Described as ‘auto-fiction’, (fictionalised autobiography) this novel is set in the 1990s. We follow an unnamed narrator from her regional Victorian town, known as Tidy Town, where she has failed her degree, to inner-city Melbourne, where she plans to become an artist.

Her move between share houses, squats, friends’ couches and park benches illustrate her financial precariousness. Time is elastic and endless, with days rolling into each other. The narrator and her eclectic group of acquaintances – yoga instructors, sculptors, performance artists, musicians – attend parties and exhibitions, take drugs, get drunk, scrawl graffiti and fail to pay rent. The narrator learns to play the saxophone and busks to supplement her dole payments.

Where I Slept is as much a portrait of a vanished Melbourne as it is of the narrator’s artistic journey. Gentrification has not yet altered the inner-city landscape, social media is not yet invented and there is a heroin epidemic. The artistic bohemian life is not glamorised in any way. The poetic writing clearly evokes the squalor of the share houses and squats, from bathroom drains plugged with hair, ants crawling across piles of dirty dishes, and junkies stealing from housemates.

The narrator’s quest for an artistic life means she is often on the margins, socially and financially, but she is determined to never return to Tidy Town.

Reviewed by Melinda Woledge

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Libby Angel is an Australian poet and novelist. She won the 2018 Barbara Jefferis Award for her debut novel, The Trapeze Act.

Where I Slept, by award-winning poet and author Libby Angel, is a sharp and sobering piece of autofiction that follows a struggling, unnamed poet/artist living on the margins in 1990s Melbourne. The narrator is commanding in her bluntness, kindness and quirkiness. Ultimately, however, Where I Slept is a bittersweet read. When, on the last page, the narrator writes ‘Happy’ on a wall, you may wonder instead if it should read ‘Fantasy’. Where I Slept is worth reading to meet the narrator and to gain an insight into a very real part of life.

Her poetry has appeared in a number of Australian journals. Where I Slept, a work of autofiction, is her second novel.