Eggshell

Olivia De Zilva

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Paperback

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English

SPINELESS WONDERS
01 November 2025

Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945); Young Adult

Set in 2000s Adelaide, Eggshell tells the story of Kira, a sarcastic, cynical teenager living in a council flat with her Cantonese grandmother (Apoh) and her rebellious older cousin, Jake. This novella starts and ends with Kira's experience of Year 12 where she is caught between two worlds: being a subservient Cantonese granddaughter and a Big Brother-watching, boy-crazy Australian schoolgirl. Eggshell is a young-adult novella dealing with themes of identity, racism, romance, sexuality and adolescence.

'As a Chinese Australian who lived through the early 2000s, this stunning novella gave me cultural whiplash, taking me straight back to my salad days of early internet, teen fashion mags, Charlie perfume in the girl's locker rooms and rites of passages with privileged Western students! I laughed out loud at the biting humour, I wept for these flesh and bone characters and I nodded along to our shared Asian experience until my neck hurt. Olivia is an exciting new powerhouse and I will be following her career keenly.'

Shirley Marr

'Delightfully raucous and rich in detail, Eggshell is packed with all the cringe, colour, heartache and hilarity of high school. De Zilva has created a cast of memorable characters that you'll fall in love with, groan at, despair for and ultimately cheer on with both fists raised.'

Erin Gough

By: Olivia De Zilva
Imprint: SPINELESS WONDERS
Country of Publication: Australia
Dimensions: Height: 233mm, Width: 103mm,
ISBN: 9780987447944
ISBN 10: 0987447947
Pages: 190
Publication Date: 01 November 2025
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Forthcoming

Olivia De Zilva is a writer based on Kaurna Yerta/Adelaide. She has been awarded prizes including the AAWP Novella Prize, Deakin University Non-Fiction Prize, the Kat Muscat Fellowship and the Richell Prize for Emerging Writers. Olivia holds a Master of Philosophy from the University of Queensland; her thesis explored the representation of Asian-diasporic identity in contemporary Australian publishing. Her memoir, Plastic Budgie is published by Pink Shorts Press.