This year I will be partaking in the Australian Women Writers Challenge which ‘was set up to help overcome gender bias in the reviewing of books by Australian women’. Throughout 2017 I will be reading and reviewing at least 6 books which are authored by female Australians and are related to the following subject matters:
- Archiving/Recordkeeping;
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture, and;
- Memory/Identity.
Currently I am brainstorming potential books to review and welcome all suggestions. If anyone wants to read along and join the conversation, my reviews will be shared through this blog.
Book ideas:
- The Memory Artist by Katherine Brabon
- Stasiland: Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall by Anna Funder
- A Spy in the Archives by Sheila Fitzpatrick
- Private Lives, Public History by Anna Clark
- The Invisible History of the Human Race: How DNA and History Shape Our Identities and Our Futures by Christine Kenneally
- Unearthed: The Aboriginal Tasmanians of Kangaroo Island by Rebe Taylor
Personal Recordkeeping, Identity and Archives 
What a great list you have there already!
Off the top of m y head, can I suggest you add:
Her Father’s Daughter by Alice Pung
Reckoning, Magda Szubanski
Hope Farm by Peggy Frew (inspired by the submissions to the Forced Adoptions senate inquiry)
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They all look amazing, thanks Cate!
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Not sure if you’re still looking for stuff to read, Annelie, but thought I’d throw in my few cents 🙂
I don’t know if you’ve read The Secret River by Kate Grenville, but I found that to be a real thought-bubbler on indigenous/settler relationships and cultural conflict, and Sarah Thornhill is an accompanying novel that I’ve been meaning to read.
I hear anything by Helen Garner or Robyn Annear is apparently worth a read (This House of Grief was brutally honest and devastating, but oh so memorable), and I found Clare Wright’s The Forgotten Rebels of Eureka to be a really engaging read, illustrating the gold rush from the side the newspapers and historians largely chose to leave out.
In terms of memory and identity, Moral Hazard by Kate Jennings is brilliant on so many levels and refreshingly short, and The Strays by Emily Bitto was quite interesting even if the art world never quite grabbed me.
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Thanks so much Tonks! I’ve head Clare Wright present on The Forgotten Rebels and thought she was incredibly interesting. I’m glad you’ve reminded me 🙂 I look forward to checking out the rest of your suggestions.
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