One of my goals at Final Draft is to present Australian writing and Australian writers in a way that might intrigue and captivate, perhaps challenge but never judge. Having the extraordinary opportunity to meet and discuss with so many literary minds I’d prefer if they hold the stage so that you, the listener can get more of the books you love.
I don’t always love every book that I read, but I also understand that many of these books will have readers that love them. I also understand that these books are not written exclusively for my personal edification and so I try to approach them with an open heart.
It’s quite difficult then for me to collate a list of the best or select from a certain period books that are more worthy than others. I have huge respect for those who can and I eagerly devour awards list and wrap ups, but I guess I’ve always been a little reluctant. I mean, I read a lot, but nothing close to every single Australian release in a given period so I won’t even pretend to in the entire scope of Aussie writing.
This then is a list of books that have personally impacted me this year. They’re all 2019 releases and all Australian; which meant a few books from writers working in Australia missed out because I wanted the list to reflect stories being told about Australia. I’ve also left off some hugely entertaining books because they didn’t move me in the same way as these works have
It’s a highly unsatisfactory process and I thank you for sticking with me this far! I guess if I could tell you what to read I would say read these works from 2019. They all have something important to say about our world, our country, our lives and our future. They have challenged me and given me tears and troubled sleep, but have also left me with the feeling that reading and being part of a literary community is a very fine thing to be!
Alison Whittaker’s Blakwork
Blakwork is a collection of Alison Whittaker’s poetry and essay covering personal and social biography, satire and critique. It explores Alison’s life as a First Nations woman, and her experiences as a poet and a lawyer.
Alison’s collection and my time speaking with her for Final Draft helped crystallise for me threads of thoughts about the ways in which I read and the impact of that reading. At the beginning of the year I undertook to review the ways Final Draft represented voices in our community. It was important to me that voices of First Nations people as well as queer and other non-white, non-dominant culture writing was featured on the show.
In Blakwork and through Alison’s writing I discovered that just having that representation is only a first step. That we read writers from a variety of cultural or otherwise perspectives means nothing if we fail to challenge the dominant colonial lens through which we read. Now maybe what I’m saying doesn’t resonate with you, maybe it makes you feel uncomfortable, maybe you feel like being told how to read is a betrayal of why you engage with literary discussion.
For me, I discovered a challenge to decolonise my reading and approach the literature I consume in new ways.
Alice Bishop’s A Constant Hum
A Constant Hum presents a collection of stories exploring the aftermath of bushfire. Across nearly fifty stories the collection looks at the many ways we try to understand and move forward when catastrophic events occur.
At the time of A Constant Hum’s release I spoke with Alice and reviewed A Constant Hum I wrote that “The stories are visceral and sensory, opening up a world that the average reader may never experience…” Now mere months later and across the country Australian’s are getting a first hand understanding of fire and its seemingly new place in our summer life.
