiction.

Across these categories, together with The Matt Richell Award for New Writer of the Year, shortlisted titles — in no particular order — include:

Still Life by Amber Creswell Bell
The Storyteller by Dave Grohl
Love & Virtue by Diana Reid
Dropbear by Evelyn Araluen
Wild Abandon by Emily Bitto
and the aforementioned Love Stories by Trent Dalton

The winners will be named at a ceremony on the evening of Thursday 9 June 2022, at the ICC Sydney.

Red, a novel by Felicity McLean, the Ned Kelly story retold

23 May 2022

A novel that is a contemporary re-telling of the story of nineteenth century Australian bushranger and outlaw Ned Kelly? Ok, you have my attention. Such is the premise of Red (published by HarperCollins, 18 May 2022), the second novel by Sydney based Australian writer and journalist, Felicity McLean.

But McLean isn’t flippantly bandying about references to Ned Kelly merely to, you know, attract attention, she has partly based her protagonist Ruby “Red” McCoy, on the contents of Kelly’s 1879 Jerilderie letter.

It’s the early 1990s and Ruby ‘Red’ McCoy dreams about one day leaving her weatherboard house on the Central Coast of New South Wales, where her best friend, Stevie, is loose with the truth, and her dad, Sid, is always on the wrong side of the law. But wild, whip-smart Red can’t stay out of trouble to save her life, and Sid’s latest hustle is more harebrained than usual. Meanwhile, Sergeant Trevor Healy seems to have a vendetta against every generation of the McCoys.

So far only a few reviews of Red have been published, but Australian author John Purcell holds McLean’s writing in high regard:

But the novel’s greatest strength is the voice of narrator Red. I know it is loosely based on Ned Kelly’s voice from the famous [Jerilderie] letter, but it goes well beyond that. Red speaks to us as a fully formed living entity with her own ticks and wisdom. So much so that I started to believe McLean must have suffered from some kind of unholy possession throughout the writing of the book. Red’s narration overflows with colourful anecdotes, cheek and bravado. McLean’s use of language is ceaselessly inventive, coming up with the goods time and time again.

Photos from inside the besieged Mariupol steel plant

23 May 2022

The photos were taken by Dmytro Kozatsky, one of several thousand Ukrainian soldiers who managed to defend the Azovstal steel plant for almost three months, from Russian invaders. Kozatsky is now being held by the Russians as a prisoner of war.

Here’s hoping he wins an award for these images.

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Whina, a film by James Napier Robertson and Paula Whetu Jones

23 May 2022

Whina, trailer, directed by James Napier Robertson, and Paula Whetu Jones, is the story of Dame Whina Cooper, a twentieth century Māori activist and leader, who fought for Māori rights in New Zealand. Whina will screen at the 2022 Sydney Film Festival.

The daughter of a Māori chief, Josephine (‘Whina’ for short), was born in Hokianga in 1895. For nearly a century, Whina (Miriama McDowell, as younger Whina, and Rena Owen, Once Were Warriors) never stopped asserting the rights of her people and striving for unity between Māori and Pākehā. In 1975, Whina, frail but still determined, led a sacred hīkoi over 600kms, from the top of New Zealand to Parliament House in Wellington.

A critique of Trent Dalton’s novels by Catriona Menzies-Pike

23 May 2022

An in-depth look at the writing of Brisbane based Australian author Trent Dalton, in particular his two bestsellers Boy Swallows Universe, and All Our Shimmering Skies, by Catriona Menzies-Pike, editor of the Sydney Review of Books.

If Dalton’s prose style skims the surfaces of his characters’ lives, so does his thinking about the moral and political world. Dalton infantilises his audience by feeding them palatable maxims about history, society and human flourishing. The themes are repeated again and again in case the rowdy kids up the back aren’t paying attention.

It’s a longer read, but well worth the time. It seems to me effectively critiquing a work of fiction — as is writing a good novel in the first place — is an art form in itself. Many of the book reviews I read — and, doubtless — write myself, essentially summarise the plot and include a few words as to the merit or otherwise of the title. There’s nothing wrong with that, when choosing what to read next I often quickly look for a consensus, before deciding what to do.

Radiohead’s Ok Computer album turns twenty five

23 May 2022

Last Saturday, 21 May 2022, marked twenty five years since British band Radiohead released their third studio album Ok Computer, in 1997. To mark the occasion Ed O’Brien, the group’s guitarist, took to Instagram to share insights into the way the band thought and worked.

Wow… feels like an age away.. 1997 belonged to a different era .. we were just kids.. with unswerving focus and drive .. no partying just the desire to make better and better work.. it was fucking exciting .. people seemed to get what we were doing and the gigs were getting more powerful.

“1997 belonged to a different era”… I copy that.

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Brazen Comics Festival Sydney 2022

21 May 2022

Some late news to hand for anyone with an interest in graphic novels, and comics, who’s in Sydney tomorrow: the Brazen Comics Festival is on at the East Sydney Community and Arts Centre, in Darlinghurst, Sunday 22 May 2022, from 10AM until 4PM.

Brazen Comics Festival is a one day comics festival. The festival will amplify, highlight, and celebrate the voices of women, non-binary, and gender diverse people in comics, and foster a connected, welcoming, and supportive community of comic fans and creators in Australia. Brazen Comics Festival is accessible and welcoming to all.

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The Impact, a film by 50 directors and 50 writers

21 May 2022

Made up of thirty-seven short films, The Impact , trailer, counts down the final two hours on Earth before a catastrophic meteor strike. Grim storyline aside, The Impact is a feat of filmmaking, with fifty directors and fifty writers collaborating to produce the feature. I’m not sure if we’ll see it on Australian film screens, but The Impact premieres in London on Tuesday 31 May 2022.

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Sally Rooney’s books are better than their film adaptations

21 May 2022

That appears to be the case for the Irish author’s 2018 book Conversations with Friends, writes Robert Moran for Stuff:

All the forensic psychological nuance that Rooney feeds us through Frances – her neurotic overthinking, her spiky self-loathing, her overworked efforts to affect nonchalant charm – those chaotic moments that lend Frances her skewed humanity, are dulled, if not lost, on screen. What you’re left with is lingering shots of Frances staring out a rain-streaked window, presumably deep in existential thought, but who knows?

Disappointing. I know I just about always look forward the screen adaptation of the novels I like, despite an innate weariness to the book to film thing…

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