The ABC's book experts round up their favourites from 2019 — from dystopian cli-fi to a cross-country American fantasia, harrowing historical fiction and a girl-powered New York story.
In this startling historical novel, Australian author Christos Tsiolkas explores his twin interests of faith and belief. Tsiolkas is associated with animating the obsessions of urban Australia in novels like The Slap, Barracuda and Loaded, but in Damascus he transports the reader to the first century AD, to the beginnings of Christianity and the life of St Paul.
Tsiolkas digs into the psychology of Paul, the person rather than the saint, and imagines him as a man with illicit desire, including homosexual yearning, in part to understand why Christianity became a central force in his life . Other historical figures also populate the story, including Lydia, reputedly one of the early Christian converts. Little is known of the real Lydia, but her story is moving and powerful in this rendition.
The world that's portrayed is brutal, and Tsiolkas' interpretation of the period provides an insight into why the burgeoning cult of Christianity had such radical power at the time. It offered redemption and hope, two qualities that were in short supply in the Roman Empire. There are scenes that might turn your stomach — in fact the novel opens with a girl being stoned to death for being a Christian — and it's not a light read. But who said summer reads should be unchallenging?
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