Booksmart

TW: Discussion of violence against women

We are only 41 weeks into the year — which means we have surpassed the much-quoted statistic of one woman being killed every week in Australia.

By the time this podcast is edited and published, it’s probable that another woman will have been killed by an intimate partner. Around the world, a woman is killed every 11 minutes.

It was with this heavy heart that Soaliha Iqbal spoke to Kate Fitz-Gibbon, a Professor at Monash University, who has dedicated her life to researching the causes of (and solutions to) violence against women in Australia.

“2024 has been a horrific year on top of horrific decades for women's safety. But this year does feel particularly challenging,” she tells Missing Perspectives.

Fitz-Gibbon is an internationally recognised expert in domestic and family violence, femicide, perpetrator interventions, and the impacts of policy and practice reform in Australia and internationally. She is the chair of Respect Victoria, and also a published author.

Her most recent book, Our National Crisis: Violence Against Women and Children, highlights the alarming reality of domestic violence in Australia, where we haven’t made nearly as much progress as we should have in the fight against men’s violence.

This is a really important and timely episode - have a listen and let us know what you think. 

Introducing a **very** different episode this week, just to shake things up here at Booksmart. Because honestly, why not?

This week, Tash sits down with the iconic Dr Jen Gunter for an equally iconic conversation.

Dr Gunter is also known as "Tik Tok and Twitter's Resident Gynecologist", having used the platform to debunk myths about women's health, amassing a huge following in the process. 

The Canadian-American gynecologist, New York Times columnist, author and most important truth teller in women’s health, is passionate about setting the record straight on dubious wellness product claims, misconceptions about basic anatomy and confusion over reproductive rights. 

Her opinions – that most supplements are a waste of money, underwire bras do not cause cancer, you actually can get an IUD if you’ve never been pregnant, and your vagina should not smell like a pina colada – are shared with her hundreds of thousands of followers.

Buckle up, because this is quite the episode - and we guarantee you'll learn some new things along the ride.

We're excited to bring you a really special episode this week. Our Editorial & Partnerships Lead Alicia got to sit down with the wonderful Alyssa Huynh for a chat about her new (debut!) book Safe Space.

ICYMI: In 2020, Alyssa began sharing her thoughts on racism and connection to cultural identity through her Instagram account @alyssahuynhwritings and quickly gained a following for her commentary and anti-racism advocacy. You might also know Alyssa from her work with publications like Mamamia, The Latch, Sydney Morning Herald and the Shameless podcast.

She's a force to be reckoned and we're so excited to share this episode (and please grab a copy of this book STAT if you haven't already!).

“I had to relearn how to live after nearly dying. It felt like a rite of passage no-one else had ever experienced, a journey there was no map for, and for so long afterwards, I was lost to myself. 

This book is for anyone who is interested in knowing more about life. And maybe a little about death, too. "

Queensland-based writer Carly-Jay Metcalfe was born with cystic fibrosis, survived a double-lung transplant at the age of twenty-one and faced a rare cancer at the age of thirty. 

What she has endured should have killed her, but her humour, courage and optimism became her best survival skills. From her hospitalised childhood to her many friendships, loves and losses, Carly-Jay shares the fickle nature of life with candour and warmth in her powerful new book Breath.  This episode is a must-listen.

If Dr Mykaela Saunders isn't on your radar, then we are changing that today.

Mykaela is a Koori/Goori and Lebanese writer, researcher, editor and teacher. Her incredible speculative fiction collection Always Will Be (casually) won the David Unaipon Award and has taken the literary world by storm.

In this new thought-provoking collection, Mykaela poses the question: what might country, community and culture look like in the Tweed if Gooris reasserted their sovereignty?

She imagines different scenarios for how the local Goori community might reassert sovereignty - reclaiming country, exerting full self-determination, or incorporating non-Indigenous people into the social fabric - while practising creative, ancestrally approved ways of living with changing climates.

Be sure to grab a copy of Always Will Be today.

Shankari Chandran was once told that her stories weren't 'Australian enough.'

She later went on to win the prestigious Miles Franklin Award - an annual literary prize awarded to "a novel which is of the highest literary merit and presents Australian life in any of its phases".

Here at Missing Perspectives, we are huge fans of Shankari - it's actually  the second time we've hosted her on our podcast (be sure to listen to our episode on her last book, Chai Time at Cinnamon Gardens).

This week, Shankari joins Hannah to talk about her incredible new book Safe Haven that is making huge waves. Safe Haven is about displacement and seeking refuge—but ultimately it is a story about finding home—and the lengths you’ll go to find safety and love. 

This is an episode not to be missed - and a really timely one too.

Everyone. We know we say that every episode of Booksmart is special, but this one is PARTICULARLY so (we promise). And it's poetry too, so even better.

This week, Hannah Diviney got to sit down with proud Wiradjuri poet Jeanine Leane to discuss her new work of poetry titled Gawimarra: Gathering. We don't want to spoil the collection, or this discussion, but here's the poetry in a nutshell:

'Gawimarra: Gathering' moves from deeply tender meditations on Country, culture and kinship, to experimental archival poems dissecting the violence and destruction of the settler-colony. Jeanine Leane’s poems are richly palpable in texture, imagery and language, layering the personal with the political, along with a sharp-tongued telling of history. 

Cleverly divided into three parts, ‘Gathering’, ‘Nation’ and ‘Returning’, Gawimarra weaves back and forth in a dedication to strong matriarchs, and the core acts of gathering and returning – memory, language, history – resonate powerfully throughout. This remarkable book is the result of decades of poetic, political, and cultural work and reflection.

Breaking our (small yet needed) hiatus from Booksmart and coming back with an absolute BANGER: the one and only Lisa Taddeo!

Our EIC Hannah was lucky enough to sit down with Lisa to chat about her incredible writing, career, and bestselling novel Three Women.  The book has been adapted into a TV show for Stan - and we got to hear all about it. This is an episode not to be missed (although honestly, we say that about pretty much every episode...SO KEEP LISTENING!).

CW: Discussion of sexual assault

It's been described as the game-changing book about sex and consent that every woman - and man - should read.

In 2021, Chanel Contos posted on Instagram asking people to share their stories of sexual assault during their schooling years. This post unexpectedly went viral, and almost 7000 people sent in testimonies describing behaviour that constitutes rape. Virtually none of these instances were reported, and almost all of them were by people they knew.

How and why is this happening in an era of growing equality? In her new book, Chanel argues that when it comes to sex, we are still working with an outdated social contract that privileges men's pleasure at the expense of women's humanity.

In this important episode if Booksmart, Hannah Diviney sat down with Chanel to discuss her journey and what it was like writing and publishing Consent Laid Bare. 

Is there a better way to kick off this year then chatting with the author of one of the most buzziest books of 2023?! Madeleine Gray is an arts writer, book critic, a PhD candidate in English literature at the University of Manchester (what can't she do!?) and the author of The Green Dot. The book has been described witty, profound and painfully relatable debut novel exploring solitude, desire, and the allure of chasing something that promises nothing. It's also REALLY funny. 

Maddy sat down with our Editor-in-Chief Hannah Diviney to discuss the writing and publishing process, and what she has learnt on the way. It's an episode not to be missed.