AustLit logo

AustLit

image of person or book cover 2752839427578253465.jpg
Cover image courtesy of publisher.
y separately published work icon Wild Abandon single work   novel  
Issue Details: First known date: 2021... 2021 Wild Abandon
The material on this page is available to AustLit subscribers. If you are a subscriber or are from a subscribing organisation, please log in to gain full access. To explore options for subscribing to this unique teaching, research, and publishing resource for Australian culture and storytelling, please contact us or find out more.

AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'A breathtaking new novel from the Stella Prize-winning author of The Strays.

'In the fall of 2011, a heartbroken young man flees Australia for the USA. Landing in the excessive, uncanny-familiar glamour and plenitude of New York City, Will makes a vow to say yes to everything that comes his way. By fate or random chance, Will's journey takes him deep into the American heartland where he meets Wayne Gage, a fast-living, troubled Vietnam veteran, would-be spirit guide and collector of exotic animals. These two men in crisis form an unlikely friendship, but Will has no idea just how close to the edge Wayne truly is.

'Wild Abandon is a headlong tumble through the falling world of end-days capitalism, a haunting, hyperreal snapshot of our own strange times. We read with increasing horror and denial as we approach the cataclysmic conclusion of Will's American odyssey, dreading what is galloping towards us, but utterly unable to look away.

'This lyrical and devastating new novel from the Stella Prize-winning author of The Strays offers us startling and profound visions of the world and our place in it.' (Publication summary)

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • Crows Nest, North Sydney - Lane Cove area, Sydney Northern Suburbs, Sydney, New South Wales,: Allen and Unwin , 2021 .
      image of person or book cover 2752839427578253465.jpg
      Cover image courtesy of publisher.
      Extent: 448p.
      Note/s:
      • Published September 2021
      ISBN: 9781760879136
VIEW PUBLICATION DETAILS FOR ALL VERSIONS ()

Other Formats

  • Large print.
  • Sound recording.
  • Dyslexic edition.
Find library holdings on Trove

Works about this Work

y separately published work icon Book It In : Emily Bitto Zoya Patel (presenter), 2022 25160150 2022 single work podcast

'In a road trip prompted by an Australian man’s imagination of America, Emily Bitto explores the literary trope of the masculine hero’s quest – through her novel Wild Abandon.'

Source: Book It In.
New Skin for the Old Ceremony Katie Dobbs , 2022 single work review
— Appears in: Sydney Review of Books , May 2022;
— Review of Wild Abandon Emily Bitto , 2021 single work novel

'Discussing the challenges of setting fiction in his adopted America, expatriate Peter Carey recalled a comment by one of his students: ‘when you change countries you lose your peripheral vision.’ Working up the nerve to take stock of the ‘democratic experiment’ in Parrott and Olivier in America (2009), Carey sensibly muffled any missteps in the picaresque blunderings of two fish-out-of-water nineteenth-century Europeans, a myopic nobleman and his roguish footman. Though it’s 2011 when 22-year old Melburnian Will lugs his backpack from the airport carousel, Emily Bitto’s second novel Wild Abandon adopts a similar strategy: figuring its millennial hipster as a quixotic adventurer, charting the (Introduction)distance between his American dream and obstinate reality for comic juxtaposition.' (Introduction)
Marion Frith on Hope in the Aftermath of War Paul Daley (interviewer), 2022 single work podcast interview
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 20 January 2022;

'Paul Daley talks to Marion Frith about how she wrote a novel about life after loss and human resilience in the midst of trauma – by telling the story through an unlikely friendship between two fictional characters'

 
Emily Bitto on Gender and the Hero's Quest Zoya Patel (interviewer), 2022 single work podcast interview
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 27 January 2022;

'In a road trip prompted by an Australian man’s imagination of America, Emily Bitto explores the literary trope of the masculine hero’s quest – through her novel Wild Abandon'
Australia in Three Books Yves Rees , 2021 single work review
— Appears in: Meanjin Online 2021; Meanjin , Summer vol. 80 no. 4 2021;
— Review of Fairyland : A Novel Sumner Locke Elliott , 1990 single work novel ; Dancing on Coral Glenda Adams , 1987 single work novel ; Wild Abandon Emily Bitto , 2021 single work novel
Emily Bitto : Wild Abandon Robert Goodman , 2021 single work review
— Appears in: The Newtown Review of Books , October 2021;
— Review of Wild Abandon Emily Bitto , 2021 single work novel

'Emily Bitto won the Stella Prize in 2015 for her first novel The Strays. Her second, Wild Abandon, was worth the wait.'
Emily Bitto Wild Abandon Luke Horton , 2021 single work review
— Appears in: The Saturday Paper , 30 October - 5 November 2021;
— Review of Wild Abandon Emily Bitto , 2021 single work novel

'Emily Bitto’s first novel since her 2015 Stella Prize-winning debut, The Strays, is the coming-of-age story of 22-year-old Will. It is 2011 and, reeling from a bad break-up, Will flees Melbourne for the United States in search of “experience” and “the grand American ideal of self-determination”.' (Introduction)
Wayne’s World : Emily Bitto’s Baroque New Novel Amy Baillieu , 2021 single work review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , November no. 437 2021; (p. 31)
— Review of Wild Abandon Emily Bitto , 2021 single work novel

'Joe Exotic. Carole Baskin. Tiger King. There was a moment in early 2020 when these were names to conjure with; when a plague-ridden world became fascinated with the outlandish behaviour of these larger-than-life Americans and their unbelievably legal menageries of ‘exotic’ animals. Now, as we inch closer to ‘Covid-normal’, revisiting this surreal world through Emily Bitto’s exuberantly baroque second novel, Wild Abandon, is an unsettling experience.' (Introduction)
Tales of Freedom and Captivity Vanessa Francesca , 2021 single work review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 25 September 2021; (p. 25)
— Review of Wild Abandon Emily Bitto , 2021 single work novel
Australia in Three Books Yves Rees , 2021 single work review
— Appears in: Meanjin Online 2021; Meanjin , Summer vol. 80 no. 4 2021;
— Review of Fairyland : A Novel Sumner Locke Elliott , 1990 single work novel ; Dancing on Coral Glenda Adams , 1987 single work novel ; Wild Abandon Emily Bitto , 2021 single work novel
y separately published work icon At Home with Emily Bitto Astrid Edwards (interviewer), 2021 23443379 2021 single work podcast interview

'Emily Bitto is a Melbourne-based writer of fiction, poetry and non-fiction. Her debut novel, The Strays, was the winner of the 2015 Stella Prize, and in 2021 she released her second novel, Wild Abandon.

'Her fiction, poetry and non-fiction has appeared in various publications, including Meanjin, The Age, the Monthly, the Saturday Paper, The Big Issue, and The Sydney Morning Herald. She is also the co-owner of Carlton wine bar Heartattack and Vine.' (Production summary)
Emily Bitto on Gender and the Hero's Quest Zoya Patel (interviewer), 2022 single work podcast interview
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 27 January 2022;

'In a road trip prompted by an Australian man’s imagination of America, Emily Bitto explores the literary trope of the masculine hero’s quest – through her novel Wild Abandon'
Marion Frith on Hope in the Aftermath of War Paul Daley (interviewer), 2022 single work podcast interview
— Appears in: The Guardian Australia , 20 January 2022;

'Paul Daley talks to Marion Frith about how she wrote a novel about life after loss and human resilience in the midst of trauma – by telling the story through an unlikely friendship between two fictional characters'

 
y separately published work icon Book It In : Emily Bitto Zoya Patel (presenter), 2022 25160150 2022 single work podcast

'In a road trip prompted by an Australian man’s imagination of America, Emily Bitto explores the literary trope of the masculine hero’s quest – through her novel Wild Abandon.'

Source: Book It In.
VIEW ALL WORKS ABOUT (10)

Awards

VIEW ALL AWARDS (4)
Last amended 29 Apr 2022 11:47:54
Subjects:
Settings:
  • c
    United States of America (USA),
    c
    Americas,
  • 2011
Newspapers:
    Powered by Trove
    X