Susan Lever, Real Relations: The Feminist Politics of Form in Australian Fiction. Melbourne: Halstead Press with the Association for the Study of Australian Literature, 2000. 173 pages. ISBN 1875684417 [Book Review]

"In literary critical circles, realist fiction is often - rightly or wrongly - aligned with conservatism. In this book Susan Lever aims to show us another, forgotten dimension to the Australian realist tradition. Real Relations challenges the prevalent assumption that realist writers speak for patriarchal liberalism and that only experimental writing explores feminist concerns. Instead Lever suggests that the distinction is not so clear-cut by pointing to several well known Australian women writers who were ‘realist experimenters’ trying to adapt traditional realism to the demands of their subjects."