tony birch

Tony Birch

“Whatever you’re writing about, the story has to work. It has to be a good story.”: Author Tony Birch talks about his latest collection Dark As Last Night

Professor Tony Birch is the bestselling and award-winning Australian author of The White Girl, Ghost River, Blood, Shadowboxing, Father’s Day, The Promise and Common People. In 2017 he was awarded the Patrick White Literary Award. An activist, historian and essayist, Birch’s latest short story collection Dark As Last Night was released by the University of Queensland Press in August 2021. We caught up…

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Dark As Last Night

Book Review: Tony Birch explores pivotal decisions in everyday moments in Dark As Last Night

Tony Birch once again proves he is the master of short fiction in Dark As Last Night, a collection of sixteen slice of life short stories that range in time, tone and focus. In his trademark style, which brings the world to life with vivid but simple descriptions, Birch explores the various chances we’re given…

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Anticipated Books

The AU’s Most Anticipated Books of 2021: Jul – Sep

We’re over halfway through the year. How are your 2021 reading goals going? Have all the mini snap lockdowns around the country had you turning to a good book? We’re back to take a look at a handful of the new titles coming out across the next couple of months. With so many books published each…

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Miles Franklin

The 2020 Miles Franklin Award shortlist unveiled

The shortlist for the 2020 Miles Franklin Literary Award was announced yesterday evening. As has become the new norm during the COVID-19 pandemic the announcement was made online via a live YouTube presentation.  The award, established in 1954, celebrates the best of Australian character and creativity whilst recognising “the novel of the highest literary merit…

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Book Review: Tony Birch’s The White Girl pushes beyond the limits of love in one family’s experience of the Protection Act

The town that makes up the main setting of Tony Birch’s new novel The White Girl is a fictional one, but it could have been anywhere in Australia. The novel tells the story of Odette Brown, an Indigenous woman who was raised on the mission in Deane separated from her family, and in particular her father. She lives on…

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