Vortex (Hall novel)

The novel follows a cast of characters in Brisbane as the city prepares for the visit of the newly crowned Queen Elizabeth II in 1954. It is also the coming-of-age story of 16-year-old Compton Gillespie who meets an older German immigrant, Beckmann, who becomes his mentor in life.

James Ley, writing in Australian Book Review noted that this book is "a substantial addition to Hall's already substantial body of work. It is a novel that draws its full measure of vitality from its concerted attempt to recreate a particular time and place. Capacious and richly descriptive, it at times earns the labels loose and baggy; it sets out to cover an extraordinary amount of historical ground."^[3]

On The Conversation website, Tony Hughes-d'Aeth found much to admire in the writer's style and prose: "It would be remiss to not mention the beauty of this novel, which emerges at different scales. Most immediately, it is a joy to read the limpid prose that skips about with such mercurial agility. The style is somehow both languid and aphoristic. There is a stinging sharpness in the novel's droll humour that speaks to a certain foundational absurdity."^[4]

• 2025 The Age Book of the Year Award – Fiction, winner^[2]
• 2025 Voss Literary Prize, longlisted^[5]