The Australian newspaper has described Charlotte Wood as “one of our most original and provocative writers.” She is the author of five novels and two books of non-fiction. Her latest novel, The Natural Way of Things, presented at Wordfest, has received many awards and nominations in Australia and is now being adapted to film. This year, she also published The Writer’s Room, a selection of interviews with established Australian authors.

The Natural Way of Things

Charlotte Wood masterfully renders a dystopian world where women who have dared to speak out are silenced and shackled by a cruel system of corporate control and misogyny. Two women awaken from a drugged sleep to find themselves imprisoned in a broken-down property in the middle of a desert. Strangers to each other, they have no idea where they are or how they came to be there with eight other girls, guarded by two inept yet vicious armed jailers and a “nurse”. Doing hard labour under a sweltering sun, the prisoners soon learn what links them: in each girl’s past is a sexual scandal with a powerful man.