Jill Barclay

Jill Barclay’s first novel The Illustrator is available for purchase here.
Published by Sevenpens (2018)

The Illustrator is based on Jill Barclay’s real grandmother, a woman who just disappears. All her life, she has been sure of one thing – her love of drawing and the desire to be a commercial artist. In the 1920s, Eileen’s talents are well recognised in the Goulburn Valley where she is a farmer’s daughter, but this is a place and time when women can only be wives, mothers and homemakers. A woman choosing a career over her husband and baby is unheard of.

‘Time and place are brilliantly evoked in Jill Barclay’s The Illustrator, which opens in rural Victoria and moves on to Melbourne, Sydney and Auckland. The novel traces the unpredictable life journey of a young woman who resists conventional expectations. Deftly shaped and written with imaginative power, this haunting novel confronts us with the mystery of a self-driven personality.’
Brenda Niall

‘Jill Barclay’s The Illustrator demonstrates such richness of imagination, the writing is evocative and full of charm, and the story crackles with unforgettable moments – I was immediately transported.’    Louise Swinn

‘Written with an acute eye for the period and a sympathy for the distressing choices a woman might be forced to make The Illustrator offers an alternative history for being female and not ordinary in the first half of last century.’    Helen Elliott

‘The Illustrator could well reflect Miles Franklin’s character Sybylla Melvyn who turns her back on an offer of a marriage in order to travel and write.’   Dianne Dempsey

 

Jill Barclay’s second novel Black is available for purchase here.

Black is an artworld legend. Frank made the radical, visually powerful painting as a young artist and the opening night of his first-ever one-man show is a kerfuffle because of it. Astonishingly it is purchased that very night. But the painting vanishes soon afterward. Black is unique and Frank yearns to see it again. Reproductions in art books will just not do, he needs to be with it.
He is deeply scarred by the loss of his masterpiece but still driven by the need to express himself in paint. Frank spends his days and nights in the studio. Most of his relationships are strained, and some are wrecked beyond repair. Fortunately, there are those who stick by him, among them are old friend and music devotee, Paul; Brian the dog; daughter Francesca, and her great friend, Ruby.

If you live in Castlemaine, the book is available at Stoneman’s Bookroom and Castlemaine Art Museum