Cloudstreet by Tim Winton wins number one in Top 100 Australian Books poll

Listeners of ABC Radio National recently voted Cloudstreet, the 1991 novel by Fremantle based Australian author Tim Winton, to the top spot in the Top 100 Australian Books poll. Cloudstreet won a number of literary awards, including the 1992 Miles Franklin prize for Australian literature, and went on to be adapted for stage and television. It is quite the yarn: After two separate catastrophes, two very different families leave the country for the bright lights of Perth. The Lambs are industrious, united and — until God seems to turn his back on their boy Fish — religious. The Pickleses are gamblers, boozers, fractious, and unlikely landlords. Chance, hardship and the war force them to swallow their dignity and share a great, breathing, shuddering joint called Cloudstreet. Over the next twenty years they struggle and strive, laugh and curse, come apart and pull together under the same roof, and try as they can to make their lives. Other titles among the top ten include The Book Thief…