Liam Pieper

An explosive and unforgettable novel, Sweetness and Light confirms Liam Pieper’s place as one of our country’s finest, sharpest writers. Racing from the beaches of Goa to the streets of Delhi and the jungles of Tamil Nadu, we meet an expat Australian grifter running low-stakes scams and an American woman in search of spiritual succour. Soon, they discover something deeply wrong inside a utopian ashram community. Winner of the Christina Stead Prize for Fiction for his novel The Toymaker, Liam talks with Roanna Gonsalves about his intoxicating new story that explores the battles between love and lust, and morality and corruption.

This recording is available on all major podcast platforms.

Liam Pieper (Australian)

Liam Pieper's 2014 memoir, The Feel-Good Hit of the Year, was shortlisted for the National Biography Award and the Ned Kelly Best True Crime award. In 2015 he was the UNESCO Resident for City of Literature of Prague. His first novel The Toymaker has been widely translated and won the Fellowship of Australian Writers Christina Stead Fiction Award. He was the 2018 National Library of Australia Creative Arts Fellow for Australian Writing. Sweetness and Light is his new novel.

Roanna Gonsalves (Australian)

Roanna Gonsalves is the award-winning author of the acclaimed collection of short fiction The Permanent Resident. Her writing has been compared to the work of Alice Munro and Jhumpa Lahiri. Her four-part radio series On the tip of a billion tongues (ABC Radio National Earshot) is an acerbic portrayal of contemporary India through its multilingual writers. Roanna is a recipient of the Prime Minister’s Australia Asia Endeavour Award and teaches Creative Writing at UNSW and at NYU Sydney. She serves on the Board of Writing NSW.