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y separately published work icon Our Father Who Wasn't There single work   autobiography  
Issue Details: First known date: 2010... 2010 Our Father Who Wasn't There
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'Can a memoir begin without memories? Can a father be invented? When David Carlin was only six months old, his father, Brian, died. It was the 1960s in isolated Western Australia, a place in which emotions were discreetly veiled, women did not attend funerals - and suicide was a sin. Brian became a mysteriously absent figure in David's family story, hardly spoken of again.

'As an adult, David yearns to conjure up his father, to uncover what led to his death at his own hand. Gradually, he begins to piece together Brian's story from the faltering memories of friends and relatives, and from the voices and incidents that emerge from Brian's medical records. Into the inevitable gaps that remain, David cannot help but stray with his own imaginings.

'Through David, Brian's story starts to fill out - up rise the hessian walls of his childhood house on the edge of the wheat belt during the Depression, the outposts of heady undergraduate bohemia in late-1940s Perth, and Brian's happily married life with a brilliant and loving young wife, and an equally brilliant career. But, in among it all, there also rises a darkness - a damaging undertow of electric-shock therapy, insulin comas, and whispered wartime events.

'In this masterfully rendered memoir, David moves like a ghost through time and place, deftly weaving a story from what he has always known, and from all that he will never know.' (From the publisher's website.)

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • Carlton North, Parkville - Carlton area, Melbourne - North, Melbourne, Victoria,: Scribe , 2010 .
      image of person or book cover 5395355886202632275.jpg
      This image has been sourced from online.
      Extent: 225p.
      ISBN: 9781921640254 (pbk.)

Works about this Work

How We're Hooked on Hurt Jane Sullivan , 2010 single work column
— Appears in: The Age , 14 August 2010; (p. 26)
Painful Search for Truth behind the Life of Brian Nicole Trian , 2010 single work review
— Appears in: The Sun-Herald , 15 May 2010; (p. 13)

— Review of Our Father Who Wasn't There David Carlin , 2010 single work autobiography
Homage to a Father's Ghost Rod Moran , 2010 single work review
— Appears in: The West Australian , 9 March 2010; (p. 6-7)

— Review of Our Father Who Wasn't There David Carlin , 2010 single work autobiography
Compassion for the Life of Brian Jeremy Fisher , 2010 single work review
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 20-21 February 2010; (p. 29)

— Review of Our Father Who Wasn't There David Carlin , 2010 single work autobiography
Non-Fiction Books Ian Barry , 2010 single work review
— Appears in: The Courier-Mail , 13 - 14 February 2010; (p. 24)

— Review of Our Father Who Wasn't There David Carlin , 2010 single work autobiography
Journey into a Dead Father's Maze of a Mind Stephen Romei , 2010 single work review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 30-31 January 2010; (p. 18-19)

— Review of Our Father Who Wasn't There David Carlin , 2010 single work autobiography
Reaching for Meaning in the Void Sian Prior , 2010 single work review
— Appears in: The Age , 30 January 2010; (p. 23)

— Review of Our Father Who Wasn't There David Carlin , 2010 single work autobiography
A Son Searches for the Father Who Wasn't There Peter Pierce , 2010 single work review
— Appears in: The Canberra Times , 6 February 2010; (p. 15)

— Review of Our Father Who Wasn't There David Carlin , 2010 single work autobiography
Cover Notes Lucy Sussex , 2010 single work review
— Appears in: The Sunday Age , 7 February 2010; (p. 21)

— Review of Our Father Who Wasn't There David Carlin , 2010 single work autobiography
Non-Fiction Books Ian Barry , 2010 single work review
— Appears in: The Courier-Mail , 13 - 14 February 2010; (p. 24)

— Review of Our Father Who Wasn't There David Carlin , 2010 single work autobiography
How We're Hooked on Hurt Jane Sullivan , 2010 single work column
— Appears in: The Age , 14 August 2010; (p. 26)
Last amended 23 Jul 2014 15:46:16
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