Böcker av Helen Garner

A collection of short stories celebrating the work of one of Australia's most loved authors

Athena and Dexter live a happy but insular life, bound by routine and the care of their young sons. When Elizabeth, an old friend from Dexter's university days, turns up, she brings an enticing world to their doorstep and Athena finds herself straining at the confines of her life.? This intimate and engaging short novel was first published in 1984. The Children's Bach is 'a jewel', in Ben Lerner's description, 'beautiful, lapidary, rare'.

The gritty, lyrical novel that launched Helen Garner's career

Anyone can see the place where the children died. You take the Princes Highway past Geelong, and keep going west in the direction of Colac. Late in August 2006, soon after I had watched a magistrate commit Robert Farquharson to stand trial before a jury on three charges of murder, I headed out that way on a Sunday morning, across the great volcanic plain.On the evening of 4 September 2005, Father's Day, Robert Farquharson, a separated husband, was driving his three sons home to their mother, Cindy, when his car left the road and plunged into a dam. The boys, aged ten, seven and two, drowned. Was this an act of revenge or a tragic accident? The court case became Helen Garner's obsession. She followed it on its protracted course until the final verdict.In this utterly compelling book, Helen Garner tells the story of a man and his broken life. She presents the theatre of the courtroom with its actors and audience - all gathered to witness to the truth - players in the extraordinary and unpredictable drama of the quest for justice.This House of Grief is a heartbreaking and unputdownable book by one of Australia's most admired writers.

'The chameleon-like non-fiction of the Australian Helen Garner, queen of the effervescent true crime, proves that reality is, at times, pure literature' Babelia, Spain

'A voice of great honesty and energy' ANNE ENRIGHT'There are very few writers that I admire more than Helen Garner' DAVID NICHOLLS'It is impossible not to follow her as she brings to life the events and feelings she is exploring' DIANA ATHILL'Not long ago I read Helen Garner for the first time and was so stunned that I wanted to run around the block' RUMAAN ALAMHelen Garner has kept a diary for almost all her life. 'A stream of fragments', she says, 'of the world as it struck me on my way through.'Strewn with devastating honesty, sparkling humour and steel-sharp wit, these expertly arranged volumes offer a window into the life and work of one of Australia's greatest living writers.Helen Garner's Collected Diaries span twenty years, with the first volume beginning in the late 1970s just after the publication of her debut novel Monkey Grip. The second volume begins in 1987 as she embarks on an affair that she knows will be all-consuming, and the final volume in 1995, as she fights to hold on to a marriage that is disintegrating around her.Shockingly relatable and forensically observed, these diaries reveal the inner life of a woman in love and a great writer at work. In doing so, they uncover the messy, painful, dark side of love, the sheer force of a woman's anger, the immutable ties of motherhood and the regenerative power of a room of one's own.

This Australian novel is the journey of two women as their friendship is threatened by death. 'A perfect novel' Peter Carey

They say that tourist ships to Antarctica, even more than ordinary human conveyances, are loaded down with aching hearts. Deceived wives and widowers, men who've never been loved and don't know why, Russian crew forced to leave their children behind for years at a time ... And then there are the married couples: how calm the old ones, how eager the new! - but isn't a couple the greatest mystery of all? Regions of Thick-Ribbed Ice is the tale of a journey to Antarctica aboard the Professor Molchanov. With unmatched eloquence, Helen Garner spins a tale of ships, icebergs, tourism, time, photography and the many forms of desolation. Helen Garner has written novels, short stories, screenplays and many acclaimed works of journalism. She was the recipient of the 2006 Melbourne Prize for Literature. Her books include Monkey Grip, The Children's Bach, Joe Cinque's Consolation, The Spare Room and This House of Grief.