Sunbathing (Isobel Beech, A&U) 

After her father dies of suicide, the unnamed narrator of Sunbathing travels from her hometown of Melbourne to the Italian countryside. There, she stays with friends Fabrizio and Giulia in Fab’s ancestral home as the couple plan their wedding. The days pass gently as the narrator tends the garden, picks fruit, visits flea markets and cares for a stray cat. In between long sun-drenched lunches and walks in the countryside, the narrator begins to recall the moments leading to her father’s death and all the little things that, retrospectively, seemed like warning signs. Through rest, contemplation and the quiet support of friends, the narrator slowly learns to move through her grief and embrace life once more. This debut novel—written by Isobel Beech, former senior culture writer at VICE—reads very much like a traditional grief memoir, with its subtle and astute insights into the complexities of the grieving process and use of second person to address the narrator’s father. As a novel, however, it is also able to touch on larger cultural subjects, such as the #MeToo movement, white male privilege and social media dependence. Sunbathing is not a book driven by plot or character development, but instead by introspection and the gradual self-actualisation of the narrator, which fuses the sadness and absurdity of life and death through powerful prose and just a touch of dark humour.  

Chloë Cooper is a freelance writer, bookseller and library assistant in Meanjin.

Category: Reviews