Book review: The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins

The Girl on the Train

Written by: Paula Hawkins

Published: 2015

Synopsis: Rachel takes the same commuter train every morning. Every day she rattles down the track, flashes past a stretch of cozy suburban homes, and stops at the signal that allows her to daily watch the same couple breakfasting on their deck. She’s even started to feel like she knows them. “Jess and Jason,” she calls them. Their life—as she sees it—is perfect. Not unlike the life she recently lost.

And then she sees something shocking. It’s only a minute until the train moves on, but it’s enough. Now everything’s changed. Unable to keep it to herself, Rachel offers what she knows to the police, and becomes inextricably entwined in what happens next, as well as in the lives of everyone involved. Has she done more harm than good? (Via goodreads)
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“I have never understood how people can blithely disregard the damage they do by following their hearts.”

When I was travelling through Europe I found this book in every book store and I nearly bought a copy, but since I was mostly travelling by trains and I wasn't sure if this book was about something evil happening on a train - I decided to not risk suddenly being terrified travelling alone in a strange country and bought The Twelve instead. But I did note it down because I did want to read it, I just wanted the safety of knowing I could avoid trains if I needed too.

Anyway, this is going to be a vague and short book because like most thrillers, it's best to avoid as many details and story points as possible before heading in. I certainly went into this blind, knowing only what the blurb on the back cover said. And since I really quite liked this book that's what I'd recommend for you too.

But in case you want some details here we go. The book is about Rachel, a woman who takes a train to and from work in London every day. She catches the same train in the morning and the same one in the evening, and because she follows this routine so regularly she knows exactly where the train stops or slows. At one particular point in her trip, the train slows down beside a series of terrace houses and she's able to glimpse a couple that live in one of them. She doesn't see them every day and she doesn't see them with much detail, but she sees enough to know that they're young and in love. She has a backstory for this couple, careers, names, hobbies - things she couldn't possibly know but which help pass the time and make her feel happy. There is a sense that Rachel is a little lonely, and perhaps she's missing this kind of love from her life. And then one morning while looking out for her favourite couple she sees something. It could be nothing, but in her gut she knows that isn't true. Rachel pulls at this thread and it unravels catastrophically for not only her, but for several other people too. Which people though I can't share without giving away some of the details that should really be discovered on reading.

I thought the book was pretty well constructed. Hawkins divulges the tiniest glimpses of details only slowly over time, pulling back the covers to reveal things dark or haunted or ugly. I don't mean to sound snobby, but thrillers often follow a fairly predictable path - even if you don't necessarily cotton on to who the killer/monster/villain is. Hawkins plays with all of the typical tools of the thriller, but she also experiments with these tools to construct a thriller that is both fairly traditional and also quite breathtaking. There is a sense of an unreliable narrator within this story, but Hawkins plays with this idea and the effect is rather dizzying. That's all I can say without giving anything away, but if you've read the book I'm sure you understand what I mean here.

I was a little worried when I began that it was going to be a Gone Girl clone. It's fairly cynical about life and people and love and the characters are all fairly unlikable. I had a couple of moments where I wondered if I really cared why things were happening or where they would go. But the unfolding narrative made me constantly change my mind about characters, for instance new information suddenly giving insight which adds a level of sympathy to a character's previously murky agenda. So even if I didn't necessarily like the characters, I was curious about uncovering the full story.

So if you've been looking for a new thriller then give this one a shot. It isn't perfect, but as a debut novel I think it shows a lot of promise for Hawkins in the future.


**I was thinking that instead of writing these vague "things happen, but read it for yourself" reviews I might start writing analysis reviews of thrillers instead. So they'd be aimed at people who had read the book so I could discuss the spoilers and what I liked/didn't like about the real story. Would people be into this or nah?**

Book Review: The Lady of the Rivers by Philippa Gregory

The Lady of the Rivers (The Cousin's War #3)

Written by: Philippa Gregory

Published: 2011

Synopsis: Jacquetta, daughter of the Count of Luxembourg and kinswoman to half the royalty of Europe, was married to the great Englishman John, Duke of Bedford, uncle to Henry VI. Widowed at the age of 19, she took the extraordinary risk of marrying a gentleman of her household for love, and then carved out a new life for herself. (via Goodreads)




*mild spoilers below, but really, it's based on a historical event so this shouldn't be news to you*

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“Any woman who dares to make her own destiny will always put herself in danger.”

I don't tend to read it too often, but I really do love historical fiction. There's something about reading a fictionalised account of a family or event from long ago which just ticks a lot of boxes for me. The Lady of the Rivers is actually the third in Philippa Gregory's Cousin's War series, but it's a prequel that takes place during the years prior to and during Henry VI rule. It focuses on Jacquetta, a real life fascinating woman, who began her life in English-occupied France, the daughter and niece of Luxembourg royalty (and a Goddess), before marrying one of the most powerful men in England, John of Lancaster.

Jacquetta is a perfect character for this type of book because while she's involved in a lot of the critical events that led up to the Cousin's war, she's removed enough that the book isn't just another rehash of a very famous family feud. Instead we see life on the outskirts, how her first husband ruled France and how he tried to guide his young nephew, the king. We see the early days of Henry's rule and the follies of youth as he and his young wife play favourites in court and have zero understanding of how to run a castle, let alone a country. And we get a little insight into raising a child (or 14 as is the case with Jacquetta) during these tough and troubled times, especially as a lady of the court who is forced to spend months away from their children. This peripheral view, I imagine since I haven't read the following two books, also helps to set the scene quite well for the really character-driven narrative that is to come*.

One of the best things about this book was how focused it was on women in this era. Through Jacquetta and the women in her life, we see how few options they had. And not only did they have far fewer options in life compared to men, but their futures were largely out of their control. If they were from wealthy families like Jacquetta, their marriages were often to form alliances or to solve land feuds. Jaquetta's first marriage to John of Lancaster is never consumated, instead she is an object for him to use. Jacquetta, as their family myth says, is gifted with the "sight" because their oldest ancestor was the water goddess Melusina. John, obsessed with alchemy, wants Jacquetta to see the future in a mirror and help him guide his nephew to success and prosperity. And while her talents puts her in his favour, as the reader sees with Jacquetta's brief interaction with Joan of Arc and another woman of the English court, this favour can quickly turn sour when it no longer works in someone's favour. A talent at forecasting the future or making herbal remedies quickly becomes signs of witchcraft and can lead to an unfortunate end tied to a stake. In a less supernatural sense, a woman failing to give her husband a child and heir just as quickly turns from favour. It was a time where women were balancing on a tightwire, hoping to keep their husband, their father, their brother, and their King happy.

In spite of this, Jacquetta, and several other women in the book, are shown to be independent and strong characters. They make themselves heard and they make their own choices, even though they face dire consequences. After John's death, Jacquetta marries his squire and almost loses everything in the process. But her marriage is one of love, and not only do they survive, they rise high in the court. Henry's wife and Queen, Margaret, is ruled by her emotions and is a passionate and fiery woman. Many of her decisions could have risked her her crown and her head, but she lives as she pleases regardless. Joan of Arc, although only in the book for a short while, is an absolutely beautiful and principled girl. Her trial and death is utterly heartbreaking, and the weight of it effects Jacquetta long after it happens. The women are the focus of this book, so we see a lot less of the wars and fighting than many books that deal with this era typically show. This I am eternally grateful for because, ugh, I don't need more battle scenes in my life. I get enough of them in Game of Thrones thank you very much.

Now this isn't to say this book is perfect. It falls into many of the holes historical fiction struggle to deal with. There is an insane overuse of titles in the book. Every time John is mentioned, it is "John of Lancaster, first Duke of Bedford". While I know it's hard to keep on top of all the characters, especially since they all seem to be called John, Richard, Edward and Henry, but when you have a 10 page chapter that only involves a discussion between Jacquetta and her husband, I think the reader can be trusted to understand which John this is. It also struggles at times with covering so much. I loved that it gave glimpses into life in court, away from court, during pregnancy, during birth, during war etc etc, but this did mean that sometimes things were fairly shallow in their depiction. A few times Jacquetta brings up her pregnancy and then gives birth 200 words later and then you don't hear of the child for another 40 pages. A tightening of the focus, just a bit, may have helped here. Building on this...I hated Margaret. She was an insipid and obnoxious brat who plunged two countries into ruin because she wanted to play favourites at court and didn't have a proper grasp of money or time. Because the book is so focused towards the women in the narrative, all of the blame ends up heaped on her shoulders, probably unfairly, while Henry is barely discussed or depicted as a pious and naive young man. Because Jacquetta is one of her ladies in waiting, we spend so much time with her, especially as the country falls into war between the two factions of the family. I didn't like spending so much time with her scheming, although I guess there wasn't a lot else that could be depicted since we were following Jacquetta. But to further infuriate me, the book depicts Margaret as this horrendous woman but then Jacquetta will dote on her or excuses her terrible actions. I couldn't get a read on how Jacquetta truly felt. When she talks about a shallow or dangerous decision made by Henry and Margaret, is she simply being nice because it's her job to be loyal, or does she truly not understand/care how terrible that decision was? Jacquetta was shown to be so intelligent before this part of her life, and suddenly I couldn't tell if she was playing it safe or naive or foolish or simply blind. At the end of the book I was firmly on the York side, which I don't think was Gregory's intention.

Problems aside, I did really enjoy reading this book. I spent most of my first day up the Coast with Tom with this book in one hand, and my phone in the other googling names so I could work out everyone's relationship. English family trees give me such a headache! I loved that this book introduced me to a new badass woman in history. Because Jacquetta most definitely was a badass. This book sadly doesn't cover the later years of her life, but she ends up accused of witchcraft (hence the supernatural elements threaded through this book) and manages to escape with her life. And as a mother of 14** it's really beautiful to see how much she fought for her kids and for them to have the best in life. Other accounts of Jacquetta that I've read since tend to depict her as this grabby power-hungry woman who used her children to rise up in station, and maybe she truly was the 15th century version of Kris Kardashian but I much prefer this version. She fought for and risked everything for all of the people in her life, even those like Margaret who perhaps didn't deserve her love and loyalty. Melusina would have been proud.

*Like I said in the intro, this is actually the third in the series and a prequel, but from what I've read about the other two books it does sound like they are more tightly written in terms of focus. 

**I really should fact check this, it's either 12 or 14, but I've already sent the book back to the library and I'm LAZY.

Graphic Novel Mini-Review #29

Fatale: The Devil's Business (2)

Written by: Ed Brubaker; illustrated by: Sean Phillips

Published: 2013

My Thoughts: Ah Brubaker, you've done it again. Volume 2 of Fatale takes place in the late 1970s so it isn't quite as noir-ish as the first volume, nor is it quite as mysterious. This volume gives us a much closer look at Jo, our ageless captivating fatale, although she's still as much of a closed book as she was in volume 1. She finds herself caught in a seedy situation when an actor and his ex (now dealer) sneak into her backyard after running away from a crime scene. It turns out that Jo has a past connection to the Mason-esque cult church that the two are running from and as the volume continues it gets messier and murkier and hints at Jo's mysterious past. I loved having a bit more of her perspective this volume even if there is still so much to learn before the series ends. Just as she entrances every man she comes into contact with, I found myself captivated in the sadness that surrounds her. Where has she been? What has she seen? The art beautifully compliments the mood of the comic, although there are times where secondary characters are hard to distinguish from one another.

My Friend Dahmer

Written and Illustrated by: Derf Backderf

Published: 2012

My Thoughts: I think this might be the first non-comic series comic I've read in awhile. Tom's brother bought it for us for Christmas and I eagerly read through a couple of days later. The subject of the comic is fascinating for a couple of reasons. First and most obviously, it's a look at Jeffrey Dahmer before he was the Jeffrey Dahmer who murdered and raped and ate people. Second, it's fascinating in its complete dullness. Dahmer is a strange guy, for sure, but what high school didn't have the guy who put on weird voices or seemed to be dealing with his own hidden demons? As much as Backderf exclaims over his disbelief that no teachers ever took Dahmer aside or spoke to his parents, I'm not sure there was ever enough, judging off this comic, to really write home about. While Backderf paints a sad tale of a boy who grew up without much love or attention in a tiny town of few distractions and old-fashioned morals which made it difficult to come out as gay, what really hit me was that Dahmer could have been so many people I knew growing up. I knew people who smoked too much pot and drank themselves into comas every weekend. I saw people walk around our high school campus without ever really seeming to fit in or even wanting to. I knew people who struggled with coming out as gay, who battled with their parents or who were hurt by their parents disapproval or oblivion. This comic really hit home that anyone could be a serial killer. Most people won't be, but it's not like they're walking around with a giant sign reading "danger danger, future murderer" while slaughtering kittens in front of you. The book does get a little armchair psychologist-y at times and I think Backderf could have benefited from a little more inward examination but he's done a great deal of work to combine his personal anecdotes from high school with evidence that has since come out about Dahmer's first dalliances with animal mutilation, sexual identity and his first murder. It's sensational without being sensationalist.

Hawkeye: L.A Woman (3)

Written by: Matt Fraction; Illustrated by: Annie Wu, Javier Pulido

Published: 2014

My Thoughts: L.A. Woman is the collection of Hawkeye issues that focus on the lady Hawkeye, Kate Bishop. After being well and truly fed up with Clint/Hawkeye's self-destructive bullshit she decides to make her way to L.A to start fresh and a P.I. Kate felt a little less together in this collection than the previous two and I can't work out if it's just because she doesn't have the human wreck known as Clint Barton to be compared to or if she's actually more of a disaster in these pages. There definitely does seem to be a great deal more of the "she's grown up rich and hasn't ever really had to consider paying for accommodation or food or life" stuff than I think I remember from volumes 1 or 2. These were problems I battled with while reading the volume, but I also fell pretty hard for her almost instantly. Maybe her messy life is a condescending way to make a female superhero appeal more to general readers, but she also felt a bit like a grown up Veronica Mars or Buffy the Vampire Slayer (what with the ass-kicking) which is always okay in my books. David Aja is off art duty this volume, and while I missed his stunning art I quite enjoyed Wu's take on the character. There was a lot more experimentation in terms of the different art styles, and I found the switches into the almost-chibi anime style a nice representation of Kate's arrested development. I am also totally on board for an Elliot Gould look-alike and stories that poke fun at the Hollywood persuit for eternal youth any day of the week.

Book Review: In The Miso Soup by Ryu Murakami (and a giveaway!)

In the Miso Soup

Written by: Ryu Murakami

Published: 1997

Synopsis: It is just before New Year's. Frank, an overweight American tourist, has hired Kenji to take him on a guided tour of Tokyo's sleazy nightlife on three successive evenings. But Frank's behavior is so strange that Kenji begins to entertain a horrible suspicion: that his new client is in fact the serial killer currently terrorizing the city. It isn't until the second night, however, in a scene that will shock you and make you laugh and make you hate yourself for laughing, that Kenji learns exactly how much he has to fear and how irrevocably his encounter with this great white whale of an American will change his life.

Details for the giveaway will be given at the bottom of the review.

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“There's no reason a child commits murder, just as there's no reason a child gets lost. What would it be - because his parents weren't watching him? That's not a reason, it's just a step in the process.”

As has become my standard travel preference, I headed over to Japan with a bunch of books on the kindle app on my phone (I decided to leave my actual kindle at home) and a single physical copy book. And as usual, I tired of this arrangement pretty quickly. I don't know about everyone else, but as convenient as ebooks are I find I tire of reading off an electronic device far quicker than if it's an actual book. I think it might be tied to how often I use my phone to procrastinate, so I've programmed myself to feel to need to flick through things as quickly as possible. I hardly needed a lot of encouragement to dart into a bookstore and look for a new book to read, so when I saw a Kinokuniya in Sapporo I decided to see what their English language section had to offer.

I might have bought The Sisters Brothers, but what I really wanted was a book by a Japanese author. There is something amazingly cool about reading a book as you're travelling around where the book is set. It adds a level of personal investment that you simply don't get if you read it back home and it cements that book with that country in your memory, so future re-reads are always happy visits down memory lane. Aside from some English translations of traditional Japanese poetry and folklore the only real offering was Haruki Murakami, who is far too readily available in Australia to be special enough for a Japanese purchase,* and Banana Yoshimote and Ryu Murakami (no relation to Haruki). Since I've read (and adored) Yoshimoto that really only left Ryu Murakami - which I was 100% okay with because the blurbs on all of his books sounded brilliant. What I got from the covers of In the Miso Soup, Coin Locker Babies and Piercing is that Murakami is basically the Japanese equivalent of Hunter S. Thompson, rolling fictional narratives with unflinchingly accurate depictions of the underbelly of Japanese (and particularly Tokyo) life and culture. Yes please, gimmie gimmie gimmie.

In the Miso Soup is a sharp and slick peek into the apathetic life of Tokyo youngster Kenji. 20 years old, Kenji works as a tourist guide in Shinjuku, Tokyo. Except rather than guide Americans and English tourists around the shopping district or to the nearest shrine, Kenji specialises in sex tourism. When foreigners come to Japan and want to knock boots in the seedy and kinky Tokyo sex industry, Kenji guides them through Kabuki-cho, a brightly-lit district in Shinjuku that's full of love hotels, yakuza-run bars and prostitutes. Kenji is disillusioned, disinterested and despondent working in this industry, but it helps him get closer to his dream of having enough money to move to America and start a new life. Frank is Kenji's latest client. American, overweight and with a weird plastic shine to his skin, Frank creeps Kenji out from the outset. But money is money, and one creep is no different to the rest.

The book covers the three nights Kenji spends with Frank, and over the 200 pages you fall headlong into the turbulence of the Tokyo sex industry, shuffling between disaffected youths, antagonistic pimps and gangsters and the slow-building tension between Kenji and his American client. Everything is awash with a general sense of unease but because everything is so foreign and dirty and awkward it's hard to know if Frank is actually as unsettling as Kenji seems to find him, or if everything is just being heightened in the unhappy mind of Kenji as he comes to realise how little he likes this world. As the narrative unfolds and Frank questions Kenji about Japanese customs and the Tokyo scene it becomes clear that Kenji sees Japanese culture as littered with problems. Whether it's the high school girls selling their time (but not their bodies) to the highest bidder, not for a need for stimulation or for money but because they're lonely and are looking for something, or the unsettling salary men and karoshi careers, Kenji seems determined to push against everything that's accepted as natural in Japan but also seems unaware of how to go about it. He's floundering and unhappy.

“Very few people of our generation or the next will reach adulthood without experiencing the sort of unhappiness you can't really deal with on your own. We're still in the minority, so the media lump us together as "The Oversensitive Young", or whatever the latest catchphrase is, but eventually that will change.”

But perhaps the best part of the book is how well Murakami, 45 years old at the time of writing, manages to write as a young disillusioned Japanese man, a 35 year old American man and successfully display each character's confusion, apprehension and misunderstanding about the other's culture. The cultural and generational divide between the two men acts as a point of separation but it also performs as a way for each man to come to terms with their own identity and that of their country. Through Frank's confusion or disgust Kenji finds himself questioning parts of Japan that he hadn't thought to question before. But by learning more about America through Frank, Kenji also comes to realise that the grass isn't always greener, and at the end of the day maybe everyone, everywhere, is equally fucked up.

“After listening to a lot of these stories, I began to think that American loneliness is a completely different creature from anything we experience in this country, and it made me glad I was born Japanese. The type of loneliness where you need to keep struggling to accept a situation is fundamentally different from the sort you know you'll get through if you just hang in there."

I've been tiptoeing pretty hard around the actual plot of this book, partially because it's one that's better to go into knowing next to nothing about but also because it's so unpredictable and thrilling that I'd basically have to lay it all out from start to finish to avoid making it sound fractured and disastrous. So vague as this review may be, just trust me when I say it is excellent and you need to find out for yourself what the book is really about. And from someone who has just spent three weeks walking around many of the streets mentioned in this book, let me just assure you that it's a complete and fascinating look at a part of Japan that you might not encounter otherwise. While it emphasises the less than savoury aspects of Japanese (and in particular, Tokyo) culture and night time proclivities, it also paints a picture of a bustling, colourful, sometimes dangerous and always bizarre city that has to be seen to believed. It's a glimpse into another time and place, and I loved it.

*Although I actually did go back and buy one of his books later.
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**Giveaway time! I had such a great time reading this book I want to share the experience! For one week I'm going to be accepting entries into my Ryu Murakami/Japanese goodies giveaway. If you'd like to see what the fuss with this book was all about (or would prefer to read another of Murakami's books, i.e. Audition, Coin Locker Babies, From the Fatherland with Love or Piercing) and get some super special Japanese goodies I brought back with me, then raise your hand in the comments (and make sure you "follow" this blog) and let me know which book you'd pick. I'll be picking one of you randomly next week and sending this fancy package your way! YAY!** (Giveaway closed, congrats Alley!)

Learning to Love A Sunburnt Country, or Australian Fiction for Newbies.

So last week Laura reviewed one of my favourite books, Seven Little Australians by Ethel Turner. Ethel Turner is a bit of a hero of mine. At a time when "Australian" children's books were mostly written by British dudes who had never been to Australia and were always about a recently transplanted English kid who tumbles through the bush and finds himself at the pointy end of an aboriginal's spear and does some Boy's Adventure stuff and ends with a rousing game of cricket. Ms Turner called bullshit on this because Australian children are not like British kids, as she details in the intro to Seven Little Australians.

If you imagine you are going to read of model children, with perhaps a naughtily inclined one to point a moral, you had better lay down the book immediately and betake yourself to 'Sandford and Merton' or similar standard juvenile works. Not one of the seven is really good, for the very excellent reason that Australian children never are. 

In England, and America, and Africa, and Asia, the little folks may be paragons of virtue, I know little about them. But in Australia a model child is--I say it not without thankfulness--an unknown quantity. It may be that the miasmas of naughtiness develop best in the sunny brilliancy of our atmosphere. It may be that the land and the people are young-hearted together, and the children's spirits not crushed and saddened by the shadow of long years' sorrowful history. 

There is a lurking sparkle of joyousness and rebellion and mischief in nature here, and therefore in children.

And in a single introduction an entire national identity was born. Well, we had our national identity pretty well sown up before this book was released in 1894 but it reiterates the most important parts pretty spectacularly. And the book only gets better, so read it please. All of this is a long way of saying that it is thanks to Laura and Alley that I'm writing this post because they both said they were devastated they hadn't read more Australian fiction and were weeping rivers of tears and asking would I please help them? Or at least that's how I remember it happening.

I actually touched on this subject earlier this year in an Armchair BEA post about children's literature. I wrote specifically about picture, children and YA books written by Australians, although not necessarily take place in Australia. So I might use that as a jumping off point, and write a series of posts which cover the early history of fiction in Australia (because it's fascinating), as well as looking at more contemporary authors and culminating with the mother of all lists. I'll try to keep from going overboard but I spent A LOT of time at university studying just this so it's possible I'll go too far (sorry not sorry). Also, because I'm pretty proud of a lot of our female writers (did you know the first novel published in Australia was written by a woman?) it's possible this will be a super biased list and you should probably check out the Australian Gov site for a more complete history.

So even if you only really want to read contemporary Australian books you should probably still read some of the writings of our bush poets. Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson are the two main dudes in this category. You've all heard the song Waltzing Matilda right? Well that's a Banjo Paterson poem and along with The Man From Snowy River is probably one of the most famous Australian bush poems.  Paterson and Lawson were pretty different when it came to their writing, Paterson favoured a romantic approach to working and living in the bush, seeing it as a motivating strength to our national identity while Lawson was more of a realist and tended to be a little bit more political with his poems. If you have some time you should check out the shit they used to throw at each other either through their poems or the articles they wrote for Australian papers. Also, Henry Lawson was the son of noted suffragist and feminist Louisa Lawson which is probably why Henry turned out so damn stellar, and is still considered Australia's greatest writer.

Speaking of feminists and Henry Lawson. Miles Franklin (pseudonym for Stella Maria Sarah Miles Franklin) is probably one of Australia's most noted female authors. She's best known for her 1901 novel My Brilliant Career which she wrote as a TEENAGER. She then passed it on to Henry Lawson who gave it to his publishers and BOOM. She bequeathed her estate to create the Miles Franklin Literary Award which is THE award to win if you're an Australian author, and a pretty good place to look if you're after books that are about Australia and by Australians. And still speaking of feminists and Henry Lawson, READ BARBARA BAYNTON. She's amazing. She basically grabbed all of the bush poets by the ear and said "what about the ladies huh? How do they fit into this idyllic view of life in the bush?" (except Henry Lawson whose short story The Drover's Wife covered similar ground - told you he was stellar). If you read anything in this list make it her short story The Chosen Vessel, (originally titled The Tramp) which is basically a harrowing gothic-esque short story about a woman alone on a bush homestead who is harassed and threatened by a passing tramp. It's terrifying and reminds me a lot of The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. If you want to read more of Baynton (and I suggest you do) get hold of Bush Tales which is a collection of short stories that includes The Chosen Vessel and Squeaker's Mate (equally good and terrifying). This review from ANZ Lit Lovers covers more than I could ever hope to.

 Joseph Furphy writing under the name Tom Collins published the novel Such is Life which remains one of Australia's best known and regarded novels. It's written in the vernacular of the day, so it can be tricky to get into (think Trainspotting) but it's a humourous, realistic (realism being the 19th century genre du jour) novel that presents something of an all encompassing look at the Australian way of life. The title, by the way, comes from Ned Kelly's supposed final words as he was about to be hanged. David Unaipon was 1000 kinds of awesome. Not only was he a writer and an inventor (trivia fans -he's on our $50 note) but he was indigenous. And this is a big deal because he was the first published indigenous writer, and he was responsible for breaking through a lot of the "savage native" stereotypes that existed at the time. He was often referred to as the Australian Leonardo Di Vinci which is a killer compliment to give a scientist.

Ruth Park is technically from New Zealand, however she began writing after she moved to Australia to marry author Darcy Niland. She was a prolific author, owing apparently to the lack of books in her life growing up. Her book Playing Beattie Bow was a favourite of my mums and she passed that down to me as soon as I could read. However I think her book The Harp in the South was probably her most famous novel both in Australia and internationally. And because I'm completely shallow, you should check out her picture because dayum the lady was stunning.

Who else needs mentioning? Henry Handel Richardson (pseudonym for Ethel Florence Lindesay Richardson) was a novelist best known for her 1910 coming of age novel The Getting of Wisdom. Marcus Clarke's novel For the Term of His Natural Life explored life as a convict in early Australian settlement. May Gibbs wrote the beloved Snugglepot and Cuddlepie children's stories and Dorothy Hewitt was a poet, playwright and novelist followed by controversy. Then of course there is poet Dorothea McKellar whose second verse of her poem My Country gave Bill Bryson the title for his travel book on Australia.

I love a sunburnt country,

A land of sweeping plains,

Of ragged mountain ranges,

Of droughts and flooding rains.

And I think I'll end this post here, not only because it is already HUGE but because you can find most of these authors online and for free (especially the short story and poetry writers) and the next bunch will necessitate library and book store searches. But hopefully this has been somewhat interesting and you don't feel like I've just regurgitated a bunch of essays at you. This is actually my favourite era of Australian writing because it's so fundamental to the writing of contemporary Australian authors and contemporary Australian society. I don't think people tend to think of Australia as a place for progressive thought especially early in our history (and for the most part, as a country, we weren't) but the most prolific authors from this era were all republicans, nationalists, communists, feminists and were constantly challenging the societal norms of the day. And that's something to be proud of.

Next week I'll look at authors who published after WW2, and I'll follow it with a final post that'll basically just be a list of books to read I think. If any Aussie bloggers are reading let me know if I've missed anything out or gotten any of the details wrong.