What Am I Reading?
The Bookbinder of Jericho – Pip Williams
Author Pip Williams received international acclaim for her best-selling debut novel The Dictionary of Lost Words, and enamoured readers will be equally as fascinated by her companion novel, The Bookbinder of Jericho (Affirm Press 2023). With a large cast of characters...
The Keepers – Al Campbell
If you only read one book this year, make it The Keepers (UQP 2022) by Al Campbell. This immersive, extraordinary fictional story, informed by the author’s insightful real-life experience, is an utterly compelling and heartbreaking yet hopeful tale of resilience and...
Shrines of Gaiety – Kate Atkinson
I’ve read and adored every one of Kate Atkinson’s books and her latest, Shrines of Gaiety (Penguin Random House 2022) is no exception. Atkinson is a phenomenal storyteller, creating in each book a complex and nuanced world, peopled with fascinating characters. Her...
The Death of John Lacey – Ben Hobson
Author Ben Hobson writes about men, boys, mateship, family and violence. Those are recurring themes in all three of his novels so far. His latest book The Death of John Lacey (Allen and Unwin 2023) revisits those themes but incorporates much richer, complex and...
Dark Mode – Ashley Kalagian Blunt
Ashley Kalagian Blunt is a remarkable writer – she can turn her hand to fiction, creative non-fiction, essays, comedic writing, with the appearance that each has been her strength all along. But it is her novel Dark Mode (Ultimo Press 2023), a deeply disturbing...
No Longer Human – Osamu Dazai
My son gifted me this Japanese classic, No Longer Human or Ningen Shikkaku, by Osamu Dazai – the pen name of author Shuji Tsushima – (Tuttle 1981) but first published decades earlier. The author’s tragic life story is fascinating, even more so because it is frequently...
Everything I Never Told You – Celeste Ng
Everything I Never Told You (Black Friars 2014) was Celeste Ng’s debut, years before her popular novels Little Fires Everywhere and Our Missing Hearts. Even this first book demonstrates her extraordinary talent for capturing characters and weaving an intricate plot of...
The Boy and the Dog – Seishu Hase
This beautiful hardback copy of The Boy and the Dog (Scribner 2022) by famed Japanese author Seishu Hase, translated by Alison Watts, won the prestigious Naoki Prize. A simple story of a dog named Tamon who, after the tragic tsunami, travels the length of Japan for...
Taken – Dinuka McKenzie
Just breathlessly finished Taken (Harper Collins 2023) by Australian crime author Dinuka McKenzie, the second novel featuring Detective Sergeant Kate Miles. What a follow-up to her debut! This book focuses on any parent’s worst nightmare – a missing child – while also...
The Murder Rule – Dervla McTiernan
I’ve read and loved all three of Dervla McTiernan’s previous crime novels featuring Detective Cormac Reilly. Her new book The Murder Rule (Harper Collins 2022) is different in so many ways from her previous work – a standalone, it is set in the US and concerns The...
Everyone in My Family has Killed Someone – Benjamin Stevenson
If you are a fan of the recent Netflix hits Glass Onion and Knives Out, then you will enjoy this original and quirky crime story, Everyone in My Family has Killed Someone (Penguin Random House 2022) by Benjamin Stevenson. Wry, funny and full of mystery, this is a...
Our Missing Hearts – Celeste Ng
I absolutely adored Little Fires Everywhere so was keen to buy my copy of Celeste Ng’s new novel Our Missing Hearts (Abacus Books 2022) from Avid Reader. Ng is a writer of the highest calibre, managing to combine beautiful, literary pages with an accessible and...