Some stories stood out: ‘Mac Attack’, by Sally Breen, a literary non-fiction piece about working as a teenager in a local McDonalds, the drama in moving up the McDonalds hierarchy and dealing with co-workers and managers. This piece has also been published in different forms in The Age and The Griffith Review. Carolyn Court has two marvellous stories in the collection, ‘Byron’s School of Method Reading’ and ‘365’. Both contain quirky, likeable characters, and their warmth and wisdom give them a fable-like quality.

Two of the longer pieces in Allnighter are exceptional. Pete Nicholson’s ‘A Raga Called Milk and Honey’ balances a heart-wrenching story with a casual narrative style. ‘Lights’, by Claire Thomas, contains conventional coming-of-age themes but is wholly individual and crafted beautifully. This story stands alone, but could easily be made into a longer piece, or is perhaps an extract from a novel.

There was one minor disappointment with this volume. Allnighter does not contain biographies of its contributors, and instead readers are directed to the website for this information. This detracts from the immediacy of linking an author to the work, and unfortunately many of the contributors are not listed on the website. This is such an outstanding anthology that all of the writers should be in the spotlight.