The Shiralee
10 best books like The Shiralee (D'Arcy Niland): Cloudstreet, A Fortunate Life, Dirt Music, My Brilliant Career, The Harp in the South, Carpentaria, My Brother Jack, Seven Little Australians, We of the Never Never, Playing Beatie Bow
| Author | Tim Winton |
| ISBN | 0743234413 |
Hailed as a classic, Tim Winton's masterful family saga is both a paean to working-class Australians and an unflinching examination of the human heart's capacity for sorrow, joy, and endless gradations in between. An award-winning work, Cloudstreet exemplifies the brilliant ability of fiction...
| Author | Albert B. Facey |
| ISBN | 0140081674 |
This is the extraordinary life of an ordinary man. It is the story of Albert Facey, who lived with simple honesty, compassion and courage. A parentless boy who started work at eight on the rough West Australian frontier, he struggled as an itinerant rural worker, survived the gore of Gallipoli, the loss...
| Author | Tim Winton |
| ISBN | 0330490265 |
Luther Fox, a loner, haunted by his past, makes his living as an illegal fisherman, a shamateur. Before everyone in his family was killed in a freak rollover, he grew melons and played guitar in the family band. Robbed of all that, he has turned his back on music. There's too much emotion in it, too much memory...
| Author | Miles Franklin |
| ISBN | 1600963781 |
"My Brilliant Career" is the story of Sybylla, a headstrong young girl growing up in early 20th century Australia. Sybylla rejects the opportunity to marry a wealthy young man in order to maintain her independence. As a consequence she must take a job as a governess to a local family to which her father...
| Author | Ruth Park |
| ISBN | 0140008535 |
Since it was first published in 1948, this compassionate novel has become a favourite with generations of Australian readers.
The Harp in the South is a nostalgic and moving portrait of the eventful family life of the Darcys of Number Twelve-and-a-Half Plymouth Street in Surry Hills, a Sydney...
| Author | Alexis Wright |
| ISBN | 1920882176 |
Hailed as a "literary sensation" by The New York Times Book Review, Carpentaria is the luminous award-winning novel by Australian Aboriginal writer and activist Alexis Wright.
Alexis Wright employs mysticism, stark reality, and pointed imagination to re-create the land and the Aboriginal...
| Author | George Johnston |
| ISBN | 0207187320 |
3.5 stars
It was only after I finished reading My Brother Jack by George Johnston that I discovered it had been the winner of the 1964 Miles Franklin award. To win, novels must be of the highest literary merit and present Australian life in any of its phases There is no question in my mind that this was...
| Author | Ethel Turner |
| ISBN | 1428041451 |
19th century Australia: Captain Woolcot, having lost his wife tragically young, remarried a much younger young woman to provide his six children with a new mother. Together, they had another child, making seven. The Captain felt it was necessary to run the family with army discipline, but his rules...
| Author | Jeannie Gunn |
| ISBN | 1406500232 |
I had already read this book many years ago but somehow I had forgotten how sad the ending is! To have so much for just fourteen months and then have to return to Melbourne alone to pick up the pieces of her former life. It must have been really hard.
Anyway, I enjoyed this memoir from 1902, when Australia...
| Author | Ruth Park |
| ISBN | 1903015111 |
I can't believe how long it took me to get through this book. It's only 200 pages and I *loved* it as a kid. But rereading it as an adult in a world where YA is a thing? This is...odd.
Admittedly, this book is older than I am - it was published in 1980 - and it's essentially a YA book that was written in an...
The Redemption of Alexander Seaton
| Author | Shona MacLean |
| ISBN | 1847245056 |
This was a solid and enjoyable historical mystery set in Scotland in 1626. The main hero, Alexander Seaton, is a disgraced would-be minister of the Church of Scotland who is obsessed with guilt and tormented by his lack of faith. He's certainly a compelling character and I grew to like him more and more...
A finely nuanced exploration of responsibility, snobbery and culture clash from one of the twentieth centrury's finest novelists.
When Amy's husband dies on holiday in Istanbul, she is supported by the kindly but rather slovenly Martha, a young American novelist who lives in London. Upon...
