Drowning Rose by Marika Cobbold (Aphrodite’s Workshop for Reluctant Lovers) is a novel about guilt, grief and the heart-wrenching effects of schoolgirl manipulation. It centres around Eliza Cummings, whose estranged Godfather makes contact with her, asking her to visit him in Sweden. She hasn’t been in contact with him since the tragic death of his…
Read more
I’m not big on cooking. It’s not that I’m awful at it – unless my friends and family have been lying to be about my culinary skills – it’s just that I don’t particularly enjoy it. Having said that, I love love love cookbooks. I’m addicted to them. I love flicking through them, and imagining…
Read more
I used to hate memoirs. I thought they were self-indulgent and lacked a certain composition in the writing. But when I was twenty, I read Dave Eggers’s A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius and something shifted. In the past year, likely since I’m working on my own, I’ve devoured memoirs. I’m fascinated at how other…
Read more
A couple of years ago, my younger sister went through some severe health issues. During this time I was amazed at how life just, well, went on. Assignments still needed to be written. Bills still needed to be paid. Hair still needed to be brushed, and dresses still needed to be washed. People often say…
Read more
As a single girl in my mid-twenties, one of my worst nightmares isn’t that I’ll die alone while my thirty-six cats eat my remains, but that I’ll find myself in a life I resent. I’m terrified of being one of those women who get married and have a couple children, and all of a sudden…
Read more
There are two novels I hold in reverent esteem. I could write pages on how brilliant they are technically, and how powerfully they represent the human condition. I recommend these novels to people by clutching their forearms and locking their eyes and telling them, ‘No, really. You HAVE to read it. Promise me you will?…
Read more
Amy March from Little Women. So I know we’re all supposed to hate her for being a brat and stealing Laurie, but she’d be the best March sister to be friends with. Meg would be the friend who is always agonising about being single or is completely obsessed with her boyfriend. Beth would be sickly…
Read more
Not Just Friends is the latest EP from Melbourne-based Loon Lake. The quintet consists of three brothers: Sam (vocals, guitar and keys), Sime (guitar and vocals) and Nick Nolan (drums), and two of their friends, Dan Bull (lead guitar and vocals) and Tim Lowe (bass). As you would expect from a group who obviously hold…
Read more
In a previous article, I mentioned how much I loved Dave Egger’s A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. I love AHWOSG for the same reason I love Joan Didion’s The Year of Magical Thinking: they are both about intense personal tragedies, but they are full of humour, self-deprication and wit. A commenter mentioned they thought…
Read more
I loathed Blade Runnerwhen I studied it in twelfth grade, and to the dismay of my class, I was extremely vocal about it. And just to clear something up: I aced the unit, so I did “get” it. But nearly ten years on, I still have nightmares about being forced to watch it. So when…
Read more
Marcus Teague is the debut album of Melbourne artist Single Twin. The artist behind Single Twin is Marcus Teague. Marcus Teague used to front Deloris. Marcus Teague was also the name of a smarmy doctor on Neighbours back in 2001. Apparently Marcus Teague had to give permission for the naming of Ramsay Street’s Marcus Teague….
Read more
Once in a postgraduate creative writing class, a teacher asked me what my favourite book was. Adamantly claiming I could not pick one, I answered The Great Gatsby, Therese Raquin and Atonement. While this is not completely untrue, I realised later I didn’t approach the question correctly. The only one of the three I could…
Read more
When I was fifteen, I read The Pact by Jodi Picoult. It soon became one of my favourite books. I was struck by the intriguing story line, the different voices, the lyricism. I told all of my friends to read it, and after they did, they all thanked me. I became a devout Picoult lover….
Read more
After Dunja challenged my musical sensibilities with Aa’s unique beats, she thought she’d give me a breather with something a little more in my comfort zone: namely, a boy with a break in his voice who plays the guitar. Enter Kurt Vile‘s latest offering: Smoke Ring for my Halo. Yes, Kurt Vile is his real…
Read more
