The Degenerates (Raeden Richardson, Text)
Tuesday, 9 July 2024
The Degenerates is a bold, layered work of experimental literary fiction that follows the linked storylines of Maha, Titch and Ginny, three Melbournians who have found themselves lost in their...
Diving, Falling (Kylie Mirmohamadi, Scribe)
Tuesday, 9 July 2024
In Kylie Mirmohamadi’s debut novel, Diving, Falling, Leila Whittaker is left with the business of living after her husband’s death. Ken Black was a famous artist, a legend given a...
Six Summers of Tash and Leopold (Danielle Binks, Lothian)
Tuesday, 9 July 2024
Middle-grade readers who enjoyed A L Tait’s The First Summer of Callie McGee and Nova Weetman’s The Edge of Thirteen will delight in this compelling coming-of-age story targeting the ever-growing...
How (Not) to Lose $1 Million (John Addis, Major Street)
Tuesday, 9 July 2024
How (Not) to Lose $1 Million is full of surprises. Given it's a book aimed at people seeking to invest in shares and control their own portfolio or improve their...
The Fog (Brooke Hardwick, S&S)
Tuesday, 2 July 2024
The atmospheric setting of Brooke Hardwick’s debut novel, a highly selective writers’ retreat on the isolated island of Rathlin, off the coast of Northern Ireland, is sure to entice readers...
Summer of Shipwrecks (Shivaun Plozza, UQP)
Tuesday, 2 July 2024
Award-winning children’s author Shivaun Plozza’s Summer of Shipwrecks is a vividly real, heartfelt middle-grade novel that explores the capriciousness of tween friendship. Sidney has been waiting all year for her...
Anomaly (Emma Lord, Affirm)
Tuesday, 2 July 2024
Anomaly, the debut YA novel by Emma Lord, is fast-paced, compelling and confidently plotted. In 2020, Piper Manning awakens 52 days after a virus has wiped out her town—and perhaps...
Protecting Indigenous Art (Colin Golvan, MUP)
Tuesday, 2 July 2024
Scepticism is probably reasonable, at first, reading a book about Indigenous art written by a non-Indigenous person. Colin Golvan, however, has earned his bona fides by working as a barrister...
Jasper Cliff (Josh Kemp, Fremantle)
Tuesday, 2 July 2024
Western Australian author Josh Kemp’s debut novel, Banjawarn, won several prestigious awards, including the Dorothy Hewett Award, a Ned Kelly Award, and a Western Australian Premier’s Prize. For his second...
The Best Present Ever (Zoë Foster Blake, illus Lucinda Gifford, Puffin)
Tuesday, 2 July 2024
The most delightful stories can often stem from the simplest of ideas, as seen in The Best Present Ever, a playful celebration of creativity, imagination and the joy of giving....
In the Margins (Gail Holmes, Ultimo)
Tuesday, 2 July 2024
Inspired by the life of Frances Wolfreston, a book collector who preserved the earliest part of Shakespeare’s legacy, Gail Holmes’s elegant debut speaks about the injustices and lack of freedom...
Translations (Jumaana Abdu, Vintage)
Tuesday, 25 June 2024
Translations is a powerful, character-driven debut novel by Jumaana Abdu. It follows young mother Aliyah and her daughter, Sakina, who leave Sydney for a property in the Northern Rivers region...
Dragonfire: 18,000 Holes in the Universe (Adam Wallace & Lisa Foley, illus James Hart, HarperCollins)
Tuesday, 25 June 2024
Tee off into the surreal world of Dragonfire: 18,000 Holes in the Universe, the first book in a new graphic novel series by Adam Wallace and Lisa Foley, with imaginative...
Chae: Korean slow food for a better life (Jung Eun Chae, Hardie Grant)
Tuesday, 25 June 2024
Originally from Seoul, South Korea, chef Jung Eun Chae worked in the renowned Melbourne restaurant Cutler & Co before opening her cosy six-seater restaurant, Chae, in her Brunswick apartment. Her...
Girl Falling (Hayley Scrivenor, Macmillan)
Tuesday, 25 June 2024
Girl Falling is the second novel by award-winning crime writer Hayley Scrivenor. Three women—Daphne, Magdu and Finn—head out for a day of rock climbing in the Blue Mountains, but only...
The Girl with No Reflection (Keshe Chow, Penguin)
Tuesday, 25 June 2024
The Girl with No Reflection by Keshe Chow is a debut YA historical fantasy novel set in Imperial China, drawing on Chinese mythology. The story begins with Ying, a young...
Bird (Courtney Collins, Hachette)
Tuesday, 25 June 2024
Following the success of her first novel, The Burial, Courtney Collins’s new dual-narrative novel, Bird, centres on the titular 14-year-old girl. The story is told in alternating chapters differentiated by...
Tiny: A memoir about love, letting go and a very small house (Louise Southerden, Hardie Grant Explore)
Tuesday, 25 June 2024
Award-winning travel writer Louise Southerden’s first memoir, Tiny, tackles some big topics. Ostensibly an account of her experience of building a tiny house with her partner, Max, Tiny is so...
Dung Beetle on a Roll (Sandra Severgnini, CSIRO Publishing)
Tuesday, 25 June 2024
Dung Beetle on a Roll by Sandra Severgnini (Meet Mim, Grub) follows an ambitious dung beetle who is working on his best dung ball yet. But what exactly is a...
Between Husbands and Wives (Susannah Glenn, Pantera)
Tuesday, 25 June 2024
Jennifer’s life is changed after her vehicle crashes into a car carrying a woman in labour, killing the mother and her unborn child. Escaping jail time but wracked with guilt...
Dirrayawadha (Anita Heiss, S&S)
Tuesday, 18 June 2024
Dirrayawadha is a work of searing historical fiction set during the Wiradyuri wars in 1820s Bathurst and centring on a love story between a young Wiradyuri woman and an Irish...
Liars (James O’Loghlin, Echo)
Tuesday, 18 June 2024
In James O’Loghlin’s murder mystery Liars, every character has secrets to hide. The novel is set in the fictitious Bullford Point, a coastal town on NSW’s Northern Beaches, untouched by...
Captured: How neoliberalism transformed the Australian state (ed by Philip Toner & Michael Rafferty, SUP)
Tuesday, 18 June 2024
Privatisation, deregulation and fiscal restraint are some of the major hallmarks of neoliberalism. Each is an intervention taken by governments in economics and public policy to privilege free markets and...
Stickboy (Rebecca Young, illus Matt Ottley, Scholastic)
Tuesday, 18 June 2024
From the multi-award-winning creators of Teacup comes a lyrical new picture book about a young boy’s hope and determination in the face of adversity. In a dry and barren land...
How to Break a World Record and Survive Grade Five (Carla Fitzgerald, UQP)
Tuesday, 18 June 2024
How to Break a World Record and Survive Grade Five is the new novel from Carla Fitzgerald, author of the popular middle-grade title How to Be Prime Minister and Survive...
Voyagers: Our journey into the Anthropocene (Lauren Fuge, Text)
Tuesday, 18 June 2024
The Anthropocene—the geological period dominated by humanity’s activity on the planet—is increasingly seen by scientists and academics as an era of devastation wrought by overconsumption and insatiable industrialisation. In Voyagers,...
Bernie Thinks in Boxes (Jess Horn, illus Zoe Bennett, Affirm)
Tuesday, 18 June 2024
This charming story by debut author Jess Horn features a child, Bernie, who likes to classify her world into different categories (portrayed as boxes) in her head. When Bernie is...
Love Unleashed (Melanie Saward, Michael Joseph)
Tuesday, 11 June 2024
Melanie Saward’s Love Unleashed is a bingeable, warm and soulful romantic comedy. Saward (whose debut novel, Burn, was released in 2023) draws on her own experience in New York to...
Sky Country (Aunty Patsy Cameron & Lisa Kennedy, Magabala)
Tuesday, 11 June 2024
Grandmother takes her young grandchildren on a walk up a mountain in Trouwerner (Tasmania). As they walk together, Grandmother retells an ancient story of creation, sky, and the First Peoples...
Winter of the Wolf (Amanda Willimott, Viking)
Tuesday, 11 June 2024
Winter of the Wolf is Amanda Willimott’s debut novel, inspired by the real-life trial of Gilles Garnier, who was convicted of being a werewolf in 1573. When Sidonie Montot travels...
