What I’d rather not think about

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 »

Mania

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. The post … Read more »

Frank Moorhouse: A Life

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 had … Read more »

The Thursday Murder Club (and the next three in the series)

reviewed by Wendy Tucker
by Richard Osman

In 2020 forty publishers bid for the rights to this first novel by television presenter and producer, Richard Osman. It has become the biggest selling adult crime novel since records began and Spielberg immediately purchased the film rights. Osman has since written three more novels in the series with equal success: The man who died twice in 2021, The bullet that missed in 2022 and The last devil to die in 2023. He … Read more »

Women & Children

Reviewed by Wendy Tucker

by Tony Birch

Tony Birch is an author, activist and academic. This is his fourth novel. He is best known for his award-winning novel The White Girl and his short story collection Dark as Last Night.

Women & Children has just won the 2024 Age Book of the Year for Fiction and will probably win more awards. It is set in 1965 in a poor inner-city suburb of Melbourne. Our protagonist is Joe Cluny, ‘a wide-eyed, … Read more »

Unfinished Woman

reviewed by Wendy Tucker
by Robyn Davidson
I eagerly read this memoir that has been 25 years in the writing. The name of Robyn Davidson was first heard in 1977 when a young woman was reported to be crossing the Simpson Desert from Alice Springs to the coast of WA. The photos that appeared in the National Geographic in 1978 were of a beautiful young blonde woman travelling across the desert with four camels and … Read more »