Eliza's Review

This is by far Winton’s best-known book and it conjures a bitter Australia of beaches, waves, fishing boats and rivers in his family saga that proves the point that we are all ultimately connected.

The Lamb family and the Pickles family escape from their own separate tragedies in an attempt to rebuild their lives and find themselves living under the same roof of the big, old haunted house on Cloud Street over 20 years. The families grow, change and live intersecting lives. They are opposites in many fundamental ways, but both families have mastered their own personal brands of dysfunction, and through sleights of destiny are fostered along by bouts of gambling, love, alcoholism, as well as a dark, menacing energy.

Cloudstreet’s backbone is its black comedy, and just enough of it to temper the tragedy. This rambling story of all the messy characters within Cloudstreet proves that our capacity to experience is limitless and that sometimes pure endurance is needed to get through this long life of sorrow and joy. And if you can do that with forgiveness and compassion intact it’s a good life indeed.

You'll Love It If

You love a rollicking, rolling satirical family saga that makes you feel like one of the family when you laugh while you cry. It has a beautiful sense of belonging.