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'The city I grew up in was elastic and belonged to me and my friends as we stretched it through the nights. We knew its contours, and when something new arrived we were among the first to be a part of it. Everything was powder pink and bendy and shiny for us. We hadn’t had time to build a lasting memory around some fixture and then watch that time fall away from under us.
'A group of friends moves into a share house in Redfern. They are all on the cusp of thirty and big life changes, navigating insecure employment and housing, second-generation identity, online dating and social alienation—and one of them, our narrator, has just lost her father.
'How do you inhabit a space where the landscape is shifting around you, when your sense of self is unravelling? What meaning does time have in the midst of grief?
'Through emotionally rich vignettes, tinged with humour, Friends & Dark Shapes sketches the contours of contemporary life. It is a novel of love and loss, of constancy and change. Most of all, it is about looking for connection in an estranged world.' (Publication summary)
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
-
Friends & Dark Shapes by Kavita Bedford Review : An Intimate, Epiphanic Portrait of Millennial City Life
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 5 March 2021;
— Review of Friends and Dark Shapes 2021 single work novel -
From Spain to Sydney to Small-Town New Mexico, 3 Debuts Anchored by a Strong Sense of Place
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: The New York Times Book Review , 4 May 2021;
— Review of Friends and Dark Shapes 2021 single work novel -
Faithful Tales of Life
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 10 April 2021; (p. 17)
— Review of Friends and Dark Shapes 2021 single work novel ; The Breaking 2021 single work novel ; Chasing the McCubbin 2021 single work novel -
Taking the Temperature : Four New Novels
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , April no. 430 2021; (p. 34-35)
— Review of The Price of Two Sparrows 2021 single work novel ; Repentance 2021 single work novel ; Low Expectations 2021 single work novel ; Friends and Dark Shapes 2021 single work novel 'To survey concurrent works of art is to take the temperature of a particular time, in a particular place. And the temperature of the time and place in these four début Australian novels? It is searching for a sense of belonging, and, at least in part, it’s coming out of western Sydney in the wake of the 2005 Cronulla riots. All four novels are set in New South Wales, three of them in suburban Sydney. Each is concerned with who is entitled to land and the stories we tell while making ourselves at home in the world, sometimes at the expense of others.' (Introduction) -
Books Roundup Dropbear, Emotional Female, Friends & Dark Shapes, Monsters
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: Kill Your Darlings [Online] , March 2021;
— Review of Dropbear 2021 selected work poetry essay ; Friends and Dark Shapes 2021 single work novel ; Emotional Female 2021 single work autobiography ; Monsters 2021 single work autobiography essay
-
Books Roundup Dropbear, Emotional Female, Friends & Dark Shapes, Monsters
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: Kill Your Darlings [Online] , March 2021;
— Review of Dropbear 2021 selected work poetry essay ; Friends and Dark Shapes 2021 single work novel ; Emotional Female 2021 single work autobiography ; Monsters 2021 single work autobiography essay -
Taking the Temperature : Four New Novels
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , April no. 430 2021; (p. 34-35)
— Review of The Price of Two Sparrows 2021 single work novel ; Repentance 2021 single work novel ; Low Expectations 2021 single work novel ; Friends and Dark Shapes 2021 single work novel 'To survey concurrent works of art is to take the temperature of a particular time, in a particular place. And the temperature of the time and place in these four début Australian novels? It is searching for a sense of belonging, and, at least in part, it’s coming out of western Sydney in the wake of the 2005 Cronulla riots. All four novels are set in New South Wales, three of them in suburban Sydney. Each is concerned with who is entitled to land and the stories we tell while making ourselves at home in the world, sometimes at the expense of others.' (Introduction) -
Faithful Tales of Life
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 10 April 2021; (p. 17)
— Review of Friends and Dark Shapes 2021 single work novel ; The Breaking 2021 single work novel ; Chasing the McCubbin 2021 single work novel -
From Spain to Sydney to Small-Town New Mexico, 3 Debuts Anchored by a Strong Sense of Place
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: The New York Times Book Review , 4 May 2021;
— Review of Friends and Dark Shapes 2021 single work novel -
Friends & Dark Shapes by Kavita Bedford Review : An Intimate, Epiphanic Portrait of Millennial City Life
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 5 March 2021;
— Review of Friends and Dark Shapes 2021 single work novel
Awards
- 2021 shortlisted Queensland Literary Awards — Fiction Book Award
- Redfern, Inner Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales,