Australia Day

(Paperback)

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Description

Australia Day is a collection of stories by debut author Melanie Cheng. The people she writes about are young, old, rich, poor, married, widowed, Chinese, Lebanese, Christian, Muslim. What they have in commonno matter where they come fromis the desire we all share to feel that we belong. The stories explore universal themes of love, loss, family and identity, while at the same time asking crucial questions about the possibility of human connection in a globalised world.

Melanie Cheng is an important new voice, offering a fresh perspective on contemporary Australia. Her effortless, unpretentious realism balances an insiders sensitivity and understanding with an outsiders clear-eyed objectivity, showing us a version of ourselves richer and more multifaceted than anything weve seen before.

Reviews

Melanie Cheng is an astonishingly deft and incisive writer. With economy and elegance, she creates a dazzling mosaic of contemporary life, of how we live now. Hers is a compelling new voice in Australian literature. -- Christos Tsiolkas
What a wonderful book, a book with bite. These stories have a real edge to them. They are complex without being contrived, humanising, but never sentimental or cloyingand, ultimately, very moving. -- Alice Pung
If only the PM might pick up a copy, even by mistake. * Saturday Paper *
A wonderful feat of storytellingMelanie Cheng is an exciting new writer. * Readings *
The happy surprise of Chengs work as a collection lies in her resolute grasp of the absolute normalcy of a culture that not so many years ago was divided and dually suspicious. The census gives us the facts but it takes fiction to make reality three-dimensional. * Sydney Morning Herald *
The authors empathetic eye and easy facility with dialogue make the anthology a strong debut, with the longer stories in particular offering breadth and depthIt feels like Cheng has taken a wide sample from the census to craft this inclusive portrait of contemporary Australia. * Big Issue *
The book bears witness to the authors empathetic eye, multicultural characterisation and easy facility with dialogueThis short story collection explores what it means to belong, to be Australian; its insight from different vantage points and its photo-realistic narrative make it an exciting and impressive debut. * Judges Report, Victorian Premiers Literary Awards, 2018 *
The stories are unpretentious, diverse, and a lot of the time, disconcertingly real. Chengs characters are just as well realised; they live on in your head long after youve put her book down. * Lifted Brow, Favourite Books of 2017 *

Author Bio

Melanie Cheng is a writer and general practitioner. Of Chinese-Australian heritage, she was born in Adelaide, grew up in Hong Kong and now lives in Melbourne with her family. In 2016 she won the Victorian Premiers Literary Award for an Unpublished Manuscript. Her debut short story collection, Australia Day, won the 2018 Victorian Premier's Literary Award for Fiction and was shortlisted for the 2018 Indie Book Award for debut fiction and the 2017 Readings Prize for New Australian Fiction. Her writing has been published in Age, Big Issue, Meanjin and Overland among other publications.