Dua Lipa‘s August pick for her Service95 book club is ‘This House of Grief‘ by Helen Garner. This non-fiction book tells the true story of a murder trial. On Father’s Day 2005, a recently divorced man in rural Victoria, Australia, drove his car off the road and into a dam. He swam to safety, but his three young boys drowned. When local writer Garner saw it on the news, she wanted it to be an accident. Her House of Grief takes us inside the real-life trial of Robert Farquharson as Garner sits through days of detailed evidence, weeks of witness testimony, and years of appeals.
Dua said: “What [Garner] reveals along the way is not simply a courtroom drama but a sharp and forensic analysis of the human condition. This is what really drew me to Helen’s writing. She’s not looking for monsters – her interest lies with ordinary people who seem to have been pushed beyond their emotional limits. As the trial progresses, I found myself questioning my own reactions, asking myself less, Did he do it? and instead, Is it possible to have empathy for this man, even if he did the worst thing imaginable?”
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