Bellinger Valley.
I just finished reading the Peter Carey novel that came out 18 mths or so ago “His Illegal Self”. Probably the 8th or 9th of his I’ve read, a perennial holiday reading favourite.
One thing that strikes me is how often Bellingen and that nsw north coast area comes up in his writing. I know he lived in the area for a while in a 70s style alternative community & it seems to be a rich touchstone that he returns to again & again. Some of his earlier books like Bliss & Oscar + Lucinda were partly set there (that great opening scene from O + L with the church floating down the Bellinger river) & in the years since he has been living in the US American characters increasingly visit Bellinger Valley. Memorably in the 80s artworld setting of “Theft, A Love Story” & in Illegal Self a setting very like Bellingen in the 70s is transposed up to the hinterland behind Noosa Heads.
Increasingly his view of the area and the people is harsh and flinty eyed (particularly toward the more feral hippies), but as always with Carey vital and energetic. Perhaps I should go back and read the earlier ones again but my sense is that he gets better with each book. He has this great ability to obscure details from the viewpoint of different characters forcing you to join the dots when you see the same situation partially from the viewpoint of another character. It’s a masterful trick one of the things I enjoy most reading him.
I now have the new one “Parrot & Oliver in America” in the pile to read after Roberto Bolan “The Savage Detectives” (which is an astonishingly good novel set in mid 70s Mexico City), one of his historical novels which are not usually as successful for me, but nonetheless looking forward to it.
