Bøger udgivet af Puncture Publications

Mother Paul, June Wright¿s beloved nun-detective, returns to her sleuthing ways after she takes up a new position as warden of a student hall of residence at the University of Melbourne.No sooner has Judith Mornane arrived on campus than she startles her fellow residents by announcing her intention to discover the murderer of her sister, who disappeared from the same dorm a year earlier. The ever-curious Mother Paul is drawn to investigate what happened to Judith¿s sister¿did she simply run off for reasons best known to herself, as the police concluded, or could it be she really was murdered? Was her disappearance perhaps linked to a tragedy that happened at around the same time¿the accidental drowning (in her bathtub) of the wife of one of the college¿s professors? Was that drowning in fact as accidental as the official investigation suggested?Mother Paul believes the two events are connected somehow, and a further tragedy, the faked-suicide death of one of her student charges, convinces her that a particularly cruel and clever murderer is still at work within the college. She is not above a little subterfuge in the interest of discovering the truth and moves her colleagues, the students, and even the police around like so many figures on a chessboard until finally, amid high drama, the murderer is revealed.

A new collection of essays from this acclaimed critic on photographers, musicians, artists, and writers (from Patti Smith to Weegee to David Wojnarowicz). Most of the pieces have a strong autobiographical element and sense of place, the Lower East Side of New York City where the author came of age in the fertile 1970s/80s. He traces his engagement with music and photography, his experience of the city, and his development as an artist and observer, in a series of articles that range from memoir to essay, fiction to critical analysis, humour to poetry.

June Wright''s most memorable detective, Mother Paul, might seem a bit otherworldly, but little escapes the kindly nun - she has a shrewd grasp of all that goes on in the hostel for young women she runs in 1950s Melbourne. The atmosphere is already strained by a spate of anonymous letters, when Mary Allen finds a stranger stabbed to death in the garden. Then one of the girls drowns, an apparent suicide, and the tension reaches fever pitch. Is there a connection between the two deaths and the letters? The police investigate, but Mother Paul pursues her own enquiries.

A definitive portrait of the 80s/90s indie-rock music scene in the form of 60 profiles/interviews and many rare photographs. This collection takes as starting points the psychodramas of Throwing Muses and the proto-slacker anthems of Camper Van Beethoven, and follows them through to the critical triumphs of Sleater-Kinney and Neutral Milk Hotel over a decade later, taking in such pioneering artists as P.J. Harvey, Sonic Youth, Pixies, Bikini Kill, Nick Cave, Beck, Cat Power, Pavement, Sebadoh, Breeders, Jeff Buckley, Belle & Sebastian, Hole, Magnetic Fields, and many more.

A collection of recent work by post-Beat poet Mark Terrill. Some of these poems first appeared in limited-edition chapbooks or in the numerous journals and magazines to which he is a frequent contributor; others are published here for the first time. Lavishly illustrated with 25 drawings by Jon Langford, and garnished with praise from such luminaries as Anne Waldman, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, and Joanne Kyger, Great Balls of Doubt delivers images and sentiments ranging from the real to the surreal to the elegiac, with no shortage of humour along the way.

Sydney, 1959. Billy Glasheen is flogging mail order schemes from a back room in Chinatown. Hey, it''s a living. But unsettled accounts in his past are coming due. An ultimatum is delivered: come up with a small fortune in hush money, or cop a bullet and a shallow grave. Time to call in all debts and favours, but just when he needs them most, Bill''s old gang of beatniks and bandits have made themselves strangely scarce. Amaze Your Friends is a dark, wild ride through a city of easy money and sudden falls, high times and hangovers, jukebox rock''n''roll and the lowdown flophouse blues.

Robert Dean Lurie's biography is the first completely researched and written since R.E.M. disbanded in 2011. It offers by far the most detailed account of their formative years-the early lives of the band members, their first encounters with one another, their legendary debut show, early tours in the back of a van, initial recordings, their shrewdly paced rise to fame. The people and places of the American South are crucial to the R.E.M. story in ways much more complex and interesting than have been presented thus far, says Lurie, who explores the myriad ways in which the band's adopted hometown of Athens, Georgia, and the South in general, have shaped its members and the character and style of their art. The South is more than the background to this story; it plays a major role: the creative ferment that erupted in Athens and gripped many of its young inhabitants in the late 70s and early 80s drew on regional traditions of outsider art and general cultural out-thereness, and gave rise to a free-spirited music scene that produced the B-52's and Pylon, and laid the ground for R.E.M.'s subsequent breakout success.Lurie has tracked down and interviewed numerous figures in the band's history who were under-represented in or even absent from earlier biographies, and they contribute previously undocumented stories and cast a fresh light on the familiar narrative.

The Devil¿s Caress, originally published in 1952, is an tense psychological thriller set on the wild southern coast of the Mornington Peninsula, outside Melbourne. Overworked young medico Marsh Mowbray has been invited to the country home of her revered mentor, Dr. Kate Waring, but it's far from the restful weekend she was hoping for. As storms rage outside, the house on the cliff¿s edge seethes with hatred and tension, and two suspicious deaths soon follow. "Doubt is the devil¿s caress", one of the characters tells Marsh, as her resolute efforts to get to the bottom of the deaths force her to question everyone's motives, even those of Dr. Kate. This is a classic country house mystery with shades of Agatha Christie, but with the jagged emotional edge of Daphne du Maurier.

David Nichols tells the story of Australian rock and pop music from 1960 to 1985 – formative years in which the nation cast off its colonial cultural shackles and took on the world.Generously illustrated and scrupulously researched, Dig combines scholarly accuracy with populist flair. Nichols is an unfailingly witty and engaging guide, surveying the fertile and varied landscape of Australian popular music in seven broad historical chapters, interspersed with shorter chapters on some of the more significant figures of each period. The result is a compelling portrait of a music scene that evolves in dynamic interaction with those in the United States and the UK, yet has always retained a strong sense of its own identity and continues to deliver new stars – and cult heroes – to a worldwide audience.Dig is a unique achievement. The few general histories to date have been highlight reels, heavy on illustration and short on detail. And while there have been many excellent books on individual artists, scenes and periods, and a couple of first-rate encylopedias, there’s never been a book that told the whole story of the irresistible growth and sweep of a national music culture. Until now . . .

The return of Maggie Byrnes, heroine of Murder in the Telephone Exchange, finds her married, with a young son, and living in an outer Melbourne suburb. But violent death dogs her footsteps even in apparently tranquil Middleburn. It’s perhaps not that much of a surprise when widely disliked local bigwig James Holland (who also happens to be Maggie’s landlord) is shot, but Maggie suspects that someone is also trying to poison the infant who is his heir, and turns sleuth once more to uncover the culprits. First published in 1949, So Bad a Death is June Wright’s second novel, which she originally planned to call Who Would Murder a Baby? Her publishers demurred, but under any title it’s a worthy sequel to Murder in the Telephone Exchange. Novelist and crime fiction historian Lucy Sussex contributes an introduction to this reissue, which also includes a revealing interview she conducted with June Wright in 1996.

When Billy Glasheen picks up a trashy paperback he finds in his cab, its plot seems weirdly familiar. One of the main characters is based on him . . . Only one person knows enough about his past to have written it—Max, his double-crossing ex-partner in crime. But Max is dead. He famously went up in flames, along with a fortune in cash, after a bank heist. If Max is somehow still alive, Billy has a score to settle. And if he didn’t get fried to a crisp, maybe the money didn’t either. To find out, Billy has to follow the clues in the strange little book—and rapidly discovers he’s not the only one on Max’s trail.The Big Whatever is the fourth instalment of Peter Doyle’s acclaimed series, which has grown into an epic underground history of postwar Australia, where crooks, entertainers, scammers, corrupt cops and politicians all rub shoulders, chasing their big paydays.

June Wright wrote this lost gem in the mid-1950s, but consigned it to her bottom drawer after her publisher foolishly rejected it. Perhaps it was a little ahead of its time? Because while it’s a tour de force of the classic country-house murder mystery, it’s also a delightful romp, poking fun at the conventions of the genre. When someone takes advantage of a duck hunt to murder publisher Athol Sefton at a remote hunting inn, it soon turns out that virtually everyone, guests and staff alike, had a good reason for shooting him. Sefton’s nephew Charles thinks he can solve the crime by applying the “rules of the game” he’s absorbed from his years as a reviewer of detective fiction — only the killer evidently isn’t playing by those rules. Duck Season Death is a both a fiendishly clever whodunit and a marvelous entertainment.

A new edition of a classic of contemporary American literature, first published in 1997 by Sun & Moon Press but unavailable in recent years.Dra-, the nondescript heroine of this grim, hilarious fiction, might have fallen through the same hole as Lewis Carroll's Alice, only now, 130 years later, there's no time for frivolity, just the pressing need to get a job. In a sealed, modern Wonderland of "small stifled work centers, basements and sub-basements, night niches, and training hutches connected by hallways just inches across," Dra- seeks employment . . . This labyrinthine journey is brilliantly mimicked in the architecture of the prose. Levine creates cozy little warrens, small safe spaces made of short clear sentences, then sends the reader spiraling down long broken passages, fragmented by colons and semi-colons which give a halting, lurching gait to our progress. A quest, a comedy of manners, and a parable, Dra- is, above all else, a philosophical novel concerned with the most basic questions of living.

Booklist called Susan Compo “smart, sassy, and tough,” while Publishers Weekly praised her “witty, unflinching prose.” Following two highly regarded story collections, Susan Compo’s first novel takes a sharp-eyed look at LA's culture industry. Giselle Entwistle has her hands full with her roster of demanding show-business clients. There’s Adon, struggling to make the transition from teen idol to mature star with the aid of a goatee. There’s would-be rock impresario Hedda Hophead, “aggressive as junk mail and just as relentless.” There’s country singer Len Tingle, whose career has as many ups and downs as his love affair with Giselle; and Tupperware demonstrator extraordinaire Troy Harder, “a living legend in food storage,” who Giselle fears might want to plastic-wrap her. Not to mention child prodigy belter Frances Culligan, who seems to have disappeared. And then there’s Pandra, whose haunting memoir of growing up in suburban Orange County and coming of age in '70s glitter-era Los Angeles (platform boots, Rodney’s English Disco, The Real Don Steele Show, David Bowie clones) forms a book within this book. Giselle hopes to get Pandra’s story published, but it does bring up this little matter of a possible murder in Pandra’s past . . .

It's clear that something strange is afoot in ­Munson, the fictional Florida hamlet where Frances Johnson takes place. A volcano seethes on the outskirts of town, strange animals skitter in the shadows, and a dense brown fog has settled overhead. Pets and people vanish. Unfurling over a period of days leading up to the town's annual dance, the story follows Frances's mounting restlessness, as she must decide whether to take control of her life or cede it to the murky future the community has designated for her. Though the novel hinges on a familiar plot point-will Frances remain in Munson, or escape to the world at large?-it's the only trace of convention to be found in this hypnotic book, which transforms its setting into a tableau of exotic menace.-"Time Out New York"

For almost thirty years, the Church have crafted music that blends a rich variety of styles in a beautiful, multi-layered sound. They have encompassed pop, psychedelic, progressive, and straight-ahead rock, yet always remain distinctive, thanks to the inimitable vocals and lyrics of front man Steve Kilbey. Based on extensive interviews and featuring over 70 rare photographs, No Certainty Attached is the first comprehensive biography of Kilbey and his band. It charts their personal and musical ups and downs: the commercial heights of The Unguarded Moment and Under the Milky Way, the creative breakthroughs of the Priest = Aura album and Kilbey s underappreciated solo work, followed by the band s struggle to survive in the wake of bad business decisions and their singer s drug indulgences. One obsessive American fan attempts to get to the heart of the story, abetted by Kilbey himself, his family, band members, and friends and foes alike. What emerges is a compelling portrait of an artist and a band clinging steadfastly to their muse in the face of external and internal obstacles and the transformative power of the music they have created.

Beyond his work as a musician, Jon Langford has attracted attention as a visual artist in recent years. Nashville Radio is the first collection of his art. It reproduces 215 paintings, as well as song lyrics and autobiographical writings. The book includes a CD of Langford performing 18 of the printed songs. Langford’s “song-paintings” fuse portraiture with imagery derived from folk art, Dutch still life, classic Western wear, and the cold, cold war—all instilled with his trademark sardonic wit. He applies this distinctive style to the depiction of American musical icons like Bob Wills, Hank Williams, and Johnny Cash, but also to more ghostly, marginal figures—blindfolded cowboys, astronauts, and dancers—who are jerked around by success and exploitation, fame and neglect. Underlying his work is a deep love of musical lore, twinned with fierce opposition to the death-dealing tendencies in the culture of his adopted homeland, from the killing off of authentic popular music by mass-marketed drivel to the embrace of capital punishment as a response to social ills. Langford’s work offers an alternative perspective, recalling “a time when great visionaries and pioneers thrived at the heart of the mainstream—and the lid wasn’t on so tight.”