Reflecting on themes as diverse as motherhood, war, religion and memory, our experts were impressed by the 2023 shortlist.
Academic rigour, journalistic flair
Articles on Fiction
Displaying 1 - 20 of 205 articles
In her latest novel, Emma Cline depicts a world of unthinking privilege.
Deborah Levy’s new novel, set in our pandemic-era present, contains the heat and desire of a European summer and the upward struggle of a soul. Jane Gleeson-White says she ‘read it like a thriller’.
The Anniversary is a clever reflection on the relationship between art and life.
André Dao has kept the legacy of his grandparents alive in Anam, a brilliant novel of immense scope that became a full quest for the truth of his family history, which spans the two Vietnam Wars.
A strain of sorrow and pessimism underlies all of Vonnegut’s fiction, as well as his graduation speeches. But he also insisted that young people cherish those fleeting moments of joy.
Despite calls to boycott the game by trans activists, the game has proved wildly popular – particularly among Black gamers.
We don’t look to James Bond for accurate depictions of spycraft, but at least some of his adventures are grounded in reality.
Alexis Wright’s latest novel is an elegy and an ode to Aboriginal law and sovereignty: innovative, visionary, and volcanic in its rage.
In his latest novel, Gregory Day forces the reader to slow down and attend to the ecology of place.
Novels aren’t responsible for the climate crisis and probably won’t solve it, but there is plenty they can do. They can make us feel for lives unlike our own; modelling careful thinking and analysis.
Jean Toomer’s novel is a visionary masterpiece and one of the most influential works of African American modernism.
Birnam Wood is a novel of depth and complexity, but its depiction of an unscrupulous billionaire is also refreshingly unsubtle.
Short-circuiting the language of literary value, permanently wrongfooting the custodians of taste, Gravity’s Rainbow proposes a new way of thinking about what we treasure most.
Polyglot texts — texts that use many languages — have become increasingly common as writers document struggles between regimes of European hegemony and decolonizing movements.
Paul Dalgarno’s latest novel is a meditation on the sorrows that rip a family apart and a celebration of the love that threads it back together.
Set in the northern suburbs of Melbourne, Shirley switches between psychological realism and playful satire.
Kath O'Connor’s debut novel, Inheritance, follows two women – an IVF hopeful and her grandmother – who carry the BRCA1 gene and contract ovarian cancer. It’s very close to being memoir.
These literary works ask readers to rethink the histories of these half-human sea creatures and their role in society today.
From ghostly love stories to political satires and southern gothic thrillers, these are the best fiction books according to our academics.
Top contributors
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Dean, Graduate Research, University of Canberra
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Dean of Research (Creative), University of South Australia
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Associate Professor, Writing and Publishing, School of Media & Communication, RMIT University
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Professor of English Literature, University of Southern Queensland
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Senior Lecturer, Writing, Department of Media and Communication, Swinburne University of Technology
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IT Service Desk Coordinator, Swansea University
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Adjunct Lecturer, English and Creative Writing, UNSW Canberra, UNSW Sydney
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Professor of English, Institute for Humanities and Social Sciences, ACU, Australian Catholic University
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Associate Professor in Media, University of Notre Dame Australia
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Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing, The Open University
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Lecturer in Literary Studies, Monash University
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Personal Chair, Literary Studies, Deakin University
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Tutor in Publishing, Manchester Metropolitan University
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Senior Lecturer in Writing and Publishing, Griffith University
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Associate Editor, The Letters of Ernest Hemingway and Assistant Research Professor of English, Penn State
