Thomas Keneally is just one acclaimed author full of praise for the second book by Leura author Claire Corbett.
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Keneally, the Booker prize winning author of Schindler’s Ark, has called Corbett’s new work Watch Over Me, “a gem of a novel [that] ticks all the boxes … beautifully textured and lovingly narrated”.
Corbett’s first book When We Have Wings was shortlisted for the 2012 Barbara Jefferis Award and the Ned Kelly Award for Best First Fiction. Her film rights agent is currently negotiating an option for an international TV series based on the novel.
Other authors reviewing her newest book have compared the psychological thriller to the works of Aldous Huxley and Peter Carey and Corbett is naturally thrilled by the praise.
“I have so much respect and admiration for Tom [Keneally], one of Australia’s greatest writers and also a wonderful human being. He cares too much about writing to be anything other than honest, so I treasure the praise from him.”
Mireille Juchau, author of the lauded The World Without Us, said “Corbett’s atmospheric landscape, with its eerie glacial light, its drifts of fog and explosives, wild geese and Sequestered Forest, is so vividly realised and starkly described, the cold and fog seem to creep beyond the page”
The book tells the story of Sylvie and her family engaged in a struggle in the northern city of Port Angelsund which is under occupation by the soldiers of Garrison.
“For the struggling residents under military occupation, death comes ‘delivered from the sky’. Yet for Sylvie and her family, love persists in all its forms,” said Juchau.
Corbett told the Gazette “Everything in it, the politics and the technology, is happening right now in war zones around the world.The book is premised on an emerging conflict over energy resources and I see that scenario becoming more likely every day. People might think this book is dystopian but let us remember that right now we have the occupation of Gaza, Ukraine, the war in Yemen and an assassination program by drone which is signed off weekly by the US President.”
Corbett’s grandfather and great uncle served as pilots and navigators in WWII and she grew up with parents who were involved in protests against the Vietnam War.
“As a result I’ve thought a great deal about what makes a war just or unjust,” she said.
“While I’m well aware of and sympathetic to the sufferings of soldiers – and veterans did give me valuable information and perspectives for this book – I think it’s time we paid more attention to the suffering of civilians. I was particularly interested by what women go through in war, what they have to do to survive, which isn’t dealt with or honoured much.”
The book is released on April 26 by Allen and Unwin and Corbett will sign copies of the book at the Megalong Books launch on May 6 from 3pm at the Carrington.
She hopes Mountains readers will enjoy her latest work.
“It’s beautiful and heartbreaking and will take you away into another world. You will have lived another life by the time you’ve finished it. It’s a gripping story about something important – modern war – especially war as experienced by civilians”.
More details at books@megalongbooks.com.au.