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'This brilliant collection of short fiction explores the shifting spaces of desire, loss and longing. Inverting and queering the gothic and romantic traditions, each story represents a different take on the concept of a haunting or the haunted. Though it ranges across themes and locations – from small-town Australia to Hokkaido to rural England – Permafrost is united by the power of the narratorial voice, with its auto-fictional resonances, dark wit and swagger.
'Whether recounting the confusion of a child trying to decipher their father and stepmother’s new relationship, the surrealness of an after-hours tour of Auschwitz, or a journey to wintry Japan to reconnect with a former lover, Permafrost unsettles, transports and impresses in equal measure.' (Publication summary)
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Works about this Work
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Books Roundup : Permafrost, Scary Monsters, Another Day in the Colony, How to End a Story
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: Kill Your Darlings [Online] , November 2021;
— Review of Permafrost 2021 selected work short story ; Scary Monsters 2021 single work novel ; Another Day in the Colony 2021 selected work essay ; How to End a Story : Diaries 1995–1998 2021 single work diary -
‘Hot, Red Proof of Life’ : S.J. Norman’s Impressive Short Story Collection
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , November no. 437 2021; (p. 32)
— Review of Permafrost 2021 selected work short story'Ambiguity, done well, has a bifurcating momentum that can floor you. The late Argentinian writer Julio Cortázar, a master of unsettling short stories shot through with ambiguity, knew this and used it to pugilistic advantage, declaring that ‘the novel wins by points, the short story by knockout’. Ambiguity is likewise central to S.J. Norman’s début collection, Permafrost, seven eerily affecting stories that traverse and update gothic and romantic literary traditions, incorporating horror, queer, and folk elements to hair-raising effect. No matter how often you read these spectral tales, they simply refuse to resolve themselves definitively. It could be that things have gone spectacularly wrong and that, simultaneously, everything is okay – a see-saw in constant motion, made all the creepier by the fact nobody is sitting on either side.' (Introduction)
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Permafrost, S. J. Norman
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: The Saturday Paper , 2-8 October 2021;
— Review of Permafrost 2021 selected work short story'I remember the nightmare. Of course I do. It did not want to be forgotten. It demanded space, and I gave it space. The absence of control, the fact I had no say in my narrative – that I was both bystander and helpless protagonist – was an implacable loss. I awoke; only my loss continued. It goes on still.' (Introduction)
-
Permafrost, S. J. Norman
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: The Saturday Paper , 2-8 October 2021;
— Review of Permafrost 2021 selected work short story'I remember the nightmare. Of course I do. It did not want to be forgotten. It demanded space, and I gave it space. The absence of control, the fact I had no say in my narrative – that I was both bystander and helpless protagonist – was an implacable loss. I awoke; only my loss continued. It goes on still.' (Introduction)
-
‘Hot, Red Proof of Life’ : S.J. Norman’s Impressive Short Story Collection
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , November no. 437 2021; (p. 32)
— Review of Permafrost 2021 selected work short story'Ambiguity, done well, has a bifurcating momentum that can floor you. The late Argentinian writer Julio Cortázar, a master of unsettling short stories shot through with ambiguity, knew this and used it to pugilistic advantage, declaring that ‘the novel wins by points, the short story by knockout’. Ambiguity is likewise central to S.J. Norman’s début collection, Permafrost, seven eerily affecting stories that traverse and update gothic and romantic literary traditions, incorporating horror, queer, and folk elements to hair-raising effect. No matter how often you read these spectral tales, they simply refuse to resolve themselves definitively. It could be that things have gone spectacularly wrong and that, simultaneously, everything is okay – a see-saw in constant motion, made all the creepier by the fact nobody is sitting on either side.' (Introduction)
-
Books Roundup : Permafrost, Scary Monsters, Another Day in the Colony, How to End a Story
2021
single work
review
— Appears in: Kill Your Darlings [Online] , November 2021;
— Review of Permafrost 2021 selected work short story ; Scary Monsters 2021 single work novel ; Another Day in the Colony 2021 selected work essay ; How to End a Story : Diaries 1995–1998 2021 single work diary
Awards
- 2022 longlisted Indie Awards — Debut Fiction
- 2022 shortlisted Victorian Premier's Literary Awards — Prize for Indigenous Writing
- 2022 shortlisted Victorian Premier's Literary Awards — The Vance Palmer Prize for Fiction