Cassie McCullough

It has a great deal of sophistication.

It's such an incredibly...

accurate portrayal of Americana.

I just love it to pieces.

I'd always wanted to write a novel with quite a naive voice.

Charlie, the narrator of Lean on Pete, just has such a disarmingly simple narrative voice, but the book lacks no sophistication for it.

It was something that gave me a great deal of inspiration when I

uh when i approached sam watson's voice in in honeybee uh it remains a really influential book for for me and i love it to pieces i think willie is just an incredible writer and probably underestimated to be honest with you i think he's one of the best american writers working today he came out for the sydney writers festival a few years back and i think everyone just fell in love with him

I'll give you one more, and there's some honourable mentions.

My one more is, again, probably a bit of an obscure choice, but I love this book.

It is devastating.

It is raw.

It's heartbreaking.

and it's beautifully told it's a book called happy baby by an author called stephen elliott uh who wrote a little bit for mcsweeney's in the states um but this is published through mccadam cage i think so it was a small it was quite a small run but it's the story of of a boy in the us who whose parents sort of deserted him and he's been locked into group homes and and so forth but it's told in reverse the

It was actually edited by Dave Eggers, this book, and I think it was his determination that the book would be better told in reverse.

Yes, the heartbreaking work of Staggering Genius.

Yes, 826 Valencia, and he's a wonderful author, and the heartbreaking work was an important book for me also.

I really loved that book.

But this one is special.

It's very, it's almost hard to describe, but it's unforgettable.