Welcome to GR Online, a series of short-form articles that take aim at the moving target of contemporary culture as it’s whisked along the guide rails of innovations in digital media, globalisation and late-stage capitalism.
Double
ALL THE ROADS in this part of town are bitumen, so Odette’s piece-of-shit Toyota does fine, even in the...
Real fobs
Listen to Winnie Dunn read her short story ‘Real fobs’. ONLY BOGANS AND dumb ethnics go to Western Sydney University. Real fobs won’t...
University material
JEFFREY AND MY mother were together for three years. I lived with them for their final year, when I...
Vestigial
THE BOY RAN past the house just as Sherwin held the clothes pegs up to the line. The sheet...
Dramatics
ANNIE DOESN’T RECOGNISE the old teacher at first glance, not consciously. She only registers a vague sense of disorientation...
Welcome
FROM THE TIME Kurt Talker disappeared, presumed drowned, people began to claim him. They named his parents, his extended...
Americano Sal
It was always busy there in Palermo. During a snow shower I’d sit in the cafés, small corner net connections. Sometimes the weather was a little heavy – I’d kick my boots clean of ice at the entrance, umbrella heavy with sleet. The man you paid to use the internet would be singing in Farsi; a woman would speak in hushed tones in the cubicle. Sometimes not so hushed. Talking to her family on the other side of the world. Where maybe it was snowing, too. And together they could listen to each other. Together in the snow they could talk.
The menaced assassin
SOPHIE STANDS IN front of the painting, flexing her toes. She pushes one heel off the ground and then...
Wildflowers
Listen to contributor Peggy Frew read her fiction ‘Wildflowers’. IT HAD TAKEN Meg a long time to convince Nina. Many lengthy phone calls....
Emily presents
MEG IS ALLOWED onto the tarmac to watch the unloading. It is a vast, empty space at this time...
Reflecting light
DAYS FROM NOW, when the ship pitches so hard Jesse is woken being tossed from the bed, he’ll remember...
Walk
HE WALKED DOWN the seething streets of Fortitude Valley. It was 2.30 in the morning of a Saturday night and...
