Book Reviews

What if the universe as we know it, life as we know it, is just God’s first draft? What if God created Earth like an artist, and we are now living in the time when he is standing back, looking at the canvas? This is the central premise of Sheila Heti’s kooky, imaginative and philosophical third novel, Pure Colour.

It’s a short li’l book, a vivid burst of energy that’s grand in scope. It follows protagonist Mira from when she first leaves home to study, throughout her relationship with Annie, the woman who somehow breaks her open, and as she mourns the loss of her beloved father. But really, it reads more like a bible for modern times, a pep talk to us lonely readers in a world that seems destined to combust. “Are you sad to be living in the first draft – shoddily made, rushed, exuberant, malformed?” writes the omniscient narrator mid-way through the book. “No, you are proud to be strong enough to be living here now, one of God’s expendable soldiers in the first draft of the world.”

With missives on the passing of time, the beauty of nature, the complexities of love and the importance of art, all expressed in Heti’s wonderfully irreverent and singular style, reading Pure Colour will jolt you back into your imagination, remind you that there is still some grace left in this strange world, and that indeed, we are made of strong stuff. MF

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In George Haddad’s second novel, a complacent 19-year-old, drifts through life in Western Sydney. Joey sees the world happening around him, conspiring against him, and his nagging mother is copping most of the blame. Joey’s grandmother Elaine, a proud Lebanese woman, is also adrift. The novel alternates between the two perspectives and intersects when their paths cross, although their struggles are vastly different. Joey is dealing with toxic masculinity, drugs and the sense his life is not his own. Elaine is dealing with a gambling addiction, her role as a mother and grandmother, and reckoning with a past so distant it may as well have happened to someone else. Losing Face tackles intergenerational trauma, immigration, addiction and consent with tenderness and understanding. Haddad’s writing is off-chops: Joey’s obnoxious adolescent drawl chimes with an authenticity matched in Elaine’s inward reflection and female anger, which is so strong it’s clear Haddad has spent quality time with the women in his life. DANIELLE BAGNATO

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Bestselling Perth-based author Dervla McTiernan returns with her fifth novel, centred on a young law student who volunteers to spend her summer interning for a US legal team who are trying to get an innocent man released from death row. Hannah has given up everything to work for the Innocence Project, including her studies as a promising young lawyer, and her chance to nurse her mother through a life-changing illness. But is she really the selfless advocate she portrays herself as? McTiernan uses her own legal background to great effect as this mother-daughter story unfolds, the mother running from a truth that has scarred her for most of her adult life, and her daughter fighting to not only reveal it, but to also take revenge for both of them in the process. Two things will become abundantly clear to the reader: that no-one is entirely innocent in this tale, and that Dervla McTiernan has produced another stunning psychological thriller to reinforce her position as one of Australia’s most talented modern crime writers. CRAIG BUCHANAN

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What do we owe our families and ourselves? Mild-mannered Patrick Ash is a local council official and the carer for his domineering elderly mother. When decades of pent-up frustration erupt in a violent act, Patrick flees to the bushland homestead of his childhood holidays and finds unexpected love. The book is an elegy to the smallness of our lives and the tenderness that makes them worthwhile. Natural landscapes under threat from capitalist greed offer Patrick glimpses of wonder and connection beyond the constraints of filial obligation. Even as queer representation improves, love stories between middle-aged men are still somewhat rare, and Featherstone charts the experience of a cohort of closeted Gen X men whose upbringing during the AIDS crisis taught them to associate intimacy with death. Like its restrained narrator, the novel’s prose rarely experiments, yet this is a moving exploration of memory, romance and rebellion.