Issue 236 of Overland Magazine, founded in 1954, is packed with nonfiction, poetry (including by Stuart Barnes), prize-winning fiction and the brilliant cartoons by Sam Wallman – my favourite being Grenfell Two Years On, a collage memorial of the tragedy. The winner of the Overland VU Short Story Prize, Joyce Chew, gives us an experimental and disturbing work in Water Bodies, while the two runners-up, Jack Vening (Don’t Tell Me) and Laura Elvery (Fruit Flies) offer more traditional narratives, both with unforgettable characters.

The nonfiction includes writing on issues as diverse as doorknocking, car culture, the stigma of an unexplained death, misremembering colonialism, digital disconnection, an essay on neoliberalism as related to our consumption of TV streaming, and a discourse on intergenerational trauma and the body as a canvas for pain. Allanah Hunt’s story Running to Home is featured as the winner of the Nakata Brophy Prize for Young Indigenous Writers.