Aoife Clifford

But because her take on the world is so different, you can only sort of get snippets of it.

And I think Jean sort of describes it as it's as if you were studying, you know, a language at school that you can kind of almost sense but you miss so much.

Yeah.

So part of it, I mean, part of what Sue's saying, you know, I didn't get all of what Sue was saying either, but I think that's kind of the point.

exactly right like she's done it so well you've got a essential so recognizable character that then that's what allows you to go on this incredibly strange and weird journey and yet not not kind of um lose sight of what's going on because you've got that you're anchored by gene is such an anchor i think and then on top of that there's some really wise um

sort of thoughts that really made me sit back and think, you know, want to respond to just little ideas that she included of how children relate to animals, which is different to where old people might relate to animals.

That really makes you sit back and have a bit of a think about your world and how you relate to animals.

So there's a lot of kind of little bits of wisdom in this book and thoughts about the world, as well as this amazingly incredible story.

I mean, it's such an amazingly strange book.

that the fact that it's about a pandemic relating to animals while we're being published at a time when we're in a pandemic relating to animals, that is actually not even the most interesting thing about this book.

That's how amazing the ideas are in it.

slightly too young I think and not being a native Melburnian the Crystal Ballroom was a new discovery for me so sadly I miss those times Kate.

There's supposed to be a very good Facebook group of I got drunk at the Crystal Ballroom, apparently.

I saw in the notes at the end that the author referenced, which made me laugh.

Well, it's sort of, and I think she does a really great job of it.

It captures the glitter and the sweat, but also the darkness, I think, as well.

And so I think it's always interesting when one art form tries to capture another.

And I think she does a really great job of capturing that sort of the sweaty desperation of that world, what's attractive for the characters, why they're sort of drawn to it.

It's almost, to reference back to the book we were talking about, like moths to a flame a bit.

And then we see the consequences of that.