People Who Lunch (Sally Olds, Upswell)
People Who Lunch is the much-anticipated first book by Melbourne-based writer Sally Olds. Known among a devoted coterie of fans for her long-form standalone essays, Olds’ first full collection focuses on a central theme: work and our various efforts to get away from it. Across the six essays that comprise People Who Lunch, Olds combines personal reflection, ethnographic research and flâneur-like observation to investigate the dystopian exploitation that governs our lives and the micro-utopias that offer some form of escape. People Who Lunch is a celebration of leisure time, and to read this book is a pleasurable experience. Olds’ writing is original and searching, and she is a confident stylist, funny and precise. The author has a novelist’s eye for character and scene, and the best piece in the collection is an affectionate portrait of her own friends—a group of underemployed artists, accelerationist philosophers, nihilist revolutionaries and brothel-working poets. Among the most charming figures to grace the page is Jeff, the ‘swole’, crypto-investing fashion curator with a conspiratorial air and a Woolworths green bag, neatly labelled with his own name. It’s rare to find new writing this bold and exciting. Olds’ debut will appeal to readers of literary nonfiction as well as techno-futurists, the freelance precariat and all those wondering what has happened to bohemian Melbourne since Helen Garner’s Monkey Grip.
Emma Rose is an editor of books and magazines.
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