Frank Kellaway

This is an interesting first novel about a writer of Science Fiction stories, Juniper, who has a recurring nightmare about floating around the moon in a space unit. It begins and ends with one of those sequences, which alternate with sharply observed scenes of student life. Hector, Juniper’s oldest friend, is the eternal student, flitting from religion to religion and from ideology to ideology. ... (read more)

Peter Murphy is one of the very best poets under forty writing in Australia today. He also works in the theatre. His play Glitter was performed at the Adelaide Arts Festival, and he has written the libretto for an opera with music by Helen Gifford. Black Light, his first published book of short stories, shows him to be a craftsman of the first order in yet another field. ... (read more)

I must declare an interest. Dickins was once a student of mine and is still a friend. Readers of this review are invited to exercise their reservations. I believe The Crookes of Epping is in the tragi-comic tradition of Charlie Chaplin which reaches back to one of the world’s greatest books, Don Quixote. In it pathos is as important an element as humour, wit and absurdity. It also has a co ... (read more)