None of it matters. The plastic, the gadgets, the high glossed magazines; the heels with the right brand name, faded out on the soles, from all the running you do to keep in front. Things obtained to make life easier, dull a pain, stroke an ego; to make you feel like you mean something while you hurl…
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Death comes to us all; only the fortunate are allowed to grieve. Half the World in Winter is Maggie Joel’s second novel, which centres around the domestic life of a middle-class family in Victorian London. The patriarch of the family is Lucas Jarmyn, the only son and heir of a railway entrepreneur. When we meet…
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In the last months of my mother’s life, I fell into the first blushes of what I thought, at the time, was love. Chris was nine years older than me, could fix cars and had a crooked nose that reminded me of breakages. The most romantic moment of my life, to date, is…
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Directed by Chris Drummond, Babyteeth, explores the effects of cancer on the families it touches. The production, currently showing at the State Theatre Company of South Australia, Adelaide, also depicts an unusual love story, undoubtedly spurred on by the disease. Fourteen year old Milla (Danielle Catanzariti) meets twenty-five year old Moses (Matt Crook) at a train…
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There are people everywhere. And yet the house is empty. I am floating on a stormy cloud. I am not struggling to stay atop it, but rather, struggling to understand why I am not falling through. There is nothing concrete under my feet. The ground is a thousand miles beneath me and yet it is…
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When one feels lost in life, lacking in direction, miserable, one should go on an adventure. I know this thanks to books such as Eat, Pray, Love, Tales of a Female Nomad, Unfinished Business, and A Thousand Days In Venice. Adventures are transformative. Especially if they are difficult and involve travel. They’re particularly good after…
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I’m often a little saddened when I read a book that has been translated. I always wonder – how much did I lose? Language is complex, temperamental and beautiful. Words not only create worlds, but they create nuanced characters and a sense of lyrically. When used well, words create a melody that sweeps you…
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It’s a shame it took an Oscar award-winning foreign film adaptation of Eduardo Sacheri’s debut novel, The Secret in Their Eyes (La pregunta des sus ojos), for the English-speaking literary world to sit up and take notice. First published in its original Spanish in 2005, the novel was finally translated into English in 2011 on…
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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…
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