Spiel

Spiel

A metaphysical thriller set in Berlin at the turn of the twenty-first century, Spiel recounts the story of a young Melbourne architect trying to escape his past.

He is saved from a bomb blast in a theatre by an enigmatic blind woman named Rosa Stumm, but she is not what she seems to be; a ghost animated into being through the memories of a disillusioned Stasi spymaster who lost his daughter to the indifference of an emotionless Party bureaucracy.

Spiel plays with overlaps in time and space, and is told in parallel threads of present day Berlin and 1970s and 80s Melbourne.

The story drifts from realism to the metaphysical and explores the power of imaginative invention as the protagonist crosses the line between his own past and reality.

‘…[a] powerful example of the strength of contemporary Australian literary fiction‘ Canberra Times

‘…taut and gripping…’ Australian Book Review

‘…an audacious first novel that challenges the conventions of social realism dominant in contemporary fiction. Spiel is unabashedly experimental, owing much to Joyce and Kafka, Borges and Pynchon.’ Eastern Daily Press

‘…his talent is such that I’m sure we’ll hear more from him.’ The Age

Published by UWAP.