“Wearne’s epics and fragments are like the traces of a ruined culture, in which everybody got to star in their own domestic drama or screwball romance. Until you realise that it’s happening, here and now: you are being waltzed around the living room of middle-class folklore.” – Bonny Cassidy

“Australia’s finest verse satirist” – Peter Pierce

Alan Wearne specialises in monologues and verse narratives. A young widow in post-war Melbourne fends off the approaches of her best friend’s husband; a retired femocrat recalls her lovelorn Maoist youth; a single mother falls into an abusive relationship with a drifting musician; a heroin addict is haunted by his dealer’s murder of a youth. Also included is ‘The Sarsaparilla Writer’s Centre’, a collection of satires on music, football, religion, politics, and poets.

Alan Wearne’s verse novels The Nightmarkets and The Lovemakers and his collections The Australian Popular Songbook and Prepare the Cabin for Landing won the National Book Council Banjo Award, the NSW Premier’s Poetry Prize and Book of the Year Award, the Judith Wright Calanthe Award, the Grace Levin Prize and the Colin Roderick Award. He is the publisher of Grand Parade Poets.