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New Essay
Chris Feik, editor at Black Inc who publish The Monthly and The Quarterly Essay, describes the piece as “intelligent reportage, stylishly written”. Read an excerpt of the essay here and listen to Gail’s interview with Richard Aedy on Life Matters.
The New Book I have been on an exciting journey these past two years, thinking through and developing the ideas that will eventually come together as my new book. Interestingly, all this thinking has brought me full circle to where I began as a writer, in the (for me) happy, if macabre, territory of poison stories. The new book will have a poison theme, and will be ready by the end of this year, for publication in 2008. I promise my readers a subtle and enticing brew of stories and secrets.
News Special mention In the Sydney Sun-Herald Books Extra section 15th April, 2007, best-selling British author Terry Pratchett named my first book The Poison Principle as one of “five books that changed me”. He singles out the story of the lady in the arsenic-laced ballgown for special attention. Here is part of that story from the chapter called “Lethal Greens”: “It is 1862. At the London ball season crinolines are the rage. A young lady is wearing twenty yards of green tarlatane…a passable substitute [for silk]. The tarlatane comes from a factory in Leipzig where they have the knack of laying a paste of starch and copper arsenite (called Schweinfurt Green) onto cotton. When the paste is dried and polished, the cloth dazzles like an emerald. Fully rigged for dancing in matching gown, headdress, fan and shoes, the young lady is carrying enough arsenic on board to kill everyone in the room. If she dances till the late hours in a jostle of overheated bodies, thousands of lethal green particles, loosened from the paste on her dress, will lift and spin in the whirls and eddies of a room shut tight against the damp air. When she raises her fan, which has lain between times in the folds of her gown, or when her dress is admired and the folds extended, she will dust her partners with green death.” Exhibition British artist Rebecca Chesney’s art exhibition being held in the Bolton Museum and Art Gallery, UK, from 11 May to 7 July 2007, called “Death Equals All Things—omnia mors aequat” drew in part its inspiration from information on poisonous plants and famous poisoners in The Poison Principle. Rebecca wrote to me in March, “Your book has been a fantastic source of information and comment. I am growing Hemlock in a cabinet… and I made a lab in my basement at home and tried to make poisons from plants ... Poison is a dark subject with a dark resonance and I want the viewer to feel a little uncomfortable but intrigued too—a bit like our morbid fascination with all things surrounding murder and that invisible, subtle power a poisoner wields.” I have written a 500 word introduction to the exhibition catalogue but regret that I wasn’t able to travel to Britain for the opening in May. Rebecca’s work can be viewed on her website is www.rebeccachesney.com The Worried Well In the second Quarterly Essay of 2005, Gail Bell investigates Australia’s depression epidemic. Why, she wonders, do well over a million Australians now take antidepressant drugs? Read more about this on The Worried Well page. The Sunday Age, 3 July 2005, describes The Worried Well as “an intensely literate and thought-provoking essay” and “a joy to read”. For the full review go to this link: http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2005/07/02/1119724847149.html The Worried Well was ranked number 3 by Nielsen BookScan in the fastest
movers for week ending 2 July, 2005, and The Worried Well ranked number 2 in the Independents Top 10 Bestseller
list, SMH, 16-17 July 2005, and Life Matters on Radio National 28 June 2005
Appearances Gail appeared at the Sydney Writers' Festival on 27 May 2006 on a panel with Australian authors Georgia Blain and James Bradley, chaired by Dr Jeremy Fisher and presented by the Australian Society of Authors. 5-10 March 2006 - Adelaide Writers' Festival 20th to 28th August 2005 - Melbourne Writers' Festival
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In the April 2008 edition of The Monthly Magazine, Gail Bell explores the legal trade in cold and flu tablets which is being exploited by criminal gangs who convert pseudoephedrine into the highly lucrative street drug, methamphetamine.
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