Helen Garner

A captivating and deeply personal novel from one of Australia's most respected 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 with her much younger sister, Vicki, and her lover, Philip, she brings an enticing world to their...

This stylish paperback edition of Helen Garner’s collected short fiction celebrates the work of one of Australia’s most loved authors. These stories— that delve into the complexities of love and longing, of the pain, darkness and joy of life— are all told with her characteristic sharpness of observation, honesty and humour. Each one a perfect piece, together they showcase Garner’s...

The third instalment of diaries from the inimitable Helen Garner covers four eventful years in the life of one of Australia's most treasured writers. How to End a Story, Helen Garner's third volume of diaries, is an account of a woman fighting to hold on to a marriage that is disintegrating around her. Living with a powerfully ambitious writer who...

How to End a Story, Helen Garner’s third volume of diaries, is an account of a woman fighting to hold on to a marriage that is disintegrating around her. Living with a powerfully ambitious writer who is consumed by his work, and trying to find a place for her own spirit to thrive, she rails against the confines. At the...

In this second volume of diaries from one of Australia's greatest writers, we see Garner in love; asking herself questions about relationships, individuality, morality, and contentment. For readers of Lisa Taddeo's Three Women, and avid Garner fans, this volume illuminates the inner life of a writer with all its turmoil and joy. One Day I'll Remember This presents the question:...

In this second volume of diaries from one of Australia's greatest writers, we see Garner in love; asking herself questions about relationships, individuality, morality and contentment. This volume illuminates the inner life of a writer with all its turmoil and joy. Why should it be any different from any other love affair? Why shouldn't it run through its phases, wither,...

It’s footy season in Melbourne, and Helen Garner is following her grandson’s under-16s team. She not only goes to every game (give or take), but to every training session too, shivering on the sidelines at dusk, fascinated by the spectacle. She’s a passionate Western Bulldogs fan (with an imperfect grasp of the rules) who loves the epic theatre of AFL...

The first volume of private diaries from the fearless, fierce, and much-loved Helen Garner, is now available in paperback. Finally, Helen Garner has opened her diaries and invited readers into the world behind her novels and works of non-fiction. Recorded with frankness, humour, and steel-sharp wit, these accounts of her everyday life provide an intimate insight into the work of...

An extraordinary book of collected short non-fiction, spanning fifty years of work, by one of Australia's great writers. Helen Garner visits the morgue, and goes cruising on a Russian ship. She sees women giving birth, and gets the sack for teaching her students about sex. She attends a school dance and a gun show. She writes about dreaming, about turning...

Spanning forty years of work, True Stories is the collected essays, stories, and diary entries of one of Australia's greatest writers. Helen Garner visits the morgue and goes cruising on a Russian ship. She sees women giving birth and gets the sack for teaching her students about sex. She attends a school dance and a gun show. She writes about...

Helen Garner’s gritty, lyrical first novel divided the critics on its publication in 1977. Today, Monkey Grip is regarded as a masterpiece—the novel that shines a light on a time and a place and a way of living never before presented in Australian literature: communal households, music, friendships, children, love, drugs, and sex. When Nora falls in love with Javo,...

Helen Garner's gritty, lyrical first novel divided the critics upon its publication in 1977. Today, Monkey Grip is regarded as a masterpiece—a novel that shines a light on a time, a place, and a way of living never before presented in Australian literature: communal households, music, friendships, children, love, drugs, and sex. When Nora falls in love with Javo, she...

A captivating and deeply personal novel from one of Australia’s most respected 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 with her much younger sister, Vicki, and her lover, Philip, she brings an enticing world to their...

This stylish paperback edition of Stories by Helen Garner celebrates the work of one of Australia’s most loved authors. These stories—delving into the complexities of love and longing, and the pain, darkness, and joy of life—are all told with her characteristic sharpness of observation, honesty, and humour. Each one a perfect piece, together they showcase Garner’s mastery of the form....

This handsome hardback edition of Helen Garner’s collected short fiction celebrates the seventy-fifth birthday of one of Australia's most loved authors. These stories—delving into the complexities of love and longing, of the pain, darkness, and joy of life—are all told with her characteristic sharpness of observation, honesty, and humour. Each one a perfect piece, together they showcase Garner’s mastery of...

Two novellas about the deep connections we forge with the people we love, and the pain of breaking those connections. In Honour, Kathleen and Frank are amicably separated, in contact through shared parenting of their young daughter, Flo. But when Frank finds a new partner and wants a divorce, Kathleen is hurt. And Flo can’t understand why they all can’t...

These screenplays—The Last Days of Chez Nous, directed by Gillian Armstrong in 1992, and Two Friends, by Jane Campion in 1986—are sharp observations of relationships and friendships, home and family life, cut with Helen Garner's trademark humour. As intimate and engrossing as Garner's widely acclaimed novels and non-fiction (including 2015's critically-acclaimed This House of Grief), they show the range of...

"He straightened his spine, raised his head, and extended his gun arm towards me in a slow, vertical arc. I saw then what he was, and stood still in front of him, for he was here on business. He was a small, serious, stone-eyed angel of mercy." Janet is a skeptic, a journalist; Maxine revels in New Age fantasies; and...

Critically-acclaimed true crime from the author of The First Stone (Picador, 2007), The Spare Room (Canongate, 2008) and Cosmo Cosmolino (Text, 2013). On the evening of the 4th September 2005, Robert Farquharson, a separated husband, was driving his three sons home to their mother when his car left the road and plunged into a dam. The boys, aged ten, seven...

Helen Garner is one of Australia's greatest writers. Her short non-fiction has enormous range. Spanning 15 years of work, Everywhere I Look is a book full of unexpected moments, sudden shafts of light, piercing intuition, flashes of anger, and incidental humour. It takes us from backstage at the ballet to the trial of a woman for the murder of her...

Helen prepares her spare room for her friend Nicola, who is flying down from Sydney for a three-week visit. But this is no ordinary visit—Nicola has advanced cancer. She is coming to Melbourne to receive treatment she believes will cure her. From the moment Nicola steps off the plane, Helen becomes her nurse, her protector, her guardian angel, and her...

The Mushroom Tapes brings together three renowned writers of true crime: Helen Garner, Chloe Hooper and Sarah Krasnostein. For this extraordinary book, the lone wolves became a team. Garner, Hooper and Krasnostein tracked Erin Patterson’s preliminary hearings and trial, joined the media scrum at the Latrobe Valley Law Courts, slept over in Morwell and spent countless hours in fervent discussion of...

Helen Garner’s acclaimed three volumes of diaries are collected here in one sumptuous book. Spanning two decades—from the publication of her lightning-rod debut novel in the late 70s, to the throes of a consuming affair in the late 80s, and the messiness and pain of a disintegrating marriage in the late 90s—the diaries reveal the life of one of the...

When two young women students claimed they had been indecently assaulted at a party by the Master of Ormond at Melbourne University in 1990, the shock not only split the college and university communities but focused sharply the larger social debate about sexuality and power. What the media presented as a head-on clash between outraged innocence and exploiting power becomes,...