Perfume, Rain, and Chaos. Two New Stories from RAF.

There are no super powers in the latest Review of Australian Fiction, but each of the main characters possess an extraordinary ability.

Do you remember Patrick Suskind’s novel Perfume? What if the protagonist had been somewhat less psychopathic (though as completely self-obsessed) and had become trapped in the kind of corporate dullness that ruins many men? And what if you had got to hear from his wife? Equally as gifted, but in a very different way. This is the scenario that underpins  Anna  Tambour and Simon Brown’s Joy. I don’t think it gives away too much to say this is not a happy marriage.

But Laura E. Goodin has a happier view of human nature. She imagines a very wet Australia in Water Cools Not Love.  This  is a story set around cricket and climate change and chaos theory, and it is, believe it or not, a very funny piece. I’m glad to see the phrase, ‘Yeah, no, I’m not real pleased,’ will persistent into Australia’s extraordinarily wet future.