AustLit

'Elizabeth Bryer’s From Here On, Monsters is a genuinely exciting debut from an Australian writer. This novel is playful, allegorical and formally ambitious, qualities that lend it a distinctly international flavour, in the way of Peter Carey’s early work. (Notably, Bryer has previously produced English translations of Spanish-language novels.) And, like Carey’s work, From Here On, Monsters has something urgent to say about contemporary Australia.' (Introduction)

'The most charismatic of the many monsters in Elizabeth Bryer’s début novel is the conceptual artist Maddison Worthington, who commands attention with her lipstick of ‘Mephistophelian red’ and her perfume of ‘white woods, musk and heliotrope’. From the solitude of a labyrinthine mansion, Worthington devises headline-grabbing installations, and performances that often incorporate hidden-camera footage of her audiences. Her ideas, though provocative, are largely stolen from her assistants or from little-known artists in developing countries. Worst of all, Worthington has accepted a lucrative – some would say Faustian – commission from the Department of Immigration for a project called ‘Excise Our Hearts’.'  (Introduction)

'We inhabit a moment where reality seems increasingly ­malleable, a construct that serves the interests of the powerful by eliding and obscuring the truth. From police demanding journalists submit to fingerprinting to the rejection of science by lobby groups and politicians, the control and manipulation of information has become so normalised that most of the time we no longer even notice it.'(Introduction)