76 pages 2 hours read

The Turning

Fiction | Short Story Collection | Adult | Published in 2004

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Summary and Study Guide

Overview

The Turning is Tim Winton’s 2004 collection of short stories set primarily in the small Western Australia town of Angelus. The book won the Christina Snead Prize for Fiction and the Queensland Fiction Book Award. The seventeen linked stories in this collection explore themes of generational change, socioeconomic anxieties, and the lingering effects of trauma using the modes of 21st century realism.

Plot Summary

The stories in The Turning take place over several decades of life in and around Angelus, Western Australia, and trace the lives of various characters, most of whom are directly connected to Vic Lang or his family. Though each story can be read on its own, considering the work as a whole reveals thematic and narrative links that heighten the impact and meaning. The stories are not presented chronologically, and Winton uses this to maximize the dramatic irony as he explores the decline of the town through the lens of the Lang family.

Vic Lang, his baby sister, and his parents, Bob and Carol, move to Angelus in the early 1970s when his father gets a job as a police officer. Angelus was once a whaling community, but the industry is in decline, as is the town.

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