Announcing the top ten ABR Favourite Australian Novels

Of the 290 individual novels that were nominated in the ABR FAN Poll, below we list the top ten. At the foot of page 25 we simply name the ten titles that followed. We don’t have room to list all of your favourites. A complete alphabetical listing now appears on our website: www.australian- bookreview.com – a fillip to further reading and to a deeper appreciation of the range of Australian fiction, which was our shy hope when we polled our readers.

Cloudstreet im Winton’s books attract international kudos, pres- 1 tigious awards and massive sales. Winton won the Australian/Vogel National Award with his first novel andT last year became only the second person to win the Miles Franklin Award four times. Cloudstreet, published in 1991, holds a unique place in Australian readers’ affections. Winton’s tale of the Lambs and the Pickles from the end of World War II to the 1960s won the 1992 Miles Franklin Award and was dramatised by Nick Enright and Justin Monjo. Presciently, in 1994, The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature predicted that ‘it seems certain to establish itself as one of Australia’s best novels’. Countless voters agreed. One of them, Carla Ziino, described it as ‘the quintessential Australian novel’.

The Fortunes Voss of Richard atrick White, 2 3 Australia’s first Mahony Nobel Laureate Pfor Literature, dominat- enry Handel’s ed Australian literature grand trilogy from the 1950s to his – Australia death in 1990. Voss, his HFelix (1917), The Way fifth novel, published Home (1925) and Ultima in 1957, won the first Thule (1929), first col- Miles Franklin Award. lected in 1930 – is one It opens in colonial of the true epics of our Sydney, in 1845, when literature. Combining the German explorer history, naturalism and allegory, it follows the Irish- Voss, partly based on Ludwig Leichardt, prepared to born protagonist from Britain to Victoria over four cross the continent. The story of his vicissitudes decades in the nineteenth century. Few Australian and of his telepathic ‘marriage’ to Laura Trevelyan novelists have rivalled Richardson’s vision or inten- remains one of the surpassing works of modern sity. John Scully, who voted for Fortunes, remarked fiction. Richard Meale and David Malouf ’s opera that as a schoolboy he perceived Richard Mahony’s followed in 1986. Zofia Moczulski, who selected energy and restlessness as ‘a metaphor for Australia’s this novel, commented: ‘No other novel captures colonial and post-colonial development’. so movingly the essence of Australian life’.

24 Breath Eucalyptus im Winton’s urray Bail’s third 4 ninth and most 8 novel, pub- recent novel, lished in 1998, which was published in Mwon the Miles Franklin T Award. Among the favoured 2008 and won him his fourth Miles Franklin novelists, Bail’s oeuvre Award, explores themes is perhaps the smallest of friendship, risk- and most original. taking and the sea.

Oscar and The Man Who 5 Lucinda 9 Loved Children eter Carey’s third hristina Stead’s novel, published masterpiece, in 1988, won the published in 1940 Miles Franklin Award Cand long neglected, in- P vites comparisons with and the Booker Prize, and was subsequently the greatest novels of filmed. the twentieth century, Faulkner’s among them.

My Brother The Tree of 6 Jack 10 Man eorge Johnston’s atrick White’s fourth fifteenth novel, novel, published in published in 1955, two years be- G1964, opened his semi- fore Voss, concerns the lives autobiographical trilogy, P of Stan and Amy Parker and won the Miles Fran- from the 1880s to the klin Award. His second 1930s. wife, Charmian Clift, adapted it for television.

The Secret 11 My Brilliant Career Miles Franklin 12 Monkey Grip Helen Garner 7 River 13 Dirt Music Tim Winton 14 The Vivisector Patrick White ate Grenville’s sixth novel was pub- 15 Picnic at Hanging Rock Joan Lindsay lished in 2005 and 16 Remembering Babylon David Malouf Kwon the Commonwealth 17 For the Term of His Natural Life Marcus Clarke Prize for Literature Award. 18 The Merry-Go-Round in the Sea Randolph Stow It was also shortlisted for the Miles Franklin Award 19 Carpentaria Alexis Wright and Man Booker Prizes. 20 The Slap Christos Tsiolkas

ALL 290 NOMINATED TITLES ARE LISTED ON THE ABR WEBSITE: WWW.AUSTRALIANBOOKREVIEW.COM.AU 25