• 1992 The Traveller Writing award
• 1994 Bridport Prize (for short story)
• 2002 Longlist, Orange Prize for Fiction (for The Story of My Face)
• 2005 Short list, Governor General's Literary Award (for Alphabet)

Novels

• Back in the First Person (1986) Virago Press
• The Unborn Dreams of Clara Riley (1987) Virago Press
• Island Paradise (1988) Methuen Publishing/Minerva
• Frankie Styne & the Silver Man (1992) Methuen Publishing
• The Story of My Face (2002) Weidenfeld & Nicolson/McArthur
• Alphabet (2005) Weidenfeld & Nicolson/McArthur
• The Find (2010) McArthur & Company Publishing

Short story collections

• As In Music (1990) Methuen Publishing

Anthologies

• "Leaf in the Works" and "The Politics of the Superficial", in Writing Women VI, No. 3, 1982
• "The Garden", Everywoman, 1988
• "The Green Table", Panurge 10, 1989
• "The Ancient Siddanese", Minerva Anthology of C20 Women's Writing, edited by Judy Cooke, Minerva, 1991
• "Wonder", New Writing Two, edited by Malcolm Bradbury and Andrew Motion, Minerva, 1993
• "The Gymnasium", Best Short Stories 1993, edited by Giles Gordon and David Hughes, Heinemann, 1993
• "Woodsmoke", Class Work, edited by Malcolm Bradbury, Heinemann, 1995
• "My Beautiful Wife", Back Rubs, edited by Alison Campbell, et al., Serpent's Tail, 1996
• "It Is July Now", Wild Ways, edited by Margo Daly and Peter Porter, Vintage, 1997
• "Bees", New Writing Six, edited by A.S. Byatt and Peter Porter, Vintage, 1997
• "The Question", Cheatin' Heart, edited by Longinotto and Rosenthall, Serpent's Tail, 1999
• "Of Paradise", Other Voices, Vol. 13, Millennium issue, 2000
• "It Is July Now", 10 Women Writers, edited by Barbara Puschmann-Nalenz, Reclam, 2000
• "Rosemary", The Lighted Room, edited by Margo Daly, Bloomsbury Publishing, 2002
• "The Right Thing to Say", Ars Medica, 2009

Non-fiction

• "The Pike's Heart", The Traveller, 1992
• "The Family Inside", Prison Writing, Vol 1, No. 1, 1992
• "Success?", Panurge 15, 1996
• "The Butterfly", in Humane Prisons and How to Run Them, edited by David Jones, Radcliffe, UK, 2007
• "Five Times", in Great Expectations, edited by Lisa Moore and Dede Crane