After Story

2023 Longlist

When Indigenous lawyer Jasmine decides to take her mother Della on a tour of England’s most revered literary sites, Jasmine hopes it will bring them closer together and help them reconcile the past. Twenty-five years earlier the disappearance of Jasmine’s older sister devastated their tight-knit community. This tragedy returns to haunt Jasmine and Della when another child mysteriously goes missing on Hampstead Heath. As Jasmine immerses herself in the world of her literary idols – including Jane Austen, the Brontë sisters and Virginia Woolf – Della is inspired to rediscover the wisdom of her own culture and storytelling. But sometimes the stories that are not told can become too great to bear. Ambitious and engrossing, After Story celebrates the extraordinary power of words and the quiet spaces between. We can be ready to listen, but are we ready to hear?

About the Author:

Larissa Behrendt is the Distinguished Professor at the University of Technology Sydney and at the Director of Research and Academic Programs Jumbunna Institute of Indigenous Education and Research. She is the host of Speaking Out on ABC Radio. She has published numerous textbooks on Indigenous legal issues. She is a member of the Academy of Arts and Sciences and a founding member of the Australian Academy of Law. Her most recent novel is After Story.

Larissa is an award winning filmmaker, having written and directed several feature documentary films including Araatika! Rise Up, Maralinga Tjarutka, After the Apology and Innocence Betrayed. She has written and directed for television. She won the AACTA for Best Direction in Television Factual in 2020 for Maralinga Tjarutja and the 2018 Australian Directors Guild Award for Best Direction in a Feature Documentary for After the Apology. For more on Larissa’s film work: www.lavarchproductions.com

Larissa won the 2002 David Uniapon Award and a 2005 Commonwealth Writer’s Prize for her novel Home. Her second novel, Legacy, won a Victorian Premiers Literary Award. Larissa was awarded the 2009 NAIDOC Person of the Year award and 2011 NSW Australian of the Year.

Nominating Library’s Comments:

It’s a beautifully written story, fascinatingly revealed via alternating perspectives from a mother and daughter using overseas literary travel to try to mend a difficult relationship, and illuminating the complex nature of familial ties, buried grief and historical trauma. – Libraries Tasmania, Australia