The Lost Thoughts of Soldiers shortlisted for Commonwealth Book Prize!
We're delighted to hear that The Lost Thoughts of Soldiers a deeply lovely and gloriously vulgar novel by the gifted Australian Delia Falconer has been shortlisted for Commonwealth Book Prize! A "mixed bag," declares The Complete Review, [NOTE: refering to the list, not refering to our novel, our novel being a genius bag, of course] but we're just happy to see one of ours in there (it publishes in the US in late April...).
This inspires me to mention a superb article by Sydney Morning Herald's Literary Editor, Malcolm Knox. The basic spiel being:
The article discusses Delia Falconer and Cormac McCarthy as examples of literary fiction...Nice company to be in.
Finally, a sample of the deliciousness or download a nice chunk...
At the river he sees five tortoises, eyes eternal and unblinking, lined up along a muddy tree root. A sharp urge to follow his young self as he dives into this same water, the hot sun carried in upon his shoulders, his sturdy heart enjoying its brief stillness—to follow his own slick mammal stream back up to the surface, tight bubbles clinging to the hair upon his thighs.
When he received that last note that Custer sent—Bring Pacs—his first thought, even as he caught a glimpse of Reno’s troops, was that the bastard couldn’t even spell it.
At the trial afterward, they had all remarked upon his own calmness, urged his promotion, made it clear how, in spite of Custer’s note to join him, time and land had closed between him and the hope of getting bullets to the rest.
He watches as his shadow turns before him, skims along the bank. The tortoises, as one, drop into the water.
He thinks, how small the river is.
It has never been much more than a path to the gristmill, no great and mythic passage here; some premonition his father must have had, about the Benteen name.
For a while he thinks of nothing but such bitter symbols for his life.