Month: March 2021

A publisher who helped to launch the careers of several distinguished writers, Hilary McPhee believes my debut novel The Hands of Pianists is ‘perfectly poised between silences and sounds, music-making and conversation’. She said she ‘loved its utter lack of pretension’. I’m delighted with the high praise, of course. With business partner Diana Gribble, Hilary launched Helen Garner, among other fine writers, via their imprint McPhee Gribble. Hilary’s endorsement complements Peter Craven’s critique on Saturday in The Weekend Australian. Peter …

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Esteemed literary critic Peter Craven has praised to the heavens my debut novel The Hands of Pianists . In Saturday’s The Weekend Australian,  he called it ‘virtuosic in its techniques and grand in its achievement’. Indeed, it’s hard to know where to start in quoting from Peter’s review. I’m over the moon, of course — Craven is the doyen of Australian critical writing.     He begins by calling Hands ‘an absolutely compelling literary novel’ written by a ‘born artist’. By …

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My debut novel The Hands of Pianists is officially out tomorrow. (Please see good online bookstores for details.) Hands has received some quite amazing recommendations. The great Liszt pianist Leslie Howard calls it ‘rich and remarkable’. W. G. Sebald scholar Dr Deane Blackler says it ‘offers much to reflect on, a great deal to admire, and perhaps a little to fear’. Golden-voiced Colin Fox, formerly of ABC Classic and these days a presenter at radio 3MBS, would like Hands sub-titled …

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