Painting Portraits of Everyone I’ve Ever Dated (Joseph Earp, Pantera)
Tuesday, 11 March 2025
Painting Portraits of Everyone I’ve Ever Dated is both surprisingly tender and hilariously acerbic, with Joseph Earp’s writing effortlessly drawing the reader in. The novel follows Ellie Robertson, an artist...
Orpheus Nine (Chris Flynn, Hachette)
Tuesday, 4 March 2025
When a boys’ soccer game in the regional town of Gattan is interrupted by a grotesque supernatural event that ushers in a new world order, residents of the town –...
The Confidence Woman (Sophie Quick, A&U)
Tuesday, 4 March 2025
Christina Swales is a single mum, a business coach – and a blackmailer. Using incriminating information gleaned from her one-on-one online coaching sessions, Christina blackmails her clients to save enough...
Community, persistence key to ‘alchemy’ at 2025 GenreCon
Monday, 3 March 2025
This past weekend, Queensland Writers Centre (QWC) held its annual GenreCon (28 February to 2 March), dedicated to the craft and industry of writing in the five major genres of...
Quarks, Sparks and Quantum Mysteries: A Cosmic Guide to the Building Blocks of our Universe (Lisa Harvey-Smith, illus Aidan Ryan, T&H)
Tuesday, 25 February 2025
Astrophysicist professor Lisa Harvey-Smith has created another brilliant book as part of her mission to open up science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) to children at a time when they...
The Passenger Seat (Vijay Khurana, Ultimo)
Tuesday, 25 February 2025
Beginning mid-jump and barely letting up the tension, Vijay Khurana’s debut novel, The Passenger Seat, is an unusual and deftly written literary thriller. It follows the uneasy friendship between two...
When She Was Gone (Sara Foster, HarperCollins)
Tuesday, 25 February 2025
Sara Foster’s When She Was Gone stands out in a crowded thriller market for its unique blend of suspense, character depth and emotional resonance. Set in the fictional town of...
Peninsula Records and Books opens on the Yorke Peninsula
Tuesday, 25 February 2025
Peninsula Records and Books has opened a shopfront in Stansbury on the Yorke Peninsula in South Australia, with a selection of books ‘exclusively focused on Australian authors, supporting both iconic...
The Paperbark Tree Committee (Karys McEwen, Text)
Tuesday, 18 February 2025
The Paperbark Tree Committee, Karys McEwen’s second middle grade novel following All the Little Tricky Things, is a tender, compassionate story about navigating transitions and finding support in unexpected places....
Miss Caroline Bingley, Private Detective (Kelly Gardiner & Sharmini Kumar, HarperCollins)
Tuesday, 18 February 2025
Miss Caroline Bingley, the spurned love interest of Pride and Prejudice’s Mr Darcy, turns her prodigious mind to the problem of a missing maid, uncovering a murder and a dastardly...
Consider Yourself Kissed (Jessica Stanley, Text)
Tuesday, 18 February 2025
Consider Yourself Kissed is a romance set in London against the backdrop of the UK’s escalating political crises of the 21st century: Tory leadership struggles and re-election and Brexit, culminating...
Desert Tracks (Marly Wells & Linda Wells, Magabala)
Tuesday, 11 February 2025
Desert Tracks is a young adult time travel novel set in central Australia and written by daughter-mother duo Marly Wells, a proud woman of Warlpiri and white Australian descent, and...
The Sun Was Electric Light (Rachel Morton, UQP)
Tuesday, 11 February 2025
Haunted by a pervasive sense of unreality, Ruth leaves her life in New York to return to the last place she loved: a lake in southern Guatemala. In the small...
An Invisible Tattoo (Suellen Dainty, Echo)
Tuesday, 11 February 2025
Suellen Dainty (The Housekeeper, After Everything) deftly transforms her literary novel An Invisible Tattoo into a gripping mystery, social exposé and moral dilemma by skilfully concealing then revealing how a...
How to Be Normal (Ange Crawford, Walker)
Tuesday, 4 February 2025
Ange Crawford’s debut novel, How to Be Normal, is a visceral and compelling read. It centres on Astrid, who is returning to high school after five years of homeschooling. She...
Unbury the Dead (Fiona Hardy, Affirm)
Tuesday, 4 February 2025
Fiona Hardy’s Unbury the Dead is a masterful blend of fast-paced crime and Australian noir, balancing grit and dry humour with effortless skill. Set against the vivid backdrops of rural...
The Food of Bharat: A Chef’s Journey Through India’s Rich Culinary History (Helly Raichura, Hardie Grant Books)
Tuesday, 4 February 2025
Self-taught chef Helly Raichura started her career in 2018, hosting a supper club called Enter Via Laundry out of her Melbourne home, and she quickly gained national popularity. Raichura set...
First Name Second Name (Steve MinOn, UQP)
Tuesday, 28 January 2025
In Steve MinOn’s debut novel, First Name Second Name, the story spans four generations of the Chinese Australian Bolin family, whose roots in Australia date back to the late 19th...
This Stays Between Us (Margot McGovern, Penguin)
Tuesday, 28 January 2025
Margot McGovern’s second young adult novel, This Stays Between Us, may have taken seven years, but it’s worth the wait. This gripping thriller, set in the year 2000, is a...
Love Unedited (Caro Llewellyn, Picador)
Tuesday, 28 January 2025
Reading Caro Llewellyn’s debut novel, Love Unedited, is like reading someone’s diary entries on life and love, which is fitting for this story within a story. Set predominantly in New York...
How Australian Democracy Works: And Why We Need It More Than Ever (ed by Amanda Dunn, T&H)
Tuesday, 21 January 2025
At a time when democracy seems under threat globally, Australia’s democratic system is often seen as one of the best. Compulsory voting, democracy sausages and electoral boundaries set by a...
Geraldine (Andrea Thompson, Fremantle)
Tuesday, 21 January 2025
In this heartwarming debut novel, spanning the 1960s to the early 2000s, music journalist and artist manager Andrea Thompson tells the story of Geraldine, a fierce protagonist who remains true...
Half Truth (Nadia Mahjouri, Penguin)
Tuesday, 14 January 2025
Half Truth follows Zahra, a young Moroccan Australian woman, and her grandmother, Khadija. In alternating narratives, the novel follows the pair as they come of age in their respective timelines. The...
Harry and Gran Bake a Cake (Fiona McIntosh, illus Sara Acton, Puffin)
Tuesday, 14 January 2025
Fiona McIntosh (The Sugar Palace), the much-celebrated author for grown-ups, makes her debut in picture books with the simply delicious Harry and Gran Bake a Cake. A day in the...
Past & Parallel Lives (Kaya Ortiz, UWA Publishing)
Tuesday, 14 January 2025
In their debut poetry collection, Past & Parallel Lives, Kaya Ortiz explores what it means to wrestle with your identity and find belonging. Their poetry strikes a balance between grounded...
The Body Next Door (Zane Lovitt, Text)
Tuesday, 10 December 2024
Nestled in Melbourne’s western suburbs, Carnation Way is a quiet street of identical-looking houses with one distinction: number 37 was the scene of a murder 13 years ago. In the...
Gutsy Girls (Josie McSkimming, UQP)
Tuesday, 10 December 2024
When Dorothy Porter died in 2008, Australia lost one of its greatest contemporary poets. The author of nine poetry collections and five verse novels, Porter had a lusty, raw and...
Diary of a Marine Biologist (Anita Thomas, illus Sarah Wilkins & Anita Thomas, Walker)
Tuesday, 10 December 2024
Did you know that oysters are often called the kidneys of the ocean because they filter a bathtub’s worth of water every two days? Or that marine biologists play a...
A Piece of Red Cloth (Leonie Norrington, Merrkiyawuy Ganambarr-Stubbs, Djawa Burarrwanga & Djawundil Maymuru, A&U)
Tuesday, 3 December 2024
The best fiction allows the reader to enter times, cultures and places otherwise inaccessible. Children’s fiction writer Leonie Norrington was commissioned by her adoptive mother, Yolŋu woman Clare Bush, to...
Somebody Down There Likes Me (Robert Lukins, A&U)
Tuesday, 3 December 2024
Somebody Down There Likes Me begins with a limousine pulling up to a defunct gas station near a United States ghost town, setting an apt tone for a novel that...
