book coven: generational trauma edition

happy birthday, grandma!

Today would have been my grandmother Cecylia’s 99th birthday. She passed away in 2019.

This date, February 6th, will always feel special to me. It bleeds on calendars. It pulses with the colour amethyst. It smells like my grandmother’s perfume, which I’ve sentimentally kept her last ever bottle of.

So, a lot of readers (okay, three) have suggested I start a little book club.

I thought I’d use this special day to do it (only, let’s call it a coven!).

It’ll consist of me posting the occasional list. I’ll post a thread in the Substack chat for any readers to drop their thoughts, or even share their own recommendations.

Today’s theme is ‘generational trauma’ - because I just don’t think I’ve read any books specifically about grandmas.

In different ways, all of the books I’ve chosen explore themes of familial inheritance, especially down the maternal line.

I’ll conclude by waxing lyrically a little about my grandmother.

It’s coven time!

Here are my recommendations:

Rouge - Mona Awad

'A biting satire on the beauty industry.'

This book about a beauty cult sucks you into its world instantly: a mystery from the past, a protagonist who’s worked hard to free herself of her obsession with her own body - until her estranged mother, Noelle, falls off a cliff and dies. I think it’s a masterpiece of modern magic realism. The main character Belle’s skincare rituals and spa treatments are…haunting.

This one’s for anyone who loves good writing, but especially for the girls. The last third of the book is off the rails, in a good way.

Burnt Sugar - Avni Doshi

'Exhilarating, exquisite, impossible to put down.'

The prose in this debut pops with talent. I enjoyed the bold, sensory descriptions of modern India, it made me feel like I’d been transported there.

Antara unearths a secret from the past (I love those!), remembering her childhood with a flawed and difficult mother. There are no heroes or villains here; sometimes our veins run with hate for the ones we still love. An incredibly nuanced look at the trauma that can run through families. Probably not for everyone, but I really enjoyed it. Lovely literary fiction.

Lola in the Mirror by Trent Dalton

‘A big, moving, blackly funny, violent, heartbreaking and beautiful novel’

This book won the Australian Book Industry Awards’ Literary Fiction Book of the Year.

A girl and her mother have been on the run for sixteen years from a monster, living in a van by the Brisbane river. The girl has no name, but when she looks in the mirror, she finds…Lola, who can make her big dreams come true.

Bestselling Australian author Trent Dalton (Boy Swallows Universe) finds inspiration in his own familial trauma. Lola is a gripping story exploring the themes of possibility, familial secrets and fate. Its sparkling prose probes the darkest corners of modern Australia.

The Goldfinch - Donna Tart

‘A beautifully written coming-of-age novel with exquisitely drawn characters’

I. Love. Donna Tartt’s writing. She is my favourite author, even though she’s only written three books over…thirty or so years. This won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2014. Some people say this book’s too long, but it won a goddamn Pulitzer, so I say those people are misers. The writing in this is superb.

Theo Decker’s life is overshadowed by a mystery from his past (yes, another one), a painting he keeps secret, and his mother’s sudden death. A gripping story that spans many years and many places, from New York City’s upper society, to the art world, to suburbia, to Amsterdam’s underworld. You will fall in love with the characters, and you will not expect the ending.

The Overstory - Richard Powers

‘A stunning evocation of - and paean to - the natural world’

We’ve entered the Pulitzer Prize section - this one won the Fiction prize in 2019.

This novel is very creative. And more gripping than you’d expect, for a book that blabs on so much about trees. The trees breathe with life in this book, and you really begin to understand them as living beings. I learned a great deal about how trees work from the poetic descriptions of their ecosystems in this novel; Richard describes the way they share nutrients, the way they actually behave, the choices they make. It was fascinating.

The author used a unique structure, dividing the novel into four sections titled ‘roots’, ‘trunk’, ‘crown’ and ‘seeds’ - the structure of a tree! Oh yeah, and the actual story? It follows nine Americans. Their family legacies and unique experiences of trees bring them together to address the destruction of forests.

I’m Glad My Mom Died - Jenette McCurdy

‘A heartbreaking and hilarious memoir by Disney star Jennette McCurdy about her struggles as a former child actor’

We’ve entered the non-fiction section. What a title - you’ve probably heard of this one, or read it already; it topped bestseller lists when it was released. You’ll soon understand the harsh-sounding sentiment of the title of this book; Jenette’s mother was an absolutely nightmare.

This book is very easy to read, and a standout celebrity memoir. It’s honestly hard to imagine surviving a mother like the one described in this book, although I know logically there are parents who are even worse.

Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents - Lindsay C Gibson

‘Practical insight into a prevalent problem…The book is impeccably clear…This utter lack of confusion makes the book quite soothing, despite the heavy subject.’

This is a very famous self-help book; I won’t be recommending many of these, but it seems apt for this theme.

This book has helped a lot of people with abusive, negligent, or just generally difficult parents. If you, like many people, have less-than-perfect parents, it’ll teach you how to parent yourself!

[Disclaimer: I know the following two authors personally, but I stand by these recommendations! Support local authors!]

The Mail Train Murders - Kay Duke

‘This publication is an impressive achievement. So good, in fact, it's almost criminal...’

I was fortunate enough to meet Kay while we both completed residencies with the Queensland Writers Centre last year. I’m in awe of the level of research she did to write this book! It’s a gripping true crime tale, and a valuable record of Australian history.

In 1936, three brutally bashed bodies pulled up in a blood soaked carriage at Brisbane’s Central Station. This crime rocked Australia and led to a mad police chase across state lines. Kay is an ancestor of the murderer the heart of this story, Herbert Kobit - the perpetrator of the only Australian double homicide committed on a train. She delves into the impact that being related to a notorious murderer has had on her family towards the end of the book.

Kay has now commenced writing about her maternal family, who resided in Redfern, NSW during the war years.

Find The Mail Train Murders online or at one of the stockists listed here!

The Stories We Carry - Jas Rawlinson

'A memoir about finding your voice and re-writing trauma into triumph'

This gripping and inspiring story is about survival and rising up. It also manages to be really funny and ‘light’, a lot of the time.

Growing up amidst frightening domestic violence, Jas navigates a world where a shroud of silence surrounds these struggles. She takes us through the effects her childhood had on her sense of self and relationships, as she comes of age.

This book powerfully depicts the societal shame that surrounds domestic violence, and how difficult it is to recover from, while signposting ways to face it and fight. Somehow, it’s not a depressing or sluggish book. Set amongst central coastal NSW and then QLD in the 90s and 00s, this memoir’s writing is rich, alive and evocative - and full of pop culture references I related to!

Jas is now a domestic violence expert who works hard to educate the Australian community about coercive control.

Get a signed copy of The Stories We Carry here!

Remembering my grandmother

She came to this country with fire in her heels.

She came to forget a war.

She came with hope and cake in her veins.

She was tough in ways people aren’t now.

She was tough and her mother was cruel.

She sewed, she knitted, she closed wounds.

She did what she could to be better.

She sang, she danced.

She had the sweetest alto.

She waltzed me rhythmically across the bouncy linoleum floorboards of her kitchen: rum pa pa, rum pa pa.

Her motto was, “eh, good enough.”

I wrote the below poem a few years ago about the grief of losing a loved one; partly for my grandmother and partly for my aunt.

I also recorded my grandmother singing Polish lullabies and put some crappy midi music behind it years ago.... she was going a bit out-of-key by then (she was in her 80s), but hey, I tried.

Happy birthday, Babcia! You’ll never be forgotten.