Books like Cut to Care — picked by fans

Kaaron is a heavy-hitting award winner and a regular in Ellen Datlow’s anthologies, and here are over two dozen reasons why.

Her stories hum with a dark, merciless truth that makes their often-outlandish nature all the more believable; the worlds we find here are weird indeed, the peoples who populate them lonely and unsatisfied, the fates that await them uncaring and memorable.

But the writing is far from dour, imbued with a wry humour and implacable intelligence, and while it ranges unrestrained across bizarre horror, grim fantasy, and deeply personal SF, Kaaron is always entirely in control.

Lend her your attention and she won’t steer you wrong – her imagination and integrity have been an inspiration to me for many years.

Kirstyn is another stalwart of the Australian scene whom I have always admired, and this recent collection of her stellar short work is so overdue it’s almost insulting.

Like the best of our number, she delves deep into the heart of her characters to present tales that never feel rote or disengaged, and her tales have teeth in the most unexpected places.

Her weirdness is never dispassionate, her horror never tame, and she returns from the darkness with gifts of many hues.

These are modern fairy tales for the grimy backstreets and dimly lit suburban kitchens down here at the bottom end of our haunted globe.

Alan is less interested than the preceding authors in distracting poesy and deep characterisation – which is not to say that he is without sophistication, but rather that he prefers to twist the throttle hard and race through his stories like he has a metal gig to catch.

His two-fisted prose pulls no punches in this collection of five linked novellas about an odd Aussie country town, delivering bold thrills, shiversome delights, and wince-worthy kills.

Alan sets an example for myself and other local writers with his upstanding, no-shit attitude and open generosity, and those who don’t have the pleasure of knowing him personally will nonetheless feel welcomed into his world whenever they crack the covers of his books.

Claire is an irreverent delight in person, but you won’t see much of that persona in her stories – this book is heavy with gooey and bizarre body horror that always has a deeply personal context for her characters.

She’s admitted that writing is a vehicle for talking about her epilepsy, but you don’t need to share that with her to relate to the strange changes that take place on her pages.

This is just her first collection, an opening salvo across the bow of Australian horror, so it will be interesting indeed to see how her work evolves and metamorphosises over time – to meet the creature that crawls, slime-slicked and hungry, from the casing of her next books.

I really enjoyed reading all the #OwnVoice short stories, several of which have intersectional representation, in Kindred: 12 Queer #LoveOzYA Stories. The twelve authors demonstrate a wide range of writing styles, writing about different themes in a variety of genres from medieval to contemporary to dystopian. It’s a book you can return to again and again, choosing different stories to read depending on your mood and interests. 

Australian women have been involved in the creation of cinema from the beginning.

I loved this book because it was one of the few books around at the time that seriously examined this aspect of women in cinema from a range of different perspectives, including from the filmmakers themselves. Can you name the film referenced on the cover? (A: Looking for Alibrandi–a great school film and so much more!)

I loved that this classic by one of America’s greatest literary minds gave me answers about what it would be like if I did what I always dreamed of doing: leaving America behind and moving to France. One of the important things I came to realize was that The Great Escape would not solve your problems, but it would help give you a fresh perspective on things. 

Although this book is about film, rather than television, it’s impossible to understand the TV landscape without also understanding what was happening at the movies.

And then there’s Vito Russo’s incredible research and activism, which made this book possible – an inspiration for anyone interested in how media can make the world a better place.

Many books have kissing in the forest, but how many are about kissing the forest itself?

Fenton has watched countless hunters enter his forest to claim a wish by killing the white-tailed stag. Each hunter has taken: a sip from the stream, a flower from the vine, wood to light a fire. Each hunter has subsequently died.

Prior is different; he takes nothing, instead asking for a god’s assistance in waking his sister from her sleeping sickness. Fenton—who is the forest and the white-tailed stag and a son of Old Nan and also, definitely, a god—decides to pack up the forest and help Prior out.

Where I come from, that sort of thing will get you a little kiss or two at the very least.

I have to admit, although I know a lot about gods, I haven’t spent a ton of time reading about folkloric creatures, like faeries, brownies, and selkies. This book, set in a gothic old house in the English countryside in the 1850s, definitely made me feel my neglect of the topic; luckily, I got to learn alongside magician John Blake and Lord Thornby as they investigate the spell that’s holding Thornby trapped.

One remarkable thing about this book is the intriguing and clever magic system. The romance is great. And the twist at the end—well, I didn’t see it coming.