Blog review of Another

Nice to see people are still reading my first novel. (The new one, by the way, is finished and looking for a publisher.)

"This is a sour, sometimes shocking book. One scene, in which Toby breaks into a house to find a baby left alone for hours in a crib, is particularly moving. Toby bludgeons a service station attendant half to death for $45, and later remembers how good it felt to wreak violence on another person. This is harsh, unapologetic, and grim. I suspect that people who aren’t as addicted to tales of destruction and dissolution as I am might find it difficult to enjoy reading this. But enjoy it I did. ...

"And yet a sensitive reading of Another can’t but notice Deane’s cool rejection of much of the material here. It is a subtle art to write so candidly about such horrific matters, without anything but the merest hint of authorial disapproval, and expect the reader to interpret the novel ‘correctly’. (If I am interpreting it correctly.) But here I found Another to be a success. This is literature without needing to be Literature. I respect Deane for being able to write as clearly and as candidly as he does." -- Guy Salvidge

Read the full review here.

Best Australian Poems 2008
Peter Rose (ed) hosts the launch of The Best Australian Poems 2008 (Black Inc.) at Readings in Melbourne. He introduces several contributors to read from their work in the anthology: Chris Wallace-Crabbe, Joel Deane, Lisa Gorton, Nguyen Tien Hoang and Maria Takolander.