A Real Piece of Work (Erin Riley, Viking)

Erin Riley’s A Real Piece of Work traverses the vast continent of modern Australian identity through 20 short essays. Each essay is a testament to Riley’s personal experiences with sexuality, gender, family and civic issues, explored through the lens of their occupation as a social worker. Riley effectively ties in current political themes with humour—a testament to how our larrikin culture isn’t limited to White men. One of Riley’s funniest chapters is the eponymous essay, which centres on an elderly couple in a home and encapsulates crude Australian humour perfectly. Riley advocates that lack of definition and certainty is a central facet of identity, using their own fluid gender identity to illustrate this. As such, the collection reflects a coming-of-age tale, tracking Riley’s journey with gender from youth to the present day. Although readers should keep a critical eye on the White gaze so often prefaced in Western literature from writers of all intersections (a reminder that there is still a long road to accurately representing ‘Othered’ communities in literature written by the ‘Dominant’), Riley’s book is a well-meaning extension of allyship and a wonderful insight into the pieces of work we all need to do to make this complicated continent a more equitable place for everyone.

Books+Publishing reviewer: Satara Uthayakumaran is a Sri Lankan Australian writer, currently studying a Bachelor of Arts/Laws at the Australian National University. Books+Publishing is Australia’s number-one source of pre-publication book reviews.

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Category: Reviews