FRIENDS AND DARK SHAPES

“An unflinching novel that captures the isolation and emotional overload of modern life.”

“Astonishingly assured and full of razor sharp observations about what it means to live precariously in a changing city. It's hard to believe this is Bedford's first novel.” —Jenny Offill, author of Dept. of Speculation and Weather “Such a vivid geography: this is a work of smart intensities, witty sorrow and wise coming-to-terms with grief. Astute, wry and beautifully tender.” —Gail Jones, author of Five Bells “Friends and Dark Shapes is a tender look at the myriad ways that a body can hold grief. Kavita Bedford writes lyrically and longingly, imbuing sweetness and darkness throughout. It was a genuine pleasure to read this book; I felt as though I were sitting with a close friend, whispering to each other, sharing close-kept secrets. It made me rethink how loneliness can manifest; how we sometimes hurt ourselves and each other. Friends and Dark Shapes is a real delight and Kavita Bedford is a true talent.” —Kristen Arnett, author of Mostly Dead Things “An achingly relatable, thought-provoking and compelling debut, full of gorgeous sentences that stopped me in my tracks.” —Ewa Ramsey, author of The Morbids “Friends and Dark Shapes smells and feels and tastes like Sydney, like grief, like the limbo and the lucidity of your twenties. Bedford's poetic yet sparse, fearless yet gentle prose makes this a book to be savored.” —Laura McPhee-Browne, author of Cherry Beach “Kavita Bedford gives the gift of brighter eyes. Her prose is sparse yet jeweled, a desert of out-of-the-blue opals and oases.” —Vivian Pham, author of The Coconut Children

ANZ: Text Publishing; Italy: Edizioni E/O;

“Bedford's writing is spare, yet it has more than enough power.”

“Where Bedford shines is in detailing intimate human connection; those epiphanic shocks that cut through affectations of irony and disinterest: a relationship that ends between an art gallery and the sale of a bike. The death of the narrator's father (quietly, poignantly handled). Bedford subtly explores, too, the vulnerabilities and dangers, the uncertain desires, of being a young woman. Seeking “pleasure with abandon” – or never being boring, as the Pet Shop Boys' post-party mantra had it – is a queasy, bittersweet comedown that Bedford, filtering her Didionesque prose (and her protagonist's Didionesque generational cataloguing) through a wider emotional lens, excels at.”

“This is a book steeped in the hedonism and the angst of youth Bedford is clearly talented.”

“The where of Bedford's book—Sydney's gentrifying neighborhood of Redfern—is as important as the who and the what Class tension propels much of the present-day narrative, where the narrator is grieving the death of her father and spends most of her time observing those around her Bedford is a talented writer with a wonderful eye for detail, and her crisp, measured sentences are genuinely impressive. After grief, alienation and loneliness suffuse the novel, the story earns its way toward a sense of hope.”

“Bedford beautifully portrays the life of an Australian Indian writer struggling with grief a year after the death of her father An insightful view of a city in flux.”

“Grief is the novel's emotional weather: rarely discussed at length, but often fleetingly mentioned, and always present if the reader cares to look. Bedford's sentences have a syrupy, slowed-down quality, as if dragged out of tempo by melancholy. This effect works beautifully Discussing emotion is a real and often insurmountable challenge for the narrator. Perhaps in contrast, discussing politics, even the fraught politics of class and privilege, comes naturally.” Read more...

“Bedford weaves a blanket of words that fans of complex literary fiction will fall into and savor.”