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Briohny Doyle Briohny Doyle i(A70969 works by)
Born: Established: 1983 ;
Gender: Female
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Works By

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1 Show Your Working : Briohny Doyle Briohny Doyle , 2023 single work column
— Appears in: Kill Your Darlings [Online] , December 2023;
1 The Widest Wide Shot Briohny Doyle , 2023 single work poetry
— Appears in: A Line in the Sand 2023;
1 8 y separately published work icon Why We Are Here Briohny Doyle , Milsons Point : Vintage Australia , 2023 25774829 2023 single work novel

'Why We Are Here is a love story revelling in the beauty and solace of the natural world, embracing the bonds between humans and celebrating the empathy and wisdom provided by dogs.

'When life knocks you down, have faith in Dog.

'After her partner and father die in quick succession, BB moves to a glamorous, condemned beachside apartment at the edge of a glittering city so memory-saturated it might be a mirage. Her plan? To rediscover the person she was before finding, and losing, the love of her life. To heal she’ll party like it’s 1999, walk her motley dog, Baby, and surrender to the simple joys of life alone by the sea.

'When a neighbour mistakes her for a dog trainer, and enlists her in correcting the murderous tendencies of his Doberman, BB feels close to a meaningful new life. Harnessing the tenets of Cesar Millan the dog whisperer, and other less canine-centric canons, she helps local dogs and their wealthy, oblivious owners to distinguish between the things they can and cannot change. She even takes tentative steps towards new intimacies—with safely unavailable Franz, and sultry, free-spirited Vera.

'But life in Balboa Bay is increasingly surreal. Baby is sending telepathic messages. A nearby prison quotes philosophers over the intercom. The other dog trainers think BB is scab labour. And somewhere on her street there's a dog that sounds like the wind.

'Cinematic, heart-breaking, often hilarious, Why We Are Here is a singular love story for strange days. Doyle's witty prose revels in the solace of the natural world, in conversing with writers who have lost and endured, and above all in the profound connection between a woman and her dog.' (Publication summary)

1 Aftermath : Lost in the Forest Briohny Doyle , 2021 single work autobiography
— Appears in: Griffith Review , no. 73 2021;
1 Echolalia : An Extract Briohny Doyle , 2021 single work extract novel
— Appears in: Kill Your Darlings [Online] , June 2021;
1 The Weathermen Briohny Doyle , 2021 single work short story
— Appears in: Meanjin , Autumn vol. 80 no. 1 2021; Meanjin Online 2021;
1 7 y separately published work icon Echolalia Briohny Doyle , Melbourne : Vintage , 2021 21069325 2021 single work novel

'What could drive a mother to do the unthinkable?

'Before: Emma Cormac married into a perfect life but now she's barely coping. Inside a brand new, palatial home, her three young children need more than she can give. Clem, a wilful four year old, is intent on mimicking her grandmother; the formidable matriarch Pat Cormac. Arthur is almost three and still won't speak. At least baby Robbie is perfect. He's the future of the family. So why can't Emma hold him without wanting to scream?

'Beyond their gleaming windows, a lake vista is evaporating. The birds have mostly disappeared, too. All over Shorehaven, the Cormac family buys up land to develop into cheap housing for people they openly scorn.

'After: The summers have grown even fiercer and the Cormac name doesn't mean what it used to. Arthur has taken it abroad, far from a family unable to understand him. Clem is a fragile young artist who turns obsessively to the same dark subject. Pat doesn't even know what legacy means now. Not since the ground started sinking beneath her.

'Meanwhile, a nameless woman has been released from state care. She sticks to her twelve-step program, recites her affirmations, works one day at a time on a humble life devoid of ambition or redemption. How can she have an after when baby Robbie doesn't?' (Publication summary)

1 Time Machine Briohny Doyle , Mandy Ord (illustrator), 2018 single work prose
— Appears in: Meanjin , Summer vol. 77 no. 4 2018; (p. 46-53)
1 Mechanically Separated Turkey Briohny Doyle , 2017 single work essay
— Appears in: The Lifted Brow , December vol. 36 no. 2017; (p. 5-7)

'Pumpkin spice is not extracted from pumpkins. I thought about this for a long time before I googled it. A pumpkin is a bland thing-how do you get spice out of it? This question might make a few things clear. It's Halloween. I am in America. I am not American. Being a foreigner manifests acutely at the level of consumption. The money is different and so are the things you buy with it. Many interactions are framed through purchases. You feel better about yourself in a place you don't know when you discover what you like to buy and how to buy it.' (Introduction)

1 Looking For Loretta Briohny Doyle , 2017 single work prose
— Appears in: The Best of The Lifted Brow Volume Two 2017;

'There's some great graffiti on the walls in the toilet stalls of Loretta Lynn's Dude Ranch in Hurricane Mills, Tennessee. Aside from affirmations, and quotes from the scriptures of both the Holy Bible and Lynn's own country songs ('Honky Tonk Girl', 'Coal Miner's Daughter', 'Don't Come Home a Drinkin'), there's a whole literature of slogans that alter the traditional 'X was here, date' to incorporate a celebrity in the value X: i.e. "Loretta Lynn was here 2008", a not unlikely statement that segues effortlessly into more imaginative concatenations such as "Lady Gaga was here" and even "Snookie took a dookie here, 2012.' (Publication abstract)

1 2 y separately published work icon Adult Fantasy : Searching for True Maturity in an Age of Mortgages, Marriages, and Other Adult Milestones Briohny Doyle , Brunswick : Scribe , 2017 10983318 2017 single work single work autobiography

'A wry and topical inquiry into how we respond when our cultural clock starts ticking. 'For a long time I pretended turning thirty was no big deal - but looking back, it's clear I was bat-shit na-na for a good nine months either side of that birthday.' The first of the millennials are now in their thirties. Dubbed 'the Peter Pan generation', they have been accused of delaying adult milestones. But do marriage, careers, mortgages, and babies mean the same thing today that they did 30 years ago? Briohny Doyle turned 30 without a clear idea of what her adult life should look like. A greengrocer with a graduate degree, the world she lived in didn't match the one her parents described. Her dad advised her to find a nice secure job; her best friend got married and moved to the suburbs. But she couldn't help wondering if the so-called adult milestones distract us from other measures of maturity. In a crackling mix of memoir and cultural critique, Doyle explores how societies cultivate ideas about education, work, relationships, and ageing. She interrogates the concept of adulthood through the neon buzz of pop culture and the lives of other young adults. In a rapidly-changing world, she asks- what is an adult, and how do you become one?' (Publication Summary)

1 13 y separately published work icon The Island Will Sink Briohny Doyle , Australia : Brow Books , 2016 9721071 2016 single work novel science fiction

'The Island Will Sink is set decades from now - a not-too-distant future which is not so different. The energy crisis has come and gone. Cities have been rethought and redesigned, and EcoLaw is enforced by insidious cartoon Pandas and their armies of viral-marketing children. Max Galleon is a filmmaker of immersive cinema, a father to two children distressed by the world around, a distant husband, a brother to a comatose mystery man, and falling rapidly in love with a doctor who is not what she seems.'

'The Island Will Sink is a terrific postmodern science fiction novel in the vein of Michel Houellebecq and Phillip K. Dick, and marks the official breakthrough of a compelling literary talent.' (Source: Booktopia website)

1 From : The Island Will Sink Briohny Doyle , 2016 extract novel (The Island Will Sink)
— Appears in: The Lifted Brow , September no. 31 2016; (p. 22-27)
'At dawn on Thursday the 17th of February Pitcairn Island drops 0.000785 mm below its last registered sea level. An EcoEvent 24-hour live feed covers the bedroom wall. It's the first thing I see when I wake up, groggy, high above central district. I blink and bring a detailed record of my unconscious hours into my peripheral vision. On it, cartoon lightning bolts storyboard a fitful, anxious sleep. For several minutes I lie still-clammy despite the climate control- watching a chopper circle that island like a bird of prey. Tiny children speckle the cliffs in antish processions, antennae waving at the clouds, giving the viewer the disorienting feeling of guilty, godlike voyeurism.' (Publication abstract)
1 Screening a Small Australia Briohny Doyle , 2014 single work essay
— Appears in: Meanjin , Summer vol. 73 no. 4 2014; (p. 29-35)
1 New to the Yabba : Into the Aussie Badlands Briohny Doyle , 2014 single work review
— Appears in: Kill Your Darlings , July no. 18 2014; (p. 155-163)

— Review of Wake in Fright Evan Jones , 1971 single work film/TV
1 In Season Briohny Doyle , 2014 single work short story
— Appears in: Meanjin , Spring vol. 72 no. 4 2014; (p. 116-123) Meanjin A-Z : Fiction 1980 to Now 2018; (p. 43-52)

'Summer

'February was hot. Old ladies expired by the dozen in Adelaide flats. All the fire warning signs were wrenched into the red zone but heading south-west out of Sydney the air was salty with illicit barbecue. The man at the Kilmore Caltex joked that I was driving into an inferno but I was only inner weather then and thought I knew hell better—though really worse—than Dante.' (Introduction)

1 Smoke Signals Briohny Doyle , 2009 single work short story
— Appears in: The Words We Found : The Best Writing from 21 Years of Voiceworks Magazine 2009; (p. 132-134)
1 Without Events i "genealogy is a retrospective science//should i be looking for your", Briohny Doyle , 2009 single work poetry
— Appears in: Overland , Winter no. 195 2009; (p. 114)
1 All My Friends Are Cut-Ups but They Run to Hang Around or Copyright Laws Just Aren't Very Rock Briohny Doyle , 2004 single work short story
— Appears in: Loose Lips : UTS Writers' Anthology 2004; (p. 103-111)
1 Darwin i "I remember Darwin like a one-night stand", Briohny Doyle , 2003 single work poetry
— Appears in: Mouthpiece 2003; (p. Track 25)
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