The Revisionists (Michelle Johnston, Fourth Estate)

Michelle Johnston’s third novel, The Revisionist, is a beautifully crafted story that follows the journey of Christine Campbell, a young woman with strong beliefs and misguided ambitions. Christine goes to great lengths to climb the ladder from a Western Australian dustbowl town to the wild mountains of Dagestan during the unrest in Chechnya in the late 1990s and finally to the cool, muted world of wealth and New York upper-class privilege in 2023. As she relentlessly pursues her goals and the desire to get the ultimate journalistic scoop, many remarkable women enter her orbit, subtly shaping her future. While the conflict in the region was very real, Johnston (Tiny Uncertain Miracles) notes that the Dagestani village of Khumsutl and its cast of extraordinary characters are entirely fictional. The narrative thread is brought to life through exquisite descriptions of the land, people, culture and sacred traditions. It is unclear if the author has travelled to or spent time in the North Caucasus region, but the immense detail and beauty in the writing create an altogether genuine setting for the reader to become absorbed in. A must for fans of Johnston’s previous novels and Lucy Treloar’s works, The Revisionists is a powerful examination of truth, memory and ambition. It is a sophisticated novel that both overtly and subtly turns the spotlight on the oft-overlooked keepers of knowledge: women.

Books+Publishing reviewer: Kate Frawley is a former bookseller and a librarian in training. Books+Publishing is Australia’s number-one source of pre-publication book reviews.

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