Gleaner February 2016

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Vol. 23 No. 1 February 2016

New this month from Julian Barnes 1

Admissions. Only a writer of considerable skill can cover cricket, business, and social and political history with such flair and knowledge, and I found his account of an ‘unsolved crime from mid 20thC Melbourne’ fascinating. The subtitle, A Beach, a Body, and a Lifetime of Secrets, gives you the flavour of the mystery involved—but this is much more than a very good investigative journalist digging into a cold case. It’s excellent social analysis of a not too distant past where a prurient interest in the sad case of a young girl murdered in St Kilda after an ill-fated night out transforms into a strange empathy with the glamorous suspect who protests his innocence for decades after his conviction (and hanging sentence).

David Gaunt

BlackBooks

Happy New Year from us on top of the mountain and welcome to our new column BlackBooks, where we hope to share our unique book experiences at Gleebooks Blackheath.

Altitude

Welcome to the new year at Glee- In the meantime, I’ve been enthralled books, courtesy of our much-loved by, and enmeshed in, the debut novGleaner. el of Atticus Lish, Preparation for the Next Life. It won the 2015 Pen/ We hope you’ve had a restful and Faulkner Award—and it’s gruelling, rewarding break, if you got one. For even harrowing and totally original myself, the much cherished summer and brilliant. As you’d imagine of hol with family friends and many a novel set in life at the margins in books has been shanghaied this year New York’s underbelly, and centred by an unwished for sojourn in hospi- on an unlikely love story between an tal and post-operative recuperation. illegal Chinese Uighur peasant imAt least I’ve got plenty of reading migrant and a three tour Iraq veteran time—I hope. soldier, it’s a confronting, and challenging story. And it’s a long jourWe’ve some plans for 2016 involv- ney, as Lish not only doesn’t waste a ing some exciting offers that we word, but spends them with a Dickhope you’ll take up. We can never ensian profligacy on backstory in match the dreaded (for us!) Ama- China, Iraq, and on the lurid detail zon/Book Depository for price, but of daily life in Queens. It’s absowe’d like to hand pick some inter- lutely original, deeply political, and esting new releases each month at deserves to be read for its power and special prices. Watch the March commitment.

Gleaner. And we’ll do our best to involve as many of our well-read staff On a less severe note, odd as that as we can in giving perceptive and seems, since it deals with murder engaged reviews on what they’re and the death penalty, I was very reading. taken with Gideon Haigh’s Certain

ith

Welcome to 2016

Boo

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We thought we would start with some reflections on 2015 when we launched our new events programme.

This started with our Doggy Day in July with Asia Upward’s A Dog’s World book signing. We had a great afternoon planned in the park, inviting all the dogs of Blackheath and surrounds to join in the activities and treat tasting…but unfortunately the weather turned and Blackheath experienced its biggest snow dump in 50 years! We had to cancel and close the shop for a day, but it certainly made Blackheath look like a winter wonderland. We have a new Doggy Day planned for February 2016 with the launch of Asia’s new book and sequel Entertaining: A Dog’s World—look to your left for details.

Blackheath’s

Doggy Day Out Sunday 7 February 2016 10am to 2 pm Gardiners Hotel, Blackheath There’ll be a Doggy Competition, stalls with doggy food for the dogs and the Rotary Bunwagon for the humans.

Jumping castle & trampoline for the kids and to entertain, singer Nola Young.

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A Dog’s World & it’s sequel Entertaining A Dog’s World by local author and photographer Asia Upward are cookbooks of decadent doggy dreams.

Come to the Gleebooks stall, meet Asia and a chance to win a professionally photographed portrait of your dog.

Our other events in 2015 were a huge success—with David Marr in October and Drusilla Modjeska in November. Both events attracted great numbers of enthusiastic mountain folk, which was very encouraging. We also had a party in the shop to launch the 65-Storey Treehouse with 35 kids from the local school and we finished the year off with the family from The Art of Free Travel who visited us on their book signing cycling journey around NSW.

Also, on reflection, here is a list of our bestsellers for 2015: 1. Man From Cox’s River DVD;2. The 65-Storey Treehouse by Andy Griffiths; 3. Blue Mountains Best Bushwalks; 4. The Road to Little Dribbling: More Notes From A Small Island by Bill Bryson; 5. Mindfulness Colouring Book; 6. The Narrow Road to the Deep North

by Richard Flanagan; 7. Flesh Wounds by Richard Glover; 8. Quarterly Essay 59: Faction Man by David Marr; 9. Island Home by Tim Winton; 10. Girl on the Train

by Paula Hawkins.

We are currently putting together an exciting events program for 2016 and we hope to bring an author up to the mountains every month to talk about their new book—so stay tuned! Victoria Jefferys

Australian Literature

Napoleon’s Roads by David Brooks (23.95, PB) ‘What are the crimes of love, anyway, but fragments of passion broken from their moorings, evidence of a kind of shipwreck? (But what kind of ship? Where was it? What was its name?) Or crows, a flock of them, high in the air, fighting against a wind that no-one can see.’ David Brooks’ fourth collection of stories, his first in almost twenty years, capture unforgettable images of streetscapes and heartscapes, grappling with concepts of time and memory, tenderness, morality, creativity and solitude.

Fear is the Rider by Kenneth Cook (20, PB)

Image: Zhang Xiao, Relatives No.1, Giclee, 2014, 180 X 120 cm

ZHANG XIAO

张晓

The Road Home 乡关何处 5th February - 3rd March It is 40 years since China opened its doors to the world after Mao in 1976. Socioeconomic changes have dramatically shifted Chinese culture. Some things have been lost and others remain the same. Life goes on. The Road Home is a selection from t Zhang Xiao’s works over the last 10 years.

Zhang Xiao trained as architect and worked as a photo-journalist before he became a photographic artist. He is based in Chengdu, China. He is the recipient of several awards including the prestigious Three Shadows Photography Award, Beijing, and the Prix HSBC Pour la Photographie, France.

Vermilion Art 5/16 Hickson Rd. Walsh Bay, NSW 2000 Tue-Sat 11am – 7pm (02) 9241 3323 info@vermilionart.com.au www.vermilionart.com.

NEW IN B FORMAT When There’s Nowhere Else to Run

by Murray Middleton, $20 Useful by Debra Oswald, $23 Golden Boys by Sonya Hartnett, $23 Desert Writing: Stories from Country (ed) Terri-ann White (25, PB)

In September 2013 a group of intrepid writers made their way to three Australian desert settings to work with groups & individuals wishing to write. Both Aboriginal people with a profound connection to country & residents of more recent arrival who had made the choice to live in remote places participated in workshops. You’ll read new voices and hear perspectives on living in extreme geographical and climactic regions in today’s Australia. In the variety presented here we welcome you into the vitality of remote communities often isolated but full of commitment & hope for the future.

Southerly 75 No 3: War & Peace (26.95, PB) 2015 was the centenary of the landing at Gallipoli, a key date for Australia amidst the global remembrance of the Great War. ANZAC Day began as a memorial for the fallen soldiers of Gallipoli, but now includes all those who have suffered in wars of the past century. It is an Antipodean day of remembrance, but with our new understanding of war, what & how do we remember? Wars of Australian involvement, hostilities within Australia, wartime & postwar emigration & immigration, remembrance & remembering & memorialisation, trauma & illness, and peacetime after war, are all addressed in the essays, memoir, poetry, fiction & reviews in this edition of Southerly.

The Young Desire It: Text Classics

by Kenneth Mackenzie (12.95, PB)

15 year old Charles Fox is sent away to boarding school, where one of his masters develops an intense attachment to him. But when Charles meets Margaret, a girl staying at a nearby farm for the holidays, he is besotted, and a passionate, unforgettable romance begins. Published in London in 1937 this is a stunning debut novel about coming of age: an intimate and lyrical account of first love, and a rich evocation of rural Western Australia. With an introduction by David Malouf.

A young man driving from Sydney to Adelaide for work decides to take a short detour into the desert. He turns his hatchback on to a notoriously dangerous track that bisects uninhabited stone-covered flats. Out there, under the baking sun, people can die within hours.

He’s not far along the road when a distraught young woman stumbles from the scrub and flags him down. A journalist from Sydney, she has just escaped the clutches of an inexplicable, terrifying creature. Now this desert-dwelling creature has her jeep. Her axe. And her scent…. This is a previously unpublished manuscript from the 1980s that was recently rediscovered among Kenneth Cook’s papers.

The High Places by Fiona McFarlane (33, PB) The revelations of intimidating old friends on holiday. An accident on a dark country road. A marine biologist in conversation with the ghost of Charles Darwin. The sudden arrival of American parachutists in a Queensland country town. A lottery win. A farmer troubled by miracles in the middle of a drought. Ranging around the world from a remote Pacific island to outback Australia to the tourist haunts of Greece, Fiona McFarlane’s collection of stories find those moments when people confront the strangeness and mystery of their lives—and are jolted into seeing themselves from a fresh and often disconcerting perspective.

The River House by Janita Cunnington (33, PB)

It is the late 1940s, and the Broody River runs through a maze of sandbanks into the Coral Sea. On its southern bank lies the holiday town of Baroodibah. But its northern shore is wild—unsettled except for The River House, an old weatherboard box on stumps where the Carlyle family take their holidays. For 4 year old Laurie Carlyle it is a place of boating trips & nature collections, of the wind howling, the sheoaks sighing and the pelicans soaring into the blue sky.

Following the family’s story through the decades, The River House holidays seem to shine a light on the undercurrents in the family: the secret from her mother’s past, the bitterness between her older brother Tony and their father Doug, and her sister Miranda’s increasingly erratic and dangerous behaviour

That Devil’s Madness by Dominique Wilson

In 1896 Louis and his father, seduced by the allure of North Africa, travel to Algeria in search of a better life. There, Louis befriends Imez, a Berber boy, and the two become firm friends. They grow and prosper, and become like brothers. Years later, Nicolette, an Australian photojournalist, is drawn to cover the illness and eventual death of Algerian President Boumedienne. She sees it as an opportunity to follow in her grandfather’s footsteps, make her mark, and restore the bonds of the past. But the rules have changed—will the bonds that once existed be sufficient for her to survive? That Devil’s Madness tells of the often heartrending tensions that exist between idealism and duty, between friendship and loyalty to one’s country—of the struggle for freedom, dignity and respect. (29.95, PB)

Leaving Elvis: And Other Stories Michelle Michau-Crawford (25, PB)

A man returns from World War II and struggles to come to terms with what has happened in his absence. Almost seventy years later, his middle-aged granddaughter packs up her late grandmother’s home and discovers more than she had bargained for. These two stories book-end thirteen closely linked stories of one family and the rippling of consequences across three generations, played out against the backdrop of a changing Australia. This is the debut collection— from the winner of the 2013 ABR Elizabeth Jolley Short Story Prize.

Hotel du Barry by Lesley Truffle ($28, PB) When a laughing baby is found amongst the Hotel du Barry’s billowing sheets, tucked up in an expensive pair of ladies’ bloomers and neatly pegged to the laundry line, the hotel staff resolve to keep the child. The hotel’s owner, Daniel du Barry, still mourning the loss of his lover in an automobile accident, adopts the little girl, names her after his favourite champagne and seeks consolation in fatherhood. Cat du Barry grows up beloved by both hotel staff and guests, equally at home in the ninth floor premium suite as she is in the labyrinth below stairs. Years later when Daniel du Barry dies in sinister circumstances, Cat determines to solve the mystery with the assistance of her extended hotel family.

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International Literature

Shylock is My Name by Howard Jacobson ($30, PB)

February’s To-Read List

With an absent wife & a daughter going off the rails, wealthy art collector & philanthropist Simon Strulovitch is in need someone to talk to. So when he meets Shylock at a cemetery in Cheshire’s Golden Triangle, he invites him back to his house. It’s the beginning of a remarkable friendship. Elsewhere in the Golden Triangle, the rich, manipulative Plurabelle is the face of her own TV series, existing in a bubble of plastic surgery & lavish parties. She shares prejudices & a barbed sense of humour with her loyal friend D’Anton, whose attempts to play Cupid involve Strulovitch’s daughter—and put a pound of flesh on the line. Howard Jacobson’s version of The Merchant of Venice asks what it means to be a father, a Jew and a merciful human being in the modern world.

The Noise of Time by Julian Barnes ($32.99, HB)

14 brilliantly inventive stories from Fiona McFarlane, the Miles Franklin-shortlisted author of The Night Guest.

The outrageous story of misfits, renegades and visionaries who saw that the biggest credit bubble of all time was about to burst.

In May 1937 a man in his early thirties waits by the lift of a Leningrad apartment block. He waits all through the night, expecting to be taken away to the Big House. Any celebrity he has known in the previous decade is no use to him now. And few who are taken to the Big House ever return. So begins Julian Barnes’s first novel since his Bookerwinning The Sense of an Ending. A story about the collision of Art and Power, about human compromise, human cowardice and human courage, it is the work of a true master.

The High Mountains of Portugal by Yann Martel

In the early 1900s, Tomás discovers an ancient journal and sets out from Lisbon in one of the very first motor cars in Portugal to search for the strange treasure this journal describes. Thirty-five years later, a pathologist devoted to the novels of Agatha Christie, whose wife has possibly been murdered, finds himself drawn into Tomás’ quest. Fifty years later, Senator Peter Tovy of Ottawa, grieving the death of his own beloved wife, rescues a chimpanzee from an Oklahoma research facility and takes it to live with him in his ancestral village in northern Portugal, where the strands of all three stories miraculously mesh together. ($30, PB) A unique true story about a penguin who is saved from an oil slick and then refuses to leave his rescuer’s side.

Charming sketches and memorable quotes, collected by Kate Gavino at live book readings by over 100 great writers.

Fever at Dawn by Peter Gardos ($30, PB)

25 year-old Holocaust survivor Miklós is being shipped from the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp to Gotland, Sweden, to receive treatment at the Larbro Hospital. Here he is diagnosed with tuberculosis — he has six months to live. But Miklós decides to wage war on his own fate: he writes 117 letters to 117 Hungarian girls, all of whom are being treated in the Swedish camps, with the aim of eventually choosing a wife from among them. 200 kilometres away, in another Swedish rehabilitation camp, 19 year-old Lili receives Miklós’s letter. Since she is bedridden for three weeks due to a serious kidney problem, out of boredom—and curiosity—she decides to write back. This slightly formal exchange of letters becomes increasingly intimate. When the two finally manage to meet, they fall in love and are determined to marry, despite the odds that are against them. Based on the original letters written by Miklós and Lili (ninetysix altogether), Fever at Dawn is a tale of passion, striving, and betrayal; true and false friendships; doubt and faith; and the redeeming power of love.

Human Acts by Han Kang ($28, PB) Man Booker Prize winner Howard Jacobson revisits Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice.

This gripping, often deliriously funny, yet emotionally devastating book won the Costa Award 2015.

Gwangju, South Korea, 1980. In the wake of a viciously suppressed student uprising, a boy searches for his friend’s corpse, a consciousness searches for its abandoned body, and a brutalised country searches for a voice. In a sequence of interconnected chapters the victims and the bereaved encounter censorship, denial, forgiveness and the echoing agony of the original trauma.

The Prophets of Eternal Fjord by Kim Leine

Idealistic, misguided Morten Falck is a newly ordained priest sailing to Greenland in 1787 to convert the Inuit to the Danish church. A rugged outpost battered by harsh winters, Sukkertoppen is overshadowed by the threat of dissent; natives from neighbouring villages have united to reject Danish rule and establish their own settlement atop Eternal Fjord. As Falck becomes involved with those in his care—his ambitious catechist, a lonely trader’s wife, and a fatalistic widow he comes to love—his faith and reputation are dangerously called into question. ($30, PB)

A fascinating memoir-of-sorts about what it is to be human from the legendary writer and campaigner for human rights.

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A story about the collision of Art and Power, about compromise, cowardice and courage from a true master.

Am I Cold by Martin Kongstad ($28, PB) Copenhagen, 2008. Excess is in, austerity is out. The international crash is about to send everything tumbling down, but everyone’s too wasted to notice. And Mikkel Vallin’s own bubble has already burst.

Divorced, left by his girlfriend for a successful author, sacked from his job as a food critic, the wrong side of forty, Mikkel has had enough: he’s declared war on the monogamous relationship. Jealousy, deceit, hatred it’s enough to make you wonder if we’d all be better off just sleeping with who we wanted for a change. Fortunately, his new girlfriend—a successful, young, beautiful Hungarian artist—agrees.

Unfortunately, Mikkel might be falling in love with her. Among the orgies, the drug-fuelled sprees, the whirlwind of parties, surely there can’t be space for love?

Biography

The Call of the Outback: The remarkable story of Ernestine Hill, nomad, adventurer and trailblazer by Marianne van Velzen ($33, PB)

Long before Robyn Davidson wrote Tracks, the extraordinary Ernestine Hill was renowned for her intrepid travels across Australia’s vast outback. After the birth of her illegitimate son, Ernestine Hill abandoned her comfortable urban life as a journalist for a nomadic one, writing about this country’s vast interior and bringing the outback into the popular imagination of Australians. Throughout the 1930s Hill’s hugely popular stories about Australia’s remotest regions appeared in newspapers and journals around the nation and her books like The Great Australian Loneliness, The Territory, Flying Doctor Calling and My Love Must Wait were all best sellers. This is a vivid portrait of Hill, from the early brilliance she showed as a child in Brisbane to her later life.

Cursed Legacy: The Tragic Life of Klaus Mann

by Frederic Spotts ($79, HB)

Son of the famous Thomas Mann, homosexual, drug-addicted writer Klaus Mann was among the first to take up his pen against the Nazis—as a reward for which he was blacklisted & denounced as a dangerous half-Jew, his books burnt in public squares around Germany, and his citizenship revoked. Having served with the US military in Italy, he was nevertheless undone by anti-Communist fanatics in Cold War–era America & Germany, dying in France (though not, as all other books contend, by his own hand) at age forty-two. This biography charts the effects of reactionary politics on art and literature and tells the moving story of a supreme talent destroyed by personal circumstance and the seismic events of the 20th century.

Catullus’ Bedspread: The Life of Rome’s Most Erotic Poet by Daisy Dunn ($39.99, HB)

Living through the debauchery, decadence and political machinations of the crumbling Great Republic, Gaius Valerius Catullus’ fervent poetry was filled with emotion, wit and lurid insight into some of the republic’s most enduring figures. Tracing his journey across youth and experience, from Verona to Rome, Bithynia to Lake Garda, Daisy Dunn rediscovers the world of Catullus’ passions. She explores the adventures at sea described by his breathless syllables, the private dinners, lovers’ trysts and power games all amid the trembling death of the Roman republic, written with a wit and energy that Catullus would surely have enjoyed.

Mick: A Life of Randolph Stow

by Suzanne Falkiner ($50, HB)

Randolph Stow was one of the great Australian writers of his generation. His novel To the Islands—written in his early twenties after living on a remote Aboriginal mission—won the Miles Franklin Award for 1958. In later life, after publishing seven remarkable novels and several collections of poetry, Stow’s literary output slowed. Suzanne Falkiner unravels the reasons behind Randolph Stow’s quiet retreat from Australia and the wider literary world. Her biography pieces together an intriguing, and sometimes deeply moving, story from Stow’s personal letters, diaries & interviews with the people who knew him best. And many of her tales—from Stow’s beginnings in idyllic rural Australia, to his critical turning point in Papua New Guinea, and his final years in Essex, England—provide keys to unlocking the meaning of Stow’s rich and introspective works.

White Eskimo: Knud Rasmussen’s Fearless Journey into the Heart of the Arctic by Stephen R. Brown

While Amundsen, Franklin & Peary were first to explore the furthest geographical reaches of the Polar North, Knud Rasmussen was the first to explore its culture & its soul. Part Danish, part Inuit, the famed explorer anthropologist made an epic 3 year journey by dog sled from Greenland to Alaska recording not only the landscapes but also the songs and stories of the Eskimo people. In the ranks of the great explorer/writers who opened hitherto impenetrable cultures to the West—T. E. Lawrence in the Mideast, Wilfred Thesiger among the Bedouin, Richard Burton in Africa or among the Sufi—Rasmussen stars not only for his physical courage & ability to assimilate into the life of indigenous peoples, but also for the beauty of his writing. ($37, HB)

In Brazil by Fran Bryson ($33, PB)

In Brazil, you can commune with spirits & dance with gods. In Brazil, you can learn a lot about life’s possibilities. 7 years of travel in Brazil saw Fran Bryson’s fascination with the country develop into something of an obsession with its culture, religions, and history. During many journeys from her island home in Australia, she explored the country: from the flittering modern city of Brasilia to small, deeply religious towns; from the inner reaches of the Amazon jungle to the vibrant backlands—home to outcasts and the possessed—and finally to the sweat-drenched streets of Rio during Carnaval.

l l i H ’ D n O

Like so many in Sydney this summer, I spent much of my holiday time immersed in the heart of Naples by way of the enthralling Neapolitan quartet by Elena Ferrante. Beginning with My Brilliant Friend I read through the four books without pausing for breath, swept along by the power of the narrative and the visceral quality of the writing. Yes, the writing can be uneven, and yes, there’s a ‘soapy’ element to parts of the story but there’s something so raw, immediate and alive in the story of Lila and Elena, growing up in a poor suburb of Naples in the 50s and 60s, through to middle and old age—marriages, births, deaths (the stuff of life)—that you can hardly bear for it to end. There’s an excellent review in The London Review of Books by Joanna Briggs which is available online. ‘…the Neapolitan quartet’ Briggs writes ‘…has an almost deranging narrative pleasure, delivered in a style that’s more of an admission that the author cares too much about the truth to bother with style.’

Don’t read the article until you’ve finished the quartet as Briggs refers to events in the fourth book which you don’t want to know about until you get there.

Out this month and highly recommended is a book of short stories, The High Places, by Fiona McFarlane—author of the highly acclaimed The Night Guest. McFarlane writes sparely and poetically of normal people living ordinary lives—but she digs deep beneath the surface to reveal much more, with surprises in store for most of her characters. Especially good is Those Americans Falling from the Sky—set during WWII in a town somewhere like Townsville, where American soldiers are watched by the townspeople parachuting into their lives. Very few of these stories have contemporary settings, so that overall, one feels that these perfectly crafted stories might have been written by Elizabeth Harrower or maybe Thea Astley. An absolute delight. Fiona has recently moved to Marrickville, bolstering the already strong reputation our burg has for being the literary centre of Australia. Lucky us!

Next, I’m looking forward to Anthony Doerr’s bestselling All the Light We Cannot See. I haven’t heard one person say they didn’t like it. As well, I have proofs for new novels coming from Australian writers Georgia Blain, Kirsten Tranter and Emily Maguire. What riches await.

All of us at Gleebooks at Dulwich Hill would like to thank our customers for your massive support over the Christmas season, yet again proving, if there was any doubt, that the printed word and the beauty of the book continues to attract us in a way no computer screen ever could.

See you on D’Hill, Morgan.

Travel Writing

This Is London: Life & Death in the World City

by Ben Judah ($33, HB)

London is a global city. More than half of those who live in the UK’s capital came from somewhere else—and most arrived in the last ten years. Migration is transforming London, for better and for worse. Foreign correspondent, Ben Judah, turns his keen reporter’s eye on home, immersing himself in the hidden world of the city’s immigrants—from the richest to the poorest—to discover the complex and varied individuals who are making London what it is today. He’s had dinner with oligarchs and meetings with foreign royalty, spent nights streetwalking and sleeping rough; he’s heard stories of heart-breaking failure, but also witnessed extraordinary acts of compassion, hope and the triumph of love.

Hong Kong in Between by Geraldine Borio & Caroline Wuthrich ($57.95, PB)

Swiss architects & researchers Borio & Wüthrich have been living & working in Hong Kong since 2010. They’ve been fascinated by the micro-level of urban life in Hong Kong—leading to a major project of investigating the ways the city’s residents use the narrow lanes that run behind & between the city’s high-rises, semi-public spaces that offer venues for business, social interaction & a wide range of informal encounters. This book presents the results of this exploration through a mix of black-and-white drawings, diagrams, plans, photographs, and texts that reveal the active, ever-changing life of these forgotten, in-between spaces.

Now in B Format The Year of Living Danishly: Uncovering the Secrets of the World’s Happiest Country by Helen Russell, $23

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Crime Fiction

Comfort Zone by Lindsay Tanner ($30, PB)

Jack van Duyn is a pot-bellied, unfit, round-shouldered cabbie in his mid-fifties. He has a few mates, who he regards contentedly as losers & nobodies like himself, and lots of opinions about all the bastards out there who get more than they deserve. One morning, waiting for a fare, he notices a handful of dark-skinned children romping in the playground, and finds himself muttering Bloody Somalis. Why can’t they stay in their own shithole of a country? However, after reluctantly breaking up a fight between the children, Jack finds himself transfixed by one of their mothers, and feels compelled to help her. What follows is a bewildering, hair-raising descent into a world of drug-dealing, ASIO harassment, criminal thuggery & Somali payback.

The Dove’s Necklace by Raja Alem ($33, PB)

The secret life of Mecca, a neighbourhood, an unsolved murder, a spiritual journey, the story of a community and a nation. When a dead woman is discovered in Abu Al Roos, one of Mecca’s many alleys, no one will claim the body because they are ashamed by her nakedness. As we follow the investigation of the case, the secret life of the holy city of Mecca is revealed.

License to Quill by Jacopo della Quercia ($29.99, PB)

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mbracing our love of superfoods, local produce

and culinary diversity, The Oldest Foods on Earth by John Newton will open your eyes to the abundance and diversity of ‘real’ Australian food. The flora and fauna that nourished Indigenous Australians for over 50,000 years has been largely ignored

by Europeans for more than 200 years. But the tide is turning with more people

beginning to accept and relish the flavours of Australia.

Everything from kangaroo to quandongs, fresh muntries to, the latest addition, magpie goose are being re-introduced to Australian menus. With recipes from chefs such as Peter Gilmore, Maggie Beer and René Redzepi’s sous chef Beau Clugston, The Oldest Foods on Earth will convince you that this is one food revolution that really matters.

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nce regarded as helpless victims waiting to be

rescued, Muslim women are now widely regarded by both Muslim and non-Muslim disciplinarians as a potential threat to be kept under control. How did this shift in attitudes come about?

Shakira Hussein explores the lives of women negotiating the hazards of the post9/11 terrain, from volatile

Afghan refugee camps and Pakistani weddings to Australian suburbia and campaigns to ‘ban the burqa’. Her unique perspective on feminism, multiculturalism, race and religion is one that we urgently need.

w w w. n ews o u t h p u b l i s h i n g .co m

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A page-turning James Bond-esque spy thriller starring William Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe during history’s real life Gunpowder Plot. The story follows the fascinating golden age of English espionage, the tumultuous cold war gripping post-Reformation Europe, the cloakand-dagger politics of Shakespeare’s England, and lastly, the mysterious origins of the Bard’s most haunting play: Macbeth.

Fever City by Tim Baker ($30, PB) Nick Alston, a Los Angeles private investigator, is hired to find the kidnapped son of America’s richest and most hated man. Hastings, a mob hitman in search of redemption, is also on the trail. But both men soon become ensnared by a sinister cabal that spreads from the White House all the way to Dealey Plaza. Decades later in Dallas, Alston’s son stumbles across evidence from JFK conspiracy buffs that just might link his father to the shot heard round the world. Violent, vivid, visceral: Fever City is a high-octane, nightmare journey through a Mad Men-era America of dark powers, corruption and conspiracy.

To Catch a Killer by Nele Neuhaus ($30, PB) Detective Pia Kirchhoff is about to leave on her long-delayed honeymoon when she hears that a woman has been shot while out walking her dog. Then more long-range shootings swiftly follow, and it becomes clear that a highly trained serial killer is on the loose. The victims seem to have just one thing in common: they were all good people with apparently no enemies. So why are they dead? As fear of the Taunus Sniper grows among local residents, all leave is cancelled for the Frankfurt police department as they are put on red alert.

The Widow by Fiona Barton ($33, PB) We’ve all seen him: the man—the monster—staring from the front page of every newspaper, accused of a terrible crime. But what about the woman who grips his arm on the courtroom stairs—the woman who stands by him? Jean Taylor’s life was blissfully ordinary. Nice house, nice husband. Glen was all she’d ever wanted: her Prince Charming.

Until he became that man accused, that monster on the front page. Jean was married to a man everyone thought capable of unimaginable evil.

But now Glen is dead and she’s alone for the first time, free to tell her story on her own terms. Jean Taylor is going to tell us what she knows.

Daphne Du Maurier’s Rebecca meets We Need to Talk About Kevin in this intimate tale of a terrible crime.

That Empty Feeling by Peter Corris ($30, PB)

Legendary PI Cliff Hardy has reached an age when the obituaries have become part of his reading, and one triggers his memory of a case in the late 1980s—back when Sydney was awash with colourful characters, and Cliff is reminded of a case involving ‘Ten-Pound Pom’ Barry Bartlett & racing identity and investor Sir Keith Mountjoy. Bartlett, a former rugby league player & boxing manager, then a prosperous property developer, had hired Hardy to check on the bona fides of young Ronny Saunders, newly arrived from England, and claiming to be Bartlett’s son from an early failed marriage. Was Ronny Saunders a pawn in a game involving big oil and fraud on an international scale? Two murders raise the stakes and with the sinister figure of Lady Betty Lee Mountjoy pulling the strings, it was odds against a happy outcome.

Dead Joker by Anne Holt ($30, PB) Chief Prosecutor Sigurd Halvorsrud’s wife is found dead in front of the fireplace in the family living room—she has been brutally decapitated.

Halvorsrud immediately falls under suspicion. Then a journalist at one of Oslo’s largest newspapers is found beheaded. What links these two horrifically violent crimes? DI Hanne Wilhelmsen is called in to lead the investigation with her old colleague Billy T. But the most demanding task that Hanne Wilhelmsen has ever faced in her career clashes with the worst crisis in her personal life. Cecilie, the woman she lived with for almost twenty years, is seriously ill.

Rain Dogs by Adrian McKinty ($30, PB) When journalist Lily Bigelow is found dead in the courtyard of Carrickfergus castle, it looks like a suicide. But there are just a few things that bother Sean Duffy enough to keep the case file open. Which is how he finds out that she was working on a devastating investigation of corruption and abuse at the highest levels of power in the UK and beyond.

And so Duffy has two impossible problems on his desk: who killed Lily Bigelow? And what were they trying to hide?

THE WILDER AISLES

In 2004, the body of a young Perth woman was found on the grounds of a primary school. The killing would mystify investigators, lawyers, & psychologists. It would also involve the author’s family, as his brother knew the man charged with the murder. For years, the two had circled each other in a world of violence, drugs & rotten aspirations. A police procedural, a meditation on suffering & an exploration of how the different parts of the justice system make sense of the senseless, this is also a mapping of the suburbs that the author grew up in, and a revelation of the dangerous underbelly of adolescent ennui.

Margaret Leroy was a new discovery for me during my summer holiday reading. The UK born author, now a social worker after many different careers, writes what might be called psychological thrillers—however, to me the two that I have read seem more like stories where a crime takes place, but that crime is almost incidental to the main action of the story. The River House tells of Ginnie Holmes, a respected psychologist, wife & mother. Ginnie’s world begins to fall apart when through her work she meets a man she finds very attractive.

Despite her best intentions she is drawn into an affair with him. He is also married & very concerned to keep his relationship with Ginnie a secret. One day, when they meet in a secluded place by the river, Ginnie sees a man running along the path through the trees. He looks suspicious—his coat over his shoulder, looking a bit frantic. Later when a woman’s body is discovered in the river, Ginnie is conflicted. Should she go to the police with what she saw & risk ruining the lives of two families, or keep mum—after all, maybe he had nothing to do with what turns out to be a murder. Because of her job as a psychologist & her standing in the community the decision is even harder to make. But later on it looks as if Ginnie has no other option than to tell the truth.

The second Margaret Leroy I read was Postcards from Berlin. This was quite a disturbing read. Although it is fiction, I could easily imagine such things happening in real life, and I am sure they do. Catriona Lydgate is married with a loving husband and two children. But Catriona has a hidden past, and when she is recognised by someone from that past, her world begins to fall apart. When anonymous postcards start arriving from Berlin Catriona feels threatened and she fears she will lose everything—her husband, children and home. When her youngest daughter contracts a mysterious illness, Catriona is brought to the edge of collapse. Events beyond her control seem to take over her life, and the past she had so skilfully hidden, starts to rise to the surface with dire consequences. I loved this novel. I really enjoy Leroy’s writing and I am pleased to say there are more of her books for me to read.

A proof copy of a book called Rebound was put in my pigeon-hole so I dutifully read it. It is by Aga Lesiewicz, a name new to me. Set in London, it relates the story of Anna Wright, a successful media executive, who lives the good life— great job, loving boyfriend, close friends and Wispa, her dog. She seems to have it all. To keep fit Anna runs. Her favourite place to run is on the heath, but one fateful day she takes a different route. After running for a while she looks over her shoulder to see the shadow of a man, about twenty paces behind her, keeping up a steady pace, not trying to overtake but also not dropping behind.

What happens when he catches up sets her life in a whole new direction. Taking a different path means more than just a change of scenery, it changes Anna’s life completely. What follows is the story of Anna’s obsession with the shadow man and the near destruction of Anna’s nearly perfect life. This was a good read. I really liked the characters, especially Anna’s best friend and the female detective sent to investigate the case in which Anna has become embroiled. Plus—when Anna’s life is threatened it is the wonderful Wispa who comes to her rescue.

Wispa theWonder Dog! I also read two more in Andrea Camilleri’s Inspector Montalbano series—The Blade of Light & Game of Mirrors. Of course they were great as most of his are. I won’t go into the plots—just to say they involve dead bodies, robberies, the Mafia & all his crew, including of course the wonderful Catarella. These books seem to be translated at the whim of the publishers, so even though these two were published last year they are not new. However, unless you read Italian, which unfortunately I don’t, you have no choice but to wait for the translations to appear. It doesn’t really matter too much, each story is complete unto itself, but sometimes I think we the readers should get a better deal.

You may be relieved to hear the last book I want to tell you about is not a crime novel. I have long been a fan of Anna Quindlen and have written about her before, but I have to write about Still Life with Bread Crumbs because I liked it so much. Quindlen is an interesting writer of contemporary fiction & nonfiction. This latest novel features Rebecca Winter, a photographer who has had a very successful career, but now is facing an uncertain future. With her career in abeyance & her bank balance low, Rebecca leaves her New York apartment for a shack upstate. Here she is alone with no one but herself to rely on. When she hears noises in her roof, she calls on the local roofer Jim Bates for help. Through this meeting Rebecca discovers a whole new life outside the photo frame. She also discovers that life is not so easy when a steady bank balance is not in place, and finds herself grateful for the small amounts that come from photographing the birds Jim Bates is tagging—a bit of a comedown for a famous New York photographer, according to Rebecca’s son Ben. This is a lovely story of a woman in early middle-age starting a new journey in life, with unexpected love thrown in for good measure. There is a lot more to this book than I have room for here, including Rebecca’s marriage and her relationship with her parents— but I hope I have spiked your interest. Highly recommended. Janice Wilder

A century ago the brutal murder of Miss Jean Milne in a small seaside town captured the imagination of the whole country. Using newly-released evidence from police files, eye witness testimony hidden for a century and long forgotten newspaper reports from the scene, Andrew Nicoll has brought the case back from the dead to reveal the secrets of the little town where Jean Milne was murdered—the little town where he has spent his life.

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First Person Shooter by Cameron Raynes ($25, PB) Jayden lives with his father on the edge of a small country town. He stutters and is addicted to playing video games as a first person shooter. His best friend is Shannon, the girl next door, who knows how to handle a rifle. When Shannon’s mother returns home from a five-anda-half year prison sentence for manslaughter, the town waits to see whether her sociopathic stepson, Pete, will exact revenge for the death of his father. When Jayden gets caught with .22 ammunition at school and is suspended, things begin to fall apart. Over the next ten days, as he roams the dark, ugly side of a town struggling with bikie gangs and drugs, a massacre in America hits the headlines and Pete gears up for a violent assault. Will it be left to Jayden to stop him? .

Lawless and the Devil of Euston Square

by William Sutton ($15, PB)

Novice detective, Campbell Lawless, stumbles onto the trail of Berwick Skelton, an elusive revolutionary, who seems determined to bring London to its knees through a series of devilish acts of terrorism. But cast into a lethal, intoxicating world of music hall hoofers, industrial sabotage & royal scandal, will Lawless survive long enough to capture this underworld nemesis. This the first of a series of Victorian thrillers featuring London policeman, Campbell Lawless on his rise through the ranks and his initiation as a spy.

The Osiris Ritual by George Mann ($17, PB)

Death stalks London and the newspapers proclaim that a mummy’s curse has been unleashed. Sir Maurice Newbury is drawn into a web of occult intrigue as he attempts to solve the murders. And he soon finds himself on the trail of a rogue agent—a man who died to be reborn as a living weapon. Meanwhile, Newbury’s able assistant, Miss Veronica Hobbes, has her own mystery to unravel. Young women are going missing...

The Secrets of Drearcliff Grange School

by Kim Newman ($16.99, PB)

A week after Mother found her sleeping on the ceiling, Amy Thomsett is delivered to her new school, Drearcliff Grange in Somerset. Although it looks like a regular boarding school, Amy learns that Drearcliff girls are special, the daughters of criminal masterminds, outlaw scientists and master magicians. Several of the pupils also have special gifts like Amy’s, and when one of the girls in her dormitory is abducted by a mysterious group in black hoods, Amy forms a secret, super-powered society called the Moth Club to rescue their friend. They soon discover that the Hooded Conspiracy runs through the School, and it’s up to the Moth Club to get to the heart of it.

True Crime

Evil Life: The True Story of the Calabrian Mafia in Australia by Clive Small & Tom Gilling ($33, PB)

The Calabrian Mafia have been responsible for nearly 40 murders in Australia since the mid-1970s & many more before that. Yet despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, Federal & State law enforcement agencies have long assured the public that there is no Calabrian mafia in Australia. Evil Life shatters this myth. Drawing on court documents & unreleased intelligence reports, as well as interviews with well-informed sources, the authors reveal how the Calabrian mafia evolved from its beginnings on the north QLD cane fields in the 1920s to establish cells in every major capital city.

A Murder without Motive: The killing of Rebecca Ryle by Martin McKenzie-Murray ($33, PB)

The Secret Life And Curious Death Of Miss Jean Milne by Andrew Nicoll ($19, PB)

books for kids to young adults

compiled by Lynndy Bennett, our children's correspondent

Lynndy and Louise are away on personal crusades battling diabolical foes, but they will be back next month. Meanwhile, here are some of Lynndy’s recommendations.

How to Find Gold by Viviane Schwarz ($25, HB)

Smelly Louie

by Catherine Rayner ($15, BD)

Louie the dog has just had a bath—and he is NOT happy about it. He smells all wrong. Determined to get his Special Smell back, he goes on a hunt for it and meets lots of smelly things along the way—a fox, some interesting dustbins and a marvellously muddy puddle to roll in. Will he ever get his smell back?

fiction

Barney and the Secret of the Whales by Jackie French

What is the sailor’s secret about the treasure of Australia’s colony? The second book in The Secret History—a series that explores little-known history about Australia’s fascinating past.

Barney Bean is keen to make his fortune and he hears a secret; a sailor’s secret about the treasure of the colony.

But how can chasing whales make you rich? Is adventure at sea worth leaving everything he loves? ($13, PB)

‘Let’s find gold’, said Anna. ‘That would be dangerous and difficult’, said Crocodile. ‘Good!’ said Anna. ‘Let’s go!’ From the award-winning picture book creator of There are Cats in This Book comes a story of imaginative play, and of two friends—Anna and Crocodile—who are on the hunt for gold. But finding gold isn’t easy. Oh no! It’s dangerous and difficult and requires planning.

First, they must master their secret-keeping faces. Then Anna must pick up Crocodile, to be sure she’s strong enough to carry all the gold. Finally, they must draw the whole world together, with an X that marks the spot, before sailing off in their boat. What will the two friends discover? Teeming with adventurous spirit and boasting wonderfully funny dialogue, this story introduces two unforgettable characters.

Picture Books

The Night Gardener

by Eric & Terry Fan ($32, HB)

This imaginative book is far better described by Kirkus Review: ‘Grimloch Lane is a gray place where individuals trudge along wrapped in their own thoughts, until a man carrying a ladder and tools enters their sphere. Clad in almostgray green and seemingly unaware of the similarly attired boy drawing a feathered creature in the dirt he proceeds to a nearby tree. After the moonlit title page, morning breaks with narration that accompanies this child now gazing in wonder from the orphanage window. A gigantic, familiar owl has been formed from the tree’s foliage. Ensuing evenings yield ever more amazing creatures; colour creeps into the scenes as neighbours gather in admiration and spruce up their dilapidated homes. The Fan brothers contrast creamy, uncluttered pages of daytime community life with magical forest-green evenings that culminate in an invitation to help.

The pair’s resulting leafy menagerie in the park is rendered even more evocative when the page turn reveals the blazing deciduous trees dropping their sculpted shapes. But no matter—the neighbourhood has been changed permanently, as has the boy. The final double-page spread depicting the young man shaping his own playful topiary is an uplifting testament to the effect that a caring adult can have on a lonely child. An economic text punctuated with commas, questions, and ellipses leads readers forward; highly textured graphite and deepening, digitally coloured compositions surprise and delight. Visual pleasure abounds.’

Bullet Train Disaster: 1 Countdown to Danger by Jack Heath ($13, PB) In the format of Choose Your Own Adventure stories, Jack Heath’s new series Countdown to Danger guarantees breakneck thrills and grippingly real adventure, with thirty opportunities for the reader to change the course of the action. Get aboard and hold on tight till the end of the countdown!

Silly Verse For Kids by Spike Milligan ($17, PB)

The Pencil by Paula Bossio ($13, BD)

Wordless picture books are suitable for any age, and grand for encouraging children to interpret the story entirely their own way, especially as they can ‘read’ it differently every time. A little girl finds the end of a line and her adventure begins. She follows it through the pages as it becomes a slide, a hoop, a bubble ... and then something that threatens to spoil the fun. In the spirit of Harold and the Purple Crayon, this funny story is a tribute to making the impossible possible, with a surprise on every page right through to the back cover.

The Adventures of Beekle by Dan Santat ($15, PB)

Winner of the 2015 Caldecott Medal for distinguished illustration, this endearing story of an unimaginary friend is now in paperback. Beginning on a faraway island, this magical tale tells of an imaginary friend who patiently waits his turn to be chosen by a real child, but when he is overlooked time and again, he sets off on an incredible journey to the bustling city, where he finally meets his perfect match and, at long last, is given his special name: Beekle. Classic storytelling and breathtaking art create an unforgettable tale about friendship, imagination, and the courage to find your place in the world. The book also won acclaim as the Huffington Post Best Overall Picture Book of 2014.

Nonfiction

A collection of the ridiculous, sublime and characteristically anarchic verse from the brilliant Spike Milligan. With his very own illustrations, this reissued volume is sure to win over a new generation to his distinctively absurd humour.

Timeline: An Illustrated History of the World by Peter Goes ($35, HB)

A perfect introduction to history for young and old, this illustrated journey through our world’s culture and events travels from the Big Bang to the iPod and into the future. This is a trip through time, past dinosaurs, Vikings, Aztecs and spaceships. It looks at wars and disasters; introduces artists, explorers and leaders; shows us living in castles, yurts and skyscrapers. And it does not neglect the imagination—here too are dragons, mythical figures and TV characters, alongside worldchanging inventions born from the imaginations of scientists and explorers. Each scene puts global events in perspective, in space and time.

Drew: 1 Changers Quartet by Allison Glock-Cooper & T Cooper ($17, PB)

teen fiction

It’s the eve of Ethan Miller’s freshman year of high school in a brand-new town. He’s finally sporting a haircut he doesn’t hate, has grown two inches since middle school, and can’t wait to try out for the soccer team. At last, everything is looking up in life. Until the next morning. When Ethan awakens as a girl. Ethan is a Changer, a little-known, ancient race of humans who live out each of their four years of high school as a different person. After graduation, Changers choose which version of themselves they will be forever—and no, they cannot go back to who they were before the changes began. Ethan must now live as Drew—a petite blonde girl—and follow the strict Changer rules: Never tell anyone what you are. Never disobey the Changers Council. And never, ever fall in love with another Changer. And she can’t even confide in her best friend Audrey, who can never know the real her, without risking both of their lives. Fans of the books of John Green, the Joss Whedonverse—and empathy between humans—will find much to love in this first of a four-part series that tracks the journey of an average suburban boy who becomes an incredible young woman...who becomes a reluctant hero...who becomes the person she was meant to be. Because, while changing the world can kinda suck, it sure beats never knowing who you really are. This is a compelling and promising start to a new series.

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Food & Health

The Telomerase Revolution: The Breakthrough that Holds the Key to Slowing the Aging Process

by Michael Fossel ($30, PB)

Science & Nature

The Amazing (Mostly) Edible Science Cookbook: A Family Guide to Fun Experiments in the Kitchen by Andrew Schloss ($30, PB)

Scientists now know that human aging is the result of cellular aging.

Every time a cell reproduces, its telomeres—the tips of the chromosomes—shorten. With every shortening of the telomeres, the cell’s ability to repair its molecules decreases. However the enzyme telomerase re-lengthens the telomeres, keeping these cells young. Dr Michael Fossel has been at the forefront of aging research for decades, and in this book he describes how telomerase is starting to be used as a powerful therapeutic tool, with the potential to dramatically extend life spans. It also offers promise for treating Alzheimer’s & many other diseases of aging.

Introduce your children to the wonders of science by creating projects and experiments in your very own kitchen. Entertaining to make and spectacular to behold, not only will your child learn important scientific principles, but they can even enjoy the delicious final product. Almost everything made in this book is edible. Learn and appreciate projects like classic exploding volcano cakes, glow-in-the-dark Jell-O, singing cakes, and bouncy eggs. Food expert Andrew Schloss provides you and your kids with practical and humorous projects that include step by step instructions, illustrated with fun full-colour photos sure to appeal to kids of all ages.

Nourishing, restorative and comforting, bone broth is the concentrated meaty elixir with a clear, bright, essential flavour. This innovative book explains why bone broth is so healthy and nutritious and how you can harness its essential goodness in your everyday diet. The delicious recipes can be used by people who are detoxing or following the Paleo Diet as well as the 5:2 Diet (especially on fasting days)—with over 100 recipes for soups, stews and casseroles, risottos and sauces, each with broth at its core.

Statins are the single most commonly prescribed class of drugs in the whole of the developed world. They’re taken by over 100 million people, with millions more patients being offered them every year. We know that statins do some good. But we don’t know how big the benefits are. We don’t know which is the best. We don’t how common the side effects are. We don’t give clear information to patients, so they are deprived of their right to make informed decisions about the trade-off between benefits, inconvenience & risk. Drawing on his own research, Ben Goldacre explores industry misdeeds; the ‘nocebo’ effect, the evil twin of the placebo effect, where side effects are caused by the power of fear alone; and the differences in patients’ desire for treatment, and doctors’ failures to empathise with these.

Broth: Nature’s Cure-all for Health & Nutrition

by Vicki Edgson and Heather Thomas ($40, PB)

Grow Your Own Cake: 50 Recipes from Plot to Plate by Holly Farrell and Jason Ingram ($34.99, PB)

Grow long sweet parsnips to grate into parsnip cake, & short baby parsnips for a tarte-tatin. From blackcurrants for meringues to lavender for shortbread, from sweet potatoes to spinach, cherries to chillies, beetroot to basil & ginger to garlic, all manner of vegetables, fruit, herbs & flowers can be found in a baker’s kitchen garden. Grow Your Own Cake helps you to take giant strides on the road to selfsufficiency while turning your fabulous crops into sweet, savoury, floral & delicate treats. We say: grow it, bake it, eat it!

The Conversation: A Revolutionary Plan for Endof-Life Care by Angelo E. Volandes ($26, PB)

Dr Angelo E. Volandes believes that a life well lived deserves a good ending. Through the stories of 7 patients & 7 very different end-oflife experiences, he demonstrates that what people with a serious illness, who are approaching the end of their lives, need most is not new technologies but one simple thing: The Conversation. He argues for a radical re-envisioning of the patient-doctor relationship and offers ways for patients & their families to talk about this difficult issue to ensure that patients will be at the centre & in charge of their medical care.

Spiralise by Pete Evans ($25, PB)

Spiralise! has easy-to-follow instructions for creating ribbons, spaghetti & noodles out of a whole host of vegetables & fruit, such as zucchinis, parsnips, carrots, cucumbers, sweet potatoes, green papaya & apple. Then there’s a range of enticing recipes for breakfasts, soups, vegetables & meat-based dishes. Try kung pao chicken with zoodles, prawn dumpling noodle soup, creamy pumpkin carbonara with parsnip noodles or pulled lamb burritos with chipotle mayo and carrot noodles.

No Grain, No Pain: A 30-Day Diet for Eliminating the Root Cause of Chronic Pain by Peter Osborne

Dr Peter Osborne, a groundbreaking authority on gluten sensitivity and food allergies, has found that grains, even so-called safe grains like corn and rice, can wreak havoc on the body by causing tissue inflammation, creating vitamin and mineral deficiencies, and triggering an autoimmune response. The book includes a clear examination of the science behind the program, a day-by-day meal plan to make the transition to a grain-free diet easier, dozens of delicious recipes, and valuable resources to support your grain-free lifestyle for the long haul. ($29.99, PB)

The Oldest Foods on Earth: A History of Australian Native Foods with Recipes by John Newton

We celebrate cultural and culinary diversity, yet shun foods that grew here before white settlers arrived. We love ‘superfoods’ from exotic locations, yet reject those that grow here. We say we revere sustainable local produce, yet ignore Australian native plants & animals that are better for the land than those European ones. With recipes from chefs such as Peter Gilmore, Maggie Beer & René Redzepi’s sous chef Beau Clugston using everything from kangaroo to quandongs, from fresh muntries to the latest addition, magpie goose. ($30, PB)

Also New—from Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh How to Relax; How to Love; How to Walk; How to Sit. $13 each

Do Statins Work?: The Battle for Perfect Evidence-Based Medicine by Ben Goldacre ($30, PB)

Herding Hemingway’s Cats: Understanding how our genes work by Kat Arney ($29.99, PB)

According to legend, Ernest Hemingway was once given a sixtoed cat by an old sea captain, and her distinctive descendants still roam the writer’s Florida estate today. Scientists now know that the fault driving this profusion of digits lies in a tiny genetic control switch, miles away (in molecular terms) from the gene that ‘makes’ toes. And it’s the same mistake that gives rise to multi-toed humans too. There are 2.2 metres of DNA inside every one of your cells, encoding roughly 20,000 genes. These are the ‘recipes’ that tell our cells how to make the building blocks of life, along with myriad control switches ensuring they’re turned on & off at the right time & in the right place. But rather than a static string of genetic code, this is a dynamic, writhing biological library. In this book geneticist Kat Arney draws on stories ranging from six-toed cats & stickleback hips to wobbly worms & zombie genes to explore how our genes work.

Taste of Home: In Search of the Secrets of Flavor

by Diane Fresquez ($25, PB)

Do men & women experience taste & smell differently? What do apple trees have in common with humans? And what happens when you eat a meal in complete darkness? In this weird & wonderful exploration of the world of sensory science, DianeFresquez meets a brewery owner who’s developed a banana-flavoured beer meant to appeal to young women, and an entrepreneur who won’t rest until he develops the perfect mead, the ancient liquor considered the ancestor of all fermented drinks. She encounters a young mother & PhD student whose research shows that what a mother eats can influence the flavour of her breast milk, & a scientist in the Netherlands who researches flavour & memory at an Orwellian university lab called ‘The Restaurant of the Future’.

Eco Living Japan: Sustainable Ideas for Living Green by Deanna MacDonald ($40 HB)

Japan is equally as well known for its ecologically-sensitive traditional homes as it is for cutting-edge, green technology. This book presents 19 contemporary Japanese houses which exemplify the most recent trends in sustainable design in Japan. With over 250 photos, drawings, plans & lively, informative text, this sustainable architecture book offers a picture of green living in contemporary Japan & provides inspiration & practical ideas for those creating homes in other 4 season climates.

Dark Matter & the Dinosaurs: The Astounding Interconnectedness of the Universe

by Lisa Randall ($35, PB)

66 million years ago, a ten-mile-wide object from outer space hurtled into the Earth at incredible speed & destroyed the dinosaurs, along with three-quarters of the other species on the planet. Lisa Randall tells the story of Big Bang theory, cosmological inflation, the makeup of the universe & our solar system’s place in it; it’s about mass extinctions through the ages, what we know has hit the Earth & what might hit us in the future. And it explores the radical idea that dark matter might ultimately have been responsible for the dinosaurs’ extinction. A horizon-expanding tour of the cosmos that blends what we know about the universe with new thinking, this is a book full of wonders, from a gifted scientist & writer.

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16 Event—6 for 6.30

Can it be: Poems are the Prayers of a Secular World

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23 Event—6 for 6.30

Larissa Behrendt

Finding Eliza: Power & Colonial Storytelling in conv. with Ann Curthoys Eliza Fraser, was purportedly captured by the Butchulla people after a shipwreck in 1836. Larissa Behrendt uses Eliza’s tale as a starting point to interrogate how indigenous peoples have been portrayed in their colonisers’ stories.

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Event—6 for 6.30 Barry Jones

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Event— First Dog on

The Shock of Recognition: The Books & Music That Have Inspired Me in conv. with Michael Kirby In this book Barry Jones writes about his endless quest to share the extraordinary & the beautiful, to encourage the pursuit of an abundant life of reading and listening.

A Treasury o In conv. w First Dog, the eno and only marsupia winning cartoonis collection of his g 2009 till now—and books to tal

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Event— Gail & Julie

This I In 2008, inspiratio O’Brien published battle with brain Die. Since his deat Gail has gone on own—grieving not but also her epilep died a short time a

Facilitator: Donna Ward This book suggests we pray often in every day ways and that in times of crisis we come together in mass acts of secular prayer. Join us for a discussion of these issues and poetry readings from a number of the authors featured in this anthology.

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All events listed are $12/$9 concession. Book Launches are free.

Gleeclub members free entry to events at 49 Glebe Pt Rd February Events are held upstairs at #49 Glebe Point Road unless otherwise noted.

Bookings—Phone: (02) 9660 2333, Email: events@gleebooks.com.au, Online: www.gleebooks.com.au/events 2016

RSDAY

—6 for 6.30 n the Moon

of Cartoons with TBA ormously popular al Walkley awardst has released a greatest hits from d he’ll be at Gleelk about it.

—6 for 6.30 ette O’Brien

Is Gail onal surgeon Chris d a memoir of his cancer, Never Say th in 2009, his wife a journey of her t only her husband ptic son Adam, who after Chris’s death.

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Any Other r Fiona McFarlane has a new colleces. She will be talkn author Virginia debut novel, set in labama.

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7 Event—8–9 am Saturday 13th Pop Up Yoga Class

Saturday morning yoga at Gleebooks—taught by a qualified teacher from Yoga To Go Studio using the Iyengar method.

General classes, no experience necessary. Bring your own mat. $15 flat rate with $5 from each entry going to the Indigenous Literacy Foundation

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Double Launch

—6 for 6.30 Angelos Koutsourakis & Mark Steven

The Cinema of Theo Angelopoulos

George Kouvaros

Awakening the Eye: Robert Frank’s American Cinema

19 Launch—6 for 6.30 Sallyanne Pisk

13 Launch—3.30 for 4 Mark Marusic

Iconoclastic Journeys Launcher: Barry Sargent with open mic section Mark Marusic has lived in Sydney all his life and resides in Newtown.

This is reflected in his poetry’s concerns and observations. Politically aware, he is concerned for the environment and the disadvantaged.

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Eating for You: Your Personal Guide to Mindful Eating and Living for Health and Wellbeing Launcher: Dr Jeff Jankelson This book introduces 10 Principles based on knowing yourself, your food & how to introduce & live with change, to guide you in personalising your way of eating and living.

26 Launch—6 for 6.30 James Arvanitakis

Sociologic: Analysing Everyday Life and Culture Launcher: Dan Gregory TBC In this contemporary introduction to sociology for the modern student, James Arvanitakis has edited a collection to give students the tools to analyse how society functions, operates and changes… and lay down a challenge to change it for the better.

Launch—6 for 6.30

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Keith Mascord

Faith Without Fear: Risky choices facing contemporary Christians Launcher: Michael Kirby Keith Mascord asks whether Christianity has the wherewithal to meet the increasingly acute intellectual and moral challenges currently facing it, and whether it can shed the reactive fear which now grips its more conservative forms.

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21 Launch—3.30 for 4 Raghid Nahhas

The Poem of Istanbul English translations of a poetry collection by Jihad Elzein Thirty-Four Tales Arabic translations of contemporary Australian short stories Verses Across the Tasman Arabic translations of contemporary poetry from Australia & NZ Launcher: Sophie Mason

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3.30 for 4

Bob Ellis Performance TBC

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Granny’s Good Reads with Sonia Lee I have just read an interesting clutch of books: The Money Men by Chris Bowen, Two Futures by Clare O’Neil and Tim Watts, Australia’s Second Chance by George Megalogenis, and Atmosphere of Hope by Tim Flannery. Bowen chooses six important treasurers and gives sketches of Artie Fadden, Ben Chifley, Paul Keating (who gets the gold star), John Howard (when Fraser’s Treasurer), Peter Costello and Wayne Swan. A fair and balanced evaluation of Australia’s ‘money men’ and well worth reading. The authors of Two Futures are Labor MPs who didn’t come up via the union route and are worth watching. Their chapters range across Democracy, Climate, Technology and Growth, with innovative ideas about each. They give two futures for 2040, one if we do nothing, the second if we think laterally and do something really constructive for future employment. They think that including citizens in the democratic process is important and hope that the present apathy will be replaced by engagement. In Australia’s 2nd Chance, George Megalogenis thinks Australia missed its first chance by turning its back on the world in the 20th Century, having led the world in the 19th. To him ‘White Australia’ was our first big mistake. Green supporters may take issue with him on his advocacy for more migration as the basis for our second chance but the book is a very good digest of our history from First Fleet days to when we became an egalitarian society. Thoughtful and highly recommended.

The first chapters of Tim Flannery’s Atmosphere of Hope are pervaded by Gloom rather than Hope; in them he recounts all the bad things that we face with only one degree of warming, let alone two. We are already set to lose the Barrier Reef, Polar Bears and Adelie Penguins, and both polar ice caps; the North American forests are being gnawed away by pine bark beetles and Elizabeth Kolbert’s ‘Sixth Extinction’ is upon us. Now we are fighting to keep the warming at two degrees.

Flannery has a few ‘third way’ solutions for climate change, rather than the technological fixes which would probably make a bad situation worse. This is an interesting book and should be read in tandem with Bill McKibben’s Oil and Honey: The Education of an Unlikely Activist. With the Carmichael coal mine still on the books in Australia, and corporate heavyweights still pushing for the Alberta Tar Sands development, there seems to be little hope on the horizon. Let’s hope I am wrong.

Christine Bryden, the author of Before I Forget, was diagnosed with early Alzheimer’s when she was only forty-six, but twenty years later she is still driving, making speeches, writing books and managing well with the help of a supportive husband. The book shows that you can sometimes lose half your frontal lobe and do well. Though apparently one of those special cases that baffle medical science, she had a bi-lingual childhood, during which Christine and her mother used to compete on IQ tests. This may have increased her brain reserves. At one of her lectures she was affronted when a doctor in the audience said he could not accept that the brain scans which she had put on display could belong to her. Anyone interested in the treatment of patients with dementia will find this book invaluable.

And for a bit of reading on the lighter side, The Moth Catcher by Ann Cleeves is the latest Vera Stanhope mystery and it’s a cracker. A young ecologist who is house sitting in a quiet Northumberland neighbourhood is found dead and another corpse is discovered in his attic bedroom. All that the victims have in common is a passion for moths, but Vera and assistants Holly and Joe worry away at the problem until a third victim is murdered, the daughter of one of the local families is released from jail and many secrets are uncovered. This is one of her very best.

Sonia

Serious Whitefella Stuff: When solutions became the problem in Indigenous affairs

by Mark Moran ($28, PB)

How does Indigenous policy signed off in Canberra work—or not—when implemented in remote Aboriginal communities?

Mark Moran, Alyson Wright and Paul Memmott have extensive on-the-ground experience in this area of ongoing challenge.

What, they ask, is the right balance between respecting local traditions and making significant improvement in the areas of alcohol consumption, home ownership and revitalising cultural practices?

Australian Studies

Econobabble: How to Decode Political Spin and Economic Nonsense by Richard Denniss ($20, PB)

Economics is like a tyre lever: it can be used to help change a tyre, or to beat someone over the head. It’s not the tyre lever that is good or bad—it’s the person who wields it, and what they do with it. Public figures and commentators use incomprehensible economic jargon to dress up their self-interest as the national interest, to make the absurd seem inevitable or the inequitable seem fair. With acuity and precision, Richard Denniss exposes the stupid arguments, bizarre contradictions and complete lack of evidence upon which much ‘common sense’ about the economy rests in Australia—empowering the reader to cut through the babble and reach the truth.

Credlin & Co: How the Abbott Government Destroyed Itself by Aaron Patrick ($30, PB)

Tony Abbott and his chief of staff, Peta Credlin, ran a brilliant opposition campaign. But their approach led to disaster in government.

When Abbott became prime minister, he and Credlin ruthlessly controlled ministers, backbenchers, the public service and the media. They shut out voices that questioned Abbott’s way. Everything started to unravel. Credlin & Co. is the story of a relationship that determined the fate of a government. It shows in stunning detail the disastrous consequences of power abused, and the broken people left in its wake.

Griffith Review 51: Fixing the System (eds) Julianne Schultz & Anne Tiernan ($28, PB)

While Australia has never been richer, its people better educated and the country better connected internationally, there is a widespread perception that systems and key institutions are broken. Interest groups flex their muscle and block each other. Risk management has paralysed the system. Commentators proclaim the ‘end of the reform era’. They lament the rise of a ‘new volatility’ in the nation’s electoral politics; the demise of the capacity and will to lead; and the paucity of debate of the problems and challenges facing Australia.

Fixing the System examines this chorus of complaint. It asks what is broken and examines the reasons how and why. It considers what needs to be done to revive the lucky country.

Contributors include Carmen Lawrence, Clare Wright, Peter Van Onselen, Paul Ham, Gabrielle Carey, Chris Wallace, Jonathan West, Megan Davis, Stephen Mills, Anne Coombs, Graham Wood, Lee Kofman and many more.

Finding Eliza: Power and Colonial Storytelling

by Larissa Behrendt ($24.95, PB)

Larissa Behrendt has long been fascinated by the story of Eliza Fraser, who was purportedly captured by the local Butchulla people after she was shipwrecked on their island in 1836. Behrendt uses Eliza’s tale as a starting point to interrogate how Aboriginal people—and indigenous people of other countries—have been portrayed in their colonisers’ stories. Exploring works as diverse as Robinson Crusoe and Coonardoo, Behrendt looks at the stereotypes embedded in these accounts, including the assumption of cannibalism and the myth of the noble savage. Ultimately, Finding Eliza shows how these stories not only reflect the values of their storytellers but also reinforce those values—and how, in Australia, this has contributed to a complex racial divide.

Invisible Country: Southwest Australia: Understanding a Landscape by Bill Bunbury ($30, PB)

When Europeans first settled in Australia, the land withheld many of its secrets from these new arrivals. To many of the new settlers, the First Australians were a puzzle. They moved freely through country they knew intimately. They had useful things to say to the European newcomers—if they would listen. What few realised then was that Aboriginal people & the land they lived in were indistinguishable. Failure to read the people made it hard to read the country. This book describes the environmental change that has occurred in south-western Australia since European settlement, through four case studies of the development of local rivers, forests and coastal plains. These stories, compiled through extensive conversations Bill Bunbury has conducted with farmers, ecologists, traditional owners and others who rely on the land, are book-ended by an examination of the historical perspective in which these changes have occurred.

Settling the Office: The Australian Prime MinThe Politics of Identity: Who Counts as Aboriginal istership from Federation to Reconstruction

by Paul Strangio, Paul t’ Hart & James Walter Today? by Bronwyn Carlson ($39.95, PB)

The prime ministership is indisputably the most closely observed and keenly contested office in Australia. How did it grow to become the pivot of national political power? Settling the Office chronicles the development of the prime ministership from its rudimentary early days following Federation through to the powerful, institutionalised prime-ministerial leadership of the postwar era. ($50, PB)

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AIATSIS Maps of Indigenous Australia Folded or Flat, $9.95

In this award-winning work Bronwyn Carlson explores the complexities surrounding Aboriginal identity today. Drawing on a range of historical & research literature, interviews & surveys, she explores Aboriginal & non-Aboriginal understandings of Aboriginality & the way these are produced & reproduced across a range of sites & contexts. Carlson points to the multiple, yet narrow definitions of Aboriginal identity that have existed throughout Australia’s colonial history & its continuing impact upon contemporary Aboriginal identities. Emphasising Indigenous debates & claims about Aboriginality, she explores both the community & external tensions around appropriate measures of identity & the pressures & effects of identification.

Politics

A Very Expensive Poison: The Definitive Story of the Murder of Litvinenko and Russia’s Threat to the West by Luke Harding ($29.99, PB)

1 November 2006. Alexander Litvinenko is brazenly poisoned in central London. The poison? Polonium; a rare, lethal and highly radioactive substance. His crime? He had made some powerful enemies in Russia. Luke Harding traces the journey of the nuclear poison across London, from hotel room to nightclub, assassin to victim; it is a deadly trail that seemingly leads back to the Russian state itself. Harding argues that Litvinenko’s assassination marked the beginning of the deterioration of Moscow’s relations with the West and a decade of geo-political disruptions—from the war in Ukraine, a civilian plane shot down, at least 7,000 dead, two million people displaced and a Russian president’s defiant rejection of a law-based international order.

The Ways of the World by David Harvey ($45, HB) This book presents a sequence of landmark works in David Harvey’s intellectual journey over five decades. It shows how experiencing the riots, despair & injustice of 1970s Baltimore led him to seek an explanation of capitalist inequalities via Marx & to a sustained intellectual engagement that has made him the world’s leading exponent of Marx’s work. The book takes the reader through the development of his synthesis of Marxist method & geographical understanding that allows him to develop a series of powerful insights into the ways of the world, from the new mechanics of imperialism, crises in financial markets & the effectiveness of car strikers in Oxford, to the links between nature & change, and the meaning of the postmodern condition.

Masters of Mankind by Noam Chomsky ($23, PB)

In this collection of essays from 1969-2013, many in book form for the first time, Noam Chomsky exposes the real nature of state power.

With unrelenting logic, he holds the arguments of empire up to critical examination & shatters the myths of those who protect the power and privilege of the few against the interests and needs of the many. There is more than enough profound, powerful material in this collection to impress any readers unfamiliar with Chomsky’s intellectual agility.

The Shifts and the Shocks: What We’ve Learned— and Have Still to Learn—From the Financial Crisis

by Martin Wolf ($30, PB): ‘A call for radical reform . . . six years

after the crisis, he argues, the world economy is stuck in low gear and set on an unsustainable course. He puts forward a series of reforms far bolder than governments have contemplated so far—An important contribution that anyone involved in economic policy ought to read.’

Economist. ‘A magisterial overview of the financial crisis & its aftermath.’ David Kynaston, Guardian, Books of the Year

History

Private Lives, Public History by Anna Clark

The past is consumed on a grand scale: popularised by TV, enjoyed by reading groups, walking groups, historical societies & heritage tours, and supported by unprecedented digital access to archival records. Yet our history has also become the subject of heated political debate. Anna Clark explores how our personal pasts intersect with broader historical questions. Drawing on interviews with Australians from 5 communities around the country, she uncovers how we think about the past in the context of our local& intimate stories, & the role that history plays in our lives. ($28, PB)

Devil’s Diary: Alfred Rosenberg & the Stolen Secrets of the Third Reich by Robert Wittman

Only recently discovered by former FBI agent Robert Wittman, the diary of Nazi philosopher Alfred Rosenberg, who led the Nazi party when Hitler was interned in 1923, is a groundbreaking document and an object of rumour, obsession and evil.

Filled with observations, conversations and Nazi plans, it gives new details of Hitler’s rise to power and personal governance of the Reich. Not just about Rosenberg, this book is the story of Robert Kempner, the German-born Jewish Nuremberg lawyer who prosecuted Göring & Frick & stole the diary; Henry Mayer, the archivist who has doggedly been searching for it for decades; and Bob Wittman, the former FBI agent who finally found it. ($30, PB)

The Romanovs: 1613–1918

By Simon Sebag Montefiore ($45, HB)

To rule Russia was both imperial-sacred mission & poisoned chalice: 6 tsars were murdered & all the Romanovs lived under constant threat to their lives. This is the intimate story of 20 tsars & tsarinas, some touched by genius, some by madness, but all inspired by holy autocracy & imperial ambition. Montefiore’s gripping chronicle reveals their secret world of unlimited power & ruthless empire-building, overshadowed by palace conspiracy, family rivalries, sexual decadence & wild extravagance, and peopled by a cast of adventurers, courtesans, revolutionaries & poets, from Ivan the Terrible to Tolstoy, from Queen Victoria to Lenin. An enthralling story of triumph & tragedy, love and death, a universal study of power, and an essential portrait of the empire that still defines Russia today.

Now in Paperback Final Solution: The Fate of the Jews 1933–49

by David Cesarani, $30

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Alpine Meditations

Cultural Studies & Criticism

The Swiss poet and writer Regina Ullmann was unknown to me until I read a recent review of her book of short stories recently translated (by Kurt Beals), The Country Road. It mentioned she was born in St Gallen, in the 1880s, and as my grandfather was born in the same place, at the same time, I was most curious to read it. On further investigation, it appears that Regina Ullmann was a most singular and unconventional person, with extraordinary friends and supporters like Rainer Maria Rilke and Thomas Mann, amongst others.

What a curious book The Country Road is. As a modern reader I found I had to suspend the usual, rather impatient way I read; the stories in this book unfold in a deliberate way. Like Proust’s madeleine, a small detail will start a thread of unlikely ruminations—a single strawberry, or a mouse’s scratchings takes the author and her reader back into time, in an unexpected way. While her writing is spare and quiet, her subject matter is not. Surreal scenes like a trapeze artist hanging from a hot air balloon floating over the alps, or a circus horse with a miniature man flying behind. The stories are full of characters from fairytales—beautiful mountain girls who don’t speak, gnarled woodcutters, a local butcher who was previously a hangman (no one will marry him because of this), tiny violin makers, and so on. Quiet country houses with sparsely furnished, immaculately clean rooms, minutely described feast day meals, extraordinary and arcane domestic details that magnify into a much larger story (like the shame of presenting a bundt cake that is hard to cut, and too brightly yellow—indicating it was bought from a baker and not homemade). There is sincerity in these stories, and a piety, but they are also disquieting, and have an ominous and unsettling quality that leaves a lasting impression.

On a lighter note, I have been enjoying Robert Walser’s Looking at Pictures. Another eccentric German Swiss writer, Walser was in fact an acquaintance of Regina Ullmann (it really is strange how everything is connected). He was a prolific writer—producing short stories, poems and journalism, as well as avant garde writing. Looking at Pictures is a collection of texts about art. They are surprisingly modern, almost meta, taking the reader not only into the pictures described, but into the wondrous imagination of the author. If reading the late, great Robert Hughes is like listening to a very enthusiastic friend talk about art (well, it is to me), reading Walser is like listening to the most original, random person you’ve never met. He discusses lesser-known artists, such as one of his brothers, Karl, as well as the deeply familiar, Fragonard, Beardsley, van Gogh, Watteau etc, with handsome plates illustrating most of the essays. This is a very beautifully produced small book, whose price reflects its high production values. And in another lifetime I can see it sitting in my knapsack, as I hike up the alps, with a balloon floating serenely above the peaks.

Louise

Psychology

Cure: A Journey into the Science of Mind over Body by Jo Marchant ($33, PB)

Can meditation protect against depression & dementia? Can the mind boost or calm the immune system? Can the experience of a ‘Snow World’ virtual reality reduce the pain of burns? Yes. Cure is a rigorous and sceptical look at the science behind the mind’s extraordinary ability to heal the body.

Dr Jo Marchant travels the world to meet the researchers, physicians & patients at the forefront of a new approach to medicine that could revolutionise the way we treat a huge swathe of illnesses. Drawing on the latest research, she explores the neurological, hormonal & physiological processes connecting the brain with all aspects of your health. And she explains how to apply these findings in your life.

Unforbidden Pleasures by Adam Phillips

A great deal has been written about the pleasures that are forbidden to us. But what of the pleasures that are unforbidden & freely available to all? Adam Phillips, beginning with Oscar Wilde, explores the meanings & importance of the Unforbidden, from the fall of our ‘first parents’ Adam & Eve to the work of the great 19th & 20th century thinkers. Unforbidden pleasures, he argues, are always the ones we tend not to think about, yet when you look into it, it is probable that we get as much pleasure, if not more, from them. We may have underestimated just how restricted our restrictiveness, in thrall to the Forbidden and its rules, may make us. ($35, HB)

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The Shock of Recognition: The Books and Music That Have Inspired Me by Barry Jones ($32.99, PB)

‘How much time do I have left? A hundred days? A thousand? If I knew I was going to die next week but could be taken to see The Marriage of Figaro tonight, would I go? Absolutely.’ In a long and generously lived life, Barry Jones has been on an endless quest to share the extraordinary & the beautiful, to encourage the pursuit of an abundant life of reading and listening. In this book he writes about the literature & the music that have inspired him. With no claims to objectivity, he urges the reader to take the plunge, to rattle the bars of the cage & expose themselves to the music of Hildegard of Bingen, Johann Sebastian Bach, Mozart & Beethoven, Mahler, as well as the writings of Homer, Dante, Chaucer, Montaigne, Cervantes, Shakespeare, Sterne, Tolstoy, Proust, Joyce & Beckett among many more.

Last Night’s Reading: Illustrated Encounters with Extraordinary Authors by Kate Gavino ($30, PB)

Why do we go to book readings? For a chance to see the authors we love come to life off the page, answering our questions & proving to be the brilliant, witty people we catch glimpses of through their work. Illustrator Kate Gavino captures this experience firsthand. At every reading she attends, Kate hand-letters the event’s most memorable quote alongside a charming portrait of the author. Her journey through the literary world, shares illustrated insight from more than 100 of today’s greatest writers including Zadie Smith, Junot Diaz, Lev Grossman, Elizabeth Gilbert on topics ranging from friendship & humour to creativity & identity.

From Victims to Suspects: Muslim women since 9/11

by Shakira Hussein ($25, PB)

Once regarded as helpless victims waiting to be rescued, Muslim women are now widely regarded by both Muslim and non-Muslim disciplinarians as a potential threat to be kept under control. How did this shift in attitudes come about? Shakira Hussein explores the lives of women negotiating the hazards of the post-9/11 terrain, from volatile Afghan refugee camps and Pakistani weddings to Australian suburbia and campaigns to ‘ban the burqa’. Her unique perspective on feminism, multiculturalism, race and religion is one that we urgently need.

The ‘R’ Word by Kurt Barling ($20, HB) Does race matter as much as it used to? Many argue the post-racial society is upon us & racism is no longer a block on opportunity.

Skin colour has followed Kurt Barling around since the age of four, when he wished ‘I had blond hair and blue eyes’. He grew up in a confused & confusing world, in which ‘blackness’ defined so much social discourse. Racist press coverage of the Broadwater Farm riots in 1985 helped Barling decide on a career in journalism. In the 30 years since the riots, much has changed. Overt racism is certainly much less present. Music, youth culture, sport & the obsession with the body beautiful have all made ‘blackness’ commercial. But is this all just an illusion conveniently masking a culture of denial? The ‘R’ Word explores a changing country in a changing world, and our relationship with notions of race and racism.

Lactivism: How Feminists & Fundamentalists, Hippies & Yuppies, & Physicians & Politicians Made Breastfeeding Big Business & Bad Policy

by Courtney Jung ($35, HB)

Breastfeeding is widely assumed to be the healthiest choice, yet growing evidence suggests that its benefits have been greatly exaggerated. New mothers are pressured by doctors, health officials & friends to avoid the bottle at all costs—often at the expense of their jobs, their pocketbooks & their well-being. Political scientist Courtney Jung offers the most deeply researched & far-reaching critique of breastfeeding advocacy to date. She investigates the benefits of breastfeeding and asks why so many people across the political spectrum are passionately invested in promoting it, even as its health benefits have been persuasively challenged. What emerges is an eye-opening story about class and race in America, the big business of breastfeeding, and the fraught politics of contemporary motherhood.

Now in B Format The Poet’s Tale: Chaucer and the Year that Made The Canterbury Tales by Paul Strohm, $24 A Mindfulness Guide for the FRAZZLED

by Ruby Wax ($33, PB)

Five hundred years ago no-one died of stress: we invented this concept and now we let it rule us. We might have evolved to be able to miraculously balance on seven-inch heels, but as far as our emotional development is concerned we’re still swimming with the pond scum. Witty, smart and accessible, Ruby Wax shows you how and why to change for good. With mindfulness advice for relationships, for parents, for children and for teenagers, and a six-week course based on her studies of Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy with Mark Williams at Oxford University.

Philosophy & Religon

Australian Religious Thought by Wayne Hudson

Wayne Hudson’s book provides new perspectives on the relationship between religious thought & social reform in Australia. It argues that religious thought can be found in many intellectuals in Australia, both in the religiously inclined and in those who were not conventionally religious. Shapes of disbelief are explored in intellectuals of many types. The concept of sacral secularity is used to complex & contest discussions of ‘the secular’ in Australia. Religious liberalism is interpreted as transnational & as often a source of social reform. Interactions between religious thought and philosophy are discussed in some detail, as is the development of theology, which has received relatively little attention from historians. Account is also taken of what might perhaps be called post-secular consciousness in many intellectuals. Taking religious thought more seriously suggests possible revisions to the way the national story has been told. ($39.95, PB)

The Language Animal: The Full Shape of the Human Linguistic Capacity by Charles Taylor

For centuries, philosophers have been divided on the nature of language. Those in the rational empiricist tradition—Hobbes, Locke, Condillac, and their heirs—assert that language is a tool that human beings developed to encode & communicate information. Charles Taylor explains that this view neglects the crucial role language plays in shaping the very thought it purports to express.

Language does not merely describe; it constitutes meaning & fundamentally shapes human experience. The human linguistic capacity is not something we innately possess. We first learn language from others, and, inducted into the shared practice of speech, our individual selves emerge out of the conversation. Taylor expands the thinking of the German Romantics Hamann, Herder & Humboldt into a theory of linguistic holism. Language is intellectual, but it is also enacted in artistic portrayals, gestures, tones of voice, metaphors, and the shifts of emphasis & attitude that accompany speech. Human language recognizes no boundary between mind & body. In illuminating the full capacity of ‘the language animal,’ Taylor sheds light on the very question of what it is to be a human being. ($76, HB)

Lily of the Field and the Bird of the Air: Three Godly Discourses by Soren Kierkegaard

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus tells his followers to let go of earthly concerns by considering the lilies of the field and the birds of the air. Søren Kierkegaard’s short masterpiece on this famous gospel passage draws out its vital lessons. Presented here in a fresh new translation with an informative introduction, this profound yet accessible work serves as an ideal entrée to an essential modern thinker. The Lily of the Field and the Bird of the Air reveals a less familiar but deeply appealing side of the father of existentialism—unshorn of his complexity and subtlety, yet supremely approachable.

As Kierkegaard later wrote of the book, ‘Without fighting with anybody and without speaking about myself, I said much of what needs to be said, but movingly, mildly, upliftingly’. ($34.95, HB)

Flourishing: Why We Need Religion in a Globalized World by Miroslav Volf ($52.95, HB)

More than almost anything else, globalisation & the great world religions are shaping our lives, affecting everything from the public policies of political leaders & the economic decisions of industry bosses & employees, to university curricula, all the way to the inner longings of our hearts. In this perceptive & deeply personal book, a leading theologian sheds light on how religions & globalisation have historically interacted & argues for what their relationship ought to be. Recounting how these twinned forces have intersected in his own life, he shows how world religions, despite their malfunctions, remain one of our most potent sources of moral motivation & contain within them profoundly evocative accounts of human flourishing. Globalisation should be judged by how well it serves us for living out our authentic humanity as envisioned within these traditions. Through renewal and reform, religions might, in turn, shape globalisation so that can be about more than bread alone.

Augustine: Conversions and Confessions

by Robin Lane Fox ($70, HB)

Robin Lane Fox follows Augustine on a brilliantly described journey, combining the latest scholarship with recently found letters and sermons by Augustine himself to give a portrait of his subject which is subtly different from older biographies. Augustine’s heretical years as a Manichaean, his relation to non-Christian philosophy, his mystical aspirations and the nature of his conversion are among the aspects of his life which stand out in a sharper light.

For the first time Lane Fox compares him with two contemporaries, an older pagan and a younger Christian, each of whom also wrote about themselves and who illumine Augustine’s life and writings by their different choices. More than a decade passed between Augustine’s conversion and his beginning the Confessions. Lane Fox argues that the Confessions and their thinking were the results of a long gestation over these years, not a sudden change of perspective, but that they were then written as a single swift composition and that its final books are a coherent consummation of its scriptural meditation and personal biography.

s d d w n n a o 2 H R

The launch of the Space Shuttle Challenger (Mission STS-51-L) is underway. At 68 seconds into the flight Commander Richard Scobee acknowledges ‘Go throttle up’, to accelerate the craft. Four seconds later the, voice of pilot Michael Smith is heard on the cabin recorder: ‘Uh-Oh’. The shuttle explodes at an altitude of 15 kms and breaks into pieces over the Atlantic Ocean, killing all seven crew members: Scobee, Smith, Ronald McNair, Ellison Onizuka, Judith Resnik, Gregory Jarvis, Christa McAuliffe. It was later determined at a Presidential Commission that a rubber O-ring seal had failed—due to exposure to unusually cold temperatures both the day prior to and the morning of the launch. This caused a rupture that allowed a plume of burning gas to ignite the external fuel tank. The plume can be clearly seen 58 seconds into the flight. The robustly built crew cabin detached from the craft after break up. We now know some crew members survived the initial explosion—at least four oxygen packs were switched on and several electrical switches had been activated manually by pilot Smith in an attempt to restore control. No crew member survived the impact into the ocean 2 mins and 48 secs later.

I was woken very early that Wednesday morning by one of my insomniac, newsjunky housemates (we were renting a rundown place in Glebe) who had heard the initial report on his pocket radio. So we rushed to watch it on our B&W television!

In the three or so minutes it took the ancient TV to warm up, I remember thinking that there must have been an accident on the launch platform, perhaps while fuelling before the launch. It was only when we saw the actual launch that we realised.

Watching the craft ascend my friend murmured ‘Oh no!... It’s going to blow up in flight!’‘Obviously a major malfunction’, intoned the NASA launch commentator as the shuttle disappeared in a mass of explosive cloud and the vapour trails of distant debris slowly descended.

It was a genuine shock. I had watched the very first space shuttle launch in April 1981 on a large screen especially set up at Martin Place. ‘At last!’ I thought, ‘NASA has finally got off its arse! Back into space... This is the start... a landing on Mars by 1995!’ I honestly believed this. I was (am) a genuine space age enthusiast/ tragic. I read the Sydney Morning Herald’s daily illustrated comic strip Frontiers of Science (created by Sydney University’s own Dr Stuart Butler), which ran from 1961 to 1987. I watched a television show of the same name each Sunday morning which made exciting predictions of a wonderful science-led future: ‘By 1980 giant greenhouses in the Sahara will abolish world famine’ was one I still recall. I still believe the Apollo 11 moon landing—two days before I turned 12—is the greatest accomplishment we have acheived as a species (Dissenting correspondence to the Editor, please). But by 1986, five years into NASA’s shuttle programme, and 24 successful launches later, such events were seen as routine and virtually nonnewsworthy. ‘Don’t call unless it blows up!’ was the grim joke made by a news editor to a radio journalist who wanted to send a live report of the event. Part of the reason for NASA including High School Social Studies teacher Christa McAuliffe in the crew—as a Payload Specialist for the ‘Teacher in Space’ Project—was to reignite media interest and help raise increased private funding for future launches.

Journalist Malcolm McConnell’s book Challenger: A Major Malfunction (1987), was one of the first books to appear on the disaster. McConnell was one of the few journalists present at the launch. He gives a detailed account and reconstruction of what was known at the time of the shuttle countdown to the fatal mission and the decision to launch. Making use of testimony from the Presidential Commission he reveals tensions and in-fighting within the space agency departments. I read it at the time, and three decades on, it remains an interesting and immediately moving read.

Out of Print Copy. Hardcover. Foxed edges and slightly chipped and lightly worn Dust jacket. Good condition overall. Price. $25.00.

I also recommend two other titles on this subject—that are still in print: What Do You Care What Other People Think? by Richard Feynman. 1988. $29, PB. Half of this 2nd volume (pp.113–237) of memoirs by the renowned physicist is entitled Mr. Feynman Goes to Washington: Investigating the Space Shuttle Challenger Disaster. In a very entertaining narrative, Feynman reveals the cause of the explosion by dropping a piece of round rubber into a glass of ice water during a televised session of the official enquiry... read on!

Wheels Stop: The Tragedies and Triumphs of the Space Shuttle Program, 19862011 by Rick Houston 2013 $65, HB. After the Challenger explosion, Shuttle flights were not resumed until 1988. Now that the Space Shuttles have been mothballed for good, this oral history account of the experiences of actually flying one is invaluable. Combines memoirs, interviews and first-hand accounts into a well written narrative.

POSTSCRIPT: In 2006, this now middle-aged space travel enthusiast travelled to Washington DC, and on a fine Autumn day visited The National Air and Space Museum—‘So that’s what the Apollo 11 Command Module actually looks like up close!’ And just across the way, at Arlington National Cemetery, I laid a floral tribute to the seven lost heroes at The Shuttle Challenger Memorial. Stephen Reid

15

‘The Most Horrendous Crime . . .’

Anita Cobby: The Crime That Shocked the Nation

by Alan Whiticker

‘It was a horrendous case... six months magnified by the pressure of community expectation, which were enormous. The Western Suburbs of Sydney were put under the microscope. The Anita Cobby case had a massive impact on the people who live there. We’re coming up for 30 years and people still ask me about it.’—former detective Tony Waters, team leader on the Anita Cobby case.

‘The circumstances of the murder of Mrs Anita Lorraine Cobby prompt me to recommend that the official files of each prisoner should be marked ‘never to be released.’—Justice Alan Maxwell. 16 June 1987.

‘I never met her, but by the end of the trial I felt I had known her all my life. May she forever rest in peace’.—20 year- old Paul McGaughey, who unsuccessfully searched for Anita Cobby after her abduction was witnessed by his younger siblings.

Three decades later, people still visit her grave site at Prospect’s Pinegrove Memorial Park. They leave flowers, small gifts, personal letters.

The abduction, gang-rape and murder of 26 year-old nurse Anita Cobby, at Blacktown while walking home along Newton Road on Sunday night, 2 February 1986, by a gang of five youths, including three brothers (with fifty prior convictions between them), was the most notoriously evil crime of the age—’It is as if every generation has one particular crime that defines it for all time’.

Cobby’s mutilated body was found two days after her disappearance by a farmer in a cow paddock off Reen Road, Prospect. Her ordeal had lasted several hours. It led to widespread calls for the reintroduction of the death penalty. It saw the NSW State Government enact the ‘Truth in Sentencing’ legislation—her killers were sentenced to life without parole. Anita’s parents Grace and Garry Lynch, devoted their lives to offering counselling to other families who had suffered as they had.

In this book Alan Whiticker describes not merely the crime, the perpetrators and its aftermath, but also presents a detailed portrait of much of the greater Blacktown area three decades ago. This was an enclave containing satellite suburbs such as Bidwell, Doonside, Lethbridge Park, Mt Druitt, Rooty Hill, Shalvey, Tregear and Whalen: a large (pop. 200,000), youthful (50% were under the age of thirty), unskilled, unemployed, disadvantaged population (nearly 70% lacked any trade or qualification).

The suburb was also plagued by a widespread drug epidemic from the mid-1980s onward: ‘There was a bit of grass but harder drugs were coming in. In the 1980s the drug scene was full on, amphetamines and heroin.

They spread from Blacktown right out to Richmond. Amphetamines were prescribed as a weight loss pill and offenders would ‘doctor shop’ for medication... We were having 300 break and enters a month’, recalled detectives.

An earlier book, Julia Sheppard’s Someone Else’s Daughter: The Life and Death of Anita Cobby (1991) remains a bestseller. Sheppard, then a journalist with the Sydney Sun newspaper, befriended the Lynch’s and presented a moving account of the crime and its impact on the family.

Whiticker—at the time a young schoolteacher living in Blacktown—takes a broader view: ‘The purpose of this book is to look at the impact of the Cobby case from as many different angles as possible’.

He examines legal aspects arising from the case, and also the role of the media. Good use is made of extensive interviews with former detectives—some of whom now feel able to speak more freely about the case.

Equally, others admit that they still find it difficult to cope, both professionally and personally, with recalling the crime—despite the passage of time. ‘It’s taken a long time to come out the other side’, said one. ‘Anniversaries? I never forget what happened and when and where it happened’, said another.

At the conclusion of Julia Sheppard’s book, she described a continuing fortnightly visit by Kerry Sandberg to clean and care for Anita Cobby’s grave. In 1979, Sandberg, a young single mother, after a chance meeting was befriended by Cobby who provided her with help raising her child.

In 2014, a local park in Sullivan St, Blacktown (where Anita had lived) was renamed The Anita Cobby Reserve in her honour. In its picturesque surroundings, Anita’s younger sister Kathryn told Whiticker: ‘I do feel close to her still to this day. It’s a nice feeling to think she’s still there looking down and protecting me and my family’.

Stephen Reid

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Poetry

Poetry Please: Love Poems ($23, PB)

In this new anthology poets from across the ages lead us on a journey of love in its many forms. From Shakespeare to Rossetti, Keats to Auden, Byron to Browning an beyond, as well as a host of contemporary voices including Wendy Cope, Simon Armitage and Carol Ann Duffy, this new gathering of timeless love poems speaks to the heart about this most universal of themes.

A Lover Sings: Selected Lyrics by Billy Bragg

Sexuality, A New England, Levi Stubbs’ Tears are unadorned, poetic songs that skilfully interweave everyday observation with much broader concerns: of fairness & outrage, of generosity & love. Billy Bragg is one of Britain’s most distinctive and accomplished songwriters, whose work has articulated the passions, both personal and political, of Britain during the past five decades. Selected & annotated by Bragg, this collection contains over 70 of his best-known lyrics. ($33, HB)

Of Love and Desire by Louis de Bernières

Poetry was Louise de Bernières’ first and greatest literary love, a passion evident in the musicality and emotion of his poems, which are full of stories and the truth of lived experience. This, his second collection, bears the mark of many influences, from the classical Persian poets, to Neruda, to Quintus Smyrnaeus, to Brian Patten. This is a rich collection of love poems from Louis de Bernières, written over a lifetime. ($35, HB)

Drowning in Wheat: Selected Poems

by John Kinsella ($33, PB)

Drowning in Wheat collects the best of 3 decades of John Kinsella’s poetry in one volume. Kinsella is one of Australia’s greatest living poets, and arguably the most important ‘eco-poet’ of the age; but this collection also reveals a writer of unexpected & remarkable versatility, and one fluent in an almost bewildering range of forms, registers & voices. Despite its great thematic range, Kinsella’s overarching project emerges all the more clearly: a clarion call and a call to order, a plea to listen to the earth—and to understand our own place within it while we still can. It is also an ideal introduction to one of the essential poets of the age.

Blood, Tin, Straw by Sharon Olds ($34, PB)

From poems that erupt out of history & childhood to those that embody the nurturing of a new generation of children & the transformative power of marital love, Sharon Olds takes risks, writing boldly of physical, emotional & spiritual sensations that are seldom the stuff of poetry. These are poems that strike for the heart, as Sharon Olds captures our imagination with unexpected wordplay, sprung rhythms & the disquieting revelations of ordinary life. Writing at the peak of her powers, this greatly admired poet gives us her finest collection.

Made in Detroit: Poems by Marge Piercy

In poems that range from descriptions of the Detroit of her childhood to her current life on Cape Cod, from deep appreciations of the natural world to elegies for lost friends and relationships, from a vision of her Jewish heritage to a hard-hitting take on today’s political ironies Marge Piercy She writes in graphic, unflinching language about the poor, banished now by politicians because they are no longer real people like corporations. ($50, HB)

Selected Later Poems by C. K. Williams

C. K. Williams’s long career has been a catalogue of surprises, of inventions and reinventions, of honours. His one constant is a remarkable degree of flexibility, a thrilling ability to shape-shift that goes hand in hand with an essential, enduring honesty. Here are the passionate, searching, cleareyed explorations of empathy in The Vigil here is the candour and revelation of Repair; here is the agonizing morality of The Singing and Wait, and the unsparing reflections on aging of Writers Writing Dying; here are the poignant prose vignettes of All at Once. ($54, HB)

The Collected Poems of James Laughlin (ed) Peter Glassgold ($63.95, HB)

The Collected Poems of James Laughlin includes more than 1250 poems from the early lyrics written in Laughlin’s signature typewriter metric, to the long-line poems of his later years, to the playful antics of his doppelganger Hiram Handspring, to the trenchant commentary of the five-line pentastichs that occupied his last days. As Charles Simic enthused, The secret is out, the publisher of Williams and Pound is himself a great lyric poet.

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May We Be Forgiven A M Homes, PB

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The Columbia Anthology of Chinese Folk and Popular Literature, PB

Was $49.95

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S Was $50

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20th Century Children’s Poetry Treasury, HB

Was $49.99

Now $21.95

The Sacred History: How Angels, Unlikely Collaboration: A Spy Among Friends: Gertrude Stein, Bernard Fay Mystics & Higher Intelligence Kim Philby& the Great Betrayal Made Our World and the Vichy Dilemma Ben Macintyre, HB Jonathan Black, HB Barbara Will, HB

Was $50

Now $19.95

1789: The Threshold of the Modern Age David Andress, HB

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Now $22.95

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Enlightened Pleasures: 18th Century France & the New Epicureanism Lewis Walpole, HB

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The Chemistry of Tears Peter Carey, HB

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Perilous Question: Reform or Revolution? Britain on the Brink, 1832 Antonia Fraser, HB

Was $24.95

Now $10.95 An Apple a Day: Old-Fashioned Proverbs Caroline Taggart, HB

Was $39.95

Now $10.95

A Certain ‘Je Ne Sais Quoi’: The Origin of Foreign Words Used in English Chloe Rhodes, HB

Now $19.95

Dear Friend and Gardener: Letters on Life & Gardening Beth Chatto & Christopher Lloyd, HB

Was $24.95

Catastrophe 1914: Europe Goes to War Max Hastings, HB

Was $59.95

Now $10.95

Spilling the Beans on the Cat’s Pajamas: Popular Expressions What They Mean & How We Got Them Judy Parkinson, HB

Now $29.95

Country House Camera Christopher Simon Sykes, HB

Was $24.95

Was $50

Now $18.95

The Armchair Book of Gardens: A Miscellany, HB

Was $50

Now $19.95

Elizabeth of York Alison Weir, HB

Was $1995

Now $9.95

My Grammar— How to Speak and Write It Right Caroline Taggart, PB

Was $130

Now $49.95

Inventing the Garden Matteo Vercelloni, HB

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The Arts Everywhen: The Eternal Present in Indigenous Art from Australia by Stephen Gilchrist

Indigenous concepts of time play a critical role in the works of many contemporary Australian artists. Organised around four central themes: ancestral transformation, ritualized performance, seasonality, and remembrance, the six essays and nearly 70 catalogue entries in this book highlight many of the most significant Indigenous Australian artists of the last 40 years, from Rover Thomas & Emily Kam Kngwarray to the contemporary bark painter John Mawurndjul and the visual & performance artist Christian Thompson. Also included are examples of related historical objects & a technical examination of traditional Aboriginal bark paintings. This revelatory book introduces the thematic, stylistic, and cultural diversity of contemporary Indigenous art from Australia. ($84, HB)

Neo Rauch: At the Well ($65, HB)

This book brings together both small and large format paintings that expand Neo Rauch’s unique iconography of eccentric figures, animals, and hybrids within vaguely familiar but imaginary settings. Designed in close collaboration with the artist the book is anchored by 16 stunning plates & numerous 1:1 details give the viewer intimate access to these compelling compositions. The book also includes an essay by art historian & curator Sir Norman Rosenthal, who presents a careful reading of Rauch’s new work, including its relationship to fairy tales; the influence of the German Democratic Republic on his development as an artist in the 1980s; and the overarching sense of alienation that is present within his narratives. Plus a reprint of the classic Brothers Grimm fairy tale The Young Giant—chosen by Rosenthal to further expand his analysis.

Berlin Metropolis: 1918–1933 by Olaf Peters

DVDs With Scott Donovan Salaam Bombay! $26.95 Region 2

Mira Nair’s film about street kids in Bombay has lost none of it’s punch in the two decades since it was first released. It is the story of eleven-year old Krishna who, abandoned by his mother, finds his way to India’s most populous city and ekes out a living as a tea-wallah in Bombay’s red-light district. He befriends the young daughter of a prostitute and is smitten by a teenage girl who has been sold to a local brothel owner. Resourceful, hardworking and generous even in his own poverty Krishna dreams of returning to his village and his family but escape from Bombay’s pitiless streets soon proves as unattainable as any Bollywood fantasy. Shot on location in Bombay’s slums and featuring real-life street kid Shafiq Syed as Krishna, Nair’s film captures the harsh reality of life for India’s urban poor without sentiment or gloss.

Line of Duty: Series One $29.95

‘In the pursuit of corruption, how far will they go to uncover the truth?’ So goes the tag line of this thrilling six part British cop show which will keep you guessing to the very end.

Detective Chief Inspector Tony Gates (Lennie James) has just been awarded Officer of the Year leading a squad which has returned the best crime figures for three consecutive years. But are Gates’ results just too good to be true? Detective Sergeant Steve Arnott (Martin Compston), recently transferred from counter-terrorism to the anti-corruption unit after refusing to cover-up a botched police operation, is charged to find out. So begins a deadly game of cat and mouse and soon it isn’t just careers on the line—it’s lives.

Fahrenheit 451: Dir. Francois Truffaut

Ray Bradbury’s best-selling science fiction masterpiece about a future without books becomes chillingly real in this film classic directed by one of the most important screen innovators of all time, the late Francois Truffaut.

Julie Christie stars in the challenging dual role of Oskar Werner’s pleasure-seeking conformist wife, Linda and his rebellious, book-collecting mistress, Clarisse.

Montag (Oskar Werner), a regimented fireman in charge of burning the forbidden volumes, meets a revolutionary school teacher who dares to read. Suddenly he finds himself a hunted fugitive, forced to choose not only between two women, but between personal safety and intellectual freedom. Truffaut’s first English language production is an eerie fable where mankind becomes the ultimate evil. ($21.95)

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Between 1871–1919, the population of Berlin quadrupled & the city became the political centre of Germany, as well as the turbulent crossroads of the modern age. As an imperial capital, Berlin was the site of violent political revolution & radical aesthetic innovation. After the German defeat in WW I, artists employed collage to challenge traditional concepts of art. Berlin Dadaists reflected upon the horrors of war & the terrors of revolution & civil war. Between 1924–1929, jazz, posters, magazines, advertisements & cinema played a central role in the development of Berlin’s urban experience as the spirit of modernity took hold. Finally, Berlin became a stage for political confrontation between the left & the right and was deeply affected by the economic crisis & mass unemployment at the end of the 1920s. This book explores in numerous essays and illustrations the artistic, cultural & social upheavals in Berlin between 1918–1933 and places them in a broader historical framework. ($110, HB)

Pasolini: Dir. Abel Ferrara, $32.95 Region 2

Abel Ferrara (Driller Killer, Bad Lieutenant, Welcome to New York), tells the story of the fateful final days of the controversial filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini (played by Willem Dafoe). Having recently finished Salò, or 120 Days of Sodom Pasolini has enraged audiences, critics and politicians with his homosexually and the scandal that surrounds his films. Focusing on both his private and professional life, Ferrara explores the inner-world of Pasolini in the days before his violent death. Extras include a conversation with Abel Ferrara and the cast of Pasolini (2014, 40 mins): & Robin Askwith on Pier Pasolini (2015, 23 mins): the actor recounts his first meeting with Pasolini.

The Seventies, $32.95

The 1970s was one of the most dramatic decades in American history. The country lost its first war, experienced a frighteningly close nuclear meltdown, endured two energy crises; and saw a political scandal bring down a President. This was also the decade of excess and flamboyance—where punk and disco collided, sexual mores were broken and society’s taboos were laid bare. Through the use of rarely seen archival footage and interviews with key identities from the era, this incisive documentary paints a vivid portrait of a time that impacts us still.

Bastards: Dir. Claire Denis, $25.95 Region 2

In this modern take on film noir from award-winning writer-director Claire Denis (White Material, Beau Travail) shipping captain Marco (Vincent Lindon, Anything For Her) receives a phone call from his sister, urgently calling him back to Paris. Her husband has committed suicide, her daughter is missing and the family business has gone under. She holds her husband’s business partner, Edouard Laporte, accountable and Marco sets out to expose his treachery. But, as he begins to scratch under the surface, Marco discovers a dangerous underworld of violence, corruption and exploitation that will culminate in a final, shocking revelation.

Encounters: Revealing Stories of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Objects from the British Museum ($59.95, HB)

This book is published to accompany a groundbreaking exhibition at the National Museum of Australia in Canberra, in which rare historic objects collected during encounters between settlers and first peoples are displayed alongside more recent artworks and artefacts made in the communities of origin. Encounters provides a stunning visual record of these objects, most of which are displayed in Australia for the first time since they were collected. But, more importantly, it frames the objects with the voices of the people whose ancestors first made and used them. In doing so, it reveals how these objects are not just a glimpse of lives past, but continue to be embraced by living cultures today.

Joseph Cornell: Wanderlust ($70, HB)

Joseph Cornell (1903–1972) was one of the 20th century’s leading exponents of collage & assemblage. A connoisseur of an astonishing array of subjects, Cornell’s captivation with bygone imagery encompassed astronomical charts & geographical maps, Italian & Spanish Old Master paintings, historical ballet, early film, literature, poetry & ornithology. Most iconic among his works are his box constructions microcosmic curiosity cabinets filled with once-precious fragments that he collected in thrift shops in his native New York. This book brings together some of Cornell’s most compelling constructions (including Medici slot machines, soap-bubble sets & animal habitats). Essays raise questions about his artistic processes while drawing parallels with historical modes of inquiry such as connoisseurship, exploration & classification.

Grayson Perry: My Pretty Little Art Career

Grayson Perry (born Chelmsford, Essex 1960) is one of Britain’s most acclaimed contemporary artists, known for his ceramic works, sculptures in iron and brass, drawings, prints and tapestries. With a keen eye for detail and a love of the popular and vernacular, Perry infuses his art works with a sly humour and reflection on society past and present. Various themes are explored through Perry’s multifaceted practice including the history of taste and social class in Britain, religious and folk iconography, and representations of gender and sexuality. In this lavishly illustrated monograph, Jacky Klein explores Perry’s work through a discussion of his major themes and subjects, such as class or conflict. Her text is complemented by a series of intimate, insightful commentaries on individual pieces by the artist himself. ($59.95, HB)

Winton's Paw Prints

Winton is on hols, so that voracious reader, Sonia Lee of ‘Granny’s Good Reads’, is filling in with more recommendations from her own Summer Reading Guide!

The Knowledge Wars by Australian Nobel laureate Peter Doherty is a succinct history of scientific method since the time of Francis Bacon—with special attention given to the theory of human-induced global warming and how big business is trying to discredit it. Should be on every HSC student’s reading list.

The Orpheus Clock by Simon Goodman is an account of the author’s largely successful attempts to recover artworks stolen from two of his Dutch grandparents who perished in the Holocaust. Even though many of the objects had been deposited with the Netherlands authorities after the war, their son’s fifty-year search for them had proved futile, so after his death it fell to the author and his brothers to look for their grandparents’ pictures and the silver Orpheus Clock. The patient detective work required for this quest makes gripping reading—and the photograph of ninety-year-old Aunt Lili sitting in her mother’s favourite chair brought tears to my eyes. While perhaps not quite as stylish as Edward De Waal’s The Hare With Amber Eyes, Orpheus Clock is nevertheless a very readable account of how a family’s treasures and, more importantly, its history were rescued from oblivion. Goodman’s account of how museums, art galleries and private collectors acquired, and still acquire, such looted treasures is an eye-opener.

I loved Any Human Heart by William Boyd, and his new novel Sweet Caress is almost as good. The heroine is a photographer who starts out taking society portraits, earns notoriety by snapping low dives in Weimar Germany, becomes a photo-journalist in New York, then relocates to ’thirties London where she is beaten up by Oswald Mosley’s thugs. In 1940s France she is one of the first women war photographers and marries a war hero. A sweeping panorama of the period (with photographs reminiscent of W. G. Sebald’s) adding verisimilitude to the text.

I must thank Janice for recommending the crime novels of Louise Penny—set in Quebec. Her latest, The Nature of the Beast is one of her best. The charm of these novels is in their setting: the village of Three Pines, the townsfolk including Chief Inspector Armand Gamache and his wife Reine Marie, and the food, which always makes me half-wish that Lapérouse had colonised Australia rather than Phillip. At first I thought the story far-fetched until I discovered that it is based on fact. A rattling good read.

I’m also rereading The Mill on the Floss, prompted by Rebecca Mead’s mentioning it in a recent essay on George Eliot. I’m passing up the recent rewrite, The Mill on the Floss: in Half the Time, and making do with the good old unexpurgated original with its painfully small print. I’d forgotten how good it is: the ‘little wench’ who wishes she could have the education that is being wasted on her brother Tom, the uncomprehending parents, the grizzling aunts and, of course, the melodramatic end. Who could resist Aunt Pullet, who says to Maggie’s mother: ‘You was allays my favourite sister and we allays liked the same patterns’. Sonia

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Bestsellers for 2015

1.

1. The Brain’s Way of Healing 2. H is for Hawk

Norman Doidge Helen Macdonald

3. My Brilliant Friend

Elena Ferrante

4. One Life: My Mother’s Story

Kate Grenville

5. Keating

Kerry O’Brien

6. The Narrow Road to the Deep North

Richard Flanagan

7. Flesh Wounds

Richard Glover

8. Island Home: A Landscape Memoir

Tim Winton

9. QE 57: Dear Life: On Caring for the Elderly

Karen Hitchcock

10. Go Set a Watchman 11. The Secret Chord

Harper Lee Geraldine Brooks

12. The Mindfulness Colouring Book 13. The Road to Little Dribbling 14. The Bush

Emma Farraron Bill Bryson Don Watson

15. The Wife Drought

Annabel Crabb

16. Gut: The Inside Story of Our Body’s Most Under

Rated Organ

Giulia Enders

17. Not My Father’s Son

Alan Cumming

18. The Girl on the Train

Paula Hawkins

19. All the Light We Cannot See

Anthony Doerr

20. Bad Feminist: Essays

Roxane Gay

21. Being Mortal: Illness, Medicine & What Matters

in the End

Atul Gawande

22. The Story of a New Name 23. Trigger Warning

Elena Ferrante Neil Gaiman

24. The World Without Us 25. A Brief History of Seven Killings

Mireille Juchau Marlon James

26. Cornersmith: Recipes From the Cafe & Picklery

Alex Elliott-Howery & James Grant

27. Reckoning: A Memoir 28. The Green Road 29. The Rosie Project 30. This House of Grief

Magda Szubanski

and another thing.....

Welcome to Gleaner 2016. I hope you’re all well rested and ready for a vigorous reading year. If 2015’s number one best seller is any indicator, your brains will certainly be up for any challenge. I’m sad to hear that the final chapter of Hilary Mantel’s Thomas Cromwell trilogy has been pushed forward another year. I suppose it’s not surprising—reader’s expectations alone would be enough to cause a severe case of writer’s block. But I also imagine it must be hard for Mantel to approach Cromwell’s bloody demise after she has spent so much time in his company—Anne Boleyn’s eternally delayed appointment with the executioner in Bring Up the Bodies was hard enough to read. Meanwhile, as I await the release of Julian Barnes’ new book The Noise of Time, I’m reading Levels of Life— his beautiful meditation on ballooning, love and loss—we are all balloonatics when it comes to matters of the heart! Gleebooks have some remaindered US 1st edition hard cover copies of Levels of Life at the very reasonable price of $12.95.

In amongst them David found a couple of signed copies—Barnes has a very unassuming signature, perhaps made smaller by the grief at the loss of his wife he describes in the book. Another tome I’ve been working my way through is First Dog on the Moon’s Treasury of Cartoons. What national treasures are he and his chorus of marsupials & pets. Tony Abbott with a bucket on his head—a master stroke. I’ll be at First Dog’s event at Gleebooks on the 11th—you bet. Right now I’m occupied with Steve’s recommendation in 2nd Hand Rows—Challenger: A Major Malfunction—and after that will follow his lead to Richard Feynman’s What Do You Care What Other People Think? I’ve been meaning to investigate Feynman for some time—looks like 2016 is the year. May your year also take you on interesting reading trails.

Viki

For more February new releases go to:

Anne Enright Graeme Simsion Helen Garner

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