AustLit

'Richard James Allen has always been a generous poet, never miserly with his words and wisdom, so it is fitting that The Short Story of You and I is dedicated, quite simply, “for you.” Most of the poems are written in the first or second person. An abiding sense of inclusivity is achieved and so the poetry is a delight to read in a time that seems so divisive: an era of insta-hate and antisocial media, refugees banished to remote islands, and walls erected. An antidote is offered in Allen’s work – although the reader should be warned that this draught may really be a sleeping potion.' (Introduction)

'In Vanessa Page’s Tourniquet, the reader enters a realm of shadows and light. Everywhere is heat. When the sun is the star, pun intended, as in the “sex-sweat heat” of the poem “Summer Solstice” (8), nature is all: “lorikeets / arrive like rain” and “Mango trees / wear fruit bling.” When the moon takes the stage in a one-orb show, lovers lie awake “coiling and uncoiling under the skin of python weather” as in the long, languid lines of “Time-share” (12). Like Romeo, the lover must leave first thing in the morning, just as “the night sky is decomposing.”' (Introduction)

'Leni Shilton’s Walking with Camels: The Story of Bertha Strehlowis as packed with meaning as the desert landscapes she depicts are teeming with life. This beautifully-realised verse novel tells the story of Strehlow’s life, from meeting and marrying her husband, an explorer and amateur anthropologist and linguist, to their trek through central Australia, to her later life as a teacher.' (Introduction)