What we’re reading: AusLit edition
Violet F: How it Feels to Float
Helena Fox is effortlessly ambitious with How it Feels to Float. She sweeps us into the world of Biz, an Australian teen whose thoughts fall haphazardly into readers’ hands: shards so confused and hurried you can’t help but think they’re meaningless. But as you read on, and Fox patiently waits for you to place the shards together: you find yourself standing in front of a stunning mosaic confused as to how you got there and yet sure that this is how things were supposed to come together.
Biz is a Year 12 student who just kissed her best friend Grace, keeps seeing ghostly apparitions of her deceased dad, and is starting to hear the photos around her talk back to her, which, as a sentence, sounds overwhelming. And it is. But the beauty of Fox’s style is that despite this complex web Biz finds herself entangled in, the audience never feels as though this premise is an attempt to confront the audience: it’s the photo-realistic life of a teenage girl.
This is by no means an easy read, and I mean that in the best of ways. It’s heavy. A word tossed around frequently in our culture, but truly, this book weighs on you. If you’ve got enough on your shoulders, and the themes of anxiety, suicidal ideation, depression, bullying, PTSD and sexual assault make that load heavier to carry, please be kind to yourself. How it Feels to Float is painfully relatable, terrifyingly accurate and a brilliant read.
Ms Pascoe: The Nowhere Child by Christian White
The trope of the lost Australian child is one we know well as part of our literary and cultural landscape. White presents a fresh spin on a whodunnit wherein the lost child herself, Sammy Went, must return from Australia to America to find out the truth surrounding her disappearance when she was two years old. As Sammy learns more about the familial discord that surrounded her alleged kidnapping, I couldn’t help but consider how the notion of a lost child goes beyond the fabric of our country – this is truly a fear that is universal and reveals a deep-seated anxiety around the weight of responsibility we feel towards our most vulnerable people. I couldn’t put it down. I’d recommend this book for lovers of crime fiction, Year 10 and above.
Ms Tankard: Plum by Brendan Cowell
Peter (aka ‘Plum’) Lum is an ex-rugby player and single father living near the beach in Cronulla and trying to raise a son who is similarly very athletic. At the start of the story, he suffers from what seems to be an epileptic fit. I won’t say anymore! I couldn’t put this book down. I laughed out loud and sobbed my heart out. After reading this novel… actually, I let Brendan read it to me on Audible… with his deep voice… every other book failed to sustain me. I’d recommend this novel for Year 11 and above.
Ms Hitchcock: Larrimah by Caroline Graham and Kylie Stevenson
A man and his dog go missing without a trace in the remote Northern Territory town of Larrimah. Two journalists follow the investigation into the town of 12 – now 11 – to try and find out what happened to Paddy Moriarty. This novel is part whodunnit and part love letter to remote towns. The people in this novel are so vividly drawn, bizarre, and at times crazy that I had to keep reminding me that they’re actual human beings, not a figment of a writer’s imagination. I highly recommend this book for anyone who loves reading about true blue Aussie towns and their people.
Ms Hitchcock: Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson
A family reunion at Mount Kosciuszko goes horribly wrong when bodies of people – unknown and known – start turning up. Written by a comedian and told from the perspective of a crime writer, this novel is a refreshing take on the murder mystery genre. Its metatextual elements and quirky cast of characters made it great fun to read over the summer!