by Jessie Tu
reviewed by Wendy Tucker
Jessie Tu is a book critic at The Age and Sydney Morning Herald and a journalist for Woman’s Agenda. Her debut novel, A lonely girl is a dangerous thing won the Australian Book Industry Awards for 2020 Literary Fiction Book of the Year.
The honeyeater is her eagerly awaited second novel. The protagonist of her first novel was an adult but emotionally stunted former music prodigy. In … Read more »
Deb Worgan:
Prima facie by Susie Miller, an important and powerful read.
About Grace by Anthony Doerr, an odd but intriguing story, beautifully written, about exile and returning.
The conversion by Amanda Lohrey, a novel about a change of heart paralleled with the repurposing of a church.
Flick Ruby:
The valley, Chris Hammer’s latest tightly woven outback murder mystery, includes greenie protesters, good cops, bad cops, and greedy shysters, set in an imaginary town near us.
Doppelganger: a … Read more »
by Wendy Tucker
Is this one of the best Writers Festivals in Australia? I think so. An amazing selection of disparate authors, easy to access venues, not too crowded and a whale frolicking at the lunch hour, stretch-the-legs walk.
The big names are in the bigger hall and these sessions are livestreamed to wider audiences in libraries so bookworms who are further away from Tathra can enjoy some of the festival. I’m not sure who decides which … Read more »
by Jente Posthuma
translated by Sarah Timmer Harvey
reviewed by Wendy Tucker
This is the second novel from Jente Posthuma, a Dutch writer, and was among the six novels shortlisted for the International Booker Prize 2024. The Booker Prize has had a few name changes and this has resulted in some confusion. The Booker Prize (now the new/old name) is for a novel published in English from writers in Commonwealth countries and Ireland. In 2005, the International Booker Prize was inaugurated for novels worldwide, that were published in English, including books translated into English, with the aim of promoting global literature. … Read more »
reviewed by Wendy Tucker
by Lionel Shriver
I’ve been a fan of Lionel Shriver since the best-selling, prizewinning novel that made her name, We need to talk about Kevin, appeared in 2003.
Any woman who at 15 changes her name from Margaret Ann to Lionel and sticks with it, has got to be fierce. And fierce she is. We need to talk about Kevin examined maternal ambivalence and a high school shooting. … Read more »
reviewed by Wendy Tucker
by Catherine Lumby
Frank Moorhouse, the celebrated Australian author, essayist, screenwriter and journalist, died in 2022, aged 83.
There are now two recent biographies of Moorhouse. He asked his friend, journalist Catherine Lumby, to be his biographer. She spent many hours interviewing Moorhouse and was granted total access to all 158 boxes of archival material. It seems Moorhouse kept everything – a great gift to any biographer. Lumby … Read more »
