There is a book award that
doesn’t get a great deal of publicity, unlike the Man Booker Prize, the Miles
Franklin Award and many other well known prizes. It’s the Most Underrated Book Award and it is
the brain child of The Small Press Network an umbrella organisation for
Australian small and independent publishers.
The award aims to shine a light on some of the outstanding titles that,
for whatever reason, did not receive their fair dues when first released. The winner for 2014 is a debut novel by Jane
Rawson A Wrong Turn at The Office of Unmade
Lists.
Set in 1997 San
Francisco, Simon and Sarah have been sent on a quest to see America: they
must stand at least once in every 25-foot square of the country. Decades later,
in an Australian city that has fallen on hard times, Caddy is camped by the Maribyrnong River, living on small change from odd
jobs, ersatz vodka and memories.
A review from the Goodreads
website says:
“What a strange, great
little book. If you like plot, you won't like this; plot is pretty much
entirely absent. You join up with a troupe of acrobats at the start of a tour,
shift from town to town across Europe working,
drinking, dancing and having sex, and then you leave. But the voice of this
book is utterly charming. There's no plot when you meet up with your
risk-taking, charming, wilful, beautiful friend for a few too many drinks, is
there? And yet, you still look forward to doing it again every time. Somewhere
between three and four stars; let's call it four for just being so odd. “
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