'What would you suggest, weather like this?'
She didn't have to think at all. 'Procure a good looking man and some drugs, then draw the curtains. I tell you, this is not a good day.'
Life on the dole was easy that summer, and the dealers made housecalls. Doomsday had passed for Caitlin, or so it seemed, until her friends in the backstreets started dropping like flies.
funniestreviewquote
"There is not much attractive about Caitlin Steele, the junkie heroine (sic) of Nature Strip. She's loud and she's rude and she 'll throw up at your party if she thinks you are worth the vomiting.' (Simon Hughes, The Age, 14/4/94)
gushiestreview
'To say that it left me speechless would be innacurate: as I read the last lines the word amazing escaped unbidden from my lips. Such is the impact of this uncompromising, unrepentent novel of the counterculture.' (Canberra Times, 29/1/94)
One Sunday, a couple of weeks after it went on the market, I was serving at the fruit shop when a woman said to me, 'You're Leonie Stevens, aren't you? I read your book and loved it, and so did my husband.' And she pulls the husband over. They're both smiling at me. It was just the beginning of the weirdness.
Whenever anyone says they loved the book, I'm still genuinely surprised. It was written with two people in mind. One is Paul, my partner for the last 19-odd years, who I've been through everything with, and who always encouraged me to write. The other was an old mate, Brother ASP, aka Laughing Boy, who went and died of a stupid, stupid OD. The grief inspired me to finally finish this story. It's so full of in-jokes and references that I thought ONLY people who knew the hardcore scene would get that I never really expected to get it published.
Hell, I don't know what it means. It's editors and reviewers who end up telling ME what it means. It's a love story and a crime story with an early-80s hardcore punk edge. Sorry to be so vague. Read the fucking book!
I try to write little stories, that's all. Hopefully they're fast paced and funny. When I was writing Nature Strip, I was completely un-self-conscious. I didn't have time to be "literary": just finding time to write was hard because I had a two-year-old kid. I didn't know much about writing then, and I still don't now. The IMPORTANT things to know are that you've gotta salt eggplant if you're making pilav, and surviving on the dole or Austudy is a task, and if you see too many punk bands, your ears are gonna end up fucked.
Click to read the continuing drama - Big Man's Barbie - the dreaded second novel!