Final Draft - Great Conversations

The Final Draft podcast is all about books, writing and literary culture. We're dedicated to exploring Australian writing, looking into the issues that drive our storytelling to discover more from the books you love.

These are the stories that make us who we are.

Sarah Sasson is an Australian physician and writer. Her poetry, short stories and non-fiction have been published in Australia, the United Kingdom and USA. Today we will be talking with Sarah about her debut novel Tidelines which has already met with acclaim, being shortlisted for the Varuna House Publisher Introduction Program and longlisted for the Queensland Writers’ Centre Publishable Program.

On a suburban street in the south of Sydney Grub waits in her car. In the house opposite lives the man who was her brother’s best friend. Grub is there to confront him. To finally wring from him the confession that her family’s life would have been better if he’d never entered it.

Unfolding across the years of their adolescence, Tidelines is the story of Grub and her family. Of her bond with her brother … and the different directions their lives took.

Final Draft is produced and presented by Andrew Pople

Want more great conversations with Australian authors?

Discover this and many more conversations on Final Draft every week from 2ser.

Get in touch with Andrew and Final Draft. We love to hear about what you’re reading!

Twitter - https://twitter.com/finaldraft2ser 

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/finaldraft2ser/ 

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/finaldraft2ser/ 

Eugen Bacon is an African Australian author of novels and short fiction. 

Her fantasy writing has won a British Fantasy Award and has been a finalist for amongst others the World Fantasy awards and the Aurealis.

Today I’m bringing you her latest novel Serengotti.

(I’m just going to note that Eugen’s protagonist Ch’anzu uses the gender neutral pronouns ze/hir)

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A single day sees Ch’anzu’s life come crashing down around hir. First losing hir job, then Chanzu’s wife betrays hir and disappears.

The world doesn’t seem to want to relent and so Ch’anzu decides to pack up and leave, taking a job in the community of Serengotti.

Serengotti is a township for African migrants and refugees. It is meant to be a space for settling and healing for so many who have been displaced.

Ch’anzu arrives hoping for a new start only to find that when everyone is looking for renewal the past often follows them close behind.

Sernegotti is a breakneck novel that seems fueled by Ch’anzu’s sense of loss and displacement. The ruptures in hir life are underscored by Ch’anzu’s sense that hir identity is a live topic and perhaps an unspoken discussion amongst the people around hir.

In taking the leap and transposing hir chic Melbourne life for a rural African/Australian village we can feel Ch’anzu almost bargaining for a place to belong. In reality Ch’anzu is trading one feeling of being an outsider for another.

Within the borders of Serengotti the residents struggle to make sense of histories barely contained by their present calm. The weight of the violence and displacement that has brought them to Serengotti lives beneath the surface of the town waiting to erupt.

I was transfixed by Serengotti from the start. Within these pages we have lyrical, gorgeous prose telling a tale that is simultaneously strange and highly relatable. Ch’anzu’s search for belonging may take hir further than most but it is a journey we all feel. This is also a novel of mystery that weaves disparate voices together to bubble up the histories of the characters.

Serengotti is a surprisingly brisk read, or at least I found I flew through it. The novel is constantly hinting at more and layering characters and identities in a way that give it substance beyond its less than three hundred pages.

Finally Serengotti gave me that frisson of excitement and unease that you get when you see something familiar in a new way. From its unique look at rural noir, through the strange dynamics of half-met characters this book had me wondering if I really understood what I thought I was reading.

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Serengotti is a tremendous contemporary Australian novel that defies what many may think of as contemporary Australian writing. Read it for the pure entertainment of it and then stay for the thought provoking ideas.

At the time of writing Serngotti has been shortlisted for the Victorian Premier’s Award’s Fiction Prize

The Final Draft podcast is all about books, writing and literary culture. We're dedicated to exploring Australian writing, looking into the issues that drive our storytelling to discover more from the books you love.

These are the stories that make us who we are.

A.W. Hammond is the author of The Paris Collaborator and today we are seeing a return of his hero Auguste Duchene in The Berlin Traitor.

As Allied forces declare victory in Europe a sense of peace slowly reemerges on the streets of Paris. Parisians seek to welcome the calm but only for those considered blameless.

Auguste Duchene is in hiding. The men who would brand him a conspirator would not stop to hear his side of the story and so Duchene must eke out a living any way he can. 

But would he go so far as to re-enlist?   

That’s the proposal of the powers that be who seek Duchene’s help in hunting a war criminal through the bombed out streets of Berlin…

Final Draft is produced and presented by Andrew Pople

Want more great conversations with Australian authors?

Discover this and many more conversations on Final Draft every week from 2ser.

Get in touch with Andrew and Final Draft. We love to hear about what you’re reading!

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The Final Draft podcast is all about books, writing and literary culture. We're dedicated to exploring Australian writing, looking into the issues that drive our storytelling to discover more from the books you love.

These are the stories that make us who we are.

All Summer Long we are exploring great works in the Australian Classics Book Club. Today we look back to Randolf Stow's classic Tourmaline

Final Draft is produced and presented by Andrew Pople

Want more great conversations with Australian authors?

Discover this and many more conversations on Final Draft every week from 2ser.

Get in touch with Andrew and Final Draft. We love to hear about what you’re reading!

Twitter

Instagram

Facebook

The Final Draft podcast is all about books, writing and literary culture. We're dedicated to exploring Australian writing, looking into the issues that drive our storytelling to discover more from the books you love.

These are the stories that make us who we are.

All Summer Long we are exploring great works in the Australian Classics Book Club. Today we look back to Kate Jennings' classic Moral Hazard

Final Draft is produced and presented by Andrew Pople

Want more great conversations with Australian authors?

Discover this and many more conversations on Final Draft every week from 2ser.

Get in touch with Andrew and Final Draft. We love to hear about what you’re reading!

Twitter

Instagram

Facebook

The Final Draft podcast is all about books, writing and literary culture. We're dedicated to exploring Australian writing, looking into the issues that drive our storytelling to discover more from the books you love.

These are the stories that make us who we are.

All Summer Long we are exploring great works in the Australian Classics Book Club. Today we are taking a look at Amy Whitting's classic I for Isobel

Final Draft is produced and presented by Andrew Pople

Want more great conversations with Australian authors?

Discover this and many more conversations on Final Draft every week from 2ser.

Get in touch with Andrew and Final Draft. We love to hear about what you’re reading!

Twitter - https://twitter.com/finaldraft2ser 

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/finaldraft2ser/ 

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/finaldraft2ser/ 

The Final Draft podcast is all about books, writing and literary culture. We're dedicated to exploring Australian writing, looking into the issues that drive our storytelling to discover more from the books you love.

These are the stories that make us who we are.

All summer long discover incredible writers in the Australian Classics Book Club. This week we feature Robin Klein's Came Back to Show You I could Fly

Final Draft is produced and presented by Andrew Pople

Want more great conversations with Australian authors?

Discover this and many more conversations on Final Draft every week from 2ser.

Get in touch with Andrew and Final Draft. We love to hear about what you’re reading!

Twitter - https://twitter.com/finaldraft2ser 

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/finaldraft2ser/ 

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/finaldraft2ser/ 

The Final Draft podcast is all about books, writing and literary culture. We're dedicated to exploring Australian writing, looking into the issues that drive our storytelling to discover more from the books you love.

These are the stories that make us who we are.

All summer long we are exploring great works in the Australian Classics Book Club. Today on the show we look at Boyd Oxlade's darkly comic Death in Brunswick.

Final Draft is produced and presented by Andrew Pople

Want more great conversations with Australian authors?

Discover this and many more conversations on Final Draft every week from 2ser.

Get in touch with Andrew and Final Draft. We love to hear about what you’re reading!

Twitter - https://twitter.com/finaldraft2ser 

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/finaldraft2ser/ 

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/finaldraft2ser/ 

The Final Draft podcast is all about books, writing and literary culture. We're dedicated to exploring Australian writing, looking into the issues that drive our storytelling to discover more from the books you love.

These are the stories that make us who we are.

All summer long we are diving back into the archives and exploring great work's of Australian Writing. Today it's Criena Rohan's The Delinquents in the Australian Classics Book Club.

Final Draft is produced and presented by Andrew Pople

Want more great conversations with Australian authors?

Discover this and many more conversations on Final Draft every week from 2ser.

Get in touch with Andrew and Final Draft. We love to hear about what you’re reading!

Twitter - https://twitter.com/finaldraft2ser 

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/finaldraft2ser/ 

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/finaldraft2ser/ 

The Final Draft podcast is all about books, writing and literary culture. We're dedicated to exploring Australian writing, looking into the issues that drive our storytelling to discover more from the books you love.

These are the stories that make us who we are.

All across the summer we are looking back into the archives and discovering great works of Australian writing. Today it's Madeleine St John's The Women in Black in the Australian Classics Book Club.

Final Draft is produced and presented by Andrew Pople

Want more great conversations with Australian authors?

Discover this and many more conversations on Final Draft every week from 2ser.

Get in touch with Andrew and Final Draft. We love to hear about what you’re reading!

Twitter - https://twitter.com/finaldraft2ser 

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/finaldraft2ser/ 

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/finaldraft2ser/