AustLit

'Set in Melbourne, Angel of Mine is a remake of a French film, L’empreinte de l’ange (Mark of the Angel), made in 2008 by Safy Nebbou, director of the recent Who You Think I Am. Writers Luke Davis and David Regal have successfully transferred the story from France to Australia, and director Kim Farrant — making her second feature after the underrated Strangerland in 2014 — directs with considerable skill.' (Introduction)

'Western understanding of the Middle East, wrote Edward Said in his 1978 book Orientalism, had long been constructed in ­binary opposition to the West. Dividing lines were drawn to serve the dominant colonising power. The Arab world was ­defined as sensuous, uncivilised, depraved, other.' (Introduction)

'In Lucky Ticket, a collection of 12 stories, Vietnamese-Australian author Joey Bui acts as a ventriloquist for a number of voices: men and women across the age spectrum, with several tales based on interviews with Vietnamese refugees around the world.' (Introduction)

'Returns is a novel for grown-ups, though it contains­ few of them — grown-ups being a species so rare these days as to be functionally extinct.'  (Introduction)

'Vulnerable teens face illness, life with absent, careless or abusive families, and even incarceration. Despite such hardships, most of the characters in the five Australian young adult novels under review­ here today choose to trust others. They cultivate­ kindness and hope, traits that help them grow up braver and stronger.' (Introduction)

'There was a classic psychology experiment in the 1970s where men were interviewed by an attractive woman either on a shaky bridge or a stable bridge. The men on the shaky bridge were more likely to regard the interviewer as sexually attractive than the men on the stable bridge.' (Introduction)