Biologists are gathering evidence of green algae (pictured here in Kuwait) becoming carbohydrate-rich but less nutritious, due to increased carbon dioxide levels. As science fiction becomes science fact, new forms of storytelling are emerging.
Raed Qutena
As we enter the age of the Anthropocene, there is a growing recognition of different kinds of ‘un-real’ storytelling.
Author Michelle de Kretser with her Miles Franklin prize-winning novel, The Life To Come.
Courtesy Perpetual/Copyright Agency/Martin Ollman.
Every character in The Life To Come is complex, frustratingly unfulfilled, marked by kindness, selfishness, or dumb selflessness. But they are always, entirely, convincing.
A memorial in Kukenarup to the massacre that took place in the area, in which 30-40 Aboriginal men, women, and children were killed.
Wikimedia
Kim Scott, whose novel Taboo is shortlisted for the 2018 Miles Franklin award, circles around colonial violence in his work.
The Miles Franklin authors with their novels, clockwise from top left: Felicity Castagna, Eva Hornung, Kim Scott, Michelle de Kretser, Catherine McKinnon and Gerald Murnane.
Courtesy Perpetual/ Copyright Agency/ Martin Ollman/Timothy Hillier. Eva Hornung image: Noni Martin.
For many years, the Miles Franklin award was a bastion of monoculture. But this year’s stories are a diverse reflection of Australia.