Conversations I’ve Never Had

In her debut collection, award-winning talent Caitlin Maling explores coming of age in contemporary Australia. Writing from Perth, Houston and Cambridge, Maling’s early years to adulthood are told through the lens of the Australian landscape. For young settler Australians this is a place that both defines and undermines identity. A place that claims but can’t be claimed in return. Restlessly questioning and slipping between promise and possibility, Maling’s Australia is richly evoked in narratives of raw power and feeling.

PRAISE FOR THE BOOK

‘Caitlin Maling’s Conversations I’ve never had is remarkable mainly for its gritty treatment of childhood and adolescence in Western Australia.’ Canberra Times

‘Maling’s combination of hardness and emotion, experience and naivety, is productive and appealing.’ Weekend Australian

‘These conversations are intimate glimpses of loss in which nature is pivotal to the poet’s inner dialogues. Maling’s family poems are particularly moving.’ Wasafiri