Fiction

Moonlite by David Foster

August 1981, no. 33

I’ve always had a terror of one day having to explain a joke. And now it’s happened. Moonlite is one of the jokiest books since Such Is Life which in its turn reminds us of the even jokier Tristram Shandy and behind that no less than Rabelais himself. The best way to talk about Moonlite, then, is perhaps to say that it is bouncing, bewildering, wilful and – very occasionally – boring, just as these books are.

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Hunting the Wild Pineapple by Thea Astley

by Stewart Edwards •

August 1981, no. 33

Stewart Edwards reviews 'Hunting the Wild Pineapple' by Thea Astley

There nine stories in this volume are rich in people, satire, compassion, and humour. And set like ambushes, unexpected and surprising, are several cameos. It is a captivating, ensnaring book, but to call it a book of short stories would be so inadequate as to be misleading. There is an uncommon coherence, slender but powerful enough to raise it above that easy classification.

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Crooks by Bill Reed

by Thérèse Radic •

May 1985, no. 70

‘What do you reckon this is? Some kind of joke’ This final ironic cadence to Bill Reed’s sixth novel, with its upbeat question asked of death and the literary establishment, is never resolved; that isn’t Reed’s way. In a grand guignol of a novel, ostensibly about the repercussions of publishing an expose of crime bosses in New South Wales (which Reed actually did as the publisher of Australian books for Macmillan), he sets out to linguistically conceal the agony of caring for an elusive humanity he finds alien and macabre.

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Book Notes

by Hidden Author •

May 1985, no. 70

For those who wish or need to know what the Great Conciliator has been saying, it’s all here. Neville Wran, in an introduction, claims that the set speech is still important in politics. Perhaps so, but the level of platitude and generalisation in these, as in most, political speeches raises doubts. In speeches ranging from the 1983 policy speech, through speeches on the Franklin Dam Australia’s place in the world, youth employment – he’s for it – immigration and multiculturalism, arms control and disarmament – he’s for them also – to the 1984 National ALP conference, the content is high on self-congratulation, facts and figures, low on argument. The question must be raised – is this lack the fault of the reporting which mediates our politics, concentrating on personalities, on the phrase wrenched out of context and on the policy misrepresented by extremes?

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The Death of Ruth by Elizabeth Kata

by Margaret Smith •

May 1981, no. 30

Her previous work, A Patch of Blue, became a Hollywood film with Sidney Poitier, and another, Child of the Holocaust, was recently serialized by the ABC. Neither was short on social awareness, which makes her latest novel all the more inexplicable. All the characters of The Death of Ruth are stereotypical. The twists and nuances come in the plot, not in the characterization.

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Reading for Primary

by Walter McVitty •

May 1981, no. 30

David Burke, former journalist and author of books about railways, has written Darknight (Methuen pb.), a mystery story about a cadet reporter sent to an isolated, closed community to cover a story about some lost bush walkers. Come Midnight Monday (Methuen) is an equally exciting read.

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Crank Back On Roller by Donald Stuart

by Brian Dibble •

May 1981, no. 30

Crank back on roller, belt left front ...’ So begins the sequence. Stuart’s novel, the fifth in a series of six called The Conjuror’s Years, depicts Colin of Drought Foal and Wedgetail View following the instructions for preparing his Vickers gun to fire against the Vichy French in the 1941 AIF invasion of Syria.

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Xavier Herbert’s Capricornia and Poor Fellow My Country by John McLaren

by Russel McDougall •

April 1981, no. 29

Xavier Herbert’s Capricornia and Poor Fellow My Country

John McLaren’s contribution to the new series titled ‘Essays in Australian Literature’ is, as the editorial page proclaims, ‘the ﬁrst extended study of the two major works by Xavier Herbert - his ﬁrst novel, Capricornia, and his last, Poor Fellow My Country. ... (read more)

Rites of Passage by William Golding

by David English •

April 1981, no. 29

Rites of Passage qualiﬁes for a notice in ABR because, although it is written and published in Britain, it is among other things an account of the adventures of one Edmund Talbot who has taken a passage to Australia sometime during a lull in the wars with France, towards the end of the eighteenth century.

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