De Kretser, Michelle 1957–

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De Kretser, Michelle 1957–

PERSONAL: Born November 11, 1957, in Colombo, Sri Lanka; immigrated to Australia, c. 1971; naturalized Australian citizen. Education: Studied at Melbourne University; earned B.A. (with honors), 1979; earned M.A. in Paris, 1982.

ADDRESSES: Home—Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Little, Brown and Company, 1271 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

CAREER: Editor and writer. Taught for one year in Montpellier, France; worked as an editor for a Melbourne publishing house.

AWARDS, HONORS: Commonwealth Prize (Southeast Asia and South Pacific), 2004; The Hamilton Case was a 2004 Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers pick; Encore Award, 2004, for The Hamilton Case.

WRITINGS:

(Editor) Brief Encounters: Stories of Love, Sex, and Travel (nonfiction), Lonely Planet (Oakland, CA), 1998.

The Rose Grower (novel), Carroll & Graf (New York, NY), 2000.

The Hamilton Case (novel), Little, Brown (New York, NY), 2004.

SIDELIGHTS: Michelle de Kretser is an Australian author and editor of Sri Lankan descent. Her first book, Brief Encounters: Stories of Love, Sex, and Travel, includes various writers' tales, all of which reveal the romantic, and sometimes erotic, nature of travel. De Kretser features a variety of authors in Brief Encounters—including Pico Iyer, Lisa St. Aubin de Teran, Mona Simpson, and Paul Theroux—and their stories evoke settings that range from a Mexican bathhouse to a Greek ferry. Anthony Sattin, in a London Sunday Times review, commented that the collection is "a mixed bag," but added that it contains "several excellent" stories. Another reviewer, Helen Rumbelow, writing in the London Times, stated that Brief Encounters acknowledges a "truism about travel: it is to have an anonymous but passionate fling while getting there." Rumbelow described the book as "an absorbing read."

In de Kretser's first novel, The Rose Grower, an American balloonist finds love and danger with a pair of sisters in the Gascony region of southwest France during the French Revolution. Booklist reviewer Margaret Flanagan called The Rose Grower "a mesmerizing debut novel" and noted that it "builds quietly and elegantly toward an inevitably tragic climax." Critic Thomas Wright commented in the London Daily Telegraph that the story "fails to evoke the flavour of the 1790s, offering the reader instead a kind of historical limbo which is neither wholly of the present nor of the past." However, Joanne Harris, writing in the New York Times Book Review, called The Rose Grower "a lovely, meticulously researched first novel that evokes the beginnings of the Terror in crisp, elegant, compassionate prose." In an online January article, Margaret Gunning described de Kretser's writing as "heartbreakingly beautiful." Ruth Gorb commented in a Guardian review that The Rose Garden is "beautifully written, full of wit and pathos and evocative images," and added: "de Kretser's final pages are a triumph, quietly moving."

In her next novel, The Hamilton Case, de Kretser takes the reader to her native Sri Lanka to tell the story of Sam Obeysekere, a Ceylonese prosecutor recognized as having all the traits of an "English gentleman." Although his own parents were dysfunctional, Sam has shrewdly developed his career and reputation to the point that he is accepted by the foreign-based ruling class of the English, the Dutch, and the Portuguese. When a prominent Englishman is murdered, Sam decides to help solve the case, a decision that places both his reputation and his way of life in jeopardy. Bill Ott, writing in Booklist, commented: "This is far too subtle a character study to hold those expecting a literary thriller, but the novel has a way of insinuating itself into the reader's mind." A Publishers Weekly contributor wrote: "De Kretser's fine, brooding, mischievous style is sure to captivate fans of serious literary fiction." Rebecca Ascher-Walsh noted in Entertainment Weekly that the author's "sparkling language is balanced beautifully against Obeysekere's flatness of character."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, June 1, 2000, Margaret Flanagan, review of The Rose Grower, p. 1852; March 15, 2004, Bill Ott, review of The Hamilton Case, p. 1263.

Daily Telegraph (London, England), November 13, 1999, Thomas Wright, review of The Rose Grower.

Entertainment Weekly, May 21, 2004, Rebecca Ascher-Walsh, review of The Hamilton Case, p. 83.

Guardian (London, England), November 6, 1999, Ruth Gorb, review of The Rose Grower, p. 10.

Library Journal, April 15, 2000, Andrea Lee Shuey, review of The Rose Grower, p. 122.

New York Times Book Review, August 27, 2000, Joanne Harris, "Pruning Season," p. 25; July 22, 2001, Scott Veale, review of The Rose Grower, p. 28.

Publishers Weekly, April 3, 2000, review of The Rose Grower, p. 60; April 12, 2004, review of The Hamilton Case, p. 40.

Quadrant, December, 1999, Francesca Beddie, review of The Rose Grower, p. 82.

Sunday Times (London, England), May 31, 1998, Anthony Sattin, review of Brief Encounters, p. 2.

Times (London, England), October 10, 1998, Helen Rumbelow, review of Brief Encounters: Stories of Love, Sex, and Travel, p. 22; October 30, 1999, Rishi Dastidar, review of The Rose Grower, p. 23.

Tribune Books (Chicago, IL), November 18, 2001, review of The Rose Grower, p. 2.