Introduction—July 2024
Last year, I did a radio interview to promote New Australian Fiction. ‘Pretty straightforward questions,’ the presenter told me before we started. A few minutes in: ‘What makes something Australian?’
Oh no, I thought. Not so straightforward.
That question makes me think of the GANGGajang song ‘Sounds of Then’, a favourite of pub bands and Colorbond steel ads. Let’s just say I’ve never been out on that patio. I’ve never seen lightning crack over cane fields. I’ve never laughed and thought, Ah, this is Australia. At least not in earnest. The fact is, I wouldn’t exist if not for the dismantling of the White Australia Policy. Many established notions of Australianness had to change for my migrant parents to come here from different continents, meet each other and produce someone who says ummm too many times in interviews.
In the end, I told the presenter that I was not so interested in citizenship or national identity as a necessity for publication. And it’s true. We publish writers whose links to this country are varied, sometimes amorphous and ephemeral. After all, in the grand scheme of things, Australia as we know it is a pretty new concept, only made official in 1901. There are First Nations storytelling traditions on this land that reach back tens of thousands of years. The borders have spent more of human history open and porous than they have closed and exclusionary.
But I can recognise that certain texture, that certain beat (look, that song is very catchy), that makes our literature distinctive. We all can. In New Australian Fiction 2024, the question I was asked in that interview reverberates. Writers push and pull at it to varying degrees. In some stories, Australia is just the backdrop. As everyday as the carpet and walls, as in Erin Gough’s ‘Dinner Scene’, where the Howard years come into focus. It can be a site of uneasy nostalgia in the face of climate change, as in Tracey Lien’s ‘Goodbye, Blinky Bill’. In others, Australia—the idea, as much as anything else—will never be ‘home’. It can be a mirage, as in Kathryn Gledhill-Tucker’s ‘The Station’. A relic of a distant past, as in Jumaana Abdu’s ‘Illegal Alien’. Or completely off the page, as in Daley Rangi’s ‘Black Sand’. And yet every single writer has been shaped in some indelible way by this nation. As a result, it seeps into their stories, and their stories speak back to it.
It shouldn’t be a surprise that feelings of unsettlement recur in this book. Recent world events have brought national narratives to the forefront, exposing how a monolithic world view has the power to sever people from a sense of shared humanity. It can be a bind, as conveyed in Behrouz Boochani’s ‘Qobad’. It can create a hopeless cycle, like the one that we’ve seen unfold during the production of this book as Palestinians suffer a brutal collective punishment—what the International Court of Justice has deemed plausible acts of genocide by Israel and which is still ongoing. In the words of Ursula K Le Guin in The Left Hand of Darkness: ‘I know people, I know towns, I know farms, hills and rivers and rocks […] but what is the sense of giving a boundary to all that, of giving it a name and ceasing to love where the name ceases to apply?’
If there’s a throughline in this anthology, maybe it’s that our notions of what a country is—and could and should be—are ever-changing. Maybe it’s that humanity has never been just about one story but many, and it’s important to read it as a collection.
Humanity has never been just about one story but many, and it’s important to read it as a collection.
I want to express my gratitude to all the warm and wonderful people who helped bring this book to life.This anthology wouldn’t exist without the tireless guidance and advocacy of Kill Your Darlings’ publishing director Rebecca Starford, who established New Australian Fiction in 2019 to provide a platform for fresh local writing and continues to ensure its existence. Further admiration goes to my colleagues Madeline Crehan and Alan Vaarwerk for their hard work and good humour.
To Caitlin McGregor and Mekdes Yimam, our extra submissions readers: I am lucky to have your keen eyes and good taste for stories again! Hats off to the talented Darby Jones—your editorial consulting on the story ‘The Station’ was inspiring in its generosity and enthusiasm. Cheers to the queen of AusLit book covers, Alissa Dinallo, for our vibrant design refresh. Thank you to Jane Novak, for your kind assistance.
Creative Australia helped fund the creation of this anthology, and we thank them for their support and their championing of Australian literature at large.
To close, a huge thank you to those people who really make this collection what it is:
Thank you to the talented writers who allowed us to feature their brilliant creativity.
Thank you to the supporters of Kill Your Darlings, our subscribers and the more than 400 writers who submitted to this year’s callout.
Thank you to the booksellers and librarians.
And thank you to the readers—it’s for you, it’s all for you, and we couldn’t do it without you!
We hope you enjoy these stories.
New Australian Fiction 2024 features stories from: Jumaana Abdu, Dominic Amerena, Alice Bishop, Behrouz Boochani, Ennis Ćehić, Paige Clark, Ceridwen Dovey, Kathryn Gledhill-Tucker, Erin Gough, Lee Hana, Tracey Lien, Lucy Nelson, Daley Rangi, Josephine Rowe and Aisling Smith.
Order your copy here or receive a discounted copy by becoming a KYD bundle member here.
