‘We’re all triers’: Toni Jordan meditates on a childhood with greyhounds and gamblers

By Amber Gwynne, Associate Lecturer in Writing, The University of Queensland

“Childhood,” writes Toni Jordan in her eighth novel, Tenderfoot, “is as much a place as it is a time.” The place? Suburban Brisbane – specifically Morningside – and the city’s greyhound tracks, which throb with punters on race days. The time? Joh Bjelke-Petersen’s febrile 1970s, a memorable era of political regression and palm-greasing by police.

Jordan’s protagonist, the bruised and cerebral Andie, is 12 years old, on the cusp of finishing primary school. She’s a gifted student – precocious but impeccably…

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