Slow Burn

by George Alexander

As an insider to Australia’s upwardly-spiralling art world, George Alexander reveals a darker side of contemporary Australia in a tale of menacing racial conspiracies. Slow Burn is a crackling novel, framed within the crime and corruption genre.

Slow Burn opens, at the smouldering butt-end of the twentieth century, where an organisation called ‘The Cleaners’ is making threats, days before the Australia Day holiday. An Aboriginal protester was murdered the year before. Lost in the emotional quicksand of marital breakup, journalist Alex Tolman finds himself caught up in the events, all the while inextricably linked to a cannibalstic art world.

Written with page-turning energy Slow Burn casts a sharp light on contemporary Australia, as it delves into messy partnerships of all kinds: between blackfella and whitefella worlds, between men and women, between art and business, between truth and news, and even between the living and the dead.

246 pages, Paperback

First published May 15, 2009

About the author

George Alexander was born in Western Australia of Greek and Italian parents from Egypt. A speaker of Greek, Italian, French and some Arabic, he has worked as a lecturer at the Sydney University of Technology in the Department of Text and Production and in several other tertiary institutions in New South Wales. In 1978 he won the Frederick May Memorial Essay Prize (Department of Italian, University of Sydney). In 1990 his work Sparagmos was shortlisted in the New Writing category of the 1990 Victorian Premier's Literary Awards and he received a writer's grant from the Literature Board of the Australia Council. In 1991 he received a Writing Fellowship from the Visual Arts and Crafts Board, and from the Literature Board. He has read at the Performance Space, Sydney, in 1985, and presented Sleight of Hand at the Jameson Street Cabaret, Sydney in 1984.
George Alexander works as coordinator of Contemporary Art Programmes at the Art Gallery of NSW. Since the early 1970s he has worn a diagonal path between literature and the visual arts, writing for performance, radio, and the printed page, as well as a diverse array of art criticism, including book-length monographs on the Australian artists Julie Rrap and Robert Owen. Alexander’s work has been translated into French, Italian and German, and he has been the recipient of Fellowships from the Australia Council and the NSW Ministry of Arts. He has published:

1) Will Everything Possible Happen Eventually Somewhere George Alexander (editor), Currarong : Fez Press , 2014 anthology short story
2)Letters to Z George Alexander , New South Wales : Fez Press , 2013 prose
3)Orpheus Through the Rear Vision Mirror i "Even in sleep our eyes move", George Alexander , 2011 poetry— Appears in: Southern Sun, Aegean Light : Poetry of Second-Generation Greek-Australians 2011; (p. 12-17)
4) Chiasmus i "A tape-loop for two speakers", George Alexander , 2011 poetry — Appears in: Southern Sun, Aegean Light : Poetry of Second-Generation Greek-Australians 2011; (p. 6-11)
5) Writing before Writing i "I am writing. That's to say, I am walking with Death,", George Alexander , 2011 poetry — Appears in: Southern Sun, Aegean Light : Poetry of Second-Generation Greek-Australians 2011; (p. 4-5)
6) Slow Burn George Alexander , Crawley : UWA Publishing , 2009 novel
7) Remove Your Self i "When you're alive it's the outside", George Alexander , 2000 poetry
— Appears in: Siglo , Winter no. 13 2000; (p. 42-46)
8) Mortal Divide : The Autobiography Of Yiorgos Alexandrolou George Alexander , Rose Bay : Brandl and Schlesinger , 1997 novel autobiography
9) [Untitled] George Alexander , 1996 extract autobiography (Mortal Divide : The Autobiography Of Yiorgos Alexandrolou) — Appears in: Southerly , Autumn vol. 56 no. 1 1996; (p. 112-126)
10) [Untitled] George Alexander , 1994 extract autobiography (Mortal Divide : The Autobiography Of Yiorgos Alexandrolou) — Appears in: Otis Rush , December no. 10 1994; (p. 119-129)
11) Inherent Identity George Alexander , Sydney : Performance Space , 1991 essay
12) Roses for the Cutting George Alexander , 1989 prose — Appears in: Otis Rush , April no. 4 1989; (p. 25-38) Sparagmos 1989; (p. 25-38)
13) Ringing the Bell Backwards George Alexander , 1989 prose — Appears in: Sparagmos 1989; (p. 5-22)
14) Sparagmos George Alexander , Adelaide : Experimental Art Foundation , 1989 selected work prose
15) Transits : Robert Owen George Alexander , Wagga Wagga : Wagga Wagga City Art Gallery , 1988
16) The Book of the Dead i "1. Monday", George Alexander , Sydney : Switch Books , 1985 poetry
17) Aus-land, or the Other Country George Alexander , 1981 radio play
18) Message to Me at Home George Alexander , 1981 drama

sources: https://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/pa...

https://www.brandl.com.au/writers/geo...