Into the World by Stephanie Parkyn - REVIEW

Review 
Into the World by Stephanie Parkyn

By Rachel Edwards

Into the World by Stephanie Parkyn is a rich historical novel that tells the true story of Marie Louise Giradin, a woman who, disguised as a man sailed aboard the Recherche in the late 1700s and is likely the first white woman to step foot on the island now known as Tasmania.

Louis Giradin, as she becomes known, flees a France that is caught in the grip of revolution, and she is also forced to leave behind a baby son. The novel is faithful to the passage of the vessel, which was accompanied by the Esperance and was operating under instruction both to find La Perouse, whose expedition was seemingly lost – as well as to conduct scientific research. These two competing goals provide a clear point of tension in the novel, and the characters of the military command of the vessel and the increasingly eccentric behaviour of the scientists aboard juxtapose each other well. Parkyn has a background in science (she trained as a freshwater ecologist) and the attention paid to the scientific knowledge and practice of the time is sensitive and genuinely engaging.

The French explorers on board – both scientific and military have their names are intertwined in our Tasmanian history, D’entrecastreaux, Kermandec, and Labillardiere amongst them. One of the strengths of this well written novel, is the development of the characters. The story is told from Giradin’s point of view, which offers a rare historical perspective from a woman. The scientists, captains and crew mates are all fleshed out and given voices and identifying characteristics, Labillardiere the scientist who reveals himself as difficult and driven in particular. It is fascinating, given the proximity in part to these men’s and this woman’s story that we have in Tasmania, to read them as real human beings, not just names of bays and headlands and seascapes.

What Giradin had been involved with in France to cause her to flee the country is one of the many compelling parts that drives this story. The revelation that she had grown up outside the wall of Versaille -  her father worked as a gardener there - and her involvement with the nascent revolution are fascinating counterpoints to the journey on the sea and what was involved in her role, as the ship’s steward, as well as what she had to do to keep herself disguised.

This is a book that tells of a significant moment in this history of the island we now call Tasmania, as well as a significant moment internationally: the French revolution, scientific discovery and research as well. It is a well told tale of a fascinating woman and an intriguing and sometimes terrifying journey on the sea. Stephanie Parkyn is to be congratulated on her first novel, one which is sure to find a wide, and satisfied audience. 

A version of this review was published in TasWeekends, January 2018. 

Paige Turner - February

A Silent Reading Party is nigh on my favourite type of party and I’m delighted that Transportation Press and Island magazine are hosting their first one at Quartermasters Arms in Hobart on February 7 at 6pm. Simple. Bring a book (the library’s open until just before we start and we will have some books on hand too), buy a drink and a snack, read silently. No chatting. This will tease some reading wheat from chatting chaff. See you there my darlings!

Reading for the Revolution is another excellent idea launching in Hobart this month. This is a group that will discuss readings that can change the world. The first session is happening on February 12 at 7.30am at the Food Store in Macquarie Street in Hobart and will discuss writing from Stan Grant, Ursula Le Guin’s National Book Award speech and more. Drop me a line and I can pop you in touch with the organiser for more information. This is a beautiful and inclusive event, no need to contribute to discussion, you can simply be there to listen. It is organised by Millie Rooney, who actively works for the betterment of the world.

New Philosopher and Womankind, along with Island and Poet Store are presenting the third iteration of Bright Thinking on February 15 at the Salamanca Arts Centre. The discussion will be around Nature and Climate. This is a free event and doors open at 6.45pm. While we’re still on an Island note, keep an eye out for the upcoming issue (late February) in which I am most looking forward to reading an extract from Tasmanian writer, Robbie Arnott’s upcoming novel Flames.

The prolific and adored playwright Finegan Kruckemeyer has decided to convert on of his plays into a picture book. Artshub said of the play, The Girl Laughs that it ‘follows in the best tradition of fairytales through the ages – an engagingly told yarn for the children of today, with lessons for adults also,’ and nine year old Luca said ‘somewhere between hilarious and human,' in Big Kids Magazine. Seek it out on Amazon online.

Vibrance Festival returns this month and on Sunday 25^th there will be a Thylazine fair with some local and interstate zines for ‘saaaaaale’. 12-4pm with more information available on the Vibrance Facebook page.

Seasonal Poets is back at 6pm on 19 February at Hadleys in Hobart. The poets reading are Helen Swain, Lyn Reeves and Cameron Hindrum.

Jacqui Lambie is one of Tasmania’s more colourful politician and her memoir is set to be published in February. The Tamar Valley Writers Festival which is coming up in September this year (mark your diaries, this has been a glorious event in past years) is hosting the Launceston launch in partnership with Petrarchs and publisher Allen and Unwin. For more information, head over the Tamar Valley Writers FestivalFacebook page.

Forty South is running its annual short story competition. Entries for The Tasmanian Writers' Prize 2018 close on February 18. Visit fortysouth.com.au to download your entry form. 

The Tasmanian Society of Editors will conduct a session on the arcane and challenging aspects of copyright. Taking place on February 15 at 7pm at the Rosny LINC it will cover subjects like expiration of copyright, moral rights and how to ascertain if something is subject to copyright. Contact the society directly for more details (though I can tell you that it is $10 for a member and $15 for a non member).

Making Books, Making Readers is three workshops hosted by the delightful Victoria Ryle, founder of Kids’ Own Publishing. These workshops are designed to be relaxed and hands-on and are designed for artists, writers, educators and parents to explore simple approaches to creating and publishing books with, by and for children & young people. For more information including dates and costs, click here.

Fullers has a busy event calendar for February, hosting the launch of Farewell my French Love by Nadine Williams on February 7 and on February 8 (my Mum’s birthday, Happy Birthday Mum) the inimitable Christopher Lawrence from ABC RN will launch his book Symphony of Seduction.

On March 1^st GetUp! founder, Simon Sheikh will launch an exciting new book called The Rich Greenie (pictured) by Stuart Barry. This is an ethical Barefoot Investor, with clear guidance about how to grow your wealth, while living a wise life, stepping gently on our earth.

Keep an eye out for the Tasmania based dynamo Polly McGee’s recently released The Good Hustle, creating a happy, healthy business with heart, and also keep your eyes peeled for long term forest activist/saviour and exquisite artist, Aviva Reed’s Eon, The Story of Fossils.

Poet Jeremy Limn has released a collection of lyrics, poems and love ballads. The Auguries of Lost Lilacs. The book is based on the myth of love through poetry.

If you have any story or book related news, I’d love to hear from you – racheledwards488@gmail.com

Maxine Beneba Clarke PODCAST

This morning I had the wonderful opportunity to sit down with Maxine Beneba Clarke and discuss her autobiography The Hate Race and her upcoming spoken word sets at MonaFoma. We talked about racism in Australia where "he conversation about race is so behind - the minute you say the word race or racism people just start screaming," and how she believes (and so do I) that some of the answers lie in artistic storytelling and that libraries offer an equalising access to knowledge.
The Hate Race winded me again and again. May it do the same to you, may it transform you in a manner that is irrevocable.
Listen to our full discussion here.

PODCAST

Paige Turner, January

May this gentle summer wrap you in some sweet tendrils, afford you relaxation and also some dedicated reading time. And a hammock and some proper time immersed in the sea. And sunrises and stone fruit, and strawberries. Juicy, sun warmed strawberries. And peace of mind, and some love, too, while we are about it.

I have been hanging around with Vladimir Putin, in the form of The Man Without a Face, the unlikely rise of Vladimir Putin by Masha Gessen and balancing this with Women and Power by Mary Beard. Women and Power is a book tiny in structure but huge in content, tracing misogyny back through Western culture and explains why women have had such a hard time getting heard, with culturally endemic silencing and mocking of women’s voices. Beard is a historical scholar of significance and she explains how abuse and tirades against women on Twitter are the continuum of Ancient Greece’s Aristophanes’ mockery of women’s voices. Both of these books, as well as Masha Gessen’s latest The Future is History, How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia, are setting a summer reading tone for me.

The other part of my summer reading will consist of new poems from Tasmania and from Iran, as Transportation Press launches its 2018-2019 publishing program with Wine and Words, poems from Tasmania and Iran. We are welcoming Shirindokht Nourmanesh back as editor of the Iranian content and the esteemed Tasmanian poet and scholar, Pete Hay is on board to source and edit the best new writing from Tasmanian poets. Check out the website for more information, better still sign up for the newsletter on the website.

MonaFoma is happening in the middle of the month. North and south. I’m busting to hear Maxine Beneba Clarke, award winning poet and author, most recently of The Hate Race, perform some slam poetry during the festival. Slam’s a powerful form that takes poetry to a whole new universe, where words crystallised through the filter of form are taken into a performative space.

Cut Common, with the smart and savvy Steph Eslake at the helm and which showcases emerging artists across the country will be launching its first ever print magazine in 2018 and will be having a roving launch in twenty places (I love this idea). You can get more information here.

Fullers Bookshop’s event program hardly stopped for Christmas – and in January they are hosting the launch of Treaty and Statehood by Michael Mansell. This is on January 12 at 5.30pm and Bob Brown and Jimmy Everett are both speaking. Not to be missed by any Tasmanians. So many elders in one room and from what I can glean about the book, new territory and topics that we should be considering. For further information and to RSVP – Fullersbookshop.com.au

I’m delighted to break the news that Nigella Lawson will be in town, and speaking at the Federation Concert Hall on February 1. Nigella is famous for her general lusciousness as well as her cooking and her magnificent cookbooks (I love them! So many TV chefs but her recipes are solid). She will be discussing her new book At My Table. Tickets will soon be available at the TSO Box Office, and for more information contact Fullers, as they are the organisers of this event.

Speaking of cookbooks, Pie Hard is a super new Tasmanian one, from Amelia Cree and Honni Cox. About all things pies – sweet, savoury, and all the trappings and tricks. The recipes include a Strawberry Champagne Cheesecake and a Chilli Chocolate Ganache Tart which may be featuring in a pie filled summer.

January’s Bright Thinking event, from the New Philosopher and Womankind, crew, in partnership with Island mag will return on January 11 at the delicious Salamanca Arts Centre. The topic will be ‘Property’ and panellists will be announced soon. Bright Thinking is a monthly philo café that Marc Sautet (founder of the first philo café) would approve of: one that is participatory rather than dictatorial. A topic is chosen ahead of time for each event to allow attendees to prepare; the hope is that people participate and put forward their point of view. It is open to all thinkers who are looking for solutions to the fundamental problems faced by humankind. For more information, check out the New Philosopher website.

It has been a wonderful year of reading and book events for Tasmania in 2017 and I expect more of the same as well as some invigoratingly creative publishing and writing ventures in 2018. If you have any news you would like to share, drop me a line racheledwards488@gmail.com

Peace and Love.

Review - Lost Rocks

Basalt by Ross Gibson
Conglomerate by Ben Walter
Crystal Bone by Greg Lehman
Marble by Ally Bishop
Lost Rocks

Review – Rachel Edwards

“Suddenly a gray rock becomes ashen or clouded with dream. A ring around a rock is luck. To find a red rock is to discover earthblood”, writes Lidia Yuknavitch in her eviscerating memoir The Chronology of Water. Yuknavitch seeks to wade through her grief by surrounding herself with rocks.

Rocks, despite their profound variety are often used as a symbol of heaviness and lack of movement and, outside of geology and childlike wonder, their poetry can be lost or ignored.

Rocks, despite their profound variety are often used as a symbol of heaviness and lack of movement and, outside of geology and childlike wonder, their poetry can be lost or ignored.

Lost Rocks, created by A Published Event (Justy Phillips and Margaret Woodward) ignites a creative fascination with a series of rocks and minerals and, in their own words “is an accumulative event of mineralogical, metaphysical and metallurgical telling.”

Lost Rocks is also a collection of forty books that are being published, slowly, over four years. The project was conceptually inspired when Phillips and Woodward found a discarded rock board at the Tip Shop in Glenorchy. They have commissioned forty books in response to these rocks. The latest four books (of eight released so far) are Crystal Bone by Greg Lehman, Marble by Ally Bisshop, Conglomerate by Ben Walter, and Basalt by Ross Gibson. The books share a clean and simple design; white paperbacks with red silhouettes of the rock on the cover. They are small in stature, have delicate newsprint pages and they wear the process of publishing almost literally on their sleeves, bringing the formal structure of a book to the fore, including a page titled ‘colophon’. The colophon is a publisher’s device to either provide a decorative reference to the publisher, or simply the information legally required when publishing a book.

Prominent Tasmanian writer and thinker Greg Lehman’s Crystal Bone is both a deeply personal story as well as a devastating austere account of this rock and the almost centrifugal importance of it for this island’s first people. It includes diverse writing styles and a poetic recounting of a story of a tyrelore, an island wife. The images that accompany the ‘Crystal’ chapter - simple line drawings of flints, sculpted for blade and palms and annotated with the name of the place from where they have been removed is quietly devastating. The illustrations provide a desolate contrast to the lost stories of these rocks.

Ross Gibson’s Basalt describes the motion and movement of lava which then becomes basalt. In the text he returns to the paradoxical movement of this rock; the pulses of a lava flow still evident where it is found in nature. Gibson is an academic and a poet and while Basalt is a fascinating read, it has a didactic tone and there is something about the melding of poetry and geological process that did not mesh well for this reader.

Ben Walter, whose continuously transcendental writing tackles the rock conglomerate. He uses his element elegantly, as a literary device. A walker falls and hits his head on a “fist of conglomerate”. It is a raw story of a death in the Tasmanian wilderness, an inadvertent tragedy that occurs during a walk with mates. Walter writes the bush like few others down here, his words lithe and with little sentimentality, poetically descriptive.

Ally Bisshop has sculpted a tale from marble – its history, magic and the the numinous space it inhabits for gods and men. She talks about its mining and like Lehman utilises a range of stories of styles to capture this heavy rock.

These books are part of a beautiful publishing work of art, one that travels through geological and human time – a slow burn, drip feed of small, versatile publications. There is something about the Lost Rocks collection seems to inspire writers to enter new territory; cross genres and enter exciting literary spaces. It is a brilliant concept and I anticipate the forthcoming books with a sense of exhilaration

Versions of this review have been published in The Mercury and Warp.

Paige Turner - December

Holden Caulfield, is mild and banal next to Maria del Carmen Huerta, the narrator of Liveforever, a book that is both murky and luminous, and has been cited as a Colombian version of The Catcher in the Rye. Liveforever tracks a counterculture of 1970s Colombia with an intensity fuelled by rumba, dancing and salsa. The Catcher in the Rye’s Caulfield pales into wishy-washy adolescence up next to Maria, popping as she salsas across sweltering Cali. I’ve a sneaky copy of Catcher, on my little secondhand bookshop, On Her Selection and I’ll be posting my copy of Liveforever to someone I thought about a lot as I read it.*

The Story Island Project is launching a book that showcases the stories collected from, and created by, communities across Hobart's northern suburbs, reimagining the life of the Brooker Highway. The book features writing and illustrations from young people as well as a contribution from Tasmanian author Danielle Wood. Stories of the Brooker Highway celebrates the northern suburbs as a place rich in stories, and a community filled with strong, creative voices. The book will be launched at 1pm, 7 December at Glenorchy LINC. All welcome.

Steph Parkyn’s linocut that was inspired by (in an ekphratic process) Gina Mercer’s poem, Handfeeding the Crocodile is perched boldly, and yellowly on my wall, a suitable backdrop to my current reading of Into the World, her first novel and one which covers subject matter that had me entranced from the outset. It is the fictionalised account of Marie-Louise Giradin who, disguised as a man joined the French explorers whose names are intertwined in our Tasmanian history, D’entrecastreaux, Kermandec, and Laballadiere amongst them, as they sailed on the vessels Recherche and Esperance in a bid to find their missing country man, La Perouse.Into the World, which is a ripper read will be launching in Launceston at Petrarchs Bookshop on Friday 1st Dec at 6pm  and in Hobart at Fullers Bookshop on Friday 8th Dec at 5.30 pm. I’m fortunate to be in conversation with Steph for that event, North West – you don’t miss out, Steph will be delivering an author talk at Devonport LINC on Wed 13th December 2.30pm.
Island, hot off of the back of their fabulous 150^th celebrations, will launch issue 151 on Sunday 3 December  at midday. They are riffing off the fabulous photo of esteemed Tasmanian author, Heather Rose who features both inside the mag, and on the cover, replete with a magnificent red apple, at Willie Smith’s Organic Cider Apple Shed down the Huon. For more details check out the Island magazine Facebook page.

 State Cinema Bookstore is holding their VIP shopper evening on December 7^th in store between 5-9pm. 20% off compadres – and to join you simply have to be subscribed to their e-newsletter and/or be part of their loyalty program. You can even subscribe on the night.
The following paragraph is redundant, click on the link below to reveal the winners -
This column will go to print before the Tasmanian Premier’s Lit Prizes are announced late inNovember. I’m reluctant to share my picks but of each prize I’d recommend sinking your peepers into many of the books on the list, especially Heather Rose’s The Museum of Modern Love, The White Room Poems by Anne Kellas andPete Hay’s masterful collection, Physick.These alongside James Boyce’s LosingStreak. I’m tantalised and looking forward to the announcements.

The Tamar Valley Writers Festival is happening again next year and the dates are locked in for 14-16 of September. This is a lovely festival, similar vibe to the Ubud Readers and Writers Festival actually – and one that I will definitely be heading to again. The festival is also hosting Fiona McIntosh at the Hotel Grand Chancellor, in conjunction with Penguin Books and Petrarchs Bookshop. This will take place on Monday 4 December from 5.45pm until 7pm. Tickets are available from Petrarchs, ph: 63318088. Fiona McIntosh is a wonderfully diverse writer whose recent fiction work has spanned continents and tells the story of the lavender farm in Northern Tasmanian and its French antecedents.

Kristyn Harman, author of the award winning Aboriginal Convicts returns with Cleansing the Colony, Transporting Convicts from New Zealand to Van Diemen’s Land,  a story about a little known cohort of 110 [people who were transported from New Zealand to serve as convict labourers in Van Diemen’s Land. The stories of these people reflect the way the British sought to purge the colony of, as they saw it, a burgeoning criminal underclass. This is happening at 5.30pm on Thursday 7 of December at Fullers.

Finally, I wish you all a smooth Christmas and a joyous entry to the new year. I wish all those working in bookshops kia kaha, strong heart – for these trying times.
Peace xx.

If you have any book related news, drop me a line – racheledwards488@gmail.com

*It has been such a deep pleasure to hand this book over in person.

Paige Turner - November

I have recently had the good fortune to experience the wonders of reading and writing in our broader region. I travelled to Bali for the Asia Pacific Writers and Translators’ gathering at Ganesha University, which dovetailed perfectly into the Ubud Writers Festival. These two events, experienced in true tropical grandeur were replete with conversations and readings and the most delightful international cross pollination. I hope to bring some of the crumpled frangipani and deep thinking back to our island – and I will definitely be bringing Indonesians who rumble censorship and Iranians who purr Persian poetry with the most dramatic flair. Watch this space.

Down home we have a varied platter of reading and writing events coming up in November, including the launch of The People’s Library at Salamanca Arts Centre. It is a participatory artwork by Tasmanian artists Justy Phillips and Margaret Woodward, presented in partnership with SAC. The People’s Library will commission, publish and digest a unique living library of new and original book-length works by Tasmanian writers. Part performance library, part contemporary artwork, up to one hundred books in any genre will be published, culminating in a month-long event in September 2018, in which visitors will be invited to use the library – digesting its holdings of one hundred books into a single ‘digest’. The People’s Digest will then be performed by memory for a public audience. They are seeking unpublished works of fiction, memoir, science fiction, biography, non-fiction, history, crime, thriller, poetry, plays and experimental other and if you would like to find out more please click here.

The Society for Children's Writers and Editors is hosting their end of year lunch on November 26th at the Hope and Anchor in Hobart. New Zealand's Maria Gill, author of over fifty books will be speaking. Maria's latest book is Abel Tasman, Mapping the Southern Lands. For more information, please contact Anne Morgan.Loud Mouth Theatre Company will stage their final play this November, in the form of Jessica Davis' contemporary adaptation of Jekyll and Hyde. More information here.

Forty South Publishing has been running the Tasmanian Writers' Prize since 2010 and entries are now open to residents of Australia and New Zealand for the 2018 competition. The prize is for short stories up to 3,000 words having an island, or island-resonant, theme.   The winner will receive a cash prize of $500 and publication in Tasmania 40°South. A selection of the best entries will be published in Forty South Short Story Anthology 2018. Entries close on February 18 next year. Entry forms and terms can be downloaded here.  

I recently finished working with a ripper group of people living with memory loss, the Monday mob from Dementia Australia. The only common factor in this group of diverse people is that they live with younger onset dementia. We published a beautiful book called Badgers and Porcupines, working with young writer Lily Stojevscki. Lily translated some of their stories for the page and the book, which tells of love and loss and rock concerts and ducks and tennis and family is available from Dementia Australia. I mention this because another book being launched in November touches on memory loss, in this case in the form of Alzheimer’s (one of many forms of dementia). Written by Clodagh and Roy Jones and designed by the wonderful Julie Hawkins, Roy and Clodagh, Living with Dementia, will be launched at Fullers on November 2. The book provides an insight into what it’s like to live with memory loss, when many people in this situation are not able to articulate their feelings.

Also at Fullers Bookshop in November, on the 9th is the launch of Christine Milne’s book An Activist Life and, on November 11, Gareth Evans will be in conversation with Lisa Singh about his book Incorrigible Optimist. More information can be found here.

At the Hobart Bookshop in Salamanca on November 9 is the launch of LF McDermott’s book Perseverance and November 15 will see the launch of Ray Glickman’s book Frenzship. Here's the link for details.

Poet Ivy Alvarez is visiting the state in November and will be reading at the Republic, on November 5 at 3pm. Ivy is one of my favourite contemporary poets, she challenges and soothes and reads so beautifully. Seek her out. 

The National Book Council, Tasmania is hosting Nic Haygarth discussing his new book On the Ossie on Novmber 15 at the Launceston LINC. By all means join them for lunch at 12.45, the talk will begin at 1.15.

Island’s 151st issue will feature the winners of the Utas/Island comp, with an essay from Erin Hortle, art from Dexter Rosengrave and a short story from Gabrielle Lis, I am excited by all these fellas’ works and look forward to getting my hands on the issue. It will also include the winner of the Gwen Harwood poetry prize and a major feature on Tasmania's future as considered by Tasmanian women (people can join the conversation using the hashtag #tasfutures). 

I’m off to prison. Yep. Actually I will be working with the LINC program and 26Ten as a writer in residence at Risdon, working specifically with lower literacy inmates. Tasmania has a paltry 50% functional literacy and I believe that the ability to read and write can make a positive difference to individuals and communities. I am looking so very forward (wrangling language) to this project! https://26ten.tas.gov.au

The People’s Choice Awards for the Tasmanian Premier’s Literary Awards are up and running – have your say, get amongst it, up there Cazaly. All the winners of this year’s awards will be announced on November 27.

On November 9 my old principal, Mr Rodwell (I'm allowed to call him Grant these days) is launching his new book Moral Panics and School Education Programs, David Bartlett will do the honours at this event which begins at 4.30 on November 9 at the Law Building, Utas, room 132. 

Tasmania has an opportunity to nominate our capital city as a UNESCO City of Literature. We have thousands of years of stories, saw the first novel in the country published, have more readers and writers per capita than elsewhere AND we must celebrate literature and therefore celebrate and promote literacy. This will take a few moments, but please take the time to put your thoughts in.

Drop me a line – racheledwards488@gmail.com