Historically, memoir has been a genre for older authors, reflecting back on their lives, but in recent years there has been an increase in life writing that is tied to a set of ideas or a political agenda.
Some memoirs are reckonings, such as Kathryn Heyman’s Fury and Bri Lee’s Eggshell Skull, both of which confront the spectre of sexual assault. Chloe Higgins’ The Girls and Lech Blaine’s Car Crash face the authors’ extraordinary grief. A number of writers have addressed the relationship between the medical system and women’s health, including Natalie Kon-Yu’s The Cost of Labour and Sarah Sentilles’ Stranger Care.
