Once a Stranger, debut fiction by Zoya Patel

28 March 2023

Ayat as not seen, nor spoken to, her mother, Khadija, and sister, Laila, who live in Canberra, for six years. Ayat hurriedly moved away to Melbourne after her mother and sister learned she was dating Harry, a Catholic. Ayat made clear her boyfriend would not convert to Islam, the religion of her Indian family, in the event they decided to marry.

Ayat also took exception to Laila agreeing to marry a man of the family’s choosing, in accordance with tradition. Arranged marriages may have been appropriate in another time and place, but Ayat sees no place for the institution in today’s world. After six years though in the Victorian capital, she has made a new life for herself with Harry.

But Khadija is unwell. She has only a short time to live. Laila contacts Ayat, and asks her to come home and see her ailing mother, while there is still time. But on arriving in Canberra, Ayat is asked to travel far further afield. Khadija would like to make a final trip to India, with her daughters, before she dies.

But the prospect of visiting India is daunting for Ayat. For one thing, it will bring her face to face with her extended family, and their expectations. But Khadija hopes the trip will help Ayat understand her values, and desire to uphold tradition, in Once a Stranger, published by Hachette Australia, March 2023, the debut novel of Canberra based journalist and author, Zoya Patel.

Based in part on Patel’s own experiences, which she also explores in her 2018 memoir, No Country Woman, Once A Stranger treads a path that will be familiar to many first generation Australians.

People who sometimes feel they are neither here nor there, as they walk a line between the traditions their families adhere to, and embrace the culture of another country. And where acceptance and alienation comes from compatriots and locals alike, in attempting to navigate the difficult middle ground.

BookTok, the best friend of authors and booksellers

25 March 2023

Constance Grady, writing for Vox, on the impact BookTok — the book lovers’ community within video-sharing platform TikTok — has had on book sales in recent years. In terms of the American book market at least, BookTok is almost unrivalled when it comes to selling books. That could come down to the (unrivalled) sincerity of BookTokers, when they talk about their favourite novels:

The main reason BookTok sells so many books, according to most of the BookTokers I talked to, is because it feels authentic and personal. TikTok’s native format of short, punchy videos and culture of casual chattiness combine to create an atmosphere of intense intimacy between content creators and their audience. In the book world, that kind of intimacy and emotional connection is rare. All the caps-locked blog posts in the world can’t match the visceral force of a camera on a real person’s tearstained face as they sob over their favorite books — books that could easily become your favorites, too, if you want to buy them.

Grady also explores the matter of remuneration. Some BookTokers are making a living from their channels, but many are wary about accepting payments from book publishers. Others of course do, but usually declare which of their posts are sponsored, and which are not.

I’m not sure it’s territory I’d like to venture into. As regular readers know, I frequently feature new and recently published books, that are usually Australian. But they are outlines, and seldom reviews, and are written at my own volition, and not at the request of anyone else.

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Sally Rooney on the hardships facing renters in Ireland

25 March 2023

Irish author Sally Rooney, writing for The Irish Times, about the end of an eviction moratorium that may render many people homeless:

The wave of evictions expected to begin from the end of this month is not merely theoretical: we already know that during the period of the ban, tenants in the State sought advice on roughly 1,500 new eviction notices. In a few weeks’ time, if the Government does not reverse course, these evictions will be eligible to proceed. Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien has even publicly accepted that homelessness will “very possibly” increase when the moratorium comes to an end.

While the situation is different, the outlook for residential renters in Australia is likewise challenging. In January 2023, vacancy rates nationwide were just 0.8 percent. In some centres — Perth and Adelaide — vacancy rates were 0.3 percent, which might as well mean there are next to no residential properties available to rent.

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Changes to make Archibald Packing Room Prize vote democratic

24 March 2023

Changes are coming to the voting process used to select the winner of the Packing Room Prize, traditionally the first award made in the annual Archibald Prize for Australian portraiture.

In short, Art Gallery of NSW (AGNSW) packers unbox and install the works for the Archibald Prize exhibition, then decide on the portrait they liked the most. However the past head packers, Steve Peters and Brett Cuthbertson, both of whom have recently retired, held the deciding vote.

A new voting process will see a panel of three people, each with an equal vote, determine a winner:

The new Packing Room Pickers are Timothy Dale, Monica Rudhar and Alexis Wildman, three professional art handlers with 19 years of hands-on Archibald Prize experience between them. “In line with the discussions around how the prize was actually judged we felt that a more collaborative decision would be more appropriate,” Dale says.

I’ve always seen the Packing Room Prize as a light aside to the main competition, suspecting the winning choice was always subjective, which was fine by me. If I were selecting a winner, I’d choose the painting that personally appealed to me the most.

The changes could well suit participating artists though, who have long considered the Packing Room Prize to be the “kiss of death”, as, to date, no winner has gone on to win the main Archibald Prize.

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Limberlost by Robbie Arnott on Dylan Thomas Prize shortlist 2023

23 March 2023

Tasmania based Australian author Robbie Arnott’s 2022 novel, Limberlost, has been named on the shortlist of the 2023 Dylan Thomas Prize.

Limberlost joins five other titles on this year’s shortlist:

Seven Steeples by Sara Baume
God’s Children Are Little Broken Things by Arinze Ifeakandu
I’m a Fan by Sheena Patel
Send Nudes by Saba Sams
Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in Her Head by Warsan Shire

The prize is named in honour of Welsh poet and writer Dylan Thomas, who died in 1953, and is awarded for the best published literary work in the English language, written by an author aged thirty-nine, or under. The winner will be announced on Thursday 11 May 2023.

How to Kill a Client, the debut whodunit by Joanna Jenkins

23 March 2023

How to Kill a Client, by Joanna Jenkins, book cover

Gavin Jones is the in-house counsel at a large mining company, headquartered in Brisbane, the capital of the Australian state of Queensland. In his role, Jones awards legal contracts worth millions of dollars each year. As such, legal firms in Brisbane, and across Australia, are at his beck and call.

Among these law companies is Howard Green, one of Brisbane’s best known legal practitioners, who are frequently awarded lucrative work thanks to their relationship with Jones. There is nothing they wouldn’t do for fear of losing his favour. With his influence, Jones is feted wherever he goes.

Or at least that used to be the case. But at age thirty-nine, Jones is found dead. The victim of murder. Who though could possibly want someone who was the life-blood of so many businesses in mining and legal circles, dead? As the police investigation commences though, a side of Jones, not so well known to those outside of industry circles, begins to emerge.

He was demanding. Manipulative. Aggressive. Abusive. Narcissistic. And a misogynist. He treated women appallingly. Any women partners of Howard Green whom Jones took a disliking to were quickly swept aside. He treated his wife no differently. But his horrific conduct was not limited to women, and many others were also subjected to Jones’ wrath.

Indeed as the police probe continues, instead of eliminating suspects, the list of people with a grudge against Jones only grows. Far from being lauded by his business associates, just about no one actually liked him. This is the premise of How to Kill a Client, published by Allen & Unwin, January 2023, the debut novel of Brisbane based Australian author, and former lawyer, Joanna Jenkins.

Readers of How to Kill a Client have described Jenkins’ whodunit as captivating, compelling, razor sharp, and riveting. Numerous readers were unable to discern the identity of Jones’ killer until the final reveal, which speaks mountains for Jenkins’ skilful writing… despite the number of suspects.

Birrarangga Film Festival a global Indigenous film event

22 March 2023

Birrarangga Film Festival poster, by Aretha Brown

Artwork by Aretha Brown.

The biennial Birrarangga Film Festival runs from Thursday 23 March, through to Tuesday 28 March 2023, in Melbourne:

BIRRARANGGA Film Festival celebrates Global Indigenous Films that explore the curatorial themes of ‘strength, resilience and the environment’. First Nations relationships to the image as a form of expression, particularly in Australia, is connected to thousands of years of cultural practices. This festival honours that history and acknowledges the contemporary currency of the moving image, of film, as an expression of the human experience in relation to our natural surroundings.

The festival opens with a screening of Bones of Crows, directed by Canadian screenwriter and filmmaker Marie Clements.

Jinghua Qian: my role as a sensitivity reader

22 March 2023

Jinghua Qian, writing for ArtsHub, about working as a sensitivity reader:

I might notice that the portrayal of a cultural activity is off: Australians talk about going ‘to the footy’ but not ‘to the ball game’.

The article I link to was published about three and a half years ago. Sensitivity readers aren’t exactly new, it’s just we’ve been hearing a lot about their work recently.

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Amelie was a KGB spy says filmmaker Jean-Pierre Jeunet

22 March 2023

Twenty-one years after he made Amélie, full title The Fabulous Destiny of Amélie Poulain, starring Audrey Tautou, the film’s director Jean-Pierre Jeunet has revealed Amélie was actually a KGB spy. He makes the startling admission in a short film, Amelie: the Real Story, which uses scenes from the original 2001 made feature. A master of cunning, our Amélie, but we all knew that.

Did no one ever wonder how a young waitress afforded such sophisticated decoration for a flat in Montmartre, one of Paris’ most expensive districts?

You know, I did wonder, because I wanted to live in apartment exactly like Amélie’s.

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Anne de Marcken, Jonathan Buckley, win Novel Prize 2022

22 March 2023

It Lasts Forever and Then It’s Over, by American interdisciplinary artist and writer Anne de Marcken, and Tell, by British author and teacher Jonathan Buckley, have been named joint winners of the 2022 Novel Prize.

The Novel Prize is a biennial award for a book-length work of literary fiction written in English by published and unpublished writers around the world. It offers $10,000 to the winner and simultaneous publication in North America by New Directions, in the UK and Ireland by the London-based Fitzcarraldo Editions, and in Australia and New Zealand by the Sydney-based publisher Giramondo.

Both novels will be published simultaneously in 2024 by the three participating prize publishers. Australian author Jessica Au was the inaugural winner of the 2020 Novel Prize, with her book, Cold Enough for Snow.

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