Fresh Cuttings (selected by Sue Abbey and Sandra Phillips)

‘A celebration of fiction and poetry from UQP’s Black Writing Series’

A copy of this anthology, published in 2003, found its way onto my bookshelf a couple of years ago.  Now that I have finally read it, I wonder why it took me so long.  It is a mixture of fiction and poetry, of authors I have already read and some that I’ve just learned about for the very first time.  There is biographical information about each of the authors.  Of the poets, I am most familiar with Elizabeth Hodgson.  I have a copy of ‘Skin Painting’ which I read a few years ago.  The other poets are Lisa Bellear, Jack Davis, Graeme Dixon and Samuel Wagan Watson.

Of the fiction writers, I am familiar with Alexis Wright, Melissa Lucashenko, and Doris Pilkington Garimara.  Each of the ten to twelve-page extracts included in this anthology had me wanting to read more.

My favourites?  Melissa Lucashenko’s ‘Steam Pigs and John Muk Muk Burke’s ‘Bridge of Triangles’.

If you are looking to read more fiction and/or poetry by Australian Indigenous authors, I can recommend this book.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

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