This novel is a fairytale, a political allegory, and a philosophical interrogation of the human heart. Most everything has dried up: water, the womb, even the love among lovers. The earth is now mostly desert, except the last green haven behind the border where the carers of the earth preserve the natural order. Carers manage the earth's last resources and keep the wasters out. But in the vast dry outside, hunger is the pernicious plague, and people feed on sand and locusts. So they walk the dry to cross the border. But once, terrible fires crossed it too and devastated the green haven. Since then, carers have been ever-more vigilant and afraid. One night, a village is bombed for seeking to walk to the border. Only two survive: nine-year old Amedea and a locust buried in her brow. This is the story of the Locust Girl. This is her lovesong -- for those walking to the border for dear life, and those guarding the border for dear life.
Merlinda Bobis is a contemporary Philippine Australian writer, dancer, visual artist and academic. Born in Legaspi City in the Philippines, Merlinda completed her BA at Aquinas University and completed her post-graduate studies at the University of St Thomas and the University of Wollongong, where she went on to lecture in creative writing. She is now an honorary Senior Lecturer at the Australian National University. Merlinda is the recipient of multiple awards including a shortlisting for The Age Book of Year Award in 1999. In 2000 she was awarded the Steele Rudd Award for the Best Collection of Australian short stories for White Turtle and in 2016 Merlinda's novel Locust Girl: A Love Song, was awarded the Christina Stead Prize for Fiction.
Winner of the Christina Stead Prize for Fiction in the 2016 NSW Premiers Literary Awards! The judges described the author's lyrical prose as "transfiguring fiction". "There were many fine and stylistically accomplished works among this year's entries, but the distinctiveness, sweep and visual power of this short novel set it apart."
"It is no surprise that a dystopian novel about climate change has won the Christina Stead Prize for Fiction in the NSW Premier's Literary Awards." Susan Wyndham, SMH
"Bobis story resonates not only in todays Australia but throughout an environmentally and politically disrupted world where repression and violence are rife; where huge numbers of people leave their homes to undertake dangerous journeys in the search for life." Alfred Yuson, The Philippine Star
On her speaking events in Melbourne and Sydney last week, feminist, journalist and commentator Gloria Steinem congratulated Spinifex Press on 25 years of feminist publishing. "Can I say thank you to Spinifex Press which is now in its 25th anniversary. Its been such an inspiration to us." Gloria Steinem
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